Classical Studies 2200 Lecture Notes - Lecture 16: Iphigenia, Aeschylus, Omen

• School: Western University
• Department: Classical Studies
• Course: Classical Studies 2200
• Professor: Aara Suksi

Document Summary

Plays written by athenians for mostly athenian audiences: city of dionysia. Birth of tragedy is simultaneous with establishment of democracy in the late 6th century. Its plots are based on stories from mythic past: epic. Same stories but different ways of presenting them. Tragedy often explores tensions between loyalty to the larger community and loyalty to the family: polis, oikos. The audience of athenian tragedy knew from the odyssey and elsewhere the story pf. In athenian tragedy familiar myths are enacted on the stage: the interest lay in how the playwright chose to interpret the story or to find new meaning in it. Some changes could be introduced but basic plot was fixed. This contributes to a sense of inevitable fate: possibility for irony is huge. The audience members know what is going to happen but the characters on the stage do not.