DRM100Y1 Lecture Notes - Pentheus, Civil Religion, Mastodon
12 Dec 2012
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The dionysian spirit is that of a drunk, uninhibited person, when aesthetic, and intellectual boundaries come down. This play is the dismemberment (literally) of existing structures versus the maintenance of forms. At the age of 70, euripides, left athens for voluntary exile in mastodon. The bacchae is his last play, bringing us back to the theatre itself. The subject is a dimly historical event -the invasion of greece, the story of pentheus. Pentheus dies as a scapegoat, which happens to be the common sacrificial offering made to gods like dionysus. First, dionysus is a little bit like oedipus. He is returning to his place of birth as a stranger, in order to assert his identity and to claim his patrimony. The critical difference is that dionysus is a god. It"s his honor rather than a kingship that he acts towards. Pentheus, comes to find the limits of his own identity, and boundaries.
