Drama always consisted of an invaluable “database” for the culture and education of the ancient Greek spectators, who used to watch it as a performance that derived from the already existing literary types and forms (epic and lyric poetry) on which it was based and which included up to a certain degree; namely, in Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides’ tragedies and Aristophanes’ comedies, almost all the ideas, the messages, the moral values and the knowledge that constitute the so called “Ancient Greek Thought and Philosophy”, coexistand consist of the values of the ancient Greek culture as a whole. However, these do not represent the accumulation of some valuable material, but the creative conjunction and composition of qualitative and quantitative data in an astonishing analogy and harmony that expresses the basic principles and virtues of the ancient Greek Thought such as Moderation, Harmony, Symmetry, Equilibrium and the correspondence between form and content. This explains why the ancient Greek drama has been characterized by scholars as the “Theatre of Ideas” (Arrowsmith, 1963: 32) and the dramatic poets as “Educators” (Arnott, 1970: 35), since they used the stage in order to criticize their world, to promote the ideas rather than the heroes’ characters in their plays, thus providing an integrated culture and education for their spectators.
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Drama and Theatre in ancient Greece. A database and a spectators’ school.
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The Reception of Ancient Drama Values by the modern audience: “Seven against Thebes’’- Audience Research
1. Selection of a Play for Analysis
The research team‘s initial concern was to find an appropriate play / theatrical performance that was sufficiently well-known and recognizable by general theatrical spectators, contained rich conceptual context and values, and has been well-received as an artistic rendition by both critics and audience. Furthermore, the performance had to be realized by a director who had a balanced approach in the rendition of ancient drama. Finally, the performance should be streamed on the internet, and the research team should obtain projection rights as well as access rights for the research participants.
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Mnemonic recording of the theatre
If by performance we mean the “poetics of remembrance”, since it is there that the playwright’s and the actor’s memory as well as the spectators memory and social memory creatively meet, then the theatre can be called the “art of memory” ( Samuel 1994), reflection and repetitive appearance of the past in the present and, therefore, the timely presence or the timeless past, through which cultural memory (as a collective product) is enclaved inside the individual memory (as a subjective creation) of the viewer with a holistic reference ( Schudson 1989 : 105- 112). Subsequently, the theatre becomes a privileged field of repetition, memory and mnemonic reconstruction of the texts and their performed visualisation ( Malkin 2002), a timely cultural phaenomenon comprising and deriving meaning from the individual memory of the viewer, as well as the collective memory of the audience, with which it exists in a constant dialogue ( Jardine 2005 ). It is both a metaphorical and literal space where a “trial of memory” occurs, on the instance of the stage act of texts and “writings” of the past, which despite the fact that they took place elsewhere / at another time they make an appearance here/now ( Patsalidis 210:57 ).
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The Transmission and Reception of the Values of the Ancient Greek Culture in Theater via “Digital Dialogue”
Abstract[1]
Our age is characterized by the instantaneous transmission of information and the redefinition of distances and boundaries of human relationships and communication. Theater, as a “sensitive indicator of reality”, does not remain unaffected, but seeks new ways of expressing the “timelessness” and “universality” which brings viewer’s consciousness. Dialogue as a key feature of theater, through the conversation of the actors in the context of the dramatic text, as well as through the bidirectional communication between actors and spectators, influences and is influenced in production, output and reception of the performance, by the introduction of digital media, new technologies, even of Artificial Intelligence. “Old” values such as democracy, equality, equity, freedom and peace find new ways of emerging and updating through dialogue into a new reality between the transmitter and receiver of the “digital age”. The creation and reception of messages is happening with different rhythms and new ways, eliminating the space-time distances and shaping this hybrid form of theater that we call “Digital Drama”.
Key words: dialogue, theatre communication, values, digital drama
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Drama and Theatre in ancient Greece. A database and a spectators’ school.
Abstract
Drama always consisted of an invaluable “database” for the culture and education of the ancient Greek spectators, who used to watch it as a performance that derived from the already existing literary types and forms (epic and lyric poetry) on which it was based and which included up to a certain degree; namely, in Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides’ tragedies and Aristophanes’ comedies, almost all the ideas, the messages, the moral values and the knowledge that constitute the so called “Ancient Greek Thought and Philosophy”, coexistand consist of the values of the ancient Greek culture as a whole. However, these do not represent the accumulation of some valuable material, but the creative conjunction and composition of qualitative and quantitative data in an astonishing analogy and harmony that expresses the basic principles and virtues of the ancient Greek Thought such as Moderation, Harmony, Symmetry, Equilibrium and the correspondence between form and content. This explains why the ancient Greek drama has been characterized by scholars as the “Theatre of Ideas” (Arrowsmith, 1963: 32) and the dramatic poets as “Educators” (Arnott, 1970: 35), since they used the stage in order to criticize their world, to promote the ideas rather than the heroes’ characters in their plays, thus providing an integrated culture and education for their spectators.
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International Theatre Conference “Values of Ancient Greek Theatre Across Space & Time: Cultural Heritage and Memory”
The National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA) will be hosting the International Conference named Values of Ancient Greek Theatre Across Space & Time: Cultural Heritage and Memory.
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