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.
Continue ReadingAncient Drama
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Drama and Theatre in ancient Greece. A database and a spectators’ school.
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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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European Program Horizon 2020
Socioeconomic and Cultural Transformations in the Context of The Fourth Industrial Revolution
Proposal Title : Values Across Space and Time
Proposal acronym: VAST
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Trends in the direction of the Ancient Drama
The formation of the classic tradition
The fact that the Ancient Drama has such and of that kind of value and its influence on the formation of modern global theatre is so determinative, is neither because of the width and the quality of the time values and the universal messages that it carries, nor because of its aesthetic perfection, which makes it a cross section “classic” piece of literature. Continue Reading
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Ancient Greek Drama on Modern Greek Stage. Theatrical Tradition and Cultural Memory
The first efforts for stage productions of ancient Greek drama, and tragedy mainly, begin during the Age of Enlightenment, when Greece is not an independent nation yet. They are connected with the efforts of forming a national consciousness and return to the ancestral heritage (Branchfeld 1962: 341-349). With the creation of an independent Greek nation in 1830, ancient dramas are produced more frequent, always associated with linguistic and ideological demands of the times. Continue Reading
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Aristophanes through Lysistrata: the ancient greek comedy on the modern greek stage
Notwithstanding the unquestionable popularity of the hybrid and liminal Plutus for the survival and revival of Aristophanes in Greece and throughout the world,[1] it was another Aristophanic comedy that became associated with the most important and the most profound social, aesthetic and ideological turning points in the reception of Aristophanes by the modern Greek scene up to the present day. Continue Reading
