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Greek theatre's relevance in society
Greek theatre's relevance in society
How did theatre impact ancient greece
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Recommended: Greek theatre's relevance in society
Theater was an important part of Ancient Greek Civilization. History of Greek theatre began with religious festivals which aim to honor Dionysus, a god. During the festivals some citizens sing songs and perform improvisation plays and other participants of festivals judges this performances to decide which one of them was the best. These plays form the foundation of the Greek Theatre. Because of the competition between performers to create best performances, plays gained an aesthetic perspective and became a form of art. So, theatre as a part of religious rituals took attention of people and gained an importance in Ancient Greek Society.
This paper aims to study two significant playwrights, Sophocles and Euripides, and compare their respective attitudes by examining their plays in respect to plot and character structures. To achieve this goal, the paper is organized into two main sections. In the first section, we provide a brief biography of both Sophocles and Euripides. The second and last section includes summaries of Sophocles’ Electra and Euripides’ Electra which were based on same essentials and give an opportunity to observe the differences of the playwrights. This section also includes the comparisons that are made by our observations about the plays.
Information about lifes of Sophocles and Euripides are very limited and hard to verify. However, many sources match about following information about their biographies. Sophocles was born at 497 or 496 BCE in Colonus Hippius, now a part of Athens. His father was a wealthy merchant and weapon producer and an important figure in their society. So, Sophocles had the opportunity of taking the traditional aristocratic education and studying art in his early age which was a pr...
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...drama has its own strict rules that can be extended to certain rules. The Plots are based on mythological stories which are well known by society. So, audience does not come to see what is going to happen, they come to see how the playwright is going to present to story. So, the differences between them are mostly in the development of story and characters.
To conclude, it can be said that Sophocles and Euripides both were great playwrights and important characters of Ancient Greek Civilization. In addition, they contributed western literature by innovating drama and theatre.
Works Cited
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theatre_of_ancient_Greece
http://www.egs.edu/library/sophocles/biography/
http://www.ancientgreece.com/s/People/Euripides
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/sophocles
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euripides
http://www.ancientgreece.com/s/People/Sophocles
Euripides was born in Athens, Greece, around 485 B.C, with parents Cleito and Mnesarchus. He married a woman named Melito and had three sons. Euripides was raised in an ambience of culture, he was witnessed to the rebuilding of the Athenian walls after the Persian Wars, but above all belonged to the period of the Peloponnesian War. Over his career, he has written about 90 plays, but only 19 have survived through manuscripts. Euripides has been named as the most intellectual poet of his time. He has been called the philosopher of the theater. In addition to his literary expertise, he is said to have been a great athlete and painter. Like all the major playwrights of his time, Euripides participated in the annual Athenian dramatic festivals held in honor of the god Dionysus. He first entered the festival in 455, and he
Sophocles' Oedipus Tyrannus can be argued that it is related loosely to Rita Dove's The Darker Face of the Earth. This comparative and contrasting characteristics that can be seen within both plays make the reader/audience more aware of imagery, the major characters, plot, attitudes towards women, and themes that are presented from two very different standpoints. The authors Sophocles and Dove both have a specific goal in mind when writing the two plays. In this paper I will take a closer look of the two, comparing and contrasting the plays with the various elements mentioned previously.
Woodard, Thomas. Introduction. In Sophocles: A Collection of Critical Essays, edited by Thomas Woodard. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1966.
Woodard, Thomas. Introduction. In Sophocles: A Collection of Critical Essays, edited by Thomas Woodard. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1966.
arrangement, the importance of drama and religion, setting, location. and architectural features of the building. In ancient Greece, festivals were mainly held at the Great Dionysia. This was the oldest theatre in Greece and many plays were performed. here, for example, the first performance of Antigone.
Euripides is a keen witness to the human character and the father of the psychological theater. His plays were modern at the time compared to others because of the way he focused on the personal lives and motives of his characters, in a manner that was unfamiliar to Greek audiences. His plays have often been seen, in simple terms, bad because critics have been unable to comprehend his visions. The ideas and concepts that Euripides developed were not accepted until after his death.
Google the name Sophocles and in 0.58 seconds the results are 4,940,000. Sophocles is one of the most famous tragedy writers in ancient Greece. He was born and grew up in Colonus, Greece, just outside of Athens, during the Golden Age of Greece. The Golden Age of Greece was a period in which people lived in an ideal happiness with multiple political and cultural advancements. Sophocles’ writing style and plot lines were brought on by his cultural background through the Golden Age of Greece,his heavy influence from other writers, and his wealthy family.
The great Sophoclean play, Oedipus Rex is an amazing play, and one of the first of its time to accurately portray the common tragic hero. Written in the time of ancient Greece, Sophocles perfected the use of character flaws in Greek drama with Oedipus Rex. Using Oedipus as his tragic hero, Sophocles’ plays forced the audience to experience a catharsis of emotions. Sophocles showed the play-watchers Oedipus’s life in the beginning as a “privileged, exalted [person] who [earned his] high repute and status by…intelligence.” Then, the great playwright reached in and violently pulled out the audience’s most sorrowful emotions, pity and fear, in showing Oedipus’s “crushing fall” from greatness.
Sophocles. Four Plays by Sophocles. Trans. Thomas H. Banks. New York: Oxford University Press, 1966.
Sophocles’ background influenced him to write Antigone. One important influence on the drama was the author’s life in the “golden era” of Athens during fifth century BCE. In that time, Athens was experiencing much change in all facets, and drama was a major factor in Athenian culture. In his essay “Sophocles,” Ed Downey reports that Sophocles was born at the beginning of the “golden era” in Athens and lived a long life influenced by “the artistic and cultural achievements in the ancient Greek world”. Sophocles was a wealthy and highly educated, “happy man.” As a young man, Sophocles began his playwright career, eventually becoming one of the greatest writers in history although only seven of his works are still intact (1). Similarly, the setting
In his tragic trilogy, The Theban Plays, Sophocles portrays the essence of Ancient Greek life; their culture, politics, religion and the maxims that are intended to guide their daily life through the actions of the main characters, Oedipus, Creon, and Antigone. Sophocles employs the use of thematic structures that coherently affects each character uniquely, and one of the most common themes depicted in these plays is that of fate vs freewill. In the Theban trilogy, Sophocles uses a well-structured theme of fate vs freewill to establish the relationship between the Greeks and the gods, as well as to illustrate the limits of mortality.
The ineffaceable impression which Sophocles makes on us today and his imperishable position in the literature of the world are both due to his character-drawing. If we ask which of the men and women ofGreek tragedy have an independent life in the imagination apart from the stage and from the actual plot in which they appear, we must answer, ‘those created by Sophocles, above all others’ (36).
Euripides was a man who had become known for his plays over the years and became a well-noted playwright. Writing tragedies that portrayed the realistic problems of his modern life, he was the last of the classical Athen's three tragic dramatists. He was in great company alongside the elder Sophocles and the eldest Aeschylus. Some of Euripides' most recognized plays are Medea and The Bacchae. Euripides’ classics cemented his notoriety for his clever dialogue and stage exhibition.
Sophocles was born around 497 BC and died around 406 BC. He played a large role in the development of Greek culture and theater. He along with the two other most famous tragedy playwrights, Euripides and Aeschylus, are still known today as the greatest of all time. Sophocles was said to be born in a town not far from Athens known as Colonus. In his early years, Sophocles wrote music and would often perform solos at contests. Sophocles was married two time in his life and had two sons by the names of Lophon and Agathon. When Oedipus Rex premiered in Greek theaters, many people enjoyed the play. Aristotle even praised the play by explaining that the imagery and plot were merged very smoothly into one. Sophocles is also credited for writing Antigone and Oedipus at Colonus along with many other famous plays. (http://www.egs.edu/library/sophocles/biography/).
Sophists and their teachings became widespread in the latter fifth century B.C. in Athens, Greece, which was a major cultural hub in the ancient world. At this point, Greece had dominated the trade industry around the Mediterranean Sea, so Greece had great power among the critical urban cities. After the Athenians defeated the Persians, they began to esteem themselves as an elevated people. The population began to focus on broadening their intelligence and understanding of the world. The theatre reached a pinnacle as playwrights such as Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides began to write classics for example Agamemnon, Oedipus Rex, and Antigone. Satire plays which criticized the government became much more common. Great philosophers like ...