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Aristotle - perfect tragedy
Ancient greek theater vs modern
The nature of Greek theatre
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Recommended: Aristotle - perfect tragedy
From the Oedipus Rex’s Interactive Orals, I learned about the Greek theatres and the perfect tragedy. The Greek theatres were established in ancient Greece for music songs, honoring gods, mainly Dionysus. The growing popularity of the theatres started evolving the theaters. At first: writers, directors and actors were the same person but soon it started evolving. Now the plays started to have separate actors, writers and directors. The structures of the Greek theatre were absolutely incredible. Theatron was a way it was created the way so that everyone could hear and see the play very well. The costumes of the actors were exaggerated with emotions and style. As the actors have a face mask for the feeling they were trying to portray.
There
was an important role of the chorus as it is in Oedipus Rex. The Chorus was a group of homogeneous actors with no female. They all had a very collective voice which displayed the emotion of the play at the current moment. The chorus usually begins and ends the play. In Oedipus Rex, the chorus is very significant, it tells us about the events that have taken place so far, asks questions, gives answers, and symbolizes the people’s reaction to what is happening in the play. In Oedipus Rex, chorus ends the play explaining the reality of world that Oedipus understands by blinding himself. The chorus speaks for the people in the play who are watching what has happened to their great king. At times they are praying to gods, asking for help, praising Oedipus, and sharing what they feel about the whole situation that going with Oedipus. Oedipus Rex is considered a perfect tragedy by Aristotle. In the interactive orals we also talked about what makes a tragic hero. There are three things that must happen in order to have a tragic hero: the fall of character from a higher place to a lower place, a tragic flaw which is the weakness, and a tragic circumstance beyond his control. Oedipus falls from being a king to a blind man with a stick. He unknowingly kills his father and marries his mother which is a circumstance beyond his control. Oedipus might not be considered a true tragic hero because he does not have a true tragic flaw. He is still considered a hero because he seeks for the real truth.
In the history of civilization, there have been many different types of theatre. There is Greek theatre and Elizabethan theater. Some are musicals, some are comedies and some are tragedies. Some types employ realistic techniques while others are more avant-gardes. But one type stands out among the rest, and that is Kabuki theatre. This classical Japanese style of dance and drama is not just theatre. It is a beautiful form of art, which has been carefully crafted over many centuries.
In Euripides’ tragic play, Medea, the playwright creates an undercurrent of chaos in the play upon asserting that, “the world’s great order [is being] reversed.” (Lawall, 651, line 408). The manipulation of the spectators’ emotions, which instills in them a sentiment of drama, is relative to this undertone of disorder, as opposed to being absolute. The central thesis suggests drama in the play as relative to the method of theatrical production. The three concepts of set, costumes, and acting, are tools which accentuate the drama of the play. Respectively, these three notions represent the appearance of drama on political, social, and moral levels. This essay will compare three different productions of Euripides’ melodrama, namely, the play as presented by the Jazzart Dance Theatre¹; the Culver City (California) Public Theatre²; and finally, the original ancient Greek production of the play, as it was scripted by Euripides.
The theater of Dionysus stands at the foot of the acropolis and its date originates back to the 6th Century, B.C.. Its originally wood seats rise in tiers above one another against the slope of the acropolis, creating a natural setting for the plays (D'ooge, 231). The Greek Theater was built to house a drama which, during the festivals of Dionysus, had evolved from the long tradition of choral hymns which were presented each year. As Greek culture changed and flourished, entertainment transformed from being a series of choral chanting and dancing to placing an emphasis on the actor. As the actors' importance grew, there became a need for a stage from which they could be seen by each of the fourteen thousand spectators the theater housed. The chorus was still a very active part of the entertainment and they resided in the orchestra (Norwich, 64). The orchestra was the oldest part of the Greek theater and thus, when the actor was given
The Ancient Greeks, probably one of the most fascinating civilizations to study contributed several discoveries and technological advancements. One can not discuss the Greeks without discussing Greek Theatre though. Greek Theater paved the way for literature and art in later history in many ways. If it wasn’t for Greek Theatre famous play writers like Shakespeare would have never done what they are so very well known for. When studying Greek Theatre it is virtually impossible not to hear about it in the 5th Century BCE, and that is because the 5th Century BCE was rather exciting when it came to Greek Theatre.
Brockett, O.G. "The Greek National Theatre's Staging of Ancient Drama." Educational Theatre Journal (John Hopkins University Press) 9, no. 4 (1957): 280-286.
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.
The Greeks were known for many things such as their mythology, architectural beauty and their democracy, but the most interesting thing they were known for was their theater. The theater was perhaps their best form of entertainment that the Greeks had encountered and has lived on from ancient times to modern day, completely affecting just about everything that we do related to entertainment. The way that the Theater was built is still a commonly used blueprint for today’s seating arrangements. There are also several Greek tragedies and comedies that are reenacted today by Colleges and art schools that came from some of the most marvelous and entertaining men of
Roman theatre began in the 4th century B.C, which they stole ideas from the Greeks and improved them. Roman theatre had three major influences, Greek drama, Etruscan influences and Fabula Atellana, this helped them create comedies and added more entertainment like acrobatics, fights and athletics. Just like Greek theatre, Roman theatre also had festivals to honor the Gods but the Romans deity was the Goddess of Love (Venus). In this paper I will describe structures of Roman theatre, like the size, how they look, and amphitheaters and lastly I will talk about some of theatres that are still standing today.
On 10th of August 1978, the last year of the Pahlavi-era, Hoseyn Alizadeh and his two friends Farajollah and Hayat, attended a screening of Massed Kimia’s The Deer (1974) at the Rex Theatre in Abadan, Iran. The film told the story of an anti-government smuggler, and only narrowly passed censorship after considerable negotiations between Kimia and the Forbidden Acts Bureau of the Iranian Government. Four years later, and half way through this particular screening, Hoseyn and Farajollah left the cinema. They closed and locked the exit doors, and then doused them with high-octane aircraft fuel. They set fire to the doors and fled. The fire burned down the entire theatre, along with their friend Hayat, and the 470 others that were watching films.
Although much is speculated about the origins of early Greek theater, it may be stated that the “source of tragedy is to be found in choric dithyrambs sung in honor of the god Dionysus” (Nicoll 9). The performance took place in an open-air theater. The word tragedy is derived from the term “tragedia” or “goat-song”, named for the goat skins the chorus wore in the performance. Originally these songs were improvised and rhapsodical as time passed by they were “poetized or rendered literary” (Nicoll 9). The word “chorus” meant “dance or “dancing ground”, which was how dance evolved into the drama. Members of the chorus were characters in the play that commented on the action. They drew the audience into the play and reflected the audience’s reactions. The change from freelance song to theatre was obtained at the hands of a Greek named Thespis. He turned what was originally a song leader, or priest, into an actor whose words were answered by a chanting chorus. Thespis also “changed the subject matter of theatre events, expanding them to deal not solely on stories of Dionysus” (Nicoll 9). In the sixth century B.C., drama had been born in Greece and with the introduction of a second actor and later a third, this art form was ready to mature at the hands of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides.
Many aspects of ancient Greek theaters have long been studied and debated. Much of the information about these theaters is based on speculation due to the fact that so little of them still exist today. This lack of remnants especially applies to the architecture of the early Greek Theaters. However, through archeological finds and years of studying the people, the plays, and the architecture of the time, we are able to make many conclusions about these early structures.
Greek drama is said to be “the model on which the creators of modern opera at the end of the sixteenth century based their work on” (Grout 11). There are significant differences between Greek drama and opera. For instance, the casts of Greek dramas consisted of only men (Grout 13). Also Greek dramas were not entirely sung, many parts were spoken with the majority of the singing done by the chorus (Grout 12). The function of the chorus was to convey the audience’s response (Grout 12). By the second century BCE, Greek drama went through significant changes inc...
Fifth century Athens created the institutionalisation of tragedy as an art form throughout the polis. Originating as Dionysian celebrations through masks, dithyrambs and dance, tragedy developed into an architectural form for playwrights, namely Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides, to encapsulate the struggle of the human condition in its attempts to reconcile good and evil existence.
Greek and Elizabethan theatre, while similar in some respects, had a few large differences. The Greeks believed in a certain unity of theme, which was prevalent throughout the production. Greek plays were often drawn from myth or of historical significance, so it seems that only ki...
My experience watching a live theatre performance on stage was a fascinating one, most especially since it was my first time. I attended a staged performance of “The History Boys” in a small theatre called “The Little Theatre of Alexandria” at 8:00 pm on Wednesday June 8, 2016 in Alexandria, Virginia. The overall production of the play was a resounding experience for me particularly the performance of the actors and the design of the scene made the play seem real.