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Agamemnon Reconstructed 1
Agamemnon Reconstructed
Agamemnon Reconstructed 2
Aeschylus
• playwright, librettist, composer, choreographer, producer, and chief actor
• born 525/4 BCE, member of Athenian nobility
• fought Persians under Darius at Marathon, Salamis, and Platea
• author of about 70 plays• first victory 484• 13 wins (52 plays in 13 trilogies
with satyr plays)
Agamemnon Reconstructed 3
Aeschylus's Subjects• like Phrynichus used
historical subjects, closely related to public issues
• particularly etiological subjects which explain origins of social, political, religious customs
patrilinyfoundation of a system of justice under law
Agamemnon Reconstructed 4
Other Features• early user of prologue• added new features:
female characters, 2nd actor, trilogy?
• Made use of 3rd actor, added first by Sophocles
• simple plotslittle intrigue
little concealed identity
thus few recognition scenes
Agamemnon Reconstructed 5
Emphasizes theatrical effects• processions• magnificent
costumes• men-at-arms• chariots, cars• trumpets• gods, demons,
ghosts• graves, altars• later plays:
machines, stage devices
Agamemnon Reconstructed 6
Agamemnon• first play of Orestia, trilogy
about Orestes• written, performed 458 BCE at
Athens• only surviving Greek trilogy• tragedies of Libation Bearers,
Eumenidies followed• day ended with Proteus, a satyr
playMenelaus consults the old
man of the sea• focus is (initial) consequences of
Agamemnon's error
Agamemnon Reconstructed 7
Agamemnon a typical tragedy• Plot of exceptional
suffering and calamity
• Characters ones-like-ourselves
• Thought nature of human natureconditions of human lifeconsequences of wrongdoing or sin
Agamemnon Reconstructed 8
Plot• serious threat to
life or well-being of protagonist
• carried out• usually death of
tragic protagonist
Agamemnon Reconstructed 9
Characters• one like ourselves, basically
good, but prone to error• own error contributes to his
disaster• internal conflict• often a fatal tendency to pride
or one-sidedness--blind on other sides
• highly placedfate bound up with that of polisso consequences extend beyond protagonist and/or family
Agamemnon Reconstructed 10
(Almost) Typical in form: • Prologue• Parados• Episodes divided by choral odes• No Exodos
Agamemnon Reconstructed 11
Performance Circumstances• festival situation of
City Dionysia (others Lenea, Rural Dionysias)
• state support• also support of
wealthy patrons (choregoi)
Agamemnon Reconstructed 12
State support• theatre• prizes• poets' honoraria• actors fees,
costumes
Agamemnon Reconstructed 13
Choregos• civic, religious duty
and privilege• chorus fee,
training, costumes• flute player• extras, as for the
procession
Agamemnon Reconstructed 14
Production Process• festival controlled by chief civil
magistrate• choregoi chosen by lot in July• poet
cast actors (until 449)trained chorus, including choreography and singing
conducted rehearsalsplayed lead
Agamemnon Reconstructed 15
City Dionysia of 458 BCE • March or early April• procession of cult
statue from temple to Academy
• sacrifices, rituals• two days of
dithyrambs, ending with processions and revels
• five comedies• three days of
tragedies with satyr plays
Agamemnon Reconstructed 16
Audience• 15-17 thousand, mostly males, citizens in
citizens’ meeting place, aware of civic responsibilty to evaluate conduct of others
of population 155,000
• privileged had honored seats, with backs,• others merely stone benches• admission free• participants in a religious rite• spectators at an entertainment• citizens at a civic festival, excitable,
voluble, volatile, and knowledgeable
Agamemnon Reconstructed 17
Agamemnon Reconstructed 18
Chorus• predates actors• citizens, acting citizens• same entrance as citizens• primary locus orchestra, formerly agora,
a meeting place for citizens• shared light• shared in evaluation of officials and
audience• so actor/chorus/audience are in essence
same, with different and temporary practical tasks
Agamemnon Reconstructed 19
Actors and Acting• amateurs, citizens, but
increasingly dominant performance element
• highly trained, especially vocally
emphasis enunciation, resonance, flexibility
• doubling, even tripling• males played all roles• praised for naturalness,
not to be confused with naturalism
Agamemnon Reconstructed 20
Likely only 3 actors• Clytemnestra• Herald and
Cassandra, perhaps Aegisthus
• Agamemnon and Watchman, perhaps Aegisthus
Agamemnon Reconstructed 21
Style likely formal, rather than realistic• masks• huge space• doubling• speech, recitative, and song• actors admired for vocal
beauty, virtuosity; skillful handling of poetry; appropriate gestures skillful movement
• situations far from domestic, present
Agamemnon Reconstructed 22
Prologue: monologue prologue of watchman (protatic)
• antecedent events, particularly since departure of Agamemnon
• characterization of the king
• hints of secrets, tales stones could tell, fear, decline of royal house
• ends with beacon: end of war
Agamemnon Reconstructed 23
Parados• Chorus of old men,
elders, sages, visionaries
• somber, dirge-like poetic rhythm
• danced in same vein• sets mood, ethical,
social, historical framework for events
wrongs and vengeance
horrors of war
anger of gods
transcience of human life
Agamemnon Reconstructed 24
Very brief transition• Chorus addresses
Clytemnestra• who doesn't answer
Agamemnon Reconstructed 25
First Ode• antecedent events
• introduces thought "bitterness in the blood""secret anger"transcience of greatness"wisdom comes alone through suffering
Agamemnon Reconstructed 26
Episode 1• Clytemnestra
announces fall of Troy
• characterizing• fear of violations by
conquering army• "Let there be no
fresh wrong done!"
Agamemnon Reconstructed 27
Ode 2• prayer to Zeus,
thanks for victory• awful conditions of
war• sin of Paris,
"mortals who trample down the delicacy of things inviolate"
• sin of Helen, "daring beyond all daring”
• extends thought
Agamemnon Reconstructed 28
Thought on Multiple Levels• domestic level:
Menelaus's grief • social level: "now in
place of the young men / urns and ashes are carried home"
• political level: "slow anger creeps below their grief"
• ethical level: curse on daring, injustice, "the man fortunate beyond all right"
Agamemnon Reconstructed 29
Episode 2• actor speaks (sings?) to
actor • messenger, a soldier
context of Agamemnon's earlier mistakesfresh wrongs: "twice over the sons of Priam have atoned their sin"terrible voyage homeend to unhappiness
• Clytemnestra claims wifely virtue
"May he find a wife within his house as true as on the day he left her."
Agamemnon Reconstructed 30
Ode 3• Causes of evil and
wrongdoing: pride, ruthlessness
Agamemnon Reconstructed 31
Episode 3• halfway into play, title
character appears• train of returning soldiers,
Cassandra• chorus welcomes, but recalls
cost of war• Agamemnon straightforward,
contrast Clytemnestra's appeal to pride
• "treading down lovely things"• request to treat Cassandra
well
Agamemnon Reconstructed 32
Ode 4• Chorus's fear• excess, limitation,
nets and snares
Agamemnon Reconstructed 33
Episode 4• Cassandra's silence
drives Clytemnestra to fury
• Cassandra's vision of sin within the house
• Her own sin, word broken with Apollo
• Agamemnon's death cries
Agamemnon Reconstructed 34
Ode 5• Chorus hesitates to
respond
Agamemnon Reconstructed 35
Episode 5• bodies disclosed• Clytemnestra threatens Chorus• Chorus recollects history of doomed
house• Aegisthus justifies self, to control by
power and money• Clytemnestra hopes that all will be
well, house brought into order
Agamemnon Reconstructed 36
The Citadel of Mycenae
Agamemnon Reconstructed 37
No Exodos, but a brief forward link
Agamemnon Reconstructed 38
Thought• Any highly placed
person must err• Sin leads inevitably
to retribution
Agamemnon Reconstructed 39
None who undertakes a duty for the god can do so without error• antecedent: ancient blood
wrongs within family• position, pride require
return of straying Helen• sacrifice of Iphigenia• decade of inattention to
marriage and family• failure to take
Clytemnestra sufficiently into account
• conquering Troy overmuch
Agamemnon Reconstructed 40
Sin leads inevitably to retribution
• Agamemnon's sins already committed, his character irrelevant
• fear dominant emotion
Agamemnon Reconstructed 41
Theatre Buildings• evidence• important theatres• general features• Theatre of Dionysus at Athens
Agamemnon Reconstructed 42
Evidence• few records of theatre buildings• architectural remains • theatres frequently remodeled and
reconstructed during and after the fifth century
Agamemnon Reconstructed 43
• Theatre at Thorikos (oldest, 6th c.)• Theatre of Dionysus in Athens most
frequent performance site (stone theatre late 5th-4th c.)
• Theatre of Epidauros (late 4th c.) especially well-preserved
Important Theatres
Agamemnon Reconstructed 44
General Characteristics• sacred shrines• located all over the
Greek worldincluding Greek colonies in Asia Minor
• built in natural bowls
Agamemnon Reconstructed 45
three elements• Orchestra (dancing place)
circle?• skene or scene house• theatron (hearing place)
Agamemnon Reconstructed 46
Theatre at Epidauros
Agamemnon Reconstructed 47
Theatre of Dionysus in Athens• first performances of tragedy in 534
BCE• earliest, audience seated on hillside• flat dancing place supported by
retaining wall, backfill• perhaps altar South side, opposite
audience• small temple of Dionysus
Eleuthereus
Agamemnon Reconstructed 48
Conjectural reconstruction
Agamemnon Reconstructed 49
Auditorium of mid-fifth century• wooden benches (early
century)• separated from skene by
paradoi• curves around orchestra • audience, chorus entered
through paradoi
Agamemnon Reconstructed 50
Stone auditorium (330 BCE)• Divided into 13
blocks by 12 stairways
Agamemnon Reconstructed 51
Orchestra or dancing place• perhaps rectangular in earliest
theatre• likely circular by time of Agamemnon• 66' diameter
Agamemnon Reconstructed 52
Skene or scene building. • earliest, hut or tent for changing • no building required prior to 458 BCE, Orestia• probably temporary wooden structure at one
side of orchestra• different from festival to festival? • set in stone after 430
Agamemnon Reconstructed 53
Temporary skene for Orestia• possibly paraskenia • unknown number
of doors, perhaps 3-5
• roof for watchman• later stone theatre
(about 330 B.C.) had paraskenia and 5 doors.
• perhaps 2 stories, permanent or temporary
Agamemnon Reconstructed 54
Acting place or "stage"• possibly none other than the
orchestra• possibly broad steps in front of skene• no evidence of raised stage prior to
late 4th century BCE• no evidence of high raised stage
prior to mid-2nd century
Agamemnon Reconstructed 55
Scenery• no attempt to conceal the skene• no evidence of changing scenery
3 other plays produced following Agamemnon
• perhaps pinakes, but not periaktoi• ekkyklema necessary for bodies• mechane available, not needed here
Agamemnon Reconstructed 56
Properties• Altar
always present?needed to suggest tomb of Agamemnon in Choephoroi
• chariot for Agamemnon, Cassandra
• no attempt to use all the furnishings of daily life.
Agamemnon Reconstructed 57
Costumes• essential to identify
characters and their status
huge theatre, doubling
• chorus all alike• long robe or short
tunic, with or without sleeves
• cloak short or long• soft boots• appropriate
accessories: armor, staffs, crowns, sceptres
Agamemnon Reconstructed 58
Costume: Evidence• late 5th c. evidence
only• Oinochoe from the
Agora• Pronomos and
Andromeda vases• Texts
choruses differentiated by ethnicity, occupationActors distinguished by ethnicity, poverty in rags, mourning
Agamemnon Reconstructed 59
Masks worn by all, actors and chorus• use in rituals• text references
differentiation of coloring by ethnicityvarious hair colorsshorn hair for mourning
• covered entire headappropriate hairstyle, beard, ornaments
Agamemnon Reconstructed 60
Masks: Evidence• experiments of
Thespis• little contemporary
evidence• Fragment of about
470no onkos, no gaping mouth, eyes painted in
• Andromeda vase
Agamemnon Reconstructed 61
Lighting• daylight• torches indicate night, possible in
Prologue
Agamemnon Reconstructed 62
Bibliography• Allen, James T. Stage Antiquities of the
Greeks and Romans. New York: Cooper, 1963.• Arnott, Peter D. Greek Scenic Conventions in
the Fifth Century, B.C. Oxford: Clarendon, 1962.
• Ashby, Clifford. Classical Greek Theatre: New Views of an Old Subject. Iowa City: U Iowa P, 1999.
• Bieber, Margarete. History of the Greek and Roman Theatre. 2 ed. Princeton UP: 1961.
• Butler, James H. Theatre and Drama of Greece and Rome. San Francisco: Chandler, 1972.
• Flickinger, Roy C. Greek Theatre and Its Drama. 4 ed. Chicago UP, 1936.
Agamemnon Reconstructed 63
Bibliography, continued• Harsh, Philip Whaley. Handbook of
Classical Drama. Stanford UP, 1944.• Pickard-Cambridge, Arthur W.
Dramatic Festivals of Athens. Oxford: Clarendon, 1953.
• ----------. Theatre of Dionysus in Athens. Oxford: Clarendon, 1946.
• Winkler, John J. and Froma I. Zeitlin, eds. Nothing to Do with Dionysos? Athenian Drama in Its Social Context. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1990.
Agamemnon Reconstructed 64
Web Sites
Agamemnon Reconstructed 65
Web Sites“Classics and Mediterranean Archaeology.”
http://rome.classics.lsa.umich.edu/welcome.html
“Didaskalia: Ancient Theatre Today.” http://didaskalia.berkeley.edu/
“Dr. J/s Illustrated Mycenae.” http://nimbus.temple.edu/%7Ejsiegel/sites/mycenae/mycenae.htm
“Greek Art and Architecture.” http://www.officenet.co.jp/~yoji/
Skenotheke: Images of the Ancient Stage.” http://www.usask.ca/antharch/cnea/skenotheke.html