January 21, 2008 Virginia R. Francisco 1 The Trojan Women

January 21, 2008Virginia R. Francisco

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The Trojan Women

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Euripides• playwright, librettist,

composer, choreographer, producer, but not chief actor

• born about 480 bce, probably Salamis, of well-to-do family

• lived Athens? Left 408 for Macedonian court, where died 496

• A recluse, not active in public life, unlike predecessors, not personally popular

• author of 92 plays; 16 tragedies, 1 satyr play survive

• Only 5 victories (20 plays)



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Euripides’ Subjects• tragedies, tragi-comedies,

romantic drama• episodic plots in comedies• reworking of familiar

material• new popular style of

music highly emotional• women in love, babies,

children • emotions, passions,

madness• social subjects seen from

personal point of view



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Other Features• emotionalism• sententiousness• pathos• rhetoric• used 3rd actor, added

first by Sophocles• Most influential of

surviving playwrights: Seneca adopted these features and passed them on to the Renaissance

• reduced role of chorus



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The Trojan Women• 415 bce• fifteenth year of Peloponnesian

wars• Immediately after destruction of

Melos• third play of trilogy: Alexander,

Palamedes, Troades, Sisyphus• background familiar from Iliad• playwright’s second Hecuba play• Trojan point of view• anti-Homeric view



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Elements of typical tragedy• Plot of exceptional

suffering and calamity

• Characters ones-like-ourselves

• Thought nature of human natureconditions of human lifeconsequences of wrongdoing or sin



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Plot• based on

legend/history of Trojan War

• plot of suffering, not of action

• serious threat to life or well-being of protagonist

• carried out• episodes divided by

four choral odes



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Prologue

• Poseidon, Athena, Hecuba provide exposition

• and establish thought

• Troy’s glories contrasted with its present state

• moral, ethical, social, religious framework established



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Prologue: “so soon to die themselves.”• women and children

slaughtered• virgin priestess

Cassandra violated and to be forced into concubinage: Athena is angry

• Poseidon: fools waste cities, violate the sacred, “so soon to die themselves.”

• gods must abandon the city: no worshippers left



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Prologue: “This is no longer Troy.• Hecuba: “this is no

longer Troy,” we no longer lords, the mourning song replaces all earlier songs.

• Barbarism and sacrilege of the victors will be punished.



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Parados• Chorus of captive

Trojan women• horrors of war• mourning, fear for

future, fear of unknown destination

• somber, dirge-like poetic rhythm

• danced in same vein• sets mood, ethical,

social, historical framework for events


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Episode 1• Talthybius, an Argive

herald • news of who is to go to

which victor male• Cassandra: “she is

god’s.”• Cassandra’s mad,

macabre dance of Hymen—while planning to kill the “groom”

• Futility of war: for the Greek women, “in their homes are sorrows, too, the very same.”

• Prophecy of Odysseus’ sorrows to come.

• Hecuba: “count no one happy before he dies.” “all this misery, and all to come, because a man desired a woman.”


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Ode 1

• song to the death of Troy

• their own complicity, explicit in their bringing in the horse

• The horse statue intended as a gift for Athena



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Episode 2: Andromache• Andromache’s very young

son, Astyanax, the only hope for the future

• Andromache, Hecuba mourn for city, husbands, sons, freedom

• but the dead don’t suffer• domestic level: Hecuba’s

advice on managing her new master

• Talthybius announces death for Astyanax

• even this victor pities the mother and is shamed by the murder to come



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Ode 2• recalls a previous sack of Troy, also

by Greeks• contrasts lives of Greeks and ruined

Trojans• announces Athena’s desertion of the

Trojan cause


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Episode 3: Menelaus and Helen

• Helen’s defense ignoble • Hecuba’s response: • Women call for Helen’s

death• Menelaus agrees• Hecuba warms against his taking Helen in his

own ship


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Ode 3• mourning for their losses: festivals,

city• does the god even notice?• sorrow for unburied husbands, their

own coming slavery, bereaved children to be enslaved

• prayer that Menelaus’ ship may never reach home


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Episode 4: Funeral of Astyanax• Astyanax’ body

brought to his grandmother, along with Hector’s shield

• news that Achilles son and Andromache have sailed for Greece

• Funeral conducted by the women



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Ode 4• Song of the Dead• interrupted by

Hecuba’s vision: – “in heaven—there is

nothing there for us, only my miseries, only hate for Troy, most hated of cities.”

• exit of funeral procession


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Episode 5• very brief• Talthybius orders torching of Troy• orders women to march to ships• orders Hecuba to go with Odysseus’ men

Exodos

Hecuba and Chorus mourn in alternating verses.


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Characters• eight speaking,

played by three actors:– Poseidon and Athena– four royal Trojan women– Argive men: Talthybius,

Menelaus• of them, five appear

only once.• non-speaking soldiers• non-speaking child• women suffer, men

act


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Thought• irony of successful

wrongdoing of Argives• pathos of women’s

situation and death of child

• everyone suffers, including the Argive victors

• dehumanization of war• moral indifference of

gods• futility, horror and

degradation of war, viewed internally


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Performance Circumstances• festival situation of

City Dionysia (others Lenea, Rural Dionysias)

• state support• also support of

wealthy patrons (choregoi)


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State support• theatre• prizes• poets' honoraria• actors fees,

costumes


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Choregos• civic, religious duty

and privilege• chorus fee,

training, costumes• flute player• extras, as for the

procession


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Production Process• festival controlled by chief civil magistrate:

public authority• choregoi chosen by lot in July: private

cooperation• Poet: producer-director+

cast actors (until 449)trained chorus, including choreography and singing

conducted rehearsalsplayed lead


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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


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Audience• 15-17 thousand, mostly males,

of population 200,000 + 50,000 resident foreigners

• 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


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Actors and Acting• male amateurs, 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


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Music and dancing

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Likely only 3 actors


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Theatre buildings: state public facilities

• evidence• important theatres• general features• Theatre of Dionysus at Athens


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Evidence• few records of theatre buildings• architectural remains • theatres frequently remodeled and

reconstructed during and after the fifth century


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• Theatre at Thorikos very early• Theatre of Dionysus in Athens most

frequent performance site• Theatre of Epidauros especially well-

preserved

Important Theatres


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Palace of Knossos, Crete


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General Characteristics• sacred shrines, at

least at festival times

• located all over the Greek world

including Greek colonies in Asia Minor

• built in natural bowls


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three elements• orchestra circle• skene or scene

house• auditorium


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Theatre at Epidauros


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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


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Conjectural reconstruction


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City of Athens


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Auditorium of mid-fifth century• wooden benches (early

century)• separated from skene by

paradoi• curves around orchestra • audience, chorus entered

through paradoi


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Stone auditorium (330 BCE)• Divided into 13

blocks by 12 stairways


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Orchestra or dancing place• perhaps rectangular in earliest

theatre• likely circular by time of Agamemnon• 66' diameter


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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


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Temporary skene for Women• 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


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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


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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


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Properties• Altar

always present?needed to suggest tomb of Agamemnon in Choephoroi

• Cassandra’s torch• Hector’s shield• Clothing taken from

dead• Trumpet• no attempt to use all

the furnishings of daily life.


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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


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Costume: Evidence• late 5th c. evidence

only• Oinochoe from the

Agorahttp://didaskalia.berkeley.edu/stagecraft/greek.html

• Pronomos and Andromeda vases

• Textschoruses differentiated by ethnicity, occupationActors distinguished by ethnicity, poverty in rags, mourning


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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


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Masks: Evidence• experiments of

Thespis• little contemporary

evidence• Fragment of about

470no onkos, no gaping mouth, eyes painted in

• Andromeda vase


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Lighting• daylight• torches indicate night, possible in

Prologue


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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.

• 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.


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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.


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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

http://rome.classics.lsa.umich.edu/welcome.html

http://didaskalia.berkeley.edu/



http://www.officenet.co.jp/~yoji/



http://www.usask.ca/antharch/cnea/skenotheke.html

http://www.usask.ca/antharch/cnea/skenotheke.html

Documents

January 21, 2008 Virginia R. Francisco 1 The Trojan Women