Greek Tragedy: Plays and Performance in Ancient Athens

Catalog description

This course provides students the opportunity to read a significant number of ancient Greek tragedies in modern English translations. We read, study, and discuss selected works by Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, as well as selected criticism, ancient and modern, of these plays. All semester we read the plays as literature composed for performance. We study literary elements within the plays and theatrical possibilities inherent in the texts. As we read the plays, we pay close attention to the historical context and look for what each play can tell us about myth, religion, ethics, and society in ancient Athens. Finally, we give attention to the way these tragic dramas and the theater in which they were performed have continued to inspire literature and theater for thousands of years. Lectures provide historical background on the playwrights, the plays, the mythic and historical background, and possible interpretation of the texts as literature and as performance pieces. Students discuss the plays that they read in class. The course has three examinations and a final project that includes writing an essay and staging a monologue or scene from one of the tragedies. Offered as CLSC 319 , CLSC 419 , THTR 319 , THTR 419 , WLIT 319 , and WLIT 419 . Counts as a CAS Global & Cultural Diversity course.