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Morality, Politics and Religion in Euripidean Tragedy

Attic red figure Volute Krater by ‘Pronomos Painter’ around 400 BC (Note that this probably depicts the cast of a satyr play)

‘But though my druid's story is strong meat, it is only drama. Yes, only drama. At an Irish university, I met an ex-Provisional IRA man who had been in an active service unit. Having served his time in gaol, he was educating himself. "Why drama?" I asked. He replied: "Because the theatre is harmless." He was right. Theatre is a peaceful, democratic activity. All plays strive to entertain, even the terrifying Oedipus Rex by Sophocles or the blood-drenched Titus Andronicus by Shakespeare. It is one of the mysteries of the craft that when acted out on a stage, the extremes of human experience, even violent death, can uplift us in the audience. We can all have a good night out at a tragedy.’ Howard Brenton The Guardian 28 January 2006.

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‘It was no longer a piece of theatre' ... a scene from Brenton's The Romans in Britain at the National in 1980. Photograph: Graham Wiltshire/Getty

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Archaeologists now think that the fifth-century theatre of Dionysus might have been rectilinear or trapezoidal in shape. It may have accommodated only 4000-6000 people.

This is a model of the ‘Periclean’ theatre (440s-400 BC)

Image from chapter 4 by Csapo and Goette in P. Wilson 2007 (ed.) The Greek Theatre and Fesivals.

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Open air....Theatre of Dionysus. Plan of later ‘Lycurgan’ theatre(338-326 BC)

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Open air...Theatre of Dionysus as it looks now

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Digital Reconstruction based on later Roman stone-built theatrein same location . But you get the idea of the theatre’s centrality to the polis….

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In honour of Dionysus…

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A sanctuary at Trozen…