The Theatre of Apollo: Divine Justice and Sophocles' Oedipus the King
Drew Griffith
Language: English
Pages: 158
ISBN: B01FEKNUUC
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
By imaginatively recreating the play's original staging and debunking the interpretations of various critics, including Aristotle, Ulrich von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, E.R. Dodds, Frederick Ahl, and John Peradotto, Griffith shows that Apollo is a constant, powerful presence throughout the play. He contends that although we can sympathize with Oedipus because of his sufferings, he is still morally responsible for murdering his father and sleeping with his mother. Apollo is therefore not indifferent and his actions are not unjust. Griffith focuses on Apollo's commandment "know thyself," a commandment Oedipus belatedly and tragically fulfils, to stress both the need for self-understanding in the study of ancient literature and the usefulness of ancient literature in achieving self-understanding.
scapegoat/7 nevertheless, Girard goes further and argues that Oedipus is an example of secular persecution. His choice of this myth is evidently motivated by the fact that this text is central to the two pillars of French intellectual life, 32 The Theatre of Apollo psychoanalysis and structuralism. Sophocles' text received influential analyses in Freud's On the Interpretation of Dreams18 and LeviStrauss's Structural Anthropology.19 If Girard can prove that both these central disciplines have
cylinder. The mathematician August Ferdinand Mobius discovered in 1865 that the surface, called the Mobius strip, has only one side. This is not apparent when you look at just part of the strip, which appears to have two sides like the original belt, but only when you consider the whole thing. Mathematicians like to explain this onesidedness by saying that a fly who walks along the centre of the strip without ever deviating from his path will eventually pass the antipodes of his starting point
method of classical scholarship? This reluctance to discuss method may in general be a good thing. It is not so good, however, at a time when classical studies are in a state of crisis, and it is my belief that the present is such a time. It is not that classics fails to attract students, but rather that it no longer exerts any influence upon, or commands any respect from, the deans, principals, presidents, and ministers who govern our culture and education, most of whom seem determined that
1955. "The Return of Orestes in the Choephori: An Arab View." G&R 2.59-61 Usener, H. 1903. "Dreiheit." RhMus 58.1-47,161-208 Ussher, R.G. 1977. "The Other Aeschylus." Phoenix 31.287-99 van Groningen, B.A. 1953. In the Grip of the Past. Leiden: E.J. Brill - 1960. La Composition litteraire archa'ique grecque. 2nd ed. Amsterdam: NoordHollandsche Uitgevers Maatschappij Van Hook, L.R. 1920. "The Exposure of Infants at Athens." TAPA 51.134-45 Vellacott, P.H. 1964. "The Guilt of Oedipus." G&R 11.137-48
irresolution, 103n26 Omerta (code of silence), 20,74 Orchestra of theatre of Dionysus, Athens: circular? 16, 21, 96n8 Orestes, 46, 80 Originality, outweighed by tradition, 9 Ostracism, 31 Ostrich-footed race, 119n41 Overdetermination, 37, 54 Pan, death of, 84 Paraphrase: heresy of, 94n10; useful heuristic tool, 93n10 Parasol, foot as, 80 Pars pro toto: see Synecdoche Parthenogenesis: Hera's of Hephaestus, 81; Zeus's of Dionysus, 121n49 Past: becomes necessity, 62; Greeks in the grip of, 12 Penis,