Classic period - 5th c. BC.

The ancient Greek theater genetically goes back to the cult rites of ancient times (hunting, farming, seeing off winter, weeping for the dead). With all the primitiveness and simplicity of the ancient game rituals, one can already notice the sprouts of the future theatrical action in them - a combination of music, dance, song, and words. Actually, the Greek theater originated from the festivities in honor of Dionysus, which lasted several days and were solemn processions, mysteries, and then competitions of playwrights, poets, choirs in a building specially built for these purposes. The theater played an important role in the social and cultural life of the ancient Greek city. These days were declared non-working and the entire population of the city was obliged to come to the holiday. During the reign of Pericles in Athens, the poor were even allocated money to attend the theater.

Greek theater was born from the cult festivals dedicated to the god Dionysius.

3 Feasts of Dionysus:

Big Dionysia

Rural Dionysia

Dionysius gradually turned from a pagan holiday into a theatrical performance. A special performer was introduced into the choir of the inhabitants - an actor who recited pre-prepared texts, and this already marked the transition from the pagan rite to the theater, for which the great ancient Greek playwrights created.

tragedy

Tragedy (ancient Greek literally - “goat song”) is a genre of fiction based on the development of events, which, as a rule, is inevitable and necessarily leads to a catastrophic outcome for the characters, often filled with pathos; a form of drama that is the opposite of comedy. Some researchers believe that in ancient times a priest told about the sufferings of the god Dionysus, sacrificing a goat on the altar. Hence the "goat song".

Aeschylus (about 525-456 BC) - the "father" of ancient Greek tragedy. Author of about 90 works. Reached our days 7. Introduced the 2nd actor.

The main motive of the tragedy of Aeschylus is the idea of ​​the omnipotence of fate and the doom of the struggle with it. The social order was conceived as certain superhuman forces, established once and for all. Even the rebellious titans cannot shake him (the tragedy "Chained Prometheus").

Plays: "Chained Prometheus", "Oresteia" - as part of three tragedies: "Agamemnon", "Choephors" (bringers of libations) and "Eumenides"

Sophocles (circa 496-406 BC) - approximately 120 works, survived to this day 7. Won 24 victories in tragedian competitions. Introduced the 3rd actor and scenery.

At the center of his tragedies is the conflict between tribal tradition and state authority.

Plays: Oedipus Rex, Antigone, Electra, Oedipus in Colon, The Trachinian Women

Euripides (about 480406 BC) - an outstanding reformer of the ancient theater. Psychology emerges. The main characters are women for the first time. The lawsuit is a method of resolving an intrigue - deus ex machina. The role of the choir is gradually reduced to the musical accompaniment of the performance. Approximately 22 texts, 17 came down and many passages.

In the works of the atheistic Euripides, the actors in the drama are exclusively people. If he introduces the gods, then only in those cases when it is necessary to resolve some complex intrigue. His dramatic action is motivated by the real properties of the human psyche. Sophocles spoke of Euripides as follows: “I portrayed people as they should be; Euripides depicts them as they really are.

Plays: "Medea", "Phaedra" ("Hippolytus"), "Bacchae"

Comedy

Comedy - "the song of the drunken crowd." basis of satire.

Ancient Greek comedy was born on the same festivities of Dionysus as tragedy, only in a different setting. If tragedy in its infancy is a ritual service, then comedy is a product of amusements that began when the liturgical part of the Dionysia, gloomy and serious, ended. In ancient Greece, they then organized processions (komos, hence, perhaps, the name itself came about - comedy) with rampant songs and dances, put on fantastic costumes, entered into disputes, fights, threw witticisms, jokes, often obscene, which, according to the ancient Greeks encouraged by Dionysus. During these amusements, the main elements of the comic genre arose: a Doric everyday scene and a accusatory choral song.

Aristophanes - Ancient Greek comedian, "father of comedy." Approximately 40 comedies, 11 reached.

In his comedies, he waged a fierce struggle against the democracy that was in power during the Peloponnesian War. Aristophanes was a supporter of peace at all costs, since the war had a detrimental effect on the landowning aristocracy, whose ideology he expressed. This also determined the reactionary nature of his philosophical and moral views. So he portrayed Socrates in a caricature, did not spare his contemporary Euripides, the spokesman for democratic sentiments. He often parodies it. Most of his comedies were vicious satires on representatives of democracy, including Cleon and Pericles. The role of Cleon in the comedy "Babylonians" was played by him himself, since the actors did not dare to do this, fearing the revenge of the ruler.

Plays: "Peace", "Lysistratus", "Frogs", "Women in the People's Assembly", "Clouds"

This list can include such famous ancient authors as Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes, Aristotle. All of them wrote plays for performances at festivities. There were, of course, many more authors of dramatic works, but either their creations have not survived to this day, or their names have been forgotten.

In the work of ancient Greek playwrights, despite all the differences, there was much in common, for example, the desire to show all the most significant social, political and ethical problems that worried the minds of the Athenians at that time. In the genre of tragedy in ancient Greece, no significant works were created. Over time, the tragedy became a purely literary work meant to be read. On the other hand, great prospects opened up for everyday drama, which flourished most in the middle of the 4th century BC. e. It was later called "Novo-Attic Comedy".

Aeschylus

Aeschylus (Fig. 3) was born in 525 BC. e. in Eleusis, near Athens. He came from a noble family, so he received a good education. The beginning of his work dates back to the time of the war of Athens against Persia. It is known from historical documents that Aeschylus himself took part in the battles of Marathon and Salamis.

He described the last of the wars as an eyewitness in his play The Persians. This tragedy was staged in 472 BC. e. In total, Aeschylus wrote about 80 works. Among them were not only tragedies, but also satirical dramas. Only 7 tragedies have survived to this day in full, only small pieces of the rest have survived.

In the works of Aeschylus, not only people are shown, but also gods and titans, who personify moral, political and social ideas. The playwright himself had a religious-mythological credo. He firmly believed that the gods govern life and the world. However, the people in his plays are not weak-willed beings who are blindly subordinate to the gods. Aeschylus endowed them with reason and will, they act, guided by their thoughts.

In the tragedies of Aeschylus, the chorus plays an essential role in the development of the theme. All parts of the choir are written in pathetic language. At the same time, the author gradually began to introduce into the canvas of the narrative pictures of human existence, which were quite realistic. An example is the description of the battle between the Greeks and Persians in the play "Persians" or the words of sympathy expressed by the Oceanides to Prometheus.

To intensify the tragic conflict and to complete the action of the theatrical production, Aeschylus introduced the role of a second actor. At that time it was just a revolutionary move. Now, instead of the old tragedy, which had little action, a single actor and a chorus, new dramas appeared. They clashed with the worldviews of heroes who independently motivated their actions and deeds. But the tragedies of Aeschylus nevertheless retained in their construction traces of the fact that they come from the dithyramb.

The construction of all tragedies was the same. They began with a prologue, in which there was a plot plot. After the prologue, the choir entered the orchestra to stay there until the end of the play. This was followed by episodies, which were the dialogues of the actors. The episodes were separated from each other by stasims - the songs of the choir, performed after the choir ascended the orchestra. The final part of the tragedy, when the choir left the orchestra, was called "exode". As a rule, a tragedy consisted of 3-4 episodies and 3-4 stasims.

Stasims, in turn, were divided into separate parts, consisting of stanzas and antistrophes, which strictly corresponded to each other. The word "strofa" in translation into Russian means "turn". When the choir sang along the stanzas, he moved first in one direction, then in the other. Most often, the songs of the choir were performed to the accompaniment of a flute and were necessarily accompanied by dances called "emmeley".

In the play The Persians, Aeschylus glorified the victory of Athens over Persia in the naval battle of Salamis. A strong patriotic feeling runs through the whole work, i.e. the author shows that the victory of the Greeks over the Persians is the result of the fact that democratic orders existed in the country of the Greeks.

In the work of Aeschylus, a special place is given to the tragedy "Prometheus Chained". In this work, the author showed Zeus not as a bearer of truth and justice, but as a cruel tyrant who wants to wipe out all people from the face of the earth. Therefore, Prometheus, who dared to rise up against him and stand up for the human race, he condemned to eternal torment, ordering him to be chained to a rock.

Prometheus is shown by the author as a fighter for the freedom and reason of people, against the tyranny and violence of Zeus. In all subsequent centuries, the image of Prometheus remained an example of a hero fighting against higher powers, against all oppressors of a free human personality. V. G. Belinsky said very well about this hero of the ancient tragedy: “Prometheus let people know that in truth and knowledge they are gods, that thunder and lightning are not yet proof of the rightness, but only evidence of the wrong power.”

Aeschylus wrote several trilogies. But the only one that has survived to this day in full is Oresteia. The tragedy was based on tales of terrible murders of the kind from which the Greek commander Agamemnon came. The first play of the trilogy is called Agamemnon. It tells that Agamemnon returned victorious from the battlefield, but at home he was killed by his wife Clytemnestra. The commander's wife is not only not afraid of punishment for her crime, but also boasts of what she has done.

The second part of the trilogy is called "The Choephors". Here is a story about how Orestes, the son of Agamemnon, becoming an adult, decided to avenge the death of his father. Sister Orestes Electra helps him in this terrible business. First, Orestes killed his mother's lover, and then her.

The plot of the third tragedy - "Eumenides" - is as follows: Orestes is persecuted by Erinyes, the goddess of vengeance, because he committed two murders. But he is justified by the court of the Athenian elders.

In this trilogy, Aeschylus spoke in poetic language about the struggle between paternal and maternal rights that was going on in Greece at that time. As a result, paternal, i.e. state, right turned out to be the winner.

In "Oresteia" Aeschylus's dramatic skill reached its peak. He so well conveyed the oppressive, ominous atmosphere in which the conflict is brewing that the viewer almost physically feels this intensity of passion. The choral parts are written clearly, they have a religious and philosophical content, there are bold metaphors and comparisons. There is much more dynamics in this tragedy than in the early works of Aeschylus. The characters are written out more specifically, much less common places and reasoning.

The works of Aeschylus show all the heroism of the Greco-Persian wars, which played an important role in educating patriotism among the people. In the eyes of not only his contemporaries, but also of all subsequent generations, Aeschylus forever remained the very first tragic poet.

He died in 456 BC. e. in the city of Gel, in Sicily. On his grave there is a gravestone inscription, which, according to legend, was composed by him.

Sophocles

Sophocles was born in 496 BC. e. in a wealthy family. His father had a gunsmith's workshop, which provided a large income. Already at a young age, Sophocles showed his creative talent. At the age of 16, he led a choir of youths who glorified the victory of the Greeks in the battle of Salamis.

At first, Sophocles himself took part in the productions of his tragedies as an actor, but then, due to the weakness of his voice, he had to give up performances, although he enjoyed great success. In 468 BC. e. Sophocles won his first absentee victory over Aeschylus, which consisted in the fact that Sophocles' play was recognized as the best. In further dramatic work, Sophocles was invariably lucky: in his entire life he never received a third award, but almost always took first place (and only occasionally second).

The playwright actively participated in state activities. In 443 BC. e. the Greeks elected the famous poet to the post of treasurer of the Delian League. Later he was elected to an even higher position - a strategist. In this capacity, he, along with Pericles, took part in a military campaign against the island of Samos, which separated from Athens.

We know only 7 tragedies of Sophocles, although he wrote more than 120 plays. Compared with Aeschylus, Sophocles somewhat changed the content of his tragedies. If the first has titans in his plays, then the second introduced people into his works, albeit a little elevated above everyday life. Therefore, researchers of Sophocles' creativity say that he made the tragedy descend from heaven to earth.

Man with his spiritual world, mind, feelings and free will became the main character in tragedies. Of course, in the plays of Sophocles, the heroes feel the influence of Divine Providence on their fate. Gods are the same

powerful, like those of Aeschylus, they can also bring a person down. But the heroes of Sophocles usually do not rely resignedly on the will of fate, but fight to achieve their goals. This struggle sometimes ends in the suffering and death of the hero, but he cannot refuse it, since in this he sees his moral and civic duty to society.

At this time, Pericles was at the head of the Athenian democracy. Under his rule, slave-owning Greece reached an enormous internal flowering. Athens became a major cultural center, which sought writers, artists, sculptors and philosophers throughout Greece. Pericles began building the Acropolis, but it was completed only after his death. Outstanding architects of that period were involved in this work. All sculptures were made by Phidias and his students.

In addition, rapid development has come in the field of natural sciences and philosophical teachings. There was a need for general and special education. In Athens, teachers appeared who were called sophists, that is, sages. For a fee, they taught those who wished to various sciences - philosophy, rhetoric, history, literature, politics - they taught the art of speaking to the people.

Some sophists were supporters of slave-owning democracy, others - of the aristocracy. The most famous among the sophists of that time was Protagoras. It is to him that the saying belongs, that not God, but man, is the measure of all things.

Such contradictions in the clash of humanistic and democratic ideals with selfish and selfish motives were also reflected in the work of Sophocles, who could not accept Protagoras' statements because he was very religious. In his works, he repeatedly said that human knowledge is very limited, that due to ignorance a person can make this or that mistake and be punished for it, that is, endure torment. But it is precisely in suffering that the best human qualities that Sophocles described in his plays are revealed. Even in cases where the hero dies under the blows of fate, an optimistic mood is felt in tragedies. As Sophocles said, “fate could deprive the hero of happiness and life, but not humiliate his spirit, could strike him, but not win.”

Sophocles introduced a third actor into the tragedy, who greatly enlivened the action. There were now three characters on the stage who could conduct dialogues and monologues, as well as perform at the same time. Since the playwright gave preference to the experiences of an individual, he did not write trilogies, in which, as a rule, the fate of a whole family was traced. Three tragedies were put up for competitions, but now each of them was an independent work. Under Sophocles, painted decorations were also introduced.

The most famous tragedies of the playwright from the Theban cycle are Oedipus the King, Oedipus in Colon and Antigone. The plot of all these works is based on the myth of the Theban king Oedipus and the numerous misfortunes that befell his family.

Sophocles tried in all his tragedies to bring out heroes with a strong character and unbending will. But at the same time, these people were characterized by kindness and compassion. Such was, in particular, Antigone.

The tragedies of Sophocles clearly show that fate can subjugate a person's life. In this case, the hero becomes a toy in the hands of higher powers, which the ancient Greeks personified with Moira, standing even above the gods. These works became an artistic reflection of the civil and moral ideals of slave-owning democracy. Among these ideals were political equality and freedom of all full citizens, patriotism, service to the Motherland, nobility of feelings and motives, as well as kindness and simplicity.

Sophocles died in 406 BC. e.

16. Ancient Greek tragedy. Sophocles and Euripides.

Tragedy. The tragedy comes from ritual actions in honor of Dionysus. The participants in these actions put on masks with goat beards and horns, depicting the satellites of Dionysus - satyrs. Ritual performances took place during the Great and Lesser Dionysia. Songs in honor of Dionysus were called dithyrambs in Greece. The dithyramb, as Aristotle points out, is the basis of Greek tragedy, which retained at first all the features of the myth of Dionysus. The first tragedies set forth myths about Dionysus: about his suffering, death, resurrection, struggle and victory over enemies. But then the poets began to draw content for their works from other legends. In this regard, the choir began to portray not satyrs, but other mythical creatures or people, depending on the content of the play.

Origin and essence. Tragedy arose from solemn chants. She retained their majesty and seriousness, her heroes were strong personalities, endowed with a strong-willed character and great passions. Greek tragedy has always portrayed some particularly difficult moments in the life of an entire state or an individual, terrible Crimes, misfortunes and deep moral suffering. There was no place for jokes and laughter.

System. The tragedy begins with a (declamatory) prologue, followed by the entrance of the choir with a song (parod), then - episodies (episodes), which are interrupted by songs of the choir (stasims), the last part is the final stasim (usually solved in the kommos genre) and departure actors and choir - exod. Choral songs divided the tragedy in this way into parts, which in modern drama are called acts. The number of parts varied even with the same author. The three unities of Greek tragedy: place, action and time (the action could only take place from sunrise to sunset), which were supposed to reinforce the illusion of the reality of the action. The unity of time and place to a large extent limited the development of dramatic elements characteristic of the evolution of the genus at the expense of the epic. A number of events necessary in the drama, the depiction of which would break the unity, could only be reported to the viewer. The so-called "messengers" told about what was happening outside the stage.

Greek tragedy was greatly influenced by the Homeric epic. The tragedians borrowed a lot of stories from him. The characters often used expressions borrowed from the Iliad. For the dialogues and songs of the choir, playwrights (they are also melurgists, because the same person wrote poetry and music - the author of the tragedy) used iambic trimeter as a form close to living speech (for differences in dialects in certain parts of the tragedy, see the ancient Greek language ). Tragedy reached its peak in the 5th century. BC e. in the works of three Athenian poets: Sophocles and Euripides.

Sophocles. In the tragedies of Sophocles, the main thing is not the external course of events, but the internal torment of the heroes. Sophocles usually explains the general meaning of the plot right away. The external denouement of the plot is almost always easy to foresee. Sophocles carefully avoids confusing complications and surprises. His main feature is the tendency to portray people, with all their inherent weaknesses, hesitations, mistakes, and sometimes crimes. The characters of Sophocles are not general abstract embodiments of certain vices, virtues or ideas. Each of them has a bright personality. Sophocles almost strips the legendary heroes of their mythical superhumanity. The catastrophes that befall the heroes of Sophocles are prepared by the properties of their characters and circumstances, but they are always retribution for the guilt of the hero himself, as in Ajax, or his ancestors, as in Oedipus Rex and Antigone. According to the Athenian penchant for dialectics, the tragedy of Sophocles develops in a verbal contest between two opponents. It helps the viewer to better understand their rightness or wrongness. In Sophocles, verbal discussions are not the center of dramas. Scenes filled with deep pathos and at the same time devoid of Euripides' pomposity and rhetoric are found in all the tragedies of Sophocles that have come down to us. Heroes of Sophocles are experiencing severe mental anguish, but positive characters, even in them, retain the full consciousness of their rightness.

« Antigone" (about 442). The plot of "Antigone" refers to the Theban cycle and is a direct continuation of the legend about the war of the "Seven against Thebes" and about the fight between Eteocles and Polyneices. After the death of both brothers, the new ruler of Thebes, Creon, buried Eteocles with proper honors, and the body of Polynices, who went to war against Thebes, forbade to betray the earth, threatening the disobedient with death. The sister of the dead, Antigone, violated the ban and buried Politics. Sophocles developed this plot from the point of view of the conflict between human laws and the "unwritten laws" of religion and morality. The issue was topical: the defenders of the polis traditions considered the "unwritten laws" "God-established" and indestructible, as opposed to the changeable laws of people. The religiously conservative Athenian democracy also demanded respect for the "unwritten laws". The prologue to "Antigone" contains another feature that is very common in Sophocles - the opposition of harsh and soft characters: the adamant Antigone is opposed by the timid Ismene, who sympathizes with her sister, but does not dare to act with her. Antigone puts her plan into action; she covers the body of Polynices with a thin layer of earth, that is, she performs a symbolic "" burial, which, according to Greek ideas, was sufficient to calm the soul of the deceased. The interpretation of Sophocles' "Antigone" for many years remained in line with Hegel; it is still followed by many reputable researchers3. As you know, Hegel saw in Antigone an irreconcilable clash between the idea of ​​statehood and the demand that blood ties put forward for a person: Antigone, who dares to bury her brother in defiance of the royal decree, dies in an unequal struggle with the state principle, but King Creon, who personifies him, loses in this clash only son and wife, coming to the end of the tragedy broken and devastated. If Antigone is physically dead, then Creon is morally crushed and awaits death as a boon (1306-1311). The sacrifices made by the Theban king on the altar of statehood are so significant (let's not forget that Antigone is his niece) that sometimes he is considered the main character of the tragedy, who defends the interests of the state with such reckless determination. It is worth, however, to carefully read the text of Sophocles' Antigone and imagine how it sounded in the specific historical situation of ancient Athens in the late 40s of the 5th century BC. e., so that Hegel's interpretation would lose all force of evidence.

Analysis of "Antigone" in connection with the specific historical situation in Athens in the 40s of the 5th century BC. e. shows the complete inapplicability to this tragedy of modern concepts of state and individual morality. In "Antigone" there is no conflict between state and divine law, because for Sophocles the true state law was built on the basis of the divine. In "Antigone" there is no conflict between the state and the family, because for Sophocles the duty of the state was to protect the natural rights of the family, and not a single Greek state forbade citizens to bury their relatives. In "Antigone" the conflict between the natural, divine and therefore truly state law and the individual who takes the liberty of representing the state contrary to the natural and divine law is revealed. Who has the upper hand in this clash? In any case, not Creon, despite the desire of a number of researchers to make him the true hero of the tragedy; the final moral collapse of Creon testifies to his complete failure. But can we consider Antigone the winner, alone in unrequited heroism and ingloriously ending her life in a gloomy dungeon? Here we need to take a closer look at what place its image occupies in tragedy and by what means it is created. In quantitative terms, the role of Antigone is very small - only about two hundred verses, almost half that of Creon. In addition, the entire last third of the tragedy, leading the action to the denouement, takes place without her participation. With all this, Sophocles not only convinces the viewer that Antigone is right, but also inspires him with deep sympathy for the girl and admiration for her selflessness, inflexibility, fearlessness in the face of death. The unusually sincere, deeply touching complaints of Antigone occupy a very important place in the structure of the tragedy. First of all, they deprive her image of any touch of sacrificial asceticism that could arise from the first scenes, where she so often confirms her readiness for death. Antigone appears before the viewer as a full-blooded, living person, to whom nothing human is alien either in thoughts or in feelings. The richer the image of Antigone with such sensations, the more impressive is her unshakable loyalty to her moral duty. Sophocles quite consciously and purposefully forms an atmosphere of imaginary loneliness around his heroine, because in such an environment her heroic nature is fully manifested. Of course, Sophocles did not force his heroine to die in vain, despite her obvious moral rightness - he saw what a threat to Athenian democracy, which stimulated the all-round development of the individual, is fraught at the same time with the hypertrophied self-determination of this personality in her desire to subjugate the natural rights of man. However, not everything in these laws seemed to Sophocles quite explicable, and the best evidence of this is the problematic nature of human knowledge already outlined in Antigone. “Fast as the wind thought” (phronema) Sophocles in the famous “hymn to man” ranked among the greatest achievements of the human race (353-355), adjoining his predecessor Aeschylus in assessing the possibilities of the mind. If the fall of Creon is not rooted in the unknowability of the world (his attitude towards the murdered Polynices is in clear contradiction with well-known moral norms), then with Antigone the situation is more complicated. Like Yemena at the beginning of the tragedy, so subsequently Creon and the choir consider her act a sign of recklessness,22 and Antigone realizes that her behavior can be regarded in this way (95, cf. 557). The essence of the problem is formulated in the couplet that concludes Antigone's first monologue: although Creon sees her act as stupid, it seems that the accusation of stupidity comes from a fool (f. 469). The finale of the tragedy shows that Antigone was not mistaken: Creon is paying for her foolishness, and we must give the girl's feat the full measure of heroic "reasonableness", since her behavior coincides with objectively existing, eternal divine law. But since for her loyalty to this law Antigone is awarded not glory, but death, she has to question the reasonableness of such an outcome. What law of the gods have I broken? therefore Antigone asks. “Why should I, unhappy, still look at the gods, what allies to call for help if, acting piously, I deserved the accusation of impiety?” (921-924). “Look, the elders of Thebes ... what I endure - and from such a person! - although I piously revered the heavens. For the hero of Aeschylus, piety guaranteed final triumph; for Antigone, it leads to a shameful death; subjective "reasonableness" of human behavior leads to an objectively tragic result - a contradiction arises between the human and divine minds, the resolution of which is achieved at the cost of self-sacrifice of heroic individuality Euripides. (480 BC - 406 BC). Almost all of the surviving plays by Euripides were created during the Peloponnesian War (431-404 BC) between Athens and Sparta, which had a huge impact on all aspects of the life of ancient Hellas. And the first feature of the tragedies of Euripides is the burning modernity: heroic-patriotic motives, hostility to Sparta, the crisis of ancient slave-owning democracy, the first crisis of religious consciousness associated with the rapid development of materialistic philosophy, etc. In this regard, the attitude of Euripides to mythology is especially indicative: the myth becomes for the playwright only material for reflecting contemporary events; he allows himself to change not only the minor details of classical mythology, but also to give unexpected rational interpretations of well-known plots (for example, in Iphigenia in Tauris, human sacrifices are explained by the cruel customs of the barbarians). The gods in the works of Euripides often appear more cruel, insidious and vindictive than people (Hippolytus, Hercules, etc.). It is precisely for this reason, “by the contrary”, that the technique of “dues ex machina” (“God from the machine”) has become so widespread in the dramaturgy of Euripides, when in the finale of the work God suddenly appears and hastily administers justice. In the interpretation of Euripides, divine providence could hardly consciously take care of restoring justice. However, the main innovation of Euripides, which caused rejection among most of his contemporaries, was the depiction of human characters. Euripides, as Aristotle already noted in his Poetics, brought people to the stage as they are in life. The heroes and especially the heroines of Euripides by no means possess integrity, their characters are complex and contradictory, and high feelings, passions, thoughts are closely intertwined with base ones. This gave the tragic characters of Euripides versatility, evoking in the audience a complex range of feelings - from empathy to horror. Expanding the palette of theatrical and visual means, he widely used everyday vocabulary; along with the choir, increased the volume of the so-called. monody (solo singing of an actor in a tragedy). Monodia was introduced into the theatrical use by Sophocles, but the widespread use of this technique is associated with the name of Euripides. The clash of opposite positions of characters in the so-called. agonakh (verbal competitions of characters) Euripides exacerbated through the use of the technique of stichomythia, i.e. exchange of poems of the participants in the dialogue.

Medea. The image of a suffering person is the most characteristic feature of Euripides' work. In the man himself there are forces that can plunge him into the abyss of suffering. Such a person is, in particular, Medea, the heroine of the tragedy of the same name, staged in 431. The sorceress Medea, the daughter of the Colchis king, having fallen in love with Jason, who arrived in Colchis, provided him with once invaluable help, teaching him to overcome all obstacles and get the golden fleece. As a sacrifice to Jason, she brought her homeland, maiden honor, good name; the harder Medea is now experiencing Jason's desire to leave her with her two sons after several years of a happy family life and marry the daughter of the Corinthian king, who also orders Medea and the children to get out of his country. The offended and abandoned woman plots a terrible plan: not only to destroy her rival, but also to kill her own children; so she can fully take revenge on Jason. The first half of this plan is carried out without much difficulty: supposedly resigned to her position, Medea sends Jason's bride an expensive outfit saturated with poison through her children. The gift is favorably accepted, and now Medea faces the most difficult test - she must kill the children. The thirst for revenge struggles in her with maternal feelings, and she changes her mind four times until a messenger appears with a terrible message: the princess and her father died in terrible agony from poison, and a crowd of angry Corinthians hurries to Medea's house to deal with her and her children . Now, when the boys are threatened with imminent death, Medea finally decides on a terrible atrocity. Before Jason returning in anger and despair, Medea appears on a magical chariot hovering in the air; on the lap of the mother are the corpses of the children she killed. The atmosphere of magic that surrounds the finale of the tragedy and, to some extent, the appearance of Medea herself, cannot hide the deeply human content of her image. Unlike the heroes of Sophocles, who never deviate from the once chosen path, Medea is shown in multiple transitions from furious anger to prayers, from indignation to imaginary humility, in the struggle of conflicting feelings and thoughts. The deepest tragedy of the image of Medea is also given by sad reflections on the share of a woman, whose position in the Athenian family was really unenviable: being under the vigilant supervision of first her parents, and then her husband, she was doomed to remain a recluse in the female half of the house all her life. In addition, when marrying, no one asked the girl about her feelings: marriages were concluded by parents who were striving for a deal that was beneficial for both parties. Medea sees the profound injustice of this state of affairs, which places a woman at the mercy of a stranger, an unfamiliar person, often not inclined to burden himself too much with marriage ties.

Yes, among those who breathe and who think, We, women, are not more unhappy. For husbands We pay, and not cheap. And if you buy it, So he is your master, not a slave ... After all, a husband, when the hearth is disgusting to him, On the side of the heart amuses with love, They have friends and peers, and we have to look into the eyes of the hateful. The everyday atmosphere of Athens contemporary to Euripides also affected the image of Jason, far from any kind of idealization. A selfish careerist, a student of the sophists, who knows how to turn any argument in his favor, he either justifies his perfidy with references to the well-being of children, for whom his marriage should provide civil rights in Corinth, or he explains the help received once from Medea by the omnipotence of Cyprida. The unusual interpretation of the mythological legend, the internally contradictory image of Medea was evaluated by Euripides' contemporaries in a completely different way than by subsequent generations of spectators and readers. The ancient aesthetics of the classical period admitted that in the struggle for the marital bed, an offended woman has the right to take the most extreme measures against her husband and her rival who cheated on her. But revenge, the victims of which are their own children, did not fit into the aesthetic norms that demanded inner integrity from the tragic hero. Therefore, the illustrious "Medea" was only in third place at the first production, that is, in essence, it failed.

17. Antique geocultural space. Phases of development of ancient civilization Cattle breeding, agriculture, metal mining, handicrafts, trade developed intensively. The patriarchal tribal organization of society disintegrated. The wealth inequality of families grew. The tribal nobility, which increased wealth through the widespread use of slave labor, waged a struggle for power. Public life proceeded rapidly - in social conflicts, wars, unrest, political upheavals. Antique culture throughout its existence remained in the arms of mythology. However, the dynamics of social life, the complication of social relations, the growth of knowledge undermined the archaic forms of mythological thinking. Having learned from the Phoenicians the art of alphabetic writing and improved it by introducing letters denoting vowel sounds, the Greeks were able to record and accumulate historical, geographical, astronomical information, collect observations related to natural phenomena, technical inventions, mores and customs of people. The need to maintain public order in the state demanded the replacement of unwritten tribal norms of behavior enshrined in myths with logically clear and ordered codes of laws. Public political life stimulated the development of oratory, the ability to convince people, contributing to the growth of a culture of thinking and speech. The improvement of production and handicraft work, urban construction, and military art went beyond the framework of ritual and ceremonial samples consecrated by myth. Signs of civilization: * division of physical labor and mental; *writing; * the emergence of cities as centers of cultural and economic life. Features of civilization: -the presence of a center with the concentration of all spheres of life and their weakening on the periphery (when urban residents call "village" residents of small towns); -ethnic core (people) - in Ancient Rome - Romans, in Ancient Greece - Hellenes (Greeks); -formed ideological system (religion); - a tendency to expand (geographically, culturally); cities; -single information field with language and writing; -formation of external trade relations and zones of influence; -stages of development (growth - peak of prosperity - decline, death or transformation). Features of ancient civilization: 1) Agricultural basis. Mediterranean triad - cultivation without artificial irrigation of cereals, grapes and olives. 2) Private property relations, the dominance of private commodity production, oriented mainly to the market, manifested itself. 3) "polis" - "city-state", covering the city itself and the territory adjacent to it. Polises were the first republics in the history of all mankind. The ancient form of land ownership dominated in the polis community, it was used by those who were members of the civil community. Under the polis system, hoarding was condemned. In most policies, the supreme body of power was the people's assembly. He had the right to make a final decision on the most important polis issues. The polis was an almost complete coincidence of political structure, military organization and civil society. 4) In the field of development of material culture, the emergence of new technology and material values ​​was noted, handicrafts developed, sea harbors were built and new cities arose, and the construction of sea transport was underway. Periodization of ancient culture: 1) The Homeric era (XI-IX centuries BC) The main form of social control is the "culture of shame" - a direct condemning reaction of the people to the deviation of the hero's behavior from the norm. The gods are regarded as part of nature, a person, worshiping the gods, can and should build relationships with them rationally. The Homeric era demonstrates competitiveness (agon) as a norm of cultural creation and lays the agonal foundation of all European culture 2) Archaic era (VIII-VI centuries BC) everyone. A society is being formed in which every full-fledged citizen - the owner and politician, expressing private interests through the maintenance of public ones, peaceful virtues come to the fore. The gods protect and maintain a new social and natural order (cosmos), in which relations are regulated by the principles of cosmic compensation and measure and are subject to rational comprehension in various natural-philosophical systems. 3) The era of the classics (5th century BC) - the rise of the Greek genius in all areas of culture - art, literature, philosophy and science. At the initiative of Pericles in the center of Athens, the Parthenon was erected on the acropolis - the famous temple in honor of the virgin Athena. Tragedies, comedies and satyr dramas were staged in the Athenian theater. The victory of the Greeks over the Persians, the realization of the advantages of law over arbitrariness and despotism contributed to the formation of the idea of ​​a person as an independent (autarkic) person. The law takes on the character of a rational legal idea to be discussed. In the era of Pericles, social life serves the self-development of man. At the same time, the problems of human individualism begin to be realized, and the problem of the unconscious opens up before the Greeks. 4) The era of Hellenism (4th century BC) samples of Greek culture spread throughout the world as a result of the conquests of Alexander the Great. But at the same time, ancient policies lost their former independence. The cultural baton was taken over by Ancient Rome. The main cultural achievements of Rome date back to the era of the empire, when the cult of practicality, the state, and law dominated. The main virtues were politics, war, government.

The first great Greek playwright was Aeschylus (c. 525-456 BC). A participant in the battle of the Greeks with the Persians at Marathon, he showed the tragic defeat of the Greeks in this war in the drama "Perst".

At the competition of tragic poets, Aeschylus spoke for the first time in 500 BC. e., won the first victory in 484 BC. e. Subsequently, he took 1st place 12 more times, and after the death of Aeschylus (in Sicily), it was allowed to resume his tragedies as new dramas. By introducing a second actor and reducing the role of the choir, Aeschylus turned the tragedy-cantata, as it was still with Phrynichus, into a tragedy - a dramatic action based on a vital clash of personalities and their worldview. The introduction of Aeschylus into the Oresteia, following the example of Sophocles, the 3rd actor, contributed to a further deepening of the conflict. In total, Aeschylus wrote over 80 works (tragedies and satyr dramas), most of them combined into coherent tetralogy. Completely 7 tragedies and a significant number of fragments have come down to us. The tragedies "Persians" (472 BC), "Seven against Thebes" (467 BC) and the trilogy "Oresteia" (458 BC), consisting of the tragedies "Agamemnon" are reliably dated. ”,“ Choephors ”(“ Weepers ”,“ Sacrifice at the Tomb ”) and“ Eumenides ”. Tragedy. "Prayers" ("Pleaders") were usually attributed to the early period of Aeschylus' work.

After the discovery in 1952 of a papyrus fragment of the didascalium for the Danaids trilogy (which included The Prayers), most researchers tend to date it to 463 BC. e., however, the artistic features of the "Prayers" are more consistent with our idea of ​​\u200b\u200bthe work of Aeschylus in the middle. 70s, and the didascalia could refer to a posthumous production. There is also no unanimity in determining the date of "Prometheus Chained"; its stylistic features speak rather in favor of late dating.

In his dramas, Aeschylus develops the theme of man's responsibility to the gods. Whether a person violates the plans and will of the gods, pride prevents him from humble himself before them, - in any case, inevitable retribution awaits him. The immortal gods do not forgive a person's freedom-loving impulses. Before fate, you just need to reconcile. And the man accepted the inevitable verdict of fate. It was not a call for humility and passivity. It was a call to the courageous realization of their inevitable fate. Heroism, and not at all humility, is imbued with the dramas and tragedies of Aeschylus. In Prometheus, the playwright showed a daring rebellion against God: Prometheus stole fire from the gods to bring it to mortal people; Zeus chained Prometheus to a rock, where an eagle daily pecked at the liver. But neither Zeus nor the eagle can defeat the resistance of Prometheus: after all, people mastered fire in their earthly life. The Oresteia occupies a special place in the work of Aeschylus. This is a trilogy about revenge and redemption: the Homeric hero Agamemnon is killed by his wife and her lover; son and daughter take revenge on the killers. Crime must be punished; murderers cannot escape their inevitable fate.

Sophocles (496 - 406 BC) - ancient Greek playwright, author of tragedies. He came from a family of a wealthy owner of a weapons workshop in the Athenian suburb of Kolon. He received an excellent general and artistic education. He was close to Pericles and people from his circle, including Herodotus and Phidias. He was elected to important positions - the keeper of the treasury of the Athenian Maritime Union (c. 444 BC), one of the strategists (442). Sophocles did not differ in special state talent, but because of his honesty and decency, he enjoyed deep respect among his compatriots all his life. For the first time Sophocles took part in the competition of tragic poets in 470 BC. e.; wrote over 120 dramas, i.e. performed with his tetralogy more than 30 times, winning a total of 24 victories and never dropping below 2nd place. Whole 7 tragedies have come down to us, about half of the satyr drama Pathfinders and a significant number of fragments, including papyrus.

The surviving tragedies are arranged approximately in chronological order: Ajax (mid-450s), Antigone (442 BC), Trachinian Women (2nd half of the 30s), Oedipus Rex (429 - 425 BC), Electra (420 - 410 BC), Philoctetes (409 BC), Oedipus in Colone" (post. posthumously in 401 BC).

Sophocles poses eternal problems in his tragedies: attitude towards religion ("Electra"), the free will of man and the will of the gods ("Oedipus Rex"), the interests of the individual and the state ("Philoctetes"). If for Aeschylus the clash of divine forces that determine human destiny was the spring of action, Sophocles looks for it inside a person - in the motives of his actions, in the movement of the human spirit. He pays special attention to the psychological development of the characters of his characters. Sophocles does not question the divine institution and its significance of man. He, like Aeschylus, emphasizes that everything is done by the will of Zeus, or fate. But human participation in the implementation of the will is expressed here more actively. Man himself is looking for ways to fulfill it. In the tragedies of Euripides (c. 480-406 BC), a critical look at mythology as the basis of Greek religion appears. They are full of philippics against the gods, and the gods are mostly assigned an unseemly role: they are heartless, vindictive, envious, deceitful, they steal, commit perjury, they allow the suffering and death of the innocent. Euripides is not concerned with the structure of the universe, but with the fate of man, his moral path. Among the works of Euripides, the famous tragedies with a pronounced psychological orientation, due to the playwright's interest in the personality of a person with all its contradictions and passions, stand out especially (Medea, Elektra).

Euripides (c. 484 - 406 BC) - Ancient Greek playwright. Born and often lived on the island of Salamis. First performed at the Athenian theater in 455 BC. e., won the first victory in the competition of tragic poets in 441 BC. e .. In the future, he did not enjoy the recognition of his contemporaries: during his lifetime he won 1st place only 4 times, the last, 5th victory was awarded to him posthumously. After 408, Euripides moved to Macedonia, to the court of King Archelaus, where he died.

Euripides wrote 92 dramas; 17 tragedies have come down to us, the satyr drama Cyclops and many fragments, including papyrus, indicating the enormous popularity of Euripides in the Hellenistic era. 8 tragedies of Euripides are dated quite reliably: Alcestidaves (438 BC), Medea (431 BC), Hippolytus (428 BC), Trojan Women "(415 BC), "Helen" (412 BC), "Orest" (408 BC), "Bacchae" and "Iphigenia in Aulis", set in 405 BC. e. posthumously. The rest - according to indirect evidence (historical hints, features of style and verse): "Heraclides" (430 BC), "Andromache" (425 - 423 BC), "Hecuba" . (424 BC), "The Petitioners" (422 - 420 BC), "Hercules" (the turn of the 420s BC), "Iphigenia in Tauris "(414 BC)," Electra "(413 BC, Phoenicians" (411 - 409 BC).

In the tragedies of Euripides, a critical look at mythology as the basis of the Greek religion appears. They are full of philippics against the gods, and the gods are mostly assigned an unseemly role: they are heartless, vindictive, envious, deceitful, they steal, commit perjury, they allow the suffering and death of the innocent. Euripides is not concerned with the structure of the universe, but with the fate of man, his moral path. Among the works of Euripides, the famous tragedies with a pronounced psychological orientation, due to the playwright's interest in the personality of a person with all its contradictions and passions, stand out especially (Medea, Elektra).

Especially the poet Aeschylus, who lived during the Greco-Persian wars, came up with a lot of new things for the theater. The performances began to depict not only myths, but also recent events. Aeschylus, himself a participant in the battle of Salamis, presented in the tragedy "Persians" the flight of the barbarians and the humiliation of the "great king".

To revive the theater, Aeschylus came up with the idea of ​​introducing a second actor. While only one actor left the stage, he could only tell in words about what happened to the god or hero he portrayed. Two actors, especially if they represented opponents, could reproduce the incident itself, could represent the action (drama in Greek). So that the actors could move more freely and still be taller than the choir, Aeschylus stopped taking them to the platform or on the wagon and provided them with high wooden heels or tethered benches. Aeschylus arranged the first scenery. His actors were supposed to play closer to the tent: they began to paint its front wall, giving it, depending on the play, the appearance of an altar, a rock, the front facade of a house with a door in the middle, etc. If in the play it was necessary to represent both people and gods , then the gods entered the flat roof of the tent to appear taller than people.

In the tragedies of Aeschylus, the plot was sublime or sad. The audience watched with bated breath as the goddesses of bloody ghosts pursued the unfortunate Orestes, who killed his mother because she treacherously slaughtered her husband Agamemnon, father of Orestov, when he returned home after the capture of Troy. They were deeply worried, looking at the hero Prometheus, chained to a rock, a noble friend of people, punished by Zeus because he stole fire from the sky for people, taught them work and raised animals above the rough life.

Many citizens took part in theatrical performances. It was not actors by trade who played on the stage, but amateurs who were constantly changing. Even more shifts were needed for the performance of choirs and dances. The play was usually performed only once. The public demanded four new dramas for each great holiday: three tragedies and one play of mocking content in conclusion. The Athenian poets were therefore very prolific. A contemporary of Pericles, Sophocles, wrote over 120 plays. Among the few that have come down to us, there are three tragedies related to each other in content. They depict the suffering of King Oedipus and the misfortunes of his children.

The king's son Oedipus, who, according to his parents, is dead, kills his father in an accidental quarrel, whom he did not know at all. He then rules happily ever after, until a heavy pestilence sets in among the people. Then the soothsayer announces that this is the punishment for the great sin of the king. Oedipus, horrified by what he has learned, renounces power and gouges out his eyes, but trouble haunts his house: his two sons kill each other in a dispute for power; his daughter dies because she wanted to bury her murdered exiled brother. There is no fault on all these people; they are looking for a better way in their actions; they perish because their condemnation has already been decided and predicted in advance. The idea of ​​this drama is that a person, no matter how he builds his life, no matter how high impulses he has, is still powerless against fate.

In the dramas of Sophocles, the action was diversified by lively pictures. In his play Ajax, the hero of the Trojan War is presented, who fell into a wild frenzy when the armor of the murdered Achilles was awarded not to him, but to Odysseus; Ajax's wife informs the choir of his comrades that Ajax, in a rage and blinded, killed a herd of rams, mistaking them for Odysseus and his soldiers; during these words, the doors of the stage tent swing wide open: a platform leaves them on wheels and on it is the unfortunate, lost Ajax among the figures of animals killed by him; after a few minutes this moving scene is rolled back and the action continues.

During the Peloponnesian War, Euripides* stood out among dramatic writers. As usual, he chose content from myths, but under the guise of heroes he portrayed contemporary people. In the dramas of Euripides, the misfortunes and death of a person are presented as a consequence of his character and the mistakes that he made. Various questions are raised in the conversations of the characters: strength or truth triumphs in the world, is it possible to believe in the gods, etc. These conversations sometimes resemble disputes and evidence in an Athenian court.

* Euripides.

Euripides came up with a lot of new things for the theater. His play usually began with a large living picture. In order not to prepare it in front of the audience and not spoil the impression, they began to arrange a curtain in front of the stage, between its elongated side walls: this is how a quadrangular place turned out between the back decoration, side walls (backstage) and the curtain. This place, which has since been called the stage, was elevated above the orchestra; the actors came out of the back door, and the choir from the sides of the tent; passing around the orchestra, the choir entered the wide steps onto the stage.

In the plays of Euripides, new effects were prepared towards the end: the hero takes off into the air on a winged horse; the sorceress is taken away into the clouds by dragons, etc. The audience is accustomed to looking up at the end of the action. The denouement was usually brought by a god or an enlightened hero who appeared from heaven. For this, a special machine was invented (our word machine comes from the Greek mehane, which means lifting for flight): the wings were stretched upwards much higher than the tent; ropes were stretched between these wings, along which it was possible to move a basket where actors were sitting, depicting the gods in the air; behind the ropes the wide wall was painted with the blue of the sky; or hooks were attached to the posts at the edges, which held the basket with the actors and turned towards the middle.

The performances differed from ours in that the actors covered their faces with a mask that changed depending on the nature of the figure depicted. Women's roles were played by men. Greek tragedy was somewhat like our opera: the choir sang several songs; the characters, in addition to the usual conversation, still measuredly recited poetry in a singsong voice.

In the Greek theater, only the stage was covered. The audience crowded or sat around the open orchestra. To give them more space, stone ledges were built around the orchestra, rising up in ever wider circles. Below, closer to the stage, they placed the main persons in the city, chiefs, members of the council and guests of honor from other cities.

The theater of the Greeks could accommodate incomparably more spectators than ours: more than 20-30 thousand people. He served not only for performances; in its wide room they converged to listen to music, to listen to the reading of poems and speeches. The speaker (rhetor) chose a subject that could inspire those present, for example, about the fight against the Persians. The listeners followed him as attentively as in the national assembly, appreciated the beautiful turns of speech and rewarded him with warm approval.