This course offers an in-depth introduction to Greek tragedy.
The lectures cover Greek tragedy’s origins, explore its development and function in 5th-century B.C. Athens, and discuss the narratives and topics that made up the plots.
The course examines the major tragedies in depth, paying particular attention to Aeschylus’s Oresteia, Sophocles’s Theban plays (Antigone, Oedipus the King, and Oedipus at Colonus), and several plays by Euripides.
Finally, the course considers why a genre that flourished for so short a period in Greek history continues to exercise so strong an influence on modern Western culture and imagination.
The course discusses several views of tragedy, including those of Aristotle, Aristophanes, Nietzsche, Freud, and the Cambridge Ritualists.