1. The Lost Dimension of Greek Tragedy
Author(s): Peter D. Arnott
Reviewed work(s):
Source: Educational Theatre Journal, Vol. 11, No. 2 (May, 1959), pp. 99-102
Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3204731 .
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2. THELOSTDIMENSION
OF
GREEK
TRAGEDY
PETER D. ARNOTT
In a recent article in these pages1 Mr. Aristophanes rewrote his Clouds after its
William J. Calder has raised several in- dismal first reception, but it is far from
teresting questions about the perform- certain whether the revised version was
ance and appreciation of Greek tragedy. ever performed; competition for the
He rightly stresses the need for pro- available time was too severe. Revivals
duction as a means to understanding, became popular only with the fourth
and, equally rightly, criticizes Profes- century, when the dearth of good play-
sor Webster's view that the dramatist wrights and the growing secularization
wrote mainly with an eye to the reading of the theatre, with a consequent in-
public. Quoting from the population crease in performances, forced actors to
figures of fifth-century Attica, he con- fall back on old material. As Aristotle
cludes that, as the dramatist could reach tells us, the fifth century was the age of
most of his followers in the one per- poets, the fourth the age of actors. The
formance allowed him, it was in pro- great tragedies were continually revived,
duction, not in publication, that he suffering numerous corruptions and
found his main channel of approach. spectacular interpolations in the process.
I believe, however, that while Professor In the fifth century, as Mr. Calder
Webster and Mr. Calder each see part shows, the dramatist could count on
of the truth, the real answer lies some- only one performance, and made that
where in between; and I shall attempt as powerful as he could. But could he
here to develop this argument and its convey his full message in a playing
relevance to present-day revivals. time of some ninety minutes? We must
It is true that the fifth-century dram- beware of over-estimating the intelli-
atist could never be certain of a re- gence of the public. The fifth-century
vival in his life-time. The plays were audience is usually characterized as
part of a communal act of worship, erudite and quick-witted, ever ready to
performed only on certain specific oc- pick up a hint or allusion-largely on
casions. Not every dramatist could emu- the evidence of Aristophanic comedy,
late Aeschylus and go on tour to Sicily. which is full of parodies, quotations,
Peter D. Arnott is at present Visiting Lecturer
and allusions. It is certainly true that
in Classics at the State University of Iowa. He Aristophanes can still mock the cele-
has recently published translations of The
Birds and The Brothers Menaechmus (Crofts
brated gaffe of the actor Hegelochus
Classics). three years after it was perpetrated;2 and
1 The Single-Performance Fallacy, ETJ.
Oct., 1958. 2 Frogs, v. 303.

3. 100 EDUCATIONAL THEATRE JOURNAL
the debate between Aeschylus and Eu- memnon choruses would be absorbed in
ripides in the same play seems to pre- these conditions?
suppose an audience au fait with poetic There is another important factor
technicalities and green-room gossip. relevant to the choruses; that they were
But in a small and segregated commun- not declaimed but sung, to the accom-
ity good jokes would tend to remain in paniment of elaborate dance figures.
currency for a long time; and I have The fact is known, but its implications
myself performed Frogs to audiences rarely realized. Dance was an integral
who had never heard of Aeschylus and part of dramatic production. Acting and
Euripides, but still accepted the play as dancing were closely allied, and the
hilarious comedy. chorus movements were highly involved.
Surely we come nearer to the vulgar Phrynichus and Aeschylus were famous
reaction in Aristophanes' Birds." Here not only as poets but as choreographers.
the chorus give as one advantage of The former boasted that he had com-
wearing wings that the spectator who is posed as many dance figures as there
"bored by a tragic chorus" can fly away, were waves on the sea, and the latter
have a meal, and return in time for seems to have been hardly less ingenious.
the comedy. Again, Euripides' complaint Dancing was vigorous and mimetic, rep-
in Frogs that Aeschuylus' choruses resenting a wide range of emotions. Not
"would wade through a string of songs every dance would have been as active
four on end, while the actors said not as those in Bacchae, or in Sophocles'
a word"4 must have expressed the Searching Satyrs, whose chorus bend
thoughts of many a man in the Athenian double with their noses to the ground;
street who found the elaborate choral but there would normally have been a
structures passing above his head, and considerable amount of movement.
The little we know of Greek music is
longed for the robust diversions of
comedy and satyr-play. The Theatre of equally suggestive. How much do we
Dionysus, too, had its groundlings. hear of a modern opera chorus? The
two are not strictly comparable, but
This prompts a further, again slightly
there is surely a sufficient similarity.
heretical, question. Would even the in-
Turning again to Frogs,5 we find Diony-
telligentsia have grasped everything at sus commenting on Aeschylus' Persians,
one sitting? Several considerations sug- whose chorus "stood clapping their
gest that they would not. Tragedy seems hands like this, and shouting 'Yowoi!' "
to abominate a dramatic pause. Action This exclamation does not occur in
is always covered by dialogue; entrances Aeschylus' text; and in spite of mis-
come during the lines, not between guided attempt to write it in, is it not
them. Even the later commentators no- more likely that Dionysus means that
tice this fact. Tragedy is more like dra- he found the words unintelligible?
matic oratorio than drama, and when a I suggest, therefore, that the dramatist
dramatic pause does occur, it has the wrote both with performance and pub-
effect of a sudden rest in a symphony. lication in mind. The immediate impact
There was no opportunity for things to would come with performance, and I
sink in. How much of the compressed, shall venture to say that here the effect
highly complicated thought of the Aga- of the chorus would have been mainly
spectacular. As F. L. Lucas has happily
8 Vv. 785ff.
4Vv. 914ff. Vv. izo8ff.

4. THE LOST DIMENSION OF GREEK TRAGEDY 101
put it, "Where the modern spectator ing, certainly; but the folly of attempt-
refreshes himself with ten minutes in ing to interpret Greek drama with mod-
the theatre buffet, the Greek listened to ern, naturalistic methods has been plen-
a burst of music and poetry."6 But we tifully demonstrated.
must not forget that our present texts This is more than a question of ped-
are only the libretti of wonderful operas, antry. By speaking the choruses we risk
and many nuances would have been disturbing the balance of the play, of
lost in the theatre. Those who wished dragging into the theatre something
to study the philosophy of the choruses, properly belonging to the study. The
the full beauty of thought and language, beauty of the classical method was dem-
would have to have recourse to the pub- onstrated for me by two productions of
lished text, just as Dionysus in Frogs Lysistrata in 1957, one in London, the
speaks of himself as sitting on board other in Athens. In the former the
ship reading Euripides' Andromeda. chorus was blended with the actors as
This raises an important question of Hourmouzios suggests, singing, it is
production. Are we falsifying the dram- true, but in a naturalistic, almost apol-
atist's intention by splitting up the ogetic manner. The result was a sense
choruses, declaiming them and giving of strain and artificiality. In Athens
each word full weight? Are we not giv- the chorus of 48 was given full ballet
ing them the wrong sort of emphasis? treatment, with music by the popular
Do they not (heresy again) grow some- composer Hadzidakis. Though half the
what tedious, particularly in some plays words were lost, there was no sense of
of Euripides where the content is neg- deprivation. Here, it seemed, was Greek
ligible? This has been thrashed out in comedy as it should be played, with full
a recent debate, recorded in World The- attention to spectacle even at the ex-
atre.7 The chief exponent of the modern pense of the text.
view is emil Hourmouzios, Director-
Unfortunately, producers feel com-
General of the Greek National Theatre.
pelled to treat tragedy with greater re-
Dismissing "pedantic adherence to an spect. Minotis' production of Hecuba
archaeological tradition" he holds that at the same Athens Festival lost the
"if we consider the chorus as a group- effect of a beautifully rhythmical chorus
actor having the same obligations as the
entry by later splitting them into groups
leading actors of the drama, we arrive and allowing them to converse naturally.
... at results more aesthetically convinc- It is now, of course, impossible to re-
ing.... Besides, it would be unjust and construct the Greek unity of music,
harmful to sacrifice the logos, suffocating
song, and dance. What dramatic music
it with musical additions and dancing survived the classical period was swal-
exhibitions of doubtful value." The last
lowed up in the religious controversies
three words beg the question. The of Byzantium, and we are left with only
dramatists certainly did not intend their the fragment from Orestes. But we
words to be unaccompanied, and there should not merely accept the loss and
is no need for the music to be bad.
do nothing. A whole dimension of the
Hourmouzios concludes "Group recita- performances has vanished, and cannot
tion and mimicry is a negation of the be recaptured by excessive reverence for
very nature of acting." Of modern act- the text. Experiments now in progress
6 Medea, Cambridge University Press, 1923. With Byzantine music may prove fruit-
v. o319n.
7Vol. VI no. 4, Winter, 1957. ful. Failing that, we have two alter-

5. 102 EDUCATIONAL THEATRE JOURNAL
natives. We can write our own music: change, or the technique used in the
in England, at the Department of modern Greek verse play Dighenis,
Drama of Bristol University, Professor where two of the chorus mime the story
H. D. F. Kitto has produced a musical the others are telling. This could be very
Antigone which was notably successful, effective in the "sacrifice of Iphigeneia"
and I have myself used Welsh folk mu- chorus in Agamemnon. But whatever
sic for the choruses of Cyclops; alterna- happens, the chorus must be a distinct
tively, we must compensate the audience formal unit; to treat it realistically, to
for the lack of spectacle by something make it merely another group of actors,
else-perhaps an elaborate lighting is to nullify the whole spirit of tragedy.
De Gustibus...
You make me laugh with your rules, which you are always blasting in our
cars, to confound the ignorant. To hear you talk, one would think that these
rules of art are the greatest mysteries in the world; and yet they are only a few
obvious observations that common sense has made, regarding what can diminish
one's pleasure in such productions. And the same common sense which made
these observations long ago readily makes them over again every day, without
any help from Horace and Aristotle. I should like to know if the great rule of
all rules is not merely to give pleasure, and if a play which has attained this end
has not taken the right course.
-Moliere, The Critique of The School
for Wives, Dorante speaking