Greek Drama - Medea
Background to Greek Theater
- Theater
Design
- Open air theaters seating 15,000
- Orchestra - Where chorus sang and danced
- Skene - Stage building
- Proscenium - Stage in front of the skene
- Parodos - Entry from side for characters arriving from
outside the city
- Theater at Epidaurius
- Structure and Scope
- Costumes and Masks to accommodate large open-air theaters.
- Mythic plots emphasizing humanism
- Drama divided into three sections:
- Prologue
- Episodes and Chorus
- Exodos
- Three uniting principles
- Time - 24 hour
- Place - set in one city
- Action - one plot
- Violent events off stage - passionate speech on stage
Euripides' Medea
- Themes
- Witch archetype
- Neutral power of woman to transform
- Use of transformative power for evil is the pattern of the witch
- Apollonian vs. the Dionysian
- The rational - Apollonian
- The irrational - Dionysian
- The presentations, and transformation of Jason and Medea reflect
these archetypes
- Overt vs. covert elements
- Contrasts of male vs female
- Hellenic context - male's world is public and overt... female the
inverse
- Overt power Vs covert power
- The cultural significance of oaths
- Racial clashes - Greeks Vs Persians
- Plot
- Prologue - Background
- First Episode - Medea's
Version
- Second Episode - Jason's Version
- Third Episode - King Aegeus Provides
Cover
- Forth Episode - The Deception
- Fifth Episode - The Dilemma
- Sixth Episode - The Execution
- Seventh Episode - Revenge
- Exodus - The God's Surprise
Humanities
Resource of Mark Hunter