Contributions of Aeschylus and Sophocles to DramaThe most prestigious of the drama festivals held in Athens was the City Dionysia, held of a six-day period. Hundreds of visitors, dignitaries, and rural citizens crowded the city to see the spectacle. Aeschylus (524-456 B.C.) and Sophocles (496-406 ...

In southeastern Europe, along the Mediterranean Sea is the mountainous peninsula called Greece. It is a small country (only about 50,000 squares miles in area) and almost the size of New York. Greece is a very beautiful land. The long coast line is so broken that the deep blue sea seems to be every...

The Aristotelian view of drama required an imitation of life, but his heroes were invariably members of the noble class. He regarded Sophocles' Oedipus Rex as the perfect play. Given this viewpoint, and given the stranglehold that Aristotle had over Europe over the next sixteen centuries, it is no...

The reputations that people carry have a lot to do with their code of honour. Showing honour makes a person respected and strong and dishonour brings shame and misfortune. In the Greek tragedy Antigone written by Sophocles and the Shakespearean tragedy Othello written by William Shakespeare, honou...

COSTUMES AND MASKS IN GREEK DRAMA Greek Drama originated at the beginning of the 5th Century. It began as religious festivals and continued on to purposes such as entertainment and dealing with political, social, moral or ethical issues of the time. There were many famous Greek Playwrights such ...

Sophocles' drama is a perfect example of Aristotle's paradigm. Aristotle states that tragedy is "drama whose main characters are noble, and the chief point of tragedy is to show how a person's fortune can change because of circumstances that are-or may sometimes seem to be-beyond...

Oedipus: The Tragic Hero (#3) In "Oedipus the King," Sophocles concocts one of the most famous and intricate characters of Greek drama. A tragic hero, Oedipus' desire for self-discovery and understanding inevitably leads to his tragic downfall. In the end, it can be seen that Oedipus' ...

In Ancient Greece, boys go to school, while the girls stayed at home to help their moms cook and look after the household. In Athens, it was a man's world. In the family, the father was the head of the family. The wife stayed at home and ran the household. The husband could divorce, if the wife wa...

The theatre in the City Dionysia was a great semi-circle on the slope of the Acropolis, with rows of stone seats. The front row consisted of marble chairs; these were reserved for the priests of Dionysus and the chief magistrates. Beyond the front row was a circular space called the orchestra, where...

In his book Technique of the Drama (1863), the German critic Gustav Freytag created a method for understanding the narrative structure of a drama called Freytag's Triangle, also known as Freytag's Pyramid because of its focus on the climax of the tale as the most important part of any story(&qu...

My interpretation of Antigone: Drama My interpretation of Antigone was an enjoyable one. I had mixed emotions between knowing how to feel towards the characters. One strong point that geared me to enjoying the play as much as I did was feminism; to read about a woman going...

The Character Change of Oedipus The character Oedipus in Sophocles' drama Oedipus the King goes through an unfortunate but necessary character change. From a prideful, heroic king at the beginning of the play, to a tyrant in denial towards the middle, and finally to a fearful, condemned...

When a piece of work has a serious drama typically describing a conflict between the protagonist and a superior force, and has a sorrowful or disastrous conclusion that excites pity or terror, it classifies as a tragedy. The most famous tragedies were written by authors hundreds of years ago. Tho...

Authorial InformationEuripides was born in 484 BC and took up drama at the young age of 25. At most drama competitions, however his plays came in last place until he was about 45 or 50 years old. In his entire life, he wrote 92 plays of which only five received first place awards at competition. Eur...

Dramatist of Greek Tragedy There were many dramatists in the years of B.C. There were three of them that were known more than any other. Aeschylus, Euripides, and Sophocles. These three guys are much alike but they also have their differences. The "Father of Tragedy," Aeschylus was bor...

In his play, Antigone, Sophocles makes a great interpretation of tragic drama. His genius created a striking conflict between two characters Antigone and Creon that is developed through out the story from the very beginning until the last pages. Both of the characters have their unbreakable ideas an...

Before the year 479 BCE, most of the innovations from the Greeks were art in its most common form and in the mathematics and sciences. Examples of this are Pythagoras in 525; he developed a throm about right triangles. It wasn\'t until aproxiamtely 458 Bce that the first tragedy was created. Drama h...

The Missing Dialogue in Antigone After reading Antigone, one might feel that there is lacking a dialogue between Antigone and Haimon before their deaths. Sophocles does not include any direct communication between the two lovers during this drama. The reader might assume that such a c...

The Role of Fate and the Gods in Antigone Divine law can be defined as a rule or regulation coming directly from the gods. According to Greek mythology, each god is believed to possess individual and unique powers that can either help or hinder the lives of mortals. Their role in the lives of h...

"CONSIDER THE ROLE OF MINOR CHARACTERS IN THE PLAY. WHAT DO THEY DO TO CONTRIBUTE TO THE DRAMA?" The drama 'Oedipus the King' is a classical tragedy by Sophocles set in the ancient city of Thebes. The characters learn that the city is corrupted by a deadly plague, leadin...

In the story of Antigone, an argument of who is the main character between Antigone and Creon exists. I firmly believe Creon is the protagonist of the play due to his role as the key figure of the entire story and being a the traditional tragic hero in the end. Creon ends up to be one of...

Tragedy involves the downfall of an important figure, the protagonist, who usually becomes isolated or detached from his or her environment or social standing (Tragic pg). Moreover, the downfall includes others as well, such as his or her family or a society as a whole (Tragic pg). Unlike comedy, w...

One of the most important parts of a Greek drama was the chorus. It was made up of fifteen to twenty men who represented citizens. They had nine functions: set the tone, give background information, recall past events, summarize events, ask questions, give opinions, give advice, stay objective, and ...

The story of Oedipus, one of the first examples of a literary tragic hero, is of a man plunged suddenly from prosperity and power to ruin and disrepute. We see him at the height and the depth of his worldly fortunes. Oedipus, whom in the first scene the Priest calls \"the first of men,\" to whom all...

Aristotle's key principles as found in Oedipus the King Drama was an important way to transmit culture, education, morality and religion during the Golden Age of Greek theatre, which lasted from about 500bc to 400bc. There were three main tragedians in Greece at this time. Aeschylus, also k...