Greek Tragedy and the Culture of Fifth

HIST 207.3: GREEK TRAGEDY AND THE CULTURE OF
FIFTH-CENTURY ATHENS
2015-2016, Term 2 — TR 1:00-2:20
An examination of the
dramatic, literary, social, and
intellectual contexts that
inform fifth-century Athenian
tragedy
Works and topics to be discussed:
• conditions of staging and performance conventions of 5th-century Athenian
tragedy
• Aeschylus’ Persians and Agamemnon: views of the gods and divine justice
• Sophocles’ Electra and Antigone: women on the tragic stage and polis ideology
• Euripides’ Medea and Electra: women on the tragic stage and sophistic
psychology
• Euripides’ Heracles, Helen, Sophocles’ Philoctetes: Athenian tragedy and
sophistic metaphysics
• adaptations in modern film — Peter Hall, Agamemnon; Woody Allen, Mighty
Aphrodite; Don Taylor, Antigone; Michael Cacoyannis, Electra; Jules
Dassin, A Dream of Passion; Kirk Browning, The Gospel at Colonus
For further information, contact Professor John Porter at: john.porter@usask.ca