Culture is an Attic tragedy which. What is ancient Greece

We find a completely different attitude to reality, to the subject of history in Thucydides, who described the Peloponnesian War. Times shrouded in myths and legends do not interest him, because he cannot say anything definite about them. He is attracted to events of which he was a contemporary. He is trying to establish their reasons, meaning, significance. In explaining the course of history, he does not need to resort to the idea of the intervention of gods in the lives of people. Just as Democritus takes the deity beyond the limits of nature, Thucydides takes him beyond the limits of history. He treats those who believe in predictions or prophetic dreams with cold contempt. An eclipse of the sun or an earthquake has nothing supernatural for him: he is inclined to give rational explanations for them, just like Anaxagoras and the Sophists. In his every judgment one can see that he belongs to a new generation that thinks critically and rationalistically. History is directed not by gods, but by people acting in accordance with their “nature,” that is, with their interests. The “nature” of people always turns out to be stronger than laws and treaties. Knowledge of human nature and its manifestations is enough for Thucydides to comprehend the movement of his contemporary society. He breaks with the rationalistic interpretations of ancient myths, so frequent in Hecataeus and Herodotus, and generally rejects all mythology. He considers only the Trojan War a historical fact.

Although Thucydides had very definite political sympathies and antipathies and does not hide them in his “History,” although he, a native of the aristocracy, expresses its views, in his interest in the very clash of human passions, aspirations, and benefits, he is able to be objective. The high intellectualism of his work brings Thucydides closer to Socrates. A deep understanding of the factors of human behavior, the reproduction of political confrontation in the form of a collision of lengthy speeches, arguing, refuting one another, brings him closer to the sophists, primarily with his contemporary Antiphon, whose tetralogies - collections of rhetorical exercises - also represent a collision of speeches exchanged by fictional plaintiffs and the defendant. Finally, the desire to explain historical phenomena “from the inside,” by natural causes, without resorting to the idea of intervention of the gods, indicates some connection between Thucydides’ “History” with the teachings of Anaxagoras and Democritus and even with the medicine of that time, which was freed from the legacy of religious ideas.

Turbulent political events in the Greek world and in Athens itself in the 5th century. BC e. reflected in political literature and journalism. The merciless cruelty with which Athens treated its allies forced the Ionian Stesimbrotus, who came from Thassos humiliated by the Athenians, to compose and distribute a pamphlet “On Themistocles, Thucydides and Pericles,” in which the leaders of the Athenian radical democracy were subjected to sharp criticism. Another Ionian wrote equally hostilely about Themistocles and Pericles in his Epidemics. Ion of Chios. A kind of pamphlet, a mirror of social problems and trends in Athens itself, are the comedies of Aristophanes. Around 430 BC e. The anti-democratic “brochure” “On the Structure of Athens,” written by a certain supporter of oligarchic rule, a student of the sophists, also became widespread. Also, the “Lacedaemonian Politeia” by Critias, one of Socrates’ students, is directed against democracy, explaining and praising the principles of the state and social structure of Sparta.

MEDICINE AND EXACT SCIENCES

The “Hippocratic Corpus,” a collection of works by doctors who belonged to the school of Hippocrates (second half of the 5th - early 4th century BC), gives an idea of the medical knowledge and practice of that time. The medicine of the priests was replaced by the medicine of doctors, based on accurate observations. The treatise attributed to Hippocrates, On the Sacred Disease, challenges the traditional view that epilepsy is caused by evil demons and views epilepsy itself as a disease of the brain. Another essay, “On Air, Waters and Places,” establishes a connection between the state of health, including mental health, of individuals and nations and the influence of climatic conditions. The doctors of the Hippocratic school were also philosophers. Their methods, based on experience, observations, the desire for quick and correct diagnosis, and the use of preventive measures such as diet and hygiene, were undoubtedly the fruits of the same intellectual, cultural current that gave birth to both the philosophy of Democritus and Thucydides’ History. Hippocrates, nicknamed the “father of medicine,” gained fame throughout the Greek world and even in the East. His medical practice covered not only his native Kos, where a famous school of medicine existed at the Temple of Asclepius, but also Thessaly and Athens.

Along with others, the natural philosopher and physician Diogenes of Apollonia, whom Aristophanes himself honored with ... ridicule in the comedy “Clouds,” deserves mention. Diogenes of Apollonia already distinguished between “good blood” from the arteries and “evil blood” from the veins, and he also had a good understanding of the circulatory system. Let us also name Alcmaeon of Croton, who, like Hippocrates, saw the source of illnesses in the violation of harmony between the four juices or “gumbra”: blood, mucus, bile and black bile. Hence: a sanguine person is characterized by an excess of blood in the body, a phlegmatic person has too much mucus, a choleric person suffers from an excessive amount of bile, and a melancholic person suffers from black bile. If not an explanation, then at least the very identification of these four types of human temperaments was inherited by later science and has survived to this day, like Hippocrates’ immortal rule for doctors: do no harm.

We can judge medical knowledge to some extent thanks to the Hippocratic Corpus, which contains 53 medical treatises. Very little is known about the exact sciences. However, numerous names of mathematicians and astronomers of that time, preserved in ancient works, indicate that these sciences also developed successfully. Suffice it to recall the mathematician and astronomer Meton from Athens, whom the same Aristophanes immortalized by caricaturing in the comedy “The Birds.” Meanwhile, Metok designed a sundial and carried out a calendar reform.

ATTICA TRAGEDY

Just as the archaic era in Greece expressed itself in lyric poetry, the 5th century (BC), when Athens became the center of literary and poetic creativity, began to speak in the language of Attic tragedy and comedy. Tragedy (literally “song of the goats”) arose from a choral song, from a dithyramb sung by “satyrs” dressed in goat skins and depicting the constant cheerful companions of the god of wine Dionysus. Such “choirs of goats,” or satyrs, existed already in the 7th century. BC e. throughout Greece. Decisive in the birth of the Attic tragedy was the establishment by the Athenian tyrant Pisistratus of the national holiday of the Great Dionysius, thanks to which the popular cult of Dionysus now relied on the official support of the authorities. When the poet Thespis added an actor to the chorus, “answering” and conducting a dialogue with the chorus, the tragedy turned into a dramatic action. At first, the participants in the performance acted out scenes from myths only about Dionysus himself, but later the turn came to other myths. Only Aeschylus remained in the first half of the 5th century. BC e. bring before the audience also a second actor, and Sophocles a third, and the ancient “chorus of goats” was finally transformed into drama.

Like the epic poetry of Homer, Greek tragedy performed not only aesthetic functions, but also didactic and educational ones. Great tragediographers of the 5th century. BC e. they sought not only to interest the viewer, but also to frighten, shock, instruct, and show, using the example of the destinies of well-known heroes of myths, the operation of divine laws that govern people’s lives.

Introduction

Friedrich Nietzsche. Is he a philosopher? Is he a philologist? A crazy nihilist, an ideologist of fascism, a man out of his time? They tried to define it in different ways in different years of history. The very fact that he was scolded or admired does not give us the courage to say that Friedrich Nietzsche is a gray mouse in the history of philosophy. “To shine after three hundred years is my thirst for glory,” Nietzsche said in his “Evil Wisdom,” but he began to shine nine years after the publication of his first book, which was called “The Birth of Tragedy from the Spirit of Music.” A book aimed at the phenomenon of antiquity, the Hellenic phenomenon, the phenomenon of Socrates, a book designed to change the attitude of the intellectual world to ancient culture.

In this work, which consists of three paragraphs, we will consider the phenomenon of Greek tragedy. The works of F. Nietzsche will help us deal with this problem: “The Birth of Tragedy from the Spirit of Music”, “Thus Spoke Zarathustra”. When analyzing these works, we will see what roots Greek tragedy has, how it continues its existence in the work “Thus Spoke Zarathustra,” as well as what influence it had on the art of the Greeks. The influence of Apollonian and Dionysian on the formation of culture. Let us shed light on the problem of ancient man, his place in the world, as well as the problem of cognition of existence. Let's take a look from a new angle at Socrates, the personality with whom any scientific approach begins, as well as what role he played in Greek culture.

The problem of man and knowledge against the background of the Attic tragedy

When considering ancient culture, Nietzsche paid close attention to mythology. There are two principles in the culture of the Greeks: Apollonian and Dionysian. The first is responsible for the art of plastic images, in other words, the art of theater. The second is responsible for music. The Hellenic will was able to combine two opposite directions into a new art - the art of Greek tragedy. “With their two deities of the arts, Apollo and Dionysus, is connected our knowledge of the enormous opposition in origin and purpose that we encounter in the Greek world between the art of plastic images - Apollonian - and the non-plastic art of music - the art of Dionysus; these two very different aspirations act side by side with one another, most often in open discord among themselves and mutually encouraging each other to ever new and more powerful creations, in order to perpetuate in them the struggle of the named opposites, only apparently united by the common word “art”; until, finally, by a miraculous metaphysical act of the Hellenic “will” they appear bound into some permanent duality and in this duality they finally create a work of art that is as Dionysian as it is Apollonian—the Attic tragedy.”

Two gods. Two beginnings. Two completely different worlds. The Apollonian world of sleep and the Dionysian world of intoxication. And if the world of dreams brings peace to a person after a hard day, this world always remains illusory. This world, like Apollo himself, remains unshakable, self-limited, not crossing the line, so as not to turn into harsh reality. Dionysian intoxication is the opposite of this tranquility of the Apollonian principle. The life of the Dionysian madmen rushes by in a stormy rush of dances and orgies. Here life celebrates its union with man. All the boundaries separating people and man from nature are broken here. “Now, with the good news of the harmony of the worlds, everyone feels not only united, reconciled, united with his neighbor, but one with him, as if the veil of Maya was torn and only shreds of it were still fluttering before the mysterious First One.”

Already here we can see the origins of Zarathustra. It is from this work that Nietzsche “kills” God. Thanks to Dionysus, a person feels like a god. “Just as animals have now received the gift of speech and the earth flows with milk and honey, so something supernatural sounds in man: he feels like a god, he himself now walks enthusiastic and sublime; This is how he saw the gods walking in his dreams.” This idea is just emerging in Nietzsche’s first work, it is not so important for understanding it, but subsequently, it is the idea of God-Man, or rather, only man, but Man with a capital “M”, a man free from the prejudices of religion and society, that will become one of the central problems of Nietzsche's creativity. Here Nietzsche only touches on it and takes us further into the intricacies of Apollonian and Dionysian motifs. We see the influence of Dionysian rhythms on the Greeks, accustomed to the calm of Apollo. One can watch for a long time and not without pleasure how Nietzsche, like a laboratory scientist, examines the emerging Greek conflict. Delving into the Apollonian and Dionysian, Nietzsche comes to the conclusion that these phenomena are not the cause of the Greek worldview, but a consequence. Nietzsche rejects the simple explanation for the appearance of the Olympian gods. Why, asks Nietzsche. Why exactly this and for what purpose. Nietzsche finds the answer in the old Greek legend about King Midas, who was chasing Silenus, the companion of Dionysus. “When he finally fell into his hands, the king asked what was best and most preferable for a person. The demon remained stubbornly and motionless; Finally, forced by the king, he burst out with a roaring laugh in these words: “Ill-fated one-day-old generation, children of chance and need, why are you forcing me to tell you something that would be more useful for you not to hear? The best for you is completely unattainable: not to be born, not to be at all, to be nothing. And the second most important thing for you is to die soon.” Fear of existence, fear of living, lead to the creation of a pantheon of gods. In order to be able to live, the Greeks are overshadowed by the gods, and we remember what the Greek gods were like. By no means ascetic gods, and what is important, it is through the prism of the Apollonian instinct of beauty that the Olympic order of joy develops. Nietzsche shows us that it is the gods who justify human life by living it themselves. Now a person wants to live and the worst thing for him is death in general. We see here the unconditional victory of the Apollonian illusion. Illusions, since a person replaces reality with an Apollonian dream, the existence of gods, in order to avoid a clear picture of reality. However, Nietzsche correctly notes that the Dionysian has not gone away. The Dionysian broke through the boundaries of Apollonian culture time after time, reminding the Greek on what his existence rested, bringing painful sobriety. “Moreover, he also had to feel that his entire existence, with all its beauty and moderation, rested on the hidden substratum of suffering and knowledge, which was revealed to him again through the medium of this Dionysian principle.” And here lie the origins of Greek tragedy. In the close interweaving of two opposing principles, Attic tragedy is born as the goal of both instincts. The goal, as it may seem at first glance, is simple and understandable, to make a person’s existence happy. Cover yourself with illusion again. Oh, this Nietzsche, again under the veil of a scientific study of tragedy, with its integral aspects, he, as if by chance, hides the problem of knowledge, the problem of ancient man with his attitude to the world. Brings Homer and Archilochus onto the stage. Shows us their influence and place in Greek history. And only towards the end, as if by chance, does he draw our attention to the fact that Hellenic thought, thanks to the Dionysian principle, penetrated into the essence of the so-called world history and saw there the destruction, finitude and meaninglessness of the individual. This feeling of deepest despair is facilitated by the Dionysian state. “The fact is that the exaltation of the Dionysian state, with its destruction of the usual limits and boundaries of existence, contains within itself, while it lasts, a certain lethargic element into which everything personally lived in the past is immersed. Thus, between everyday life and Dionysian reality lies an abyss of oblivion.” Thus, a person learns the processes of being. He realizes that his individual Self is nothing. He cannot change anything in the eternal essence of things. “No consolation will help here; passionate desire does not stop at some world after death, even at the gods; existence is denied in its entirety, together with its sparkling reflection in the gods or in the immortal otherworldly future. In realizing the truth that has once appeared to one’s eyes, one now sees everywhere only the horror and absurdity of existence.” Fatalism and, as a consequence, pessimism, veiled by Greek art as a way to protect themselves from reality, are the core of the Greek world. The man of antiquity is deeply unhappy, and tragedy is a cure. Nietzsche confirms his conclusions with a striking example: “When, after a bold attempt to look at the sun, we, blinded, turn away our gaze, then, like a healing agent, dark spots appear before our eyes; on the contrary, the appearance of light images of Sophocles’ heroes - in short, the Apollonian mask - is a necessary product of a gaze cast into the terrible depths of nature, like shining spots, healing a gaze tormented by the horrors of the night.” Actually, on this note the era of the great Greek tragedy ends, a mixture of Apollonian calm and Dionysian ecstasy, frantic dancing. A tragedy in which, immersed in the action, the Greek merged with nature, destroyed the boundaries of individuality, became something whole, timeless, not subject to the suffering of reality and at the same time comprehending the principles of existence, the operating forces of the world. Now time is playing a cruel joke on the Greeks. The great tragedians who felt and understood Apollo and Dionysus, and turned their influence into art, beautiful and unique art, are being replaced by new faces who do not feel, at least, the Dionysian influence. Euripides was the first to destroy tragedy with his own hands. The man, according to Nietzsche, is very far from Dionysian music. Euripides did not understand either the music of Dionysus or the myth that, with its help, was so skillfully woven into the tragedy. “What did you want, blasphemous Euripides, when you tried once again to force this dying man into slave labor for your benefit? He died in your hands - the hands of a rapist, and so you put into practice a false, disguised myth, which, like the monkey of Hercules, only dressed itself up in ancient splendor. And just as the myth died for you, so did the genius of music die for you.” However, Euripides could not give up; he felt the poet in himself. He created a comedy that was only a shadow of a tragedy. The beginning of the end of the greatness of the Greeks. As if to mock them, Nietzsche speaks of the last man in Thus Spoke Zarathustra. “Woe! The time is approaching when man will no longer give birth to a star. Woe! The time of the most despicable man is approaching, who can no longer despise himself. Look! I show you the last person. "What is love? What is creation? Aspiration? What is a star? - so asks the last person and blinks. The earth has become small, and the last person is jumping on it, making everything small. His race is indestructible, like an earthen flea; the last person lives the longest. “We have found happiness,” say the last people, and blink.” Socrates decided to help Euripides in his difficult work. The one who did not understand the tragedy more than others, the one who relied only on knowledge and reason, the one who was unable to feel the sacredness of Apollo-Dionysian knowledge, hammered the last nail into the coffin of the ancient tragedy. Nietzsche very correctly notes the failure of Socrates in this area: “Like Plato, he ranked it among the flattering arts, depicting only the pleasant and not the useful, and therefore demanded from his students abstinence and strict self-isolation from such unphilosophical entertainment.” Thus, tragedy and music die when the Dionysian call to Greek man weakens. From their death a completely new, unprecedented phenomenon is born. The phenomenon of Socrates. Socrates, as Nietzsche claims, is a completely new type of being, a type of theoretical person. Socrates is the prototype of a theoretical optimist. It relies exclusively on the knowability of nature and the world. Socrates considers knowledge to be the main virtue. Delusion is the greatest evil. Every science begins with Socrates, but Nietzsche reproaches Socrates for this. Science, Nietzsche believes, is something like a ball, striving further and further in pursuit of a dream, sooner or later it comes to its boundaries, where it actually crashes. At some point it reaches a point, followed by something incomprehensible, not cognizable by science. And here Socrates’ optimistic theory of knowledge becomes tragic knowledge again, which needs the protection and support of art. According to F.G. Junger, the end of Greek tragedy: “This is the time when philosophy and history, ethics and sophistry, Euripides, Socrates and the new Attic dithyramb appear. This is a step forward from the fictional, imaginary world to the true world, a step that Nietzsche takes in the opposite direction. For here his thought begins, here he himself begins.”

nietzsche greek tragedy dionysus

Attic tragedy

But the origin of Greek tragedy from choral song was reflected in the fact that in the future the choir played no less a role in the drama than the actors. This brings Greek tragedy closer to the modern opera or oratorio. The themes and plots of the tragedies were also not arbitrarily chosen, but borrowed from mythology.<Персы» Эсхила или «Завоевание Милета» Фриниха - редчайшие исключения, подтверждающие правило.

The Attic theater differed from the modern one, however, not only in what was shown, but also in the way it was arranged. The performances lasted only three days, during the festival in honor of Dionysus. They gave three tragedies in a row, and then a “satire drama” - another dramatized episode from mythology, but in a lighter, cheerful, funny light, which allowed the audience to relieve the tension from the tragedies. Each of the three dramatic poets who competed with each other these days brought to the attention of the audience the entire tetralogy, that is, a complete cycle of three tragedies and one “satyr drama.” The performance took place in the open air, on a round platform - an orchestra. The benches for spectators were carved right into the rocky slope of the Acropolis; It was this simple auditorium that was called theatron. In such a huge open theater it was impossible to see either the facial expressions of the actors or the details of the costumes, so the participants in the performance went on stage in long, formal robes and large traditional masks, which were supposed to indicate either the stage type of character (king, old man, woman - female roles men also played), or state of mind (joy, grief, arrogant grandeur, despair). It was necessary to enlarge the actor's figure and wear special high shoes - buskins. Standing on buskins, the tragic actor pronounced sublime monologues written in a language far from everyday. All this distracted the viewer from the routine of everyday life, filling the soul with solemnity and a feeling of great celebration. It was the theater that was the main event for the Athenians during the days of the Great Dionysius, celebrated in late March - early April.

Attic tragedy owes its unfading glory to three great poets of the 5th century. BC e.: Aeschylus, Sophocles and Vrypidus. The first of them, although he belonged to the aristocracy by birth, is closely connected throughout his work with the idea of the emerging Athenian democracy. This is visible not only in the “Persians,” where eastern despotism and the tyranny of the Persian king Xerxes are defeated by the Athenians, but also in the most perfect work of Aeschylus, perhaps, in the “Oresteia”: the court established by Athena, the Areopagus, pronounces a sentence on Orestes and thus the oldest family law, the law of blood feud. Thus, the birth of new social forms coincided with and found expression in the birth of new aesthetic and artistic forms. In the tragedy “Prometheus Bound”, people who have mastered fire and other fruits of the then civilization, through the mouth of the tormented titan Prometheus, challenge the omnipotence of Zeus, represented here as a cruel, hateful tyrant. The author's sympathies and the audience's sympathy were on the side of the hero, a lover of humanity and a fighter against God.

Of course, Aeschylus, as was typical for people of his generation, still thought entirely in religious and ethical terms. As in Solon’s elegies, the boundaries of truth, justice, and good are outlined in most of his tragedies by a deity who rewards good and punishes evil. for violating his own established limits in the behavior of mortals. The inevitable law of fair retribution is manifested in the fates of almost all of Aeschylus’s heroes.

If for Aeschylus the will of the gods is, as a rule, fair, then for Sophocles it is, first of all, omnipotent, while its ethical meaning is hidden from mortals. The conflict of his tragedies is in the dramatic confrontation between man and inevitable fate. The unwritten laws established by the gods require that the dead body be buried so that the soul can find eternal peace in the underground kingdom of Hades, but a daring man, referring to the state laws he himself introduced, tries to prevent this, and then all possible misfortunes befall him one after another (the conflict between Antigone and King Creon in Antigone). Trying to fight the unknowable, to prevent the fulfillment of divine prophecies, the individual dooms himself to the inevitable retribution of fate (“Oedipus the King”). But since the will of the gods is omnipotent, the people who dare to resist it are bright and unusual: such are Creon and Oedipus. Majestic and powerful in spirit are those who in one way or another fight for their right to follow the unwritten divine regulations: the gallery of strong, unyielding and persistent heroines of the Attic tragedy is opened by Antigone and Electra in Sophocles. This increasing attention to the individual, independently making his life choices, undoubtedly reflected the increasing importance of the individual principle in the social system and culture of classical Athens. The close connection of Sophocles’s work with the circle of ideas and intellectual interests that dominated his hometown at that time is also evidenced by the fact that many of the dialogues of his heroes are built according to all the rules of the sophistic art of argument (remember, for example, the dialogue between Antigone and Creon). Sophocles's bright, dramatic tragedies more than once brought him awards in theatrical competitions of that time.

A new generation of cultural figures in Athens asserted itself on the dramatic stage in the work of Euripides, although he and Sophocles lived at the same time and, as far as we know, even died in the same 406 BC. e. In contrast to the traditionally minded Sophocles, who shares old religious beliefs and prejudices, Euripides is full of skepticism, even going so far as to outright fight against God. The gods of the youngest of the three great tragediographers are cruel and partial, but it is not they, but the uncontrollable impulses of the human soul that determine the destinies of people, throwing them from one abyss of suffering to another. For Sophocles, the will and authority of Apollo are indisputable, absolute - Euripides attacks the cult of the formidable god-soothsayer, calling Apollo himself vengeful and vindictive, like an ordinary mortal. Such different attitudes towards Apollo’s religion also had social roots. The conservative Sophocles, close to the aristocracy, remembers the former authority of both God himself, the patron of noble youth, and his Delphic sanctuary, which once controlled many aspects of the life of the Greeks. For the democratic circles of Athens, to which Euripides belonged, a passionate supporter of democratic Athens in its many years of confrontation with aristocratic Sparta, the temple of Apollo at Delphi embodied the ambiguous position of its priests during the Persian attack on Hellas.

The playwright also does not believe in the divine origin of laws and other norms regulating social relations and human behavior. Love, a product of human nature itself, forces Medea, and in another tragedy Phaedra, to reject family ties, prevailing customs, and traditions. Natural law conflicts with the law established by people. The poet denounces the prejudices that doomed Athenian women to a position close to slavery, and slaves to the inhuman attitude and contempt of their owners. The tragedy of “The Trojan Women” also sounds a protest against an offensive war, which brings suffering to both the victors and the vanquished; at the height of the Peloponnesian War, this position of Euripides demanded from him courage and loyalty to his convictions. Here again and again the creators of the Greek theater recognized themselves as educators of their contemporary society.

If the focus of Aeschylus’s attention is not on an individual hero, but on the action itself, the conflict of the drama itself, and therefore the main role is assigned not to the actors, but to the chorus, then Sophocles has already decisively broken with this tradition. Choral songs and lyrics receded into the background, the importance of actor's recitations, monologues, and dialogues increased noticeably. For Ajax, Antigone or Electra in Sophocles, the chorus serves only as a background. The psychological picture of the main roles became more and more expressive and clear. Euripides now acts as a real explorer of the secrets of the human soul. Such power of expression of love, anger, maternal passion, as in the monologues of Medea, is not easy to find in the drama of later times. The heroes of Aeschylus and Sophocles do not change at all internally throughout the entire action. Not so with Euripides: his heroes are familiar with painful hesitations, doubts, transitions from despair to determination, from self-confidence to weakness and impotent rage. Myth does not ask about the psychological motives of someone’s activity, just as neither the tragedies of Aeschylus nor the “History” of Herodotus ask about them. The tragedies of Euripides, like Thucydides' History, are realistic and look for the reasons for a person's actions in himself.

The dialogues also became more natural. In Aeschylus, the heroes utter either long, pathetic tirades or short, one-verse remarks. In Euripides' dialogues there is almost no stylization, no artificiality: the heroes speak as ordinary people speak, only those who are in great excitement or tormented by strong passions. From decade to decade, Attic tragedy developed towards increasingly entertaining, dynamic, intense intrigue, and unexpected plot twists. In Euripides' tragedies, viewers were treated to rapid changes in situations, unpredictable developments of action (of course, within the framework of some canonical requirements of the genre), and sudden recognitions and revelations. In his works, plots are often borrowed from lesser-known myths, interpreted very arbitrarily; a lot of realistic, everyday details and direct political allusions; the language is more familiar and natural. The tragedy of gods and heroes turned into a tragedy of people. Even the ancients said that Sophocles presented man as he should be, and Euripides - as he is. When Jason in Medea appears cowardly and base, and Electra, the king's daughter, is the wife of a poor peasant, the myth is destroyed, the sacred legend becomes a secular narrative.

Since tragedy was born from choral lyrics, from dithyramb, music always played an important role in Greek theater, even when the attention of authors and spectators was transferred from the choir to the actors. The tragedy consisted of two parts: lyric-orchestral, entrusted entirely to the choir and not directly related to the action, and stage, or mimetic, covering monologues and dialogues. Along with the actors, the choir also showed itself in this part in the person of its leader, called the luminary. The lyrical part was sung, the stage part consisted of recitation to the accompaniment of a flute. This is how colloquial speech, recitation to music, i.e. melodic recitation, and singing itself were combined. It should be remembered, however, that singing in ancient times was closer to melodic recitation than to today's vocals, and the recitations of ancient actors were more reminiscent of singing than modern conversations on stage. In addition, the stage part was preceded by fragments written in lyrical poetic meters, and the singing was accompanied by expressive gestures. In addition to purely speech and choral scenes, the classical Greek tragedy had the so-called komnos - a joint singing part of the soloist and choir, which continued the tradition of funeral songs: the plaintive lamentations of the actor were echoed by the refrain of the choir.

Tragic poets also had to be excellent musicians. They were especially famous for the beautiful, sweet-sounding melodies of the tragedy of Phrynichus. The lyrical and choral parts of Aeschylus are also distinguished by their freedom and variety of composition. But in Sophocles' tragedies the musical element does not play a significant role: music would only hold back the lively, dynamic development of the action. However, Sophocles also managed to achieve a rare perfection of melodic structure in the choral parts. Euripides, in a sense, restored music to its rights on stage, but not by strengthening the chorus, but by having the actors perform large solo arias; the choral parts had very little connection with the action of the drama, producing a purely musical effect. Euripides' solo arias, full of expression, required considerable virtuosity in performance, which led to professionalism and the identification of theatrical music as a special type of creativity.

The historical development of the tragedy was very dramatic, the genre experienced a wide variety of changes, while maintaining its fundamental features.

The foundations of tragedy were laid in ancient Greek. The main theme of ancient Greek tragedies was (although there were also tragedies written on modern subjects - for example, Persians Aeschylus). The evolution and formation of the genre is clearly visible in the works of three great ancient Greek playwrights, considered the founders of tragedy:, and. Aeschylus was the first to introduce a second actor into tragedy (before him, there was only one actor and a chorus on the stage), enlarging the roles of individual characters (Prometheus, Clytemnestra, etc.). Sophocles significantly increased the dialogic parts and introduced a third actor, which made it possible to sharpen the action: the hero was contrasted with a secondary character seeking to deviate him from fulfilling his duty (Oedipus the King, Antigone, Electra, etc.). In addition, Sophocles introduced scenery into the ancient Greek theater. Euripides turned tragedy to reality, according to Aristotle, depicting people “as they are” (Poetics, Chapter XXV), revealing the complex world of psychological experiences, characters and passions (Medea, Electra, Iphigenia in Aulis and etc.).

In my essay, I would like to consider the problem of interpreting myth in Attic drama using the example of the myth of Atrid. But first, I would like to highlight some issues related to the emergence of such a genre in the ancient Greek world.

II. The origin of the tragedy.

The phenomenon of drama itself originates from primitive society and accompanies almost every ritual action. At that time, drama had not yet emerged from the general labor processes, magic, everyday life, and in general from the social sphere of the then culture. But already in the 2nd millennium BC, in the so-called Cretan-Mycenaean era, drama had the opportunity to turn into an independent theatrical and entertainment performance. But drama arose only in Greece, and not earlier than the 6th century. BC e., and took the form of tragedy and comedy. This happened precisely then because drama requires greater independence of the individual and a clash of personalities among themselves, and in Greece the ascent and establishment of a democratic system had just begun. The individual who freed himself from communal consciousness needed to learn to understand the creative forces of nature. For this, the cults of deities were useful, which combined these processes.

There have always been many such deities, and during the period of the democratic ascent of Greece, Dionysus turned out to be such a deity. The god Dionysus was nothing more than a generalization of the creative productive processes of nature and society. He was imagined to be embodied in every living creature, which was imagined to be torn to pieces and then resurrected. This greatly contributed to the emergence and growth of a dramatic understanding of life. Dionysian delight and orgasm destroyed all class barriers and the aristocratic nobility in their relationship with the new deity became on the same level as the lower strata of society. Therefore, the religion of Dionysus initially came into conflict with the “Olympian” gods; in the end, he won, was ascended to Olympus and recognized as the son of Zeus and the Theban Semele.

Rulers of the 6th century BC e., implanted the cult of Dionysus in their countries. For example, the Athenian tyrant Pisistratus established the festival of the Great Dionysius in Athens, and the first tragedy was staged under him. Another tyrant, Cleisthenes, who ruled in the city of Sikyon, handed over to Dionysus the holiday that had previously been celebrated in honor of the local hero Adrastus.

The path from the cult of Dionysus to classical Greek tragedy was difficult and long, but it was covered extremely quickly in Greece.

Aristotle speaks in his Poetics about the origin of tragedy from dithyrambs or phallic songs. The tragedy gradually grew and underwent various changes. Aristotle also talks about the origin of tragedy from satyr games. There is also a version about the origin of the tragedy from the cult of the dead, and in particular from the cult of the hero.

III. Ancient Greek theater.

Theatrical performances in Greece were widespread and festive. The ruins of ancient Greek theaters are striking in their size. For example, the Theater of Dionysus in Athens is designed for approximately 17 thousand spectators.

Basically the theater consisted of three main parts:

1) orchestra, at the end of the 6th century. BC e., was a round, tightly compacted platform for actors and choir;

2) theater, seats for spectators;

3) skena, the building behind the orchestra where the actors changed clothes.

At the beginning of the 5th century. wooden benches for spectators were replaced with stone ones and were located in a semicircle along the slope of the Acropolis. The orchestra became horseshoe-shaped. In Hellenistic times, the choir and the artists no longer had an internal connection and therefore the actors played on a high stone stage, which was adjacent to the skene and proskenium with two projections on the sides - paraskenia . Seats for spectators surrounded the orchestra in a semicircle and were divided into 13 wedges.

The choir when staging the tragedy consisted of 12 and then 15 people. They were controlled by a luminary. The choir was divided into 2 parts and, through singing and dancing, portrayed people close to the heroes. The choir dressed in costumes corresponding to the theme of the performance. Of course, the main characters dressed the most colorfully. To increase the height of the actors, they used caturnas - shoes with thick soles like stilts. Also, the actors were forced to wear brightly colored masks made for a certain type of hero: old people, women, slaves, children, etc. Masks were convenient because they allowed the actor to play several roles at once in one tragedy. All female roles were played by men.

Athenian citizens at the end of the 5th century. BC e., received special entertainment money from the state to visit the theater. In exchange, they were given iron numbers indicating the location. The performance began in the morning and ended in the evening. It consisted of three tragedies and one satyr drama.

IV. Interpretation of the myth of Atrid in the works of three great tragedians:

1) Aeschylus

Aeschylus, a poet from the era of the formation of the Athenian state, is the founder of Greek tragedy. He is often called the "father of tragedy."

In the works of Aeschylus we see how the author’s traditional worldview is closely intertwined with the principles of democratic statehood. He firmly believes in the existence of divine forces that control people and often intrigue them. But on the other hand, the gods of Aeschylus become guardians of the legal foundations of the new state; he focuses the viewer’s attention on the responsibility placed on a person for his freely chosen behavior. Aeschylus is characterized by a manumental-pathetic style. It comes from the elemental foundations of life, which allows you to draw clear and very plastic images.

Aeschylus wrote about 70 tragedies and 20 satyr dramas. Only 7 tragedies and more than 400 fragments have reached us. The Oresteia is the only complete trilogy of Aeschylus that has come down to us. It consists of three parts: “Agamemnon”, “Choephora” and “Eumenides”. This tragedy tells us about the story that unfolded in the palace of Agamemnon after his return from the walls of Troy, about his murder by Aegisthus, the lover of Agamemnon’s wife Clytemnestra, and about the revenge of his son Orestes for the death of his father.

Clytemnestra is depicted here primarily as a weapon of the demon of the ancestral curse. She hates her husband, her daughter Electra, whom she keeps in the house as a servant, she hates her son Orestes, whom she frantically encourages Erinny to pursue... She is a very powerful, restrained and sensible woman, her intelligence and crime make her cynical at times. Aeschylus, however, showed that she is not alien to human experiences when, frightened by terrible dreams, Clytemnestra makes libations at the grave of Agamemnon and dreams of the modest lot of a common man. But still she is a negative character.

Another bright female character whom we meet in the first part of the trilogy is Cassandra. She was once Apollo's lover. God wanted to marry her, Cassandra agreed, on the condition that Apollo would give her the gift of prophecy. But, having received the gift, the girl abandoned God and, as punishment for this, Apollo deprived her of all recognition of the prophecy; no one believed her. Cassandra foresaw all the disasters of Troy and, approaching the palace of Agamemnon, her and his death. In a frenzy, she lets out wild screams, falls to the ground, hits it with her arms and legs, but after a few minutes she becomes silent and obediently goes into the house, knowing that death awaits her there. Among the characters of all Greek tragedies, there is no character more dramatic than Cassandra. It is surprising that it originated with Aeschylus, despite the fact that most of his heroes are extremely epic and lack a tragic edge.

2) Sophocles

The second great tragedian is Sophocles. He completed the work begun by Aeschylus of transforming tragedy from a lyrical cantata into a drama. The problems that concern Sophocles are related to the fate of one person. Apparently this is why he abandons the plot coherence of the trilogy. Sophocles' people for the most part act independently and determine their own behavior with other people. He rarely brings gods onto the stage and does not attach so much importance to the “hereditary curse.”

In his tragedy "Electra", Sophocles develops the theme of "Choephorus" by Aeschylus, namely the death of Clytemnestra and Aegisthus at the hands of Orestes. Electra, who was a minor character in Aeschylus, becomes the main character in Sophocles. Here she is written as a heroic girl. For many years she has been protesting alone against her mother and her lover. For this, he is constantly subjected to ridicule and humiliation on their part. Electra lives in the hope of revenge for her father and the return of Orestes. The heroic image of Electra, as in another tragedy by Sophocles, Antigone, is contrasted with the meek and submissive sister Chrysothemis. However, the author shows us Electra from the other side, when she, depressed by the false news of Orestes’ death and preparing to replace him in the role of avenger, cries over the urn with the imaginary remains of her brother. In accordance with the concept of the play, Sophocles deprived the image of Clytemnestra of the tragic greatness of Aeschylus, and on the contrary, exacerbated the vicious traits of her character.

Sophocles is of course inferior to Aeschylus in the severity of the problem. Although he also seeks divine order in the course of things. But unlike Aeschylus, who often questions the rightness of the gods, Sophocles still comes to the conclusion that the gods are fair. Therefore, he avoids raising questions in his work that make one think about the rightness of the gods. The artistic images of Sophocles are striking in their simplicity and monumentality. They are deeply human and their spiritual life is extremely rich. With the help of a variety of experiences, Sophocles shows different sides of the character's character. His heroes are always solid natures, almost never doubting their choice of behavior; their mode of action is predetermined by the main features of their appearance.

3) Euripides

Personality characteristics and a critical attitude towards myth - both sides of the same worldview were in sharp contradiction with the ideological traditions of Aeschylus and Sophocles. New trends in social life found a response in the work of the third great tragedian - Euripides. The ideological content and dramatic innovations caused condemnation among the conservative part of Athens, and was the laughing stock of all subsequent comedies of the 5th century. But later, in the Hellenistic era, Euripides became a favorite tragic poet. Therefore, 19 of his works have reached us, i.e. much more than Sophocles and Aeschylus combined. In addition, many fragments have survived, often giving an idea of the overall picture of the drama. In the works of Euripides, a wide variety of problems were posed that were of interest to the public at that time, new theories were presented and discussed. Ancient criticism called Euripides “a philosopher on stage.” The philosophy of the Sophists had a great influence on him, but, however, the poet was not a supporter of this or that philosophical movement, especially since his own views were not distinguished by consistency and constancy.

In the tragedies of Euripides, people with great souls are depicted, who sometimes commit crimes, and the poet, like a deep psychologist, shows us all the painful suffering of such people.

V. Conclusion:

Each of the authors studied interprets this myth in its own way. Their task was to convey to viewers and descendants the ideas of a new democratic state. Aeschylus and Sophocles are the creators of ancient tragedy in classical form. They depicted significant issues of social life and human behavior. Conflicts between paternal and maternal rights, the state and clan, suffering in the name of duty, the problem of choice and responsibility for one’s behavior, we see all this in the tragedies of Sophocles and Aeschylus. The ideological content of the works did not diverge from their mythological interpretation. Aeschylus and Sophocles were sure that the world is controlled by higher divine powers, against the background of which there is justification for even such a terrible sin as matricide. But a new time is inexorably approaching, the era of Hellenism is approaching, in which people will greatly doubt the existence of this very divine power. Anticipating these changes in his work, the greatest poet, the most tragic of tragedians, according to Aristotle, appears, Euripides. He rejected the traditional mythological system and philosophy replaced mythology. Isolation of personality and a critical attitude towards myth - both of these trends in the new worldview were in sharp contradiction with the predecessors of Euripides, Aeschylus and Sophocles.

Greek literature gave the world many wonderful people and created a powerful platform for the development of all European culture. Ancient Greek myths are still being rewritten and studied, and, most importantly, their stories remain relevant at all times.

VI. Bibliography:

1) Agbunov M. “Ancient myths and legends. Mythological Dictionary" - M.: MIKIS, 1994 - 368 pages.

2) Aristotle “Poetics” http://rifma.com.ru/Poetika-1.htm

3) Losev A.F. “Ancient Literature”: a textbook for higher school; edited by A.A. Tahoe-Godi. – 7th ed., stereotype – M.: CheRo, with the participation of the editor. "Omega-L", 2005 - 543 pages.

4) Mertlik R. “Ancient legends and tales”: trans. from Czech – M.: “Respublika”, 1992 – 479 pp.

5) Tronsky I.M.; textbook; ed. 6th M.: KomKniga, 2005; 464 pp.

6) “Antiquity and modernity through the prism of the myth of Atrid”; compiler, author of entry. Articles and notes S. M. Pinaev. – M.: School-Press, 1997 – 768 pp.

Thus, in the city of Sikyon (northern Peloponnese), “tragic choirs” glorified the “passions” of the local hero Adrastus; at the beginning of the 6th century. the Sicyon tyrant Cleisthenes destroyed the cult of Adrastus and, as the historian Herodotus says, “gave the choirs to Dionysus.” In “tragic choirs” the zalachka element, which was widely used in later tragedy, should therefore occupy a significant place. The lament, with its characteristic alternation of lamentations of individuals and choral lamentation of the group (p. 21), was probably also a formal model for scenes of joint lamentation between the actor and the choir, which are frequent in the tragedy.

However, even if Attic tragedy developed on the basis of the folklore game of the Peloponnesian “goats” and the dithyramb of the Arion type, the decisive moment for its emergence was the development of “passions” into a moral problem. While formally retaining numerous traces of its origin, tragedy in content and ideological character was a new genre that posed questions of human behavior using the example of the fate of mythological heroes. As Aristotle puts it, the tragedy “has become serious.” The dithyramb underwent the same transformation, losing the character of a stormy Dioisian song and turning into a ballad on heroic subjects; an example is the dithyrambs of Bacchylides. In both cases, the details of the process and its individual stages remain unclear. Apparently, the songs of “goat choirs” began to receive literary treatment for the first time at the beginning of the 6th century. in the northern Peloponnese (Corinth, Sikyon); at the turn of the 6th and 5th centuries. in Athens, the tragedy was already a work on the theme of the suffering of the heroes of Greek myth, and the chorus dressed up not in the mask of “goats” or satyrs, but in the mask of persons connected with these heroes. The transformation of the tragedy did not occur without opposition from supporters of the traditional game; there were complaints that at the festival of Dionysus works were performed that “had nothing to do with Dionysus”; the new form, however, prevailed. The old-style chorus and the corresponding humorous character of the game were preserved (or, perhaps, restored after some time) in a special play, which was staged after the tragedies and was called the “satyr drama.” This cheerful play, with an invariably successful outcome, corresponded to the last act of the ritual performance, the rejoicing of the risen god.

The growth of the social significance of the individual in the life of the polis and the increased interest in its artistic depiction lead to the fact that in the further development of the tragedy the role of the chorus decreases, the importance of the actor increases and the number of actors increases; but the two-part structure itself remains unchanged, the presence of choral parts and actor parts. It is reflected even in the dialectal coloring of the language of tragedy: while the tragic chorus gravitates towards the Dorian dialect of choral lyrics, the actor pronounced his parts in Attic, with some admixture of the Ionian dialect, which until that time was the language of all declamatory Greek poetry (epic, iambic) . The two-part nature of the Attic tragedy also determines its external structure. If the tragedy, as was usually the case later, began with the actors’ parts, then this first part, before the arrival of the chorus, constituted a prologue. Then came the parade, the arrival of the choir; the choir entered from both sides