Zanobini, M. (2018); 'The Chorus As a Downgraded Protagonist. Some

Zanobini, M. (2018); ‘The Chorus as a downgraded protagonist. Some remarks on Seneca's employment of the choral odes in the Agamemnon’ Rosetta 22: 1 - 17 http://www.rosetta.bham.ac.uk/issue22/Zanobini.pdf The Chorus as a downgraded protagonist. Some remarks on Seneca's employment of the choral odes in the Agamemnon Michele Zanobini Department of Classics and Philosophy The Glasgow Academy Abstract Seneca's Agamemnon represents one of the most well-known poetic reinterpretations of Aeschylus' drama. Unlike the original Greek, however, the Latin revision of the myth presents a number of features that often fragment the plot's unfolding. The employment of the Chorus, in particular, strongly contributes to the text's narrative fragmentation and testifies to Seneca's deprioritization of cohesion in favor of single, dramatic episodes. By relating to the Aeschylean text, this article provides a first compared and analytical reading of the choral songs in the Seneca's play. The lack of organic integration of the four choral odes, along with further textual evidence bring the reader to question the Agamemnon's state of accomplished and rhetorically refined theatrical play. 1 Preliminary notes In conducting a comparative analysis of Aeschylus' Agamemnon and Seneca's poetic reinterpretation of the relevant myth, the authors’ dissimilar treatment of the chorus immediately strikes the reader as one of the most outstanding and significant points of divergence between the two dramas. Among the brilliant analyses of the plays’ protagonists that have been, even recently, made by scholars, a comprehensive study of the Senecan choruses in the Agamemnon has not yet been attempted: this constitutes the aim of the present work.1 Through a close reading of the text, this study seeks to analyse the four Latin choral odes in order to show the progressive decentralization of the Senecan chorus along with the loss of its prerogatives. To better investigate the nature of this process, each of the four odes has been analysed in a separate paragraph. The conclusive section of this work will also argue that the elements of discontinuity in the choruses, along with further textual evidence, bring the reader to believe that Seneca's Agamemnon might have never been properly completed. In the Aeschylean original play, the chorus not only constitutes a figure whose presence is always easily detectable, it also represents a connective tissue that ensures the overall cohesion of the entire drama.2 The elders' function in the Latin revision of the myth loses this principal function entirely. Seneca deprives the play of a character originally rich in nuance and poetic undertones as his chorus represents instead an element of discontinuity that frequently – if not always – fragments the plot's unfolding.3 1 For a more general introduction to Seneca's reinterpretation of classical dramas, cfr. Damschen and Heil 2014, in particular Kugelmeier, as well as Mazzoli, G. 2016. For Seneca's treatment of the chorus cfr., in particular, Hill 2000; Davis 1993 and Calder 1975. On the Agamemnon, as well as on Seneca's revival of Greek epic models, cfr. Schiesaro 2014 and Lavery 2004. 2 ‘un fortissimo tessuto connettivo’ as Perutelli brilliantly defines the importance of the chorus in Aeschylus' trilogy, 1995: 7. 3 A chorus more Euripidean than Aeschylian, as Henry and Walker defines it in their analysis of the critical reception of Seneca's play: ‘The chorus (...) is employed more in imitation of Euripides than Aeschylus to provide interludes or breaks in the dramatic inaction.’ 1963: 1. 2 The disengaging feature of the Senecan chorus appears also in the social composition of the chorus itself. While the second and third choral odes are, respectively, recited by the Argive and captive Trojan women,4 the identity of the first and fourth choruses' members is not specified and the content of their odes is, as will be shown later, partially unrelated to the context.5 What this work uncovers is not the lack of homogeneity within Senecan choruses, as Aeschylus himself, in his Agamemnon, had already shown an unprecedented dismemberment of his chorus into single voices.6 Rather it draws the readers’ attention to the resulting fragmentation of narrative action that apparently shows Seneca's deprioritization of cohesion in favour of single episodes rich with dramatic tension.7 First choral ode In spite of the four choral odes being employed in the revision of the myth, Seneca's chorus is never directly involved in a dialogue with the protagonists: this aspect is already traceable in the first choral ode. In line 56, Thyestes' shadow concludes his funereal monologue, but the following chorus' parodos presents a remarkable topic shift, as the theme of damnation over Tantalus' descendants and the consequent murder of Agamemnon is suddenly abandoned. The entire ode pivots on the fate's fallacy when it comes to excessive richness, power and wealth. This theme was developed at length by Aeschylus, and the influence exerted by the Greek version of the Agamemnon is here easy to detect, as the moral precepts stated by the Aeschylean chorus are echoed in Seneca’s version.8 Nonetheless, the unceasing references to the guilt and punishment of rulers 4 Respectively lines 310-91 and 589-658. 5 Respectively lines 57-107 and 866. 6 Lines 1346-71. 7 See Perutelli 1995: 5-29. 8 Lines 374-80 (πέφανται δ᾽ +ἐκτίνουσ᾽/ ἀτολμήτων ἀρὴ+/ πνεόντων μεῖζον ἢ δικαίως/ φλεόντων 3 and political figures is emphasised to the point that the entire ode appears barely connected and integrated with the context; there is, indeed, no reference to Thyestes' speech nor to what follows the parodos of the chorus. The unrelatedness of a choral song to the context in which it is set is certainly not infrequent in Seneca's tragedies, still, what really strikes the attention here is the episodical nature of the ode itself.9 The main theme being delivered is first explicitly stated,10 then reaffirmed twice11 and ultimately presented as a metaphor with an explicit reference to Agamemnon's slaughter.12 Yet, the same theme – the congenital sin in royal families – is completely abandoned as soon as Clytemnestra takes the floor and concludes the choral ode in line 108. A linguistic analysis of Seneca exclusively based upon a compared reading of his drama and Aeschylus' original text would represent a critical approach now considered obsolete,13 yet, as a choral parodos, the first ode in Seneca's text is in too sharp contrast with the Greek one. In Aeschylus, indeed, the intervention of the old men of Argos helps contextualise the watchman’s monologue, which would otherwise be difficult to frame.14 δωμάτων ὑπέρφευ/ ὑπὲρ τὸ βέλτιστον. ἔστω δ᾽ ἀπή-/ μαντον, ὥστ᾽ ἀπαρκεῖν/ εὖ πραπίδων λαχόντα) are recalled and paraphrased in lines 56-9 (O regnorum magnis fallax/ Fortuna bonis/ in praecipiti dubioque locas/ excelsa nimis). The two versions also share the same consideration of royal families as lacking of any form of equality and justice. Such assertion is presented in lines 774-5 in Aeschylus (Δίκα δὲ λάμπει μὲν ἐν δυσκάπνοις/ δώμασιν τὸν δ᾽ ἐναίσιμον τίει/ βίον) and in lines 78-81 in Seneca (impia quas non/ arma fatigant? iura pudorque/ et coniugii sacrata fides/ fugiunt aulas). The Latin text is quoted from Tarrant 1976. The Greek text is quoted from Fraenkel 1950. 9 Tarrant rightly underlines that only three plays present a choral parodos fully integrated in their respective contexts: Troades (67 f.), Medea (56 f.), Oedipus (110 f.). See Tarrant 1976: 180-1. 10 praecipites regum casus/ Fortuna rotat. Agamemnon, 71-2. 11 Lines 78-81 and lines 87-8 (Licet arma uacent cessentque doli/ sidunt ipso pondere magna). 12 Such a metaphor is twofold, as it describes the high, imposing hills as an easy target for thunders (feriunt celsos fulmina colles, line 96), but it also presents an allusion to the neck wound that will kill Agamemnon (placet in uulnus maxima ceruix, line 100). 13 Cfr., in this regard, Martina 1981: 139. And yet, according to the Italian scholar, Seneca's drafting of the Agamemnon presupposes a deep knowledge of Aeschylus: ‘La presenza e la tecnica di elaborazione delle fonti, per lo più latine, non esclude ma implica la conoscenza da parte di Seneca dell'Agamennone di Eschilo. Le tracce di questa conoscenza, anostro parere incontrovertibili, non diminuiscono ma accrescono la novità della tragedia senecana.’ 14 ‘In this process, the “thematic” role of the Chorus immense. First of all, it is used to light up the crucial moments in the past, not simply to “give antecedent material” (for the audience knows that, or most of it) but to highlight them in such a way that the audience feels their presence at the 4 It is while describing the Greek military expedition to Troy that the Aeschylean elders emphatically affirm their pre-eminence as a principal character within the drama. In line 104 the chorus defines itself as the only entity with the “power to tell of the auspicious authority of well-grown men.”15 The old men of Argos were, in fact, eyewitnesses of the events and their thorough awareness of what has happened brings them to underline their authority (κύριός εἰμι) with a remarkably elusive language.16 Both the Aeschylean elders' display of strong authority and their function to contextualise the beginning scene are lacking in Seneca's first choral ode. The dramatic nature of the play – that well permeates the chorus' words at the beginning of the Aeschylean version –17 is already spoiled by the time the Senecan elders enter the scene.18 The only function left to Seneca's chorus is that of disclosing the final outcome of the play by presenting Agamemnon's fall as a direct consequence of his hubris.19 If the lack of emotional involvement on the part of the chorus allows it to lucidly forecast the tragic epilogue of the play, this detachment also confines the chorus into a marginal position within the narration.

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