View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Apollo CONCEPTS OF (UN)DRESSING IN GREEK DRAMA Antonia Marie Reinke (née Schrader) Murray Edwards College Faculty of Classics, University of CamBridge This dissertation is submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy April 2019 PREFACE This dissertation is the result of my own work and includes nothing which is the outcome of work done in collaboration except as declared in the Preface and specified in the text. It is not substantially the same as any that I have submitted, or, is being concurrently submitted for a degree or diploma or other qualification at the University of Cambridge or any other University or similar institution except as declared in the Preface and specified in the text. I further state that no substantial part of my dissertation has already been submitted, or, is being concurrently submitted for any such degree, diploma or other qualification at the University of Cambridge or any other University or similar institution except as declared in the Preface and specified in the text. It does not exceed the word limit prescribed by the Faculty of Classics. iii iv ABSTRACT Concepts of (Un)dressing in Greek Drama Antonia Marie Reinke In recent years, dramatic props and costumes have become the focus of a renewed scholarly interest in the performance aspects of Greek drama. This has entailed, in particular, a shift away from enquiries into the ostensible realia of Greek staging to explorations of their complex con- structions, semiotics and agencies in the plays and their cultural contexts more widely. My thesis situates itself within these developments but considers the hitherto underexplored phe- nomenon of (un)dressing in Greek tragedy and comedy. Often treated as a matter of physical costuming, it is a central contention of my work that (un)dress in theatrical representation func- tions, first and foremost, as an imaginary site where ideas of social identity, difference and transformation may be mapped and negotiated. Drawing on a broad range of relevant tragic and comic scenes, I argue that both dressing and undressing are persistently evoked in Greek drama as social and interactive performances, allowing characters to (re)position themselves and oth- ers in a grid of hierarchical relations, including differences of gender and station at their core. At the same time, the agency of (un)dressing is frequently reversed in the dramatic imagination: it is the performance of (un)dressing that determines a character’s social identity rather than vice versa. By exploring this dual capacity of dramatic (un)dressing, my thesis situates the the- atrical concepts of (un)dressing within the plays’ socio-political context in the democratic city of Athens: these concepts highlight the precarious position of the democratic citizen male, caught between traditional ideas of essential being and a pervasive public performativity of self, as well as the different representational strategies used to address this uncertainty in tragedy and comedy respectively. v vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I am deeply grateful for the generous funding that allowed me to write this thesis, including an Arts and Humanities Research Council DTP Studentship (2015-2018), a Cambridge Trust European Scholarship (2015-2018), the Stephan Körner Scholarship kindly provided by Mur- ray Edwards College (2015-2018), a Kurt Hahn Trust Scholarship (2015-2016), a DAAD Jahresstipendium für Doktorandinnen und Doktoranden (2015-2016) and a grant from the Graduate Studies Fund of the Cambridge Faculty of Classics (2018). During my PhD, I was fortunate to be able to draw on the expertise, commitment and ad- vice of a wonderful range of scholars at the Cambridge Faculty of Classics and beyond: I owe particular gratitude to my supervisor Richard Hunter, who has been exceptionally generous with his time and support. This thesis is indebted to his kind and astute guidance. I am deeply grateful to my examiners, Mario Telò and Rebecca Lämmle, for their many helpful comments and stimulating suggestions, which will be invaluable as I am taking this research forward. Rebecca Lämmle’s unfailing support has been a great encouragement throughout my PhD. Many thanks also to Simon Goldhill for his continued inspiration, to Renaud Gagné for his intellectual encouragement and to Rosanna Omitowoju for allowing me to complement my re- search with exciting teaching opportunities. I am very grateful also to the Faculty of Classics, the Faculty Library and especially the Classics graduate community for allowing me to write my PhD in such a stimulating and wel- coming environment. Special thanks go to Teresa Röger, Di Yan and Claire Rachel Jackson for their company, encouragement and friendship. I owe an additional debt of gratitude to Claire for providing insightful comments on draft sections of this thesis. Annalisa Quinn and Pascale Reinke-Schreiber have generously agreed to proof-read the final version and I am enormously grateful for their kind and careful criticism. Alongside Marina Galetaki and Louie Zweig, An- nalisa is also among the dear group of friends who have been an invaluable support and joy these past few years. Ines Thomas and Katharina Krimmel, my oldest and closest friends, de- serve special credit in this regard. My final and deepest thanks are owed to my family: to my mother Elisabeth, for her bound- less and unconditional support, to Günter, my siblings Andrea and Christian, my grandmother Gisela and my family-in-law, for their warm encouragement. Finally, to my husband Benedikt I owe more thanks than words can say – for everything, and especially for sharing the ups and downs of my PhD life with such wonderful humour, love and support. Vielen herzlichen Dank! vii viii TABLE OF CONTENTS Preface iii I Abstract Iv Acknowledgments v Iii Abbreviations and text editions xi Iii INTRODUCTION: CONCEPTS OF (UN)DRESSING 1 I CHAPTER ONE: DRAMATIC RE-DRESSING 7 I 1.1 Introduction 7 I 1.1.1 Contemporary frameworks: (re-)dressing, social hierarchy and identity 9 I 1.1.2 Dramatic re-dressing: an overview 1 5I 1.2 Comic up-dressing 1 I7 1.2.1 Introductory remarks: rethinking the comic suspension of hierarchy 1 7I 1.2.2 The up-dressing comic hero(ine) 1 8I (i) Philocleon in Wasps 1 I8 (ii) Xanthias in Frogs 1 9I (iii) The women in Assemblywomen 2 I3 1.2.3 Discussion: comic up-dressing and social non-intelligibility 2 I6 1.2.4 Utopian up-dressing: Peisetaerus in Birds 3 1I 1.3 Comic down-dressing 3 I7 1.3.1 Dressing down and up: Dicaeopolis in Acharnians 3 I7 1.3.2 Patterns of degradation 4 2I (i) Dionysus in Frogs 4 I2 (ii) The Kinsman in Thesmophoriazusae 4 I7 1.4 Tragic down-dressing 5 2I 1.4.1 Patterns of degradation 5 2I (i) Dolon in Rhesus 5 I2 (ii) Pentheus in Bacchae 5 I6 1.4.2 The down-dressing divinity: Dionysus in Bacchae 60 I 1.4.3 Strategic down-dressing 6 I5 ix (i) Telephus in Telephus 6 6I (ii) Menelaus in Helen 6 7I (iii) Orestes in Libation-Bearers and in Sophocles’ and Euripides’ Electra 6 I9 1.5 Discussion: dramatic down-dressing and social degradation 70 I 1.6 Discussion: explaining the non-representation of tragic up-dressing 7 8I CHAPTER TWO: DRAMATIC UNDRESSING 8 5I 2.1 Introduction 8 I5 2.1.1 Contemporary frameworks: civic vision and the undressed body 90 I 2.2 Tragic undressing 9 I8 2.2.1 Clytaemestra’s breast-baring appeal 9 8I (i) Clytaemestra’s maternal discourse in Libation-Bearers 9 I8 (ii) The discourse re-dramatized in Euripides’ Electra and Orestes 100 I (iii) The discourse destabilized in Libation-Bearers 102 I (iv) Clytaemestra’s self-baring as self-empowerment and sexual transgression 10 I 6 2.2.2 Undressing as social transgression 10 I 7 (i) Maenadic and mournful undressing: Bacchae and Phoenician Women I10 8 (ii) Undressing and emotional frenzy: Euripides’ Phaedra and Hermione 1 I1 0 (iii) Undressing and madness: Euripides’ Heracles 11 I 3 2.2.3 Undressing as social (dis)empowerment 11 I 5 (i) Exposure in death: Sophocles’ Antigone 11 I 6 (ii) Gendered exposure: Suppliants, Seven Against Thebes and Hecuba I11 8 (iii) Exposure re-claimed: Euripides’ Electra and Aeschylus’ Cassandra 1 I20 (iv) Exposure contained: Polyxena in Hecuba 12 I 5 2.3 Discussion: tragic undressing and the patterns of displacement 1 I30 2.4 Comic undressing 13 I 6 2.4.1 From tragedy to comedy 13 I 6 2.4.2 Gendered revelation and self-assertion: choral self-stripping in Lysistrata 13 I 7 (i) The male chorus 13 I 8 (ii) The female chorus 1 40I 2.4.3 Comic characters and undressing 1 I4 2 2.4.4 Undressing as male self-assertion 1 I4 3 x (i) Stripping oneself and others 1 4I 3 (ii) Figurative objectification and stripping as male competition 14 I 6 2.4.5 Undressing as involuntary male exposure 14 I 8 (i) Lamachus in Acharnians 14 I 9 (ii) Dionysus in Frogs 1 51I (iii) The Kinsman in Thesmophoriazusae 1 5I 3 2.5 Discussion: comic undressing between revelation and degradation 15 I 9 CONCLUSIONS 1 6I 5 BIBLIOGRAPHY 1 I73 xi xii ABBREVIATIONS AND TEXT EDITIONS ABBREVIATIONS Chantraine – Chantraine, P. (2009) Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue grecque: histoire des mots. Pierre Chantraine; achevé par Jean Taillardat, Olivier Masson et Jean-Louis Perpillou; avec en supplément les Chroniques d'étymologie grecque (1-10) rassemblées par Alain Blanc, Charles de Lamberterie et Jean-Louis Perpillou. Nouvelle Edition. Paris. KG – Kühner, R. and Gerth, B. (1966) Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache. Zweiter Teil: Satzlehre.