Spectacles of Horror Approaching the Supernatural in Greek Tragedy by Nathan Bowman
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Spectacles of Horror Approaching the Supernatural in Greek Tragedy By Nathan Bowman © 2020 Nathan Bowman Submitted to the graduate degree program in the Department of Theatre and Dance and the Graduate Faculty of the University of Kansas in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Chair: Dennis Christilles Jane Barnette Henry Bial Rebecca Rovit William Lindsey Date Defended: 28 April 2020 i The dissertation committee for Nathan Bowman certifies that this is the approved version of the following dissertation: Spectacles of Horror: Approaching the Supernatural in Greek Tragedy Chair: Date Approved: 28 April 2020 ii ABSTRACT Belief in the power of the supernatural world to affect the world of the living permeates Greek tragedy. Contrary to traditional accounts of ancient Greece as a forebearer to modern Western culture, an exploration into Greek supernatural beliefs shows that tragedy is radically non-rational, and non-modern. Its values are incongruous with the values of an empirically and globally based modern world that takes as orthodoxy the inherent realism of all things tangible. It is the radical difference between ancient Greek culture and the modern world that presents such a challenge to modern theatre directors who approach the production of Greek tragedy. This dissertation argues that while the secularized modern West dispatched with supernatural curiosities in the public sphere, tragedy finds its modern kindred in that realm to which those curiosities were banished but given new life: horror fiction. By employing the aesthetic elements of that genre to which the modern world consigned its fascination with the macabre, Greek tragedy, through a spectacle of horror centered on the existence and power of supernatural forces has the potential to challenge the social, ethical, and scientific assumptions of modern audiences. This dissertation will explore the relationship between Greek tragedy and modern horror by considering three objects of horror that guide the violent outcomes of the tragic plot: the Dead, the Divine, and the Other. An analysis of these objects of horror will first consider the role of these forces in ancient Greek culture as evidenced by the extant literary tradition of antiquity. Secondly, this dissertation will analyze exemplary modern productions of tragedy to consider how the aesthetic theories of horror provide a lens by which the modern theatre maker might approach the supernatural characteristics of tragedy. We will see that the parallels between tragedy and horror allow for the aesthetics of horror to provide a model in which the supernatural powers present in Greek tragedy may be affectively presented to a modern audience. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First and foremost, I would like to thank my wife Elizabeth Bettendorf Bowman. Her brilliance as a theatre maker and passion for utilizing the arts in public service inspires me daily. I am happy to have her both as a personal and professional partner for life. As of my writing this, she is just weeks away from giving birth to our first child, and I will be forever appreciative of the patience she has given me while I spend my time writing and finishing graduate school. I would like to thank my godfather Dr. James Eiswert. I first met James during my undergraduate program where he was my faculty advisor in philosophy. It was he who first introduced me to the Greeks. It was under his study that I first began to consider the supernatural dimension of theatre performance. To this day, I frequently think back to conversations with him for insight. The impact James has had on my mind and life trajectory cannot be understated. I will be forever in his debt. I am especially grateful to Dr. Dennis Christilles, who has kept me on track during these last four years of graduate work. Dennis went out of his way to meet with me weekly to prepare me for comprehensive exams and to give guidance throughout my dissertation writing process. It was as his assistant that I first had the opportunity to travel to and produce theatre in Greece. Because of him, I came to love the country of Greece, but also was given an unparalleled opportunity to learn how the plays of tragedy function in the country in which they originated. Dennis’ enthusiasm and constant support for my work has often uplifted me at times when I severely needed it. I could not have asked for a better mentor and friend throughout this process. I would be remiss not to mention those scholars and artists who have motivated me to get where I am today. I am grateful to Professors Henry Bial, Rebecca Rovit, William Lindsey, and Peter Zazzali for their expertise, openness, and support. Each of them has taught me as much in iv conversation as they have in classes. I am thankful to Dr. Jane Barnette in whose seminar I, for the first time, began exploring my long-time love of horror which would eventually lead to this dissertation. I am greatly appreciative of Andreas Flourakis for taking time to converse with me about his work, answering questions of translation I had, and for going out of his way to send me manuscripts. I am grateful to De-Rance Blaylock for her willingness to discuss with me her role in Antigone in Ferguson. I would like to thank the company members and artists of Kansas City Public Theatre. I am lucky to be immersed in the creative processes of so many dedicated theatre artists in the Kansas City area who I continue to learn from. Lastly, I would like to thank my parents Shelly Bowman and Chris Reynolds for the loving lack of oversight I was given as a child. From the age I could walk, I was left to amuse myself by partaking in the most vulgar, violent, crude, and sinister media that a young child could find on cable. While I cannot put it into words, I am sure that this contributed to my love of the macabre and general enthusiasm for the morbid and profane. v TABLE OF CONTENTS ACCEPTANCE PAGE……………………………………………………………………...…. iiii ABSTRACT……………………………………………………………………………………. iiiiii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS……………………………………………………………………… iviv EDITIONS AND ABBREVIATIONS………………………………………………………… viivii INTRODUCTION………………………………………………………………………………. 11 Why Horror……………………………………………………………………………… 11 Outline of Dissertation…………………………………………………………………… 88 CHAPTER 1 The Rationalization of Tragedy…………………………………………………. 1515 CHAPTER 2 Spectacles of Horror…………………………………………………………….. 3355 Elements of the Spectacle……………………………………………………………… 3355 Defining Horror……………………………………………………………………..... 43 CHAPTER 3 The Dead………………………………………………………………………… 662 Tragedy and Death……………………………………………………………………… 6162 Defining “the Dead”…………………………………………………………………… 6767 Haunted Houses in the Oresteia………………………………………………………. 7676 CHAPTER 4 The Divine……………………………………………………………………... 101 Faceless Killers…………………………………………………………………………101101 The Gods of the Trojan War………………………………………………………….. 105 Divine Dread in Tadashi Suzuki’s the Trojan Women……………………………….. 111111 Helen’s Possession……………………………………………………………………. 135135 CHAPTER 5 The Other……………………………………………………………………….. 153153 The Monstrous Other, Now and Then……………………………………………...… 153 The Barbarian in Greek Tragedy……………………………………………………... 162 Medea the Monster…………………………………………………………………… 167 EPILOGUE……………………………………………………………………………………. 193193 BIBLIOGRAPHY……………………………………………………………………………... 204204 vi EDITIONS Unless otherwise stated, all citations and references to the extant plays of Greek tragedy and other works of antiquity, both Greek and Latin, are from the Loeb Classical Library (LCL) editions. Citations are according to passage and chapter numbers used in those editions. ABBREVIATIONS Passages are cited using abbreviations for ancient authors and texts following the Oxford Classical Dictionary. I have provided a key below for the works present in this dissertation. Aesch. = Aeschlyus Ag. = Agamemnon Cho. = Choephori (Libation Bearers) Eleg. = Fragments Elegiaca Eum. = Eumenides Fr. = Fragments Pers. = Persians Pr. = Prometheus Bound Supp. = Suppliants Th. = Seven Against Thebes Apollon. = Apollonius of Rhodes, Argonautica Ar. = Aristophanes Ran. = The Frogs Thesm. =Thesmophoriazusae (Women at the Thesmophoria Festival) Arist. = Aristotle Po. = Poetics Col. = Colluthus, The Rape of Helen Diod. = Diodorus, Library of History Eur. = Euripides Alc. = Alcestis Andr. = Andromache Ba. = Bacchae El. = Electra Hec. = Hecabe Hel. = Helen vii Heracl. = Heraclidae (Children of Heracles) Hipp. = Hippolytus IA = Iphigenia at Aulis Med. = Medea Or. = Orestes Tro. = Trojan Women Hom. = Homer Il. = Iliad Od. = Odyssey Pl. = Plato Lg. = Laws Phd. = Phaedo R. = Republic Plut. = Plutarch Sol. = Solon Sen. = Seneca Med. = Medea Soph. = Sophocles Aj. = Ajax Ant. = Antigone El. = Electra Eleg. = Elegiae Fr. = Fragments. OC = Oedipus Colonus OT = Oedipus Tyrannus Ph. = Philoctetes Tr. = Trachiniae (Women of Trachis) Xen. = Xenophon Mem. = Memorabilia viii INTRODUCTION Why Horror? In 1818, English author Mary Shelley anonymously published her landmark novel that would propel works of horror into popular imagination well into the 21st century, creating one of the most iconic monsters in Western fiction. Since its publication, Shelley’s novel about a young scientist who defies the laws of death to create a hideous and violent humanoid creature has been the inspiration behind countless adaptations presented on both stage and film. Just five years after her novel was published, it received its first of many theatrical treatments in a production by Richard Brinsley Peake’s.1 As of this writing, my hometown of Kansas City,