Greek Tragedy

Tragedy stands as the supreme poetic achievement of fifth-century Athenian culture. Indeed, one could argue that no ancient literary form has had a more profound effect on Western culture as a whole. This option gives the opportunity to study a range of works from the three greatest exponents of the genre, ranging from Aeschylus' Oresteia of 458 BC, the only surviving tragic trilogy, to Sophocles' and Euripides' final masterpieces, Oedipus at Colonus and Bacchae, which were both produced posthumously in Athens in the last decade of the fifth century. Combining speech, song, and dance, tragedy embodies and animates the gods and heroes of myth as never before, and recreates their stories for a (largely) Athenian audience. The option should appeal to all students of Greek literature and culture.

A good introduction to the genre (and current critical approaches to it) is given by J. Gregory ed., The Blackwell Companion to Greek Tragedy (2005); start with the chapters on the individual tragedians. For introductions to the alpha texts, see B. Goward, Aeschylus: Agamemnon (Duckworth 2005), C. Segal, Oedipus Tyrannus: Tragic Heroism and the Limits of Knowledge (2nd edn, Oxford 2001), and W. Allan Euripides: Medea (Duckworth 2002).

Teaching: lectures, and tutorials and classes.