Dionysiac poetics and Euripides' Bacchae / Charles Segal.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Segal, Charles, 1936-2002, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Dionysus (Greek deity)--In literature.

Dionysus.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xviii, 420 pages)

Edition:

Expanded edition.

Place of Publication:

Princeton, New Jersey : Princeton University Press, [1997]

Summary:

In his play Bacchae, Euripides chooses as his central figure the god who crosses the boundaries among god, man, and beast, between reality and imagination, and between art and madness. In so doing, he explores what in tragedy is able to reach beyond the social, ritual, and historical context from which tragedy itself rises. Charles Segal's reading of Euripides' Bacchae builds gradually from concrete details of cult, setting, and imagery to the work's implications for the nature of myth, language, and theater. This volume presents the argument that the Dionysiac poetics of the play characterize a world view and an art form that can admit logical contradictions and hold them in suspension.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Contents

Preface to the Expanded Edition

Preface

Abbreviations

Introduction

1 The Elusive God

2 Forms of Dionysus: Doubling, Hunting, Rituals

3 Dionysus and Civilization: Tools, Agriculture, Music

4 The Horizontal Axis: House, City, Mountain

5 The Vertical Axis: Earth, Air, Water, Fire

6 Arms and the Man: Sex Roles and Rites of Passage

7 Metatragedy: Art, Illusion, Imitation

8 The Crisis of Symbols: Language, Myth, Tragedy

9 Dionysiac Poetics and Euripidean Tragedy

Afterword. Dionysus and the Bacchae in the Light of Recent Scholarship

Selected Bibliography

Bibliographical Addenda (1997)

Index

Notes:

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9780691065281

0691065284

9780691101354

0691101353