The golden age of ancient Greece should be called the fifth century BC. It is associated with the most famous names of poets, philosophers, politicians, sculptors, architects. This was the time of the greatest upsurge of the national consciousness of the ancient Greeks and the time of the greatest trials for them. "To be or not to be Greece?" - so the question was put.

In 500 BC. e. Greek cities in Asia Minor tried to free themselves from Persian rule and were subjected to the most severe repressions.

Miletus, the richest, most beautiful city, was destroyed and burned by the Persians. The inhabitants are killed or driven into slavery. This happened in 494 BC. e.

All Greece was agitated. The Persian ruler Darius gathered a huge army. The Greco-Persian War began. Mortal danger hung over Greece, over its small scattered city-states, which were often torn apart by petty strife. Some didn't last. The cities of Thessaly let the Persians pass unhindered. Only Athens held firm. In the difficult days of the war, major commanders appeared, whose names the Greeks remembered and honored throughout their subsequent history, among them Miltiades, who won a brilliant victory over the Persians in the Battle of Marathon (September 13, 490 BC), Themistocles, who organized the construction navy, a major politician and diplomat, the Spartan king Leonid, who heroically fought the Persians in the Thermopylae Gorge at the head of a detachment of 300 people. The outcome of the war was decided by the famous naval battle off the island of Salamis in 480. Later military actions (they continued until 449 BC) could no longer change the situation. Greece has withstood the ordeal.

Historians associate with the name of Pericles the classical period in the history of Greek culture, its especially lush flowering. It was the 5th century BC, the time when on the streets of Athens one could meet Sophocles and Euripides, Socrates and the young Plato, the historian Thucydides, the greatest sculptor Phidias and many other figures of Greek culture famous for millennia. Pericles, a native of Athens, a native of an old aristocratic family, smart, educated, became the head of state. His reign was short. In 422-429 years. BC e. he held the elective office of strategist (in 29, at the beginning of the Peloponnesian War, he died of the plague). But just in these years, Greece, after a victory over the Persians, spreading its wings wide, joyful and free from fears of a powerful neighbor, freely and freely surrendered to spiritual activity, deploying the mighty forces of its brilliant people. And then the true flowering of Greek culture began, including its theater with the great names of Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides and Aristophanes.

How did this amazing and impressive kind of art come about?

It is human nature to imitate. The child in play imitates what he sees in life, the savage in the dance depicts a hunting scene or other elements of his simple life. The ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle drew all art, one of the theorists of which he was, based on a person's inclination to imitate (mimesis - Greek "imitation, reproduction, likeness").

From imitation, Greek theater was born, instead of a story about an event, the event itself was reproduced, in other words, the story was presented in the forms of life itself.

Aeschylus (525-456 BC)

Prometheus is the noblest saint and martyr in the philosophical calendar.
K. Marx

Prometheus! Mythical character in the ancient Greek pantheon. The god-titan, who gave people fire, against the will of the supreme god Zeus, is the first in a string of already real historical figures who died for ideas, for the search for truth, for the desire to increase human knowledge. Among them is Socrates, an ancient Greek philosopher who was executed in 399 BC. e. for teaching people to think independently, to reject dogmas and prejudices. Among them is the famous Hypatia of Alexandria, a female scientist, mathematician, astronomer, stoned in 415 AD. e. Christian fanatics. Among them are the French publisher Etienne Dolet, burned in Paris in 1546, Giordano Bruno, burned in Rome in 1600, and many other sufferers, "martyrs in the philosophical calendar."

The mythical character Prometheus became, as it were, the personification of the human impulse for progress, for truth and the struggle for it. Beautiful, noble hero and martyr!

In the tragedy of Aeschylus, his story was depicted on the stage. He was brought to the mountains of the Caucasus, "to the far end of the earth, to the deserted desert of the wild Scythians", chained to a rock with iron chains, and the eagle must now fly to him every day, peck out his liver, so that it grows again and again and eternally announces he surrounds with his heartbreaking cries and groans. That was the judgment of Zeus.

One can imagine the condition of the ancient Athenians gathered in the theatre. For them, everything that happened on the stage had the meaning of a ritual action. They believed the myth as reality. Their feelings were expressed by the choir.

I shudder when I see you
It is hard for the tormented by a thousand torments! ..
You do not tremble angry Zeus,
You are wayward and now ...

Aeschylus hardly believed unconditionally the religious basis of the myth. Scientific thinking has already come a long way in the minds of the cultural part of Greek society after the naive worldview of Homer. In the benefits that Prometheus bestowed on people, he, perhaps, symbolically depicted the historical path of mankind from savagery to civilization. On stage, Prometheus talks about it. Of course, the philosophical allegory is clothed here in the artistic concreteness of the image. The viewer saw in front of him not a naked idea, but a person in the flesh, vulnerable, tormented, thinking, loving.

Prometheus is a friend, benefactor, patron of people. And Zeus, what is he, this supreme ruler of Olympus?

Zeus is the enemy of people, he planned to destroy
The whole human race and plant a new one.
No one stood up for the poor mortals,
And I dared ... -

says Prometheus. According to the myth, Zeus sent a flood to the earth and destroyed the entire human race, except for one married couple, from which the peoples were reborn. This myth later entered the Christian religion (the legend of Noah's ark). In the legend of the flood, people were accused: they were guilty of their death, and in the will of God, who doomed them to it, a kind of higher justice was carried out - punishment for their vices. Aeschylus did not say a word about the reasons for Zeus's anger at people, and his action towards them looks like a despotic trick of an evil and capricious god.

In essence, the political theme already begins here. The inhabitants of Attica, to whom Aeschylus belonged, greatly valued their democratic order and were very proud of them. Therefore, wittingly or unwittingly, but the myth of the conflict between Zeus and Prometheus in the tragedy of Aeschylus acquired the symbolic character of criticism of autocracy, Prometheus throws heavy accusations to Zeus. He is a tyrant. Zeus - "accountable to no one, harsh king." Prometheus helped him gain power, but Zeus immediately forgot about it. This is the logic of tyranny:

After all, all tyrants are characterized by disease
Criminal distrust of a friend.

And Zeus ordered this friend to be chained to a rock. His will was fulfilled by Strength and Power, personifying the idea of ​​violence and tyranny in the tragedy. Hermes, the messenger of Zeus, arrogantly instructs Prometheus to humble himself. But he proudly refuses:

Be sure that I would not change
Their sorrows to the slavish service.

This is the holy of holies for the Athenian, proud of the consciousness of his freedom, political freedom. Of course, this applied only to free citizens of the policy. There was no mention of slaves. In the mind of a free Greek of that time, they were just sounding, living things, executors of the will of the slave owner.

Prometheus is the opposite of Zeus in everything. The latter is unfair, cruel. Prometheus is humane. When the old man Ocean, who felt sorry for him from the bottom of his heart, wants to ask Zeus for mercy for him, Prometheus, he dissuades him, fearing to call trouble on his protector:

Though I feel bad, but this is not the reason,
To bring suffering to others.

Everything in the tragedy of Aeschylus truly screams against Zeus. The virgin Io, the daughter of Inach, who had the misfortune to attract the loving heart of the supreme god, was persecuted by the jealous Hera. Zeus turned her into a cow, but Hera found out about it and sent the many-eyed Argus to follow her. Hermes, on the orders of Zeus, killed Argus. Then Hera sent a stinging gadfly on her, and poor Io, not knowing peace, wanders around the world. She also reached the Caucasus:

What's the edge? What kind of people? What kind of husband is this
Chained to the rock with iron chains,
Under a storm of winds? For what sins
Does he bear punishment?

That was Prometheus. She saw him chained to a rock. Prometheus predicts her future fate: for a long time she will have to wander around the world half-mad, enduring great suffering, but in the end, having reached the mouth of the Nile, "on the edge of the Egyptian land" she will calm down, giving birth to "black Epaphus", who will "cultivate that land that waters the wide Nile." In the story of Prometheus, the mythical picture of the world is revealed, as it seemed to the ancient Greek, a picture full of strange creatures and monsters: one-eyed Arimaspians, who “jump on horseback and live near the golden-jet waters of the Pluto River”, and Phorkiad maidens, similar to swans, and terrible Gorgons , three winged sisters with snakes in their hair (“none of the mortals, having seen them, can no longer breathe”), and vultures with a sharp beak, silent dogs of Zeus, and Amazons, “not loving husbands”.

The world in the days of Aeschylus seemed still mysterious, huge and terrible places seemed to be outside the inhabited region.

The viewer, a contemporary of Aeschylus, listened with a shudder to the prophecies of Prometheus, for him it was a true reality, he involuntarily felt sympathy for Prometheus and for the unfortunate and persecuted maiden Io (she went on stage with horns on her head) and at the same time, trembling, of course, and, cold at heart, felt hostility to the cruel and tyrannical Zeus, when the cries of Io rushed from the stage:

Oh, what a grievous sin, Zeus, you me
He was sentenced to a thousand torments? ..
Why, frightening with a terrible ghost,
Are you torturing a crazy girl?
Burn me with fire, hide me in the earth,
Throw me into the food of underwater creatures!
Or my prayers
Can't you hear, king?

The question arises: how could the playwright so boldly, so frankly condemn the god in whom his compatriots sacredly believed? The Greeks were afraid of their gods, made sacrifices to them, arranged in honor of their libations and incense, but the gods were not for them a model of behavior and a standard of justice. Moreover, according to their ideas, they were not omnipotent; over them, as well as over people, hung a formidable shadow of fate and three terrible Moira, carrying out the action of a mysterious and inevitable fate ("Necessity!") - "Three Moira and Eriny that everyone remembers."

choir
Is Zeus weaker than them?
Prometheus
He cannot escape fate.

The fate of the gods, perhaps, is worse than human, they are immortal, and if they are condemned to suffering, like the grandfather and father of Zeus, who were cast into Tartarus, then they will suffer forever. Therefore, when Io, complaining about his fate, calls for death, Prometheus sadly answers her:

You would not endure my suffering!
After all, I'm not meant to die.

This is Aeschylus' Prometheus. The image of this rebel as an idea of ​​rebellion, a protest against tyranny, excited more than one generation of heroes. He was sung by the English revolutionary romantics Shelley and Byron, his features are recognizable in
the character of Milton's Satan (John Milton, "Paradise Lost").

Aeschylus is one of the founders of theatrical performances. He is almost at the beginning. The theater has not yet revealed all its stage possibilities. Then everything was much more modest. Today, dozens, and sometimes hundreds of actors operate on the Stage. Aeschylus introduced a second actor, and this was considered a great innovation. Two actors and a choir are the performers. The actors uttered long monologues or exchanged short remarks, the chorus expressed, in fact, the reaction of the audience - more often sympathy and compassion, sometimes timid murmuring - after all, the gods were acting.

Sophocles (496-406 BC)

Creon. One morning I woke up the king of Thebes. But God knows if I ever dreamed of power.
Antigone. Then you should have said no.
Creon. I could not. I suddenly felt like a master who refuses to work. It seemed dishonorable to me. And I agreed.
Antigone. Well, so much the worse for you.
Jean Anouille

Quote from a play by a French author of the 20th century. The name of the play, its plot are identical to the tragedy of the great Greek playwright. Two plays, and between them - the millennium. What connected the authors of such different eras? Thoughts about the individual and the state.

Jean Anouille reflects on the enormous responsibility of a person who has taken on the burden of state power.

Sophocles was concerned about another question: are there limits to state power over an individual, what rights of an individual cannot be ignored under any circumstances, and what should be state power? These questions are answered in life itself, in the reality that is presented on the stage, in the speeches and actions of the heroes of the play. The tragedy raises serious political and moral questions.

Sophocles is a singer of strong natures. Such is Antigone in his Oedipus Rex trilogy. She can be killed, executed, but cannot be forced to act contrary to her moral principles. Her will is unbreakable.

Two brothers, Eteocles and Polyneices, entered into a struggle with each other for power. Eteocles became the legitimate ruler of Thebes. Polynices turned to a foreign power and, with the forces of the enemies of his homeland, wanted to seize the throne, taking it away from his brother. In the battle near Thebes, both brothers died, at the same time thrusting swords into each other. Creon became the ruler of Thebes. He ordered to bury Eteocles with honors, and leave Polynices, as a traitor, without burial, to be eaten by wild animals and birds. Under pain of death, it was forbidden for anyone to violate this order.

Creon acted like a patriot. For him, the homeland is above all, the interests of the state are above all other, personal interests. “He who honors his friend more than his homeland, I don’t put such a thing in anything,” he solemnly proclaims. And this was quite in the spirit of the political and moral ideal that every Greek professed, including Sophocles. Nevertheless, he, Sophocles, condemned the actions of his hero and opposed him, the all-powerful sovereign, with a young, weak, but possessing great strength of mind Theban woman, the sister of Eteocles and Polynices Antigone. She opposed Creon's order and performed the rite of burial of her brother. For this she should be executed. Creon is relentless.

Before the audience there is a political dispute between Creon and Antigone. She accuses him of trampling on the unwritten but firm law of the gods. With the same accusation, the fiance of Antigone, the youngest son of Creon Haemon, comes forward against him. Creon defends his case, stating that the power of the sovereign must be unshakable, otherwise anarchy will destroy everything:

... Beginninglessness is the worst of evils.
It kills cities and houses
Plunges into ruin, and fighters,
Fighting nearby, separates.
The order is approved by obedience;
You should uphold the laws.

In his defense of the uncontrollability of state power, Creon goes to the extreme. He states:

The ruler must be obeyed
In everything - legal, as well as illegal.

Haemon cannot agree with this in any way, he reminds his father that the gods gave man reason, "and he in the world is the highest of blessings." In the end, Haemon throws a heavy accusation to his father: "Not a state - where one reigns." In democratic Athens, this statement of the young man found the most lively response. Creon, in a temper, fully exposes his tyrannical program of action: "But the state is the property of kings!" Gemon retorts with irony: “It would be great if you alone ruled the desert!”

Thus, on the stage of the Athenian theater of Dionysus, before 17,000 spectators, this great dispute of the ages unfolded.

Events proved Creon wrong. To him is the soothsayer Tiresias. He is trying to moderate the anger of the king, not to execute the deceased: “Respect death, do not touch the dead. Or valiantly finish off the dead. The king persists. Tiresias tells him about the highest human rights that even the gods cannot trample on - in this case, the right to burial. And this does not bother Creon. Then Tiresias, leaving, promises him the vengeance of the gods: "For this, the goddesses of vengeance, Erinyes, are waiting for you."

Creon finally begins to see clearly, he is afraid of the wrath of the gods. He orders the release of Antigone, but too late: in the crypt where she was immured, they found two corpses, a girl who had hanged herself and Haemon who had stabbed herself. The tragedy is completed by Eurydice, the wife of Creon and the mother of the young man.

Crushed by misfortune, the ruler of Thebes curses his fate, his insane persistence. His political thesis about the unlimitedness and uncontrollability of the will of the monarch is also defeated.

Antigone, who rebelled, in essence, against the tyranny of state power, which suppresses everything reasonable and just, personifies in the tragedy of Sophocles the idea of ​​\u200b\u200bthe greatness of the individual, the illegality of suppressing her rights.
This is how the playwright's contemporaries understood the play in his homeland of Athens.

More than two thousand years have passed, and the problem of the prerogatives of the state and the individual has not yet found a final solution in the world. Today, the French writer Jean Anouilh has again put it on the table, using an ancient myth. He writes a play with the same name - "Antigone".

The same characters. Again Creon and Antigone, and again heatedly arguing. True, here Creon complains about the severity of state power, about its terrible responsibility, the power that he, Creon, accepted without joy, out of necessity. To this, Antigone answers him: “I can say no to everything that I don’t like, only my own court matters to me. You, with your crown, with your guards, with all this pomp, can only kill me.

Creon. But, Lord! But try for a moment to understand, you little idiot, you need someone to say yes, you need someone to steer the boat, because there is water all around, all around is full of crime, stupidity, poverty, and the steering wheel is where especially shakes. The crew does not want to do anything, they only think about plundering from the common property, and the officers are already building a small comfortable raft for themselves - just for themselves, with a supply of drinking water to carry away their bones from here. And the mast cracks, the wind tears the sails, everything is about to fall apart, and they think only of their skin, their precious skin, their little needs.

Think about whether there is time to deal with subtleties, to look for an answer to the question “yes?” or “no?”, asking yourself if the price is not too expensive and whether you will remain a person after all this. You take a piece of the board, you ride straight into a giant wave, you roar at the top of your lungs the command, but do not obey, you shoot directly into the crowd, at the first one to come forward. To the crowd! There are no names here. Maybe it will be the one who gave you a light yesterday, smiling. He no longer has a name. And you, too, chained to the steering wheel. There are no names. There is only a ship and a storm, do you understand that?

Antigone. I don't want to understand. Let this be clear to you. I'm beyond understanding these things. I'm where you can say no and die."

As you can see, the problem is the same in ancient tragedy and modern tragedy - the individual and the state, but the roles have changed. Antigone, in essence, withdraws herself. She does not want to take on and even understand the complexity of state problems, her determination to die is just a refusal to participate in common affairs. In Anouil's play, the tragedy of the whole situation is felt - the state is dying, it, like a boat in a raging ocean, is wrecked, and Creon will not save him, because he is alone, no one supports his efforts, no one thinks about public interests - each on his own.

Anui symbolically depicts the modern bourgeois state. It is on the edge of the abyss, people are divided, the selfish interests of each individual become the centrifugal force that tears society apart.

This gloomy feeling of imminent and inevitable death is not present in the tragedy of the ancient author. Truth and justice triumph there, and this triumph is in the defeat of all the moral and political principles of Creon, therefore the tragedy itself is optimistic, which cannot be said about Anouilh's play.

Greek tragedy is commonly referred to as the "tragedy of fate". According to the ideas of the ancient Greeks, people's lives are determined by fate. She rules over everyone. It cannot be avoided or averted. Running away from her, a person only goes to meet her, as happened with Antigone's father Oedipus (the tragedy "Oedipus Rex"). Sophocles built his plays on the opposition of human will and destiny. The curse of the formidable wife of Zeus, Hera, hung over the family of Oedipus. The curse of the goddess is done. Antigone's brothers are dying, she herself is dying, but she leaves life proudly, unconquered, defending her moral creed. And therein lies its strength, its human dignity. And this is how a person will remain in all the tragedies of Sophocles - strong and proud, no matter what misfortunes, by the will of evil fate, may fall to his lot. In the tragedy Antigone, the choir sings:

There are many miracles in the world
The man is the best of them all...
... His thoughts - they are faster winds;
He himself learned his speech;
He builds cities and avoids arrows,
Sharp frosts and noisy rains;
He knows everything; from every misfortune
He found the right remedy for himself ...

In essence, all the tragedies of Sophocles are a hymn to man.

The man is beautiful. He affirms his high dignity both by his will and moral principles, which he strictly follows. Antigone goes to her death, but does not hesitate in her determination to defend human rights. Oedipus, who unknowingly committed the murder of his father, who also unknowingly became the husband of his own mother, is in essence completely innocent. The gods are guilty, the cruel Hera, who cursed the family of Laya, the father of Oedipus, in three generations and sent this misfortune on the head of the unfortunate offspring of the cursed family. And yet Oedipus does not relieve himself of guilt and blinds himself. All subsequent suffering becomes an atonement. Redemption through suffering.

Euripides (480-406 BC)

"Agamemnon. What silence! .. If only a bird or a splash of the sea.
Euripides

This is how Euripides' play "Iphigenia in Aulis" begins. Warm, southern night. The words of Agamemnon are not just information about the weather, this is already the beginning of a play and the beginning of a tragedy, a great human tragedy, when the question arises of putting to death a young creature that has barely blossomed for love and life.

In a small harbor in Aulis, in a narrow strait between the island of Euboea and the shores of Boeotia, ships from all over Greece gathered to march on Troy to rescue the beautiful Helen, the wife of Menelaus, who had been taken away by Paris, from captivity.

The sea is calm. Not the slightest breeze. Sailboats are motionless: there is no wind, no movement of ships. The gods do not give "go-ahead" for a trip to the shores of Troy.

What do they want, why are these formidable gods of Olympus angry? We turned to the soothsayer Calchas. The old man discovered the will of the gods. Artemis, the beautiful and proud maiden goddess, sister of Apollo and daughter of Zeus, patroness of animals and huntress, is angry with the leader of the troops Agamemnon - he killed the sacred doe, her doe, and boasted at the same time that he shoots more accurately than the goddess herself. For this insolence, she demands a sacrifice, and this sacrifice should be the daughter of Agamemnon Iphigenia.

A variety of desires, motives, hopes, dreams, fear, anger collide, intertwine into one ball: the feelings of the father and the duty to the army of Agamemnon, the dreams of happiness and the terrible reality of Iphigenia, the suffering of her mother, the noble impulse of the warrior Achilles, involuntarily drawn into the conflict , the adamant desire of the troops to carry out their campaign and, therefore, to sacrifice the unfortunate girl, the selfish desire of Menelaus to return his unfaithful wife and, therefore, interested in making a terrible sacrifice - and behind all this - the evil will of the gods.

Agamemnon complied and sent for his daughter, demanding her to come to the camp. To reassure Iphigenia and her mother Clytemnestra, he deceived, writing that Achilles himself wanted to marry her. The challenge letter is gone, but Agamemnon is not calm, because he is the father. He looks at the slave. Yesterday he would not have noticed his presence, today he sees him and thinks about him.

Slave! His age is inglorious.
He will live unnoticed.
Isn't that what happiness is?
How happy you are, old man!
How I envy you that you can
You live a century in obscurity.

His position, Agamemnon, is different: he is “lifted up by fate”, he rules the army, the gods require sacrifice from him, and not from a simple person, and what a sacrifice - daughters! Agamemnon suffers. Thinking better, he sends a new message to his wife - do not come, do not bring his daughter. But the letter was intercepted.

His brother reproaches him for cowardice, for betraying the common cause. But what a “common cause” it is to return a dissolute wife who fled from her husband to him, Menelaus, who failed to save her!

... I am not your assistant in correcting a harlot,
To comfort her husband, leaving me to share
Cry day and night over the spilled children's blood.

Meanwhile, the wife of Agamemnon Clytemnestra, the daughter of Iphigenia and his little son Orestes had already arrived in the camp. They are joyful, luxurious, festively dressed: after all, a wedding is coming. Euripides, as a great master, builds a tense chain of tragic collisions. Agamemnon is confused: what will he say to his daughter, how will he look into her eyes?

Hades will embrace her cold,
He is her fiancé ... Oh, how hard it is for me
Imagine her at her father's feet:
- How? Are you leading me to be executed, father?
So here it is, the promised marriage! Oh come on
God bless you and everyone you love
All weddings are just as fun to celebrate.
And little Orestes? .. After all, he will see
Death of a sister ... Say something like a child,
Of course he can't, but he understands.
And a loud cry will be terrible for people
Tiny wordless...
Curse Paris and the whore Helena,
And their marriage is a criminal curse!

Now Menelaus also understood the great grief of his brother. Just now he was furious at the apostasy of Agamemnon, raging and throwing cruel and rude words - now he is full of compassion:

…only now
Measured all the horror of being a killer
Their children, and pity for the condemned
Deep pierced into my heart.
…Oh no, Atrid,
Let the troops leave. Let's drop this
Unfortunate end.
I am not an enemy for you, but again a brother ...
Burn out in the furnace of compassion
And pour out into another shape - me
not ashamed, Agamemnon, no, not at all!
O! I'm not so ossified in evil,
So that he loses his mind over me ..:

Euripides further draws his hero. He puts it in front of his happy daughter. Iphigenia clings to her father, and her tender love, her joy both from the meeting and from the expectation of the wedding is so out of time now, so piercingly tragic! The mastery of Euripides in these psychological collisions is truly extraordinary. Agamemnon is confused, he does not know what to do:

Father…
You say you're happy, but you're sad.
- Care, daughter, that's why I am the leader and king ...
- Father, let's go back to Argos, to our palace...
- Oh, if I dared, oh, if I could.

He never found the strength to reveal the truth to his daughter and wife. He's leaving. The truth is revealed in a new tragic collision. Clytemnestra meets Achilles. She goes to him boldly, joyfully - after all, he is already almost a native, her daughter's fiancé.

Achilles suspects nothing. We remember him from Homer's descriptions. In the Iliad, he is bold, daring, cruel, vindictive, violent in both anger and love. Here, in Euripides, he is modest, shy, and rather resembles the young Telemachus, who was described by the same Homer in the poem "Odyssey". “I admire your modesty,” Clytemnestra tells him. "Who are you?" asks the astonished Achilles. He is embarrassed by the beauty, and the festive attire, and the incomprehensible friendliness of a woman he does not know, and wants to leave already (“I am ashamed to talk with a woman”). In ancient Greece, women were recluses. They lived in their own special chambers and rarely appeared before strangers. And this one, informing him that she is the wife of Agamemnon, even touches his hand. He jerks his hand away sharply: “Should I offend the king by touching his wife with my hand?”

Clytemnestra is completely captivated by the shyness and respectful timidity of the young man: “You are not a stranger, you are my daughter’s bridegroom…”

"How?" and the deceit is revealed. This is the climax. Further events will go like an avalanche. Anger and sharp reproaches will fall on the head of the unfortunate Agamemnon.

We remember Clytemnestra from Homer's descriptions in the Odyssey, from Aeschylus' Oresteia trilogy, we remember her as a cruel and treacherous woman who, with a cold heart, prepared the murder of her husband. Nothing there makes us at least somehow understand it and nothing but horror, it does not cause in us. Here, her accusations against her husband sound deadly. We are on the side of Clytemnestra:

Do you remember the day when the violence
You, Agamemnon, took me as your wife ...
In battle you killed Tantalus, who
My first husband and child
My child from mother's breast
You tore off and sold like a slave.
I was your exemplary wife...
Your royal house, how it blossomed with me!
You happily returned under your roof
And he left calm ... and to find
Not everyone has such a faithful wife
He will be able, the king ... There are many vicious wives.

Mother's grief is immeasurable. Euripides puts stinging words into her mouth. She is eloquent:

... to give your child,
To redeem a whore, for garbage
Exchanging a precious treasure...

And a dull threat, which was understandable to the viewer of the theater of Dionysus in Athens, where the play was staged during the life of the author:

Tell me, Atrid, aren't you afraid of Reckoning?
After all, only an insignificant reason -
And in Argos, among the orphans
Her sisters and mother - you
Reception, worthy of business, can meet.

The daughter joins the mother's prayers. Iphigenia does not get angry, does not threaten, does not reproach her father - she asks. She says that nature has given her "as a gift one art - tears." She loves the bright world of life:

It is good for a mortal to see the sun,
And underground is so scary ... If anyone
Does not want to live - he is sick: the burden of life,
All suffering is better than the glory of a dead man.

This recognition is the main thesis of the philosophy of the ancient Greek. The earthly world with all its hardships, with all the troubles and sorrows is a hundred times more expensive than the afterlife existence of shadows, somewhere in the cold and darkness of Hades.

What does Agamemnon answer to two praying women? What is the justification for his decision?

Hellas tells me
To kill you ... your death is pleasing to her,
Whether I want to or not, she doesn't care:
Oh, you and I are nothing before Hellas.

The formidable power of the state rises above the individual. The individual is nothing before the state. Everything is subject to him, everything is subject to him. But this subordination is voluntary, it does not burden the heart of the father, it is almost desirable. Such is the subordination of the Greek to Hellas:

... if the blood, all our blood, child,
Need her freedom to barbarian
He did not reign in it and did not dishonor wives,
Atrid and Atrid's daughter will not refuse.

And he was right: the daughter of Atris, Iphigenia, went to her death voluntarily. Achilles, having learned what a cruel joke was played with his name, that he was used as bait, was extremely indignant. Having barely recognized the girl and not having any feelings for her, he was already ready to defend her in the name of honor, truth, justice. His impulse is beautiful and noble. A grateful Clytemnestra embraces his knees. In the distance, the cry of the warriors is heard, they demand the death of Iphigenia, threaten Achilles, and then the girl, who until then silently and with fear watched what was happening, firmly and unshakably declared that she wanted to die for her homeland.

“Did you wear me for yourself, and not for the Greeks?” she asks her mother. "I'm ready ... This body is a gift to the fatherland." And boldly goes to the execution. But a miracle happens. The messenger informs about it. As soon as the priest raised the knife, the girl disappeared, and instead of her lay, bleeding, a doe. The coryphaeus of the choir sings: "The virgin enjoys life in the abode of the gods." Everyone rejoices. Clytemnestra also rejoices, but suddenly she became thoughtful and sad. The poison of doubt penetrated her soul:

And if this is empty and false nonsense,
To console me?

According to the myth, Iphigenia was taken to Taurida, where she became the ruler and brought human sacrifices to the gods. There, her brother Orestes also met her and almost became another victim of the cruel gods. Euripides dedicated the tragedy "Iphigenia in Taurida" to this second part of the myth. Here, only a shadow of doubt remained, clouding the luminosity of the finale: “And if this is empty and false nonsense?” Whose doubt is this, the God-fearing Clytemnestra or the skeptic of the author?

19 plays by Euripides have come down to us. 19 plays have passed through storms and fires, wars and cataclysms for more than two millennia and have survived almost intact. Such is the test of time.

Each of them is the fruit of a high genius, great moral culture, and aesthetic taste. There are a lot of interesting and important things to say about each of them.

Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides! Three great creators of Greek tragedy. They are not identical in style, according to the figurative system, but their main difference is in the characters. Gods act on the stage of Aeschylus, conflicts of a cosmic order, and everything is grandiose, monumental.

Sophocles went down to the people, but these are special people, unlike mere mortals, they are taller than human height, they are ideal. But over them, as well as over the gods, the mysterious and all-destroying power of fate, fate. There is no way out of it, but the greatness of a person is manifested in the strength of his spirit.

Euripides brought man down from the pedestal on which Sophocles placed him. He showed him the way he is in real life. He is not monolithic, this man, like Sophocles, he is weak and contradictory, he fights with himself, with his feelings, passions and does not always win, but strives for beauty and suffers because he does not always find the strength in himself to win, and we sympathize with him, as we would sympathize with a drowning man, desperately struggling with a whirlpool, whom we cannot help. The tragedies of Euripides contain an enormous morally attractive force. Euripides is a philosopher. His plays are full of thoughts. Belinsky called him "the most romantic poet of Greece", but his main strength was in his incomparable skill in drawing human psychology. He is extremely bold and truthful in depicting human characters, movements, sometimes unpredictable and paradoxical; human soul. Of the playwrights of modern times, only Shakespeare can be compared with him.

The myth of the sacrifice of Iphigenia in Aulis was used by the Roman poet Lucretius (we will talk about him ahead) in his famous poem "On the Nature of Things" as evidence of crimes committed in the name of religious prejudice. He wrote, drawing a terrible scene:

Silent in fear, she knelt down to the ground...
In the hands of her husbands, trembling body, lifted
And carried to the altar. But not so that after the ceremony
With hymns go loud to the glory of Hymen,
But so that she, immaculate, at the very threshold of marriage
It is vile to be killed by the hand of the father, as a sad victim,
To send the ships a happy exit to the sea.
Such are the atrocities to which the religion of mortals incited!
Aristophanes (445-385 BC)

In addition to tragedy, the ancient Greeks left to mankind another kind of theatrical performance - comedy. If in the first the audience was presented with soul-shattering events, great passions, high impulses that evoked awe and compassion, then in the second (comedy) all this: impulses, passions, and events - was reduced to the level of a farce, that is, funny, pitiful, ridiculous, insignificant.

People tend to laugh. Aristotle even raised this trait inherent in people to a dignity that distinguishes a person from an animal. People laugh at everything, even the dearest and closest. But in one case it is a kind, soft laughter, the laughter of love. Thus we sometimes laugh at the sweet weaknesses of our friends or literary heroes: at Paganel's ingenuous absent-mindedness in Jules Verne's The Children of Captain Grant, at the shyness of the most delicate Mr. the epic of Yaroslav Hasek, over the chivalrous militancy of the kindest Don Quixote of La Mancha Cervantes. The comedy began with such a good laugh. They usually laugh at a funny moment. On the days of the grape harvest, when summer ended and the harvest delighted the Greeks, festive processions were organized - something like carnivals, with mummers, with songs, dances, with funny jokes, ingenuously rude, and sometimes frankly obscene. The very name of the comedy came from the song of the carnival crowd (“komos” - the crowd, “ode” - the song). At the same time, they praised the god Dionysus, the god of fertility and winemaking.

People soon noticed that laughter can overthrow, and expose, and kill, but the means of this overthrow of opponents are, in essence, humane. There is no bloodshed in comedy, if they fight here, then, as in Rabelais' comedy novel "Gargantua and Pantagruel", with baked apples.

This property of comedy and comedy was noticed in ancient times by the philosopher Aristotle. “Ridiculous,” he wrote, “is some kind of mistake and disgrace, which does not cause suffering to anyone and is not harmful to anyone.”

Thus, from a joke, a merry mockery, amusing clowning, dressing up and disguises, Greek comedy was born and conveyed to us its artistic originality. It arose a little later than the tragedy. Its main author is Aristophanes, who lived and worked in Athens. He wrote 44 comedies. We got 11.

The comedy of Aristophanes is far from a harmless joke. She is evil, venomous. From cheerful clowning and celebratory tomfoolery, she borrowed only the techniques of parody, dressing up, caricature caricature, Aristophanes was primarily a political thinker, his laughter was purposeful, emphatically tendentious. For the stage performance, he took socially important and burning topics and problems of his day, which worried his compatriots.

Athens was in those days in a long and ruinous war with Sparta (the Peloponnesian War). Both sides suffered. Why, it seems, not to unite and not live together, as a single family (after all, the inhabitants of Attica and the Spartans belonged to a single tribe, with a common language and culture)?

Aristophanes understood this and defended the cause of peace in comedies. In his comedy Peace (Silence), the choir representing the villagers sings:

O all-Hellenic tribe! Let's all stand up for each other
Throw angry strife and bloody feuds,
The spring holiday shines on us.

In comedy, everything, of course, is comedic, that is, full of funny clowning. A certain peasant-winemaker feeds a giant beetle, sits on it and goes to Olympus, to the gods. But only Hermes remained there. The rest of the gods, angry with people for their restless disposition and eternal strife, left for the edge of the universe. Hermes remained to guard God's Junk:

Pots, spoons, bowls, pans.
As you can see, even the gods in comedy are comedic.

The peasant finds a nymph named Mir on Olympus, descends to earth, and here she bestows on him all the blessings of a peaceful life. A peasant marries a beautiful villager named Harvest. The choir of the villagers performs a cheerful dance, and the peasant invites his wife to joyful peaceful work:

Hey, woman, let's go to the fields!

Aristophanes is concerned about the changes that are taking place in the political life of his homeland. That unity of the people, which, as it seems to him, reigned in the days of Marathon and Salamis, that is, when Greece defended its freedom and independence in the struggle against mighty Persia, has now been lost. Political intriguers, demagogues seek to use the oratory and oratory for selfish purposes. Democracy is in danger, but democracy itself opens the way for political rogues who deftly juggle political slogans and all sorts of promises. The comedy of Aristophanes "The Riders", staged in 424, is dedicated to this. Two demagogues - the tanner Cleon (who really ruled Athens) and the sausage maker Agoracritus - dispute with each other the trust of the old man Demos, the people.

The action begins with a dialogue between two slaves. One of them says:

The Athenian people, deaf old man,
In the market of the past he bought himself a slave,
Leatherworker, the birth of a flagonian. That,
A terrible scoundrel, a notorious scoundrel,
He immediately managed to see through the old man's temper ... and began to assent,
To feed with crafty words,
Lubricate and flatter.

This is Cleon. The slaves offer a sausage market trader to outsmart the Leatherworker and become ruler himself.

The demagogues Kozhevnik and Sausage Man vied with each other to look after Demos.

Leatherworker. My people! I promise you
To feed, drink and treat both in vain and in an empty way.
Sausage man. But in a bottle I give you ointment,
So that you could lubricate the lichen and ulcers on your knees.
Leatherworker. about my hair, people, sushi, blowing your nose, fingers!
Sausage man, and oh mine! And oh mine!
(Both climb forward, push.)

The comedy ends with the fact that Demos is boiled in a boiling cauldron and his marathon youth is returned to him. He appears rejuvenated, in the splendor of youth and beauty. The choir sings his solemn praise:

Oh praise! Oh, hello to you, king of the Hellenes!
And for us - jubilation and joy!
After all, now you are worthy of your homeland
And holy marathon trophies.

The renewed Demos now lives in "violet-crowned Athens," in "pristine, sacred Athens."

Aristophanes cares about the moral purity of the people and believes that the fashionable philosophical trends that have appeared in Greece, and even new artistic trends, are a great danger to the stability of the state. He places the responsibility for dangerous innovations on the philosopher Socrates and the poet-dramatist Euripides. And he makes the first and second the heroes of his comedies.

In the first, he sees a person who shakes the moral foundations of society by preaching the relativity of moral values. In the second - the poet, depicting human weaknesses, which, in his opinion, weakens the moral stamina of the audience, the citizens of the Athenian Republic.

Aristophanes' attacks on Socrates (470-339) were unfair. The essence of the teachings of Socrates boiled down to the following: a person needs to cultivate a refined moral sense in himself. The starting position should be a complete rejection of any dogmatic statements.

A person, as it were, threw off the whole burden of learned concepts, ideas and, like a newborn, found himself in front of a host of unknown truths, accepting only one of them - that he knows nothing ("I know that I know nothing"). And the first task facing a person should be, according to the philosopher, the task of knowing oneself. Alas, the famous precept of Socrates “Know thyself!”, at first glance the simplest and most accessible, turned out to be the most difficult, truly impossible. The closest being to man - he himself - turned out to be the most distant. The most incomprehensible.

Great people do not always find recognition from their contemporaries. The fate of Socrates is a vivid example of this.

This great folk sage (he did not write books, but only talked with everyone who wanted it) attracted the philosophical thought of his time to issues of social life, calling for the clarification of moral truths in order to become good through knowledge of the essence of good. The very method of interviewing Socrates with his students was remarkable. He never gave ready-made conclusions, but through leading questions he led his interlocutor to an independent discovery of the truth. He called this method the medical term - "maeutics" (from Greek - "midwife"). However, in the course of the conversation, it was necessary to reject many established opinions, which, upon careful examination, turned out to be false. It was this latter that irritated the top of Athenian society. In 399 Socrates was executed.

The philosopher courageously and proudly accepted death, leaving to the centuries his noble image and example of noble service to the truth.

Aristophanes ridiculed another of his contemporary - Euripides. In the work of this playwright, he saw a great danger to the ideological stability of Athenian society and, with all the power of comedic art, took up arms against him.

According to Aristophanes, art should teach, instruct, educate the audience, just as a teacher instructs children, shows them the way to good:

“We must always talk about the beautiful.”

Amazing comedy of Aristophanes! And not only by his skill, but by the great and incomprehensible providence of the future. The crisis of Greek civilization was just beginning. Signs of this crisis, barely distinguishable at a shallow glance, were outlined, and the great comedian began to sound the alarm, sensing the impending disaster. Aristophanes constantly refers to the times of Marathon and Salamis, when Greece was strong in its unity, its will to win, its heroic fusion of personality and society, their indissolubility.

The Greek orator Demosthenes soon began to speak of the same thing from the rostrum.

I was able to distinguish events at their inception, to comprehend them in advance and to communicate my thoughts to others in advance.
Demosthenes

This statement of the great orator of antiquity cannot but shock us, who know the future fate of his homeland, which he served both with his extraordinary talent and with his whole life. On October 12, 322, after a suppressed uprising, surrounded by enemies on the small island of Kalavria, in the temple of Poseidon, he took poison, giving his life to his homeland.

The orators in the days of Demosthenes were politicians. Their speeches ignited the listeners. In democratic Athens, the solution of important state issues often depended on their eloquence. Demosthenes, at the cost of the greatest labor, achieved perfection in oratory. He had no equal in ancient Greece, and his fame has come down to our days.

A great man, he did not think about it, about glory, he needed the art of persuasion in order to serve his dear Attica, his people, whom he both condemned and loved endlessly. His speeches were stern, courageous, restrained, but in this courageous restraint lived the conquering passion, inflexible will and penetrating mind of the thinker.

In essence, he continued the work of Aristophanes. Both of them foresaw the coming end of Greek society, saw the first signs of the beginning decline and tried in vain to prevent the destructive process of time. And it inexorably drew him to disaster. And this was foreseen by Demosthenes ("Often fear attacks me at the thought of whether any deity is leading our state to death"), he constantly talked about "imported deadly diseases of Hellas."

An amazing paradox! The Greek states were able to repel the invasion of the huge Persian state, victoriously exit the Greco-Persian war, but one hundred and fifty years will pass, they will submit to the king of a small semi-savage country - Macedonia. This king was Philip II, the father of the famous Alexander the Great. And it was not military or technical weakness that led Greece to destruction, but internal social and political processes.

“Ships, troops, money, supplies and everything by which it is customary to measure the strength of the state, we now have much more than before. But all this becomes worthless, useless, invalid due to the fact that all this has become the subject of vile bargaining, ”Demosthenes told the Athenian people. Historians of recent times have looked for the reasons for the decline of Greek society in the vices of the democratic system, in the susceptibility of the people to the promises of cunning demagogues. They could draw arguments from both Aristophanes and Demosthenes, who sharply criticized this compliance. But both Aristophanes and Demosthenes sought to awaken patriotic and freedom-loving feelings among the people, meanwhile, oppositional sentiments were ripening inside Greek society, which were used by the crafty Macedonian king, bribing individual Athenian citizens and inclining them to monarchist ideas.

Demosthenes understood where history was going, and considered Philip the main enemy of Greece. The orator's passionate speeches against Philip, warning his compatriots about the great danger hanging over them, were called philippics and became common nouns (philippics are critical and abusive speeches). Not everyone agreed with him. There were supporters of Philip among the Greeks, who believed that the power of this man would save the country from the instability and chaos of democratic institutions.

“What are you looking for? Demosthenes addressed them.
- Freedom.
"But don't you see that Philip is her worst enemy, even by his title?" After all, absolutely every king and lord is a hater of freedom and laws.

In vain did Demosthenes encourage his fellow citizens to fight Philip. History went its own way.

At the battle of Chaeronea (338 BC), Athens suffered a severe defeat. Philip II, king of Macedonia, captured all of Greece. A new era has begun in its history.

The three greatest tragedians of Greece are Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides. Even the rebellious titans cannot shake him (the tragedy "Chained Prometheus").

ancient greek comedy

The number of actors did not exceed three, although each of them played more roles than in the tragedy. And the choir played a huge role in the comedy. The peculiarity of the latter was that the coryphaeus of the choir spoke on behalf of the author himself, outlining his main thoughts, which he carried out in the comedy. The actors danced part of the performance. The costumes of comedy actors were different from the costumes of tragedy actors. The masks of the actors were supposed to emphasize the funny and ugly in the hero being exposed (they were with bulging eyes, a mouth to the ears, etc.).

The figures of the actors were given a no less ugly look. Poets took the plot from the myths, refracting them satirically.

ancient greek dancing theatrical

comedians

The first comedian - Epicharm. His gods played buffoonish roles. Of the three famous representatives of Attic political comedy - Cratinus, Eupolis and Aristophanes - the last was the largest.

In his comedies, he waged a fierce struggle against democracy. In the caricature depicted Socrates, Euripides. He often parodied Euripides. Menador is one of the most prominent comedians of this time. Depicting real life, Menander's everyday comedy abandoned dancing and singing.

Aristophanes was born around 445 BC. e.

His parents were free people, but not very wealthy.

The young man showed his creative abilities very early.

Already at the age of 12-13 he began to write plays. His first work was staged in 427 BC. e. and immediately received a second award.

Aristophanes wrote only about 40 works.

Only 11 comedies have survived to this day, in which the author posed a variety of life questions.

In the plays "Aharnians" and "Peace" he advocated an end to the Peloponnesian War and the conclusion of peace with Sparta.

In the plays "Wasps" and "Horsemen" he criticized the activities of state institutions, reproaching dishonest demagogues who deceived the people.

Aristophanes in his works criticized the philosophy of the sophists and the methods of educating youth ("Clouds").

The work of Aristophanes enjoyed well-deserved success among his contemporaries. The audience flocked to his performances.

This state of affairs can be explained by the fact that a crisis of slave-owning democracy has matured in Greek society. In the echelons of power, bribery and corruption of officials, embezzlement and fraud flourished. The satirical depiction of these vices in the plays found the most lively response in the hearts of the Athenians.
But in the comedies of Aristophanes there is also a positive hero. He is a small landowner who cultivates the land with the help of two-t

Reh slaves. The playwright admired his industriousness and common sense, which manifested itself both in domestic and state affairs.

Aristophanes was an ardent opponent of war and advocated peace.

For example, in the comedy Lysistratus, he expressed the idea that the Peloponnesian War, in which the Hellenes kill each other, weakens Greece in the face of the threat from Persia.

In the plays of Aristophanes, an element of buffoonery is sharply noticeable. In this regard, the acting performance also had to include parody, caricature and buffoonery.

All these tricks caused wild fun and laughter of the audience.

In addition, Aristophanes put the characters in ridiculous positions.

An example is the comedy "Clouds", in which Socrates ordered himself to be hung high in a basket so that it would be easier to think about the sublime.

This and similar scenes were very expressive and from a purely theatrical side.
Just like tragedy, comedy began with a prologue with a plot of action.

He was followed by the opening song of the choir as he entered the orchestra.

The choir, as a rule, consisted of 24 people and was divided into two half-choirs of 12 people each.

The opening song of the choir was followed by episodies, which were separated from each other by songs.

The episodies combined dialogue with choral singing.

They always had an agon - a verbal duel.

In the agon, the opponents most often defended opposing opinions, sometimes it ended in a fight between the characters with each other.

There was a parabasis in the choral parts, during which the choir took off their masks, took a few steps forward and addressed directly to the audience. Usually parabaza was not connected with the main theme of the play.

The last part of the comedy, as well as the tragedy, was called the exode, at which time the choir left the orchestra.

Exodus was always accompanied by cheerful, perky dances.

An example of the most striking political satire is the comedy "Horsemen".

Aristophanes gave it such a name because the main character was the choir of horsemen who made up the aristocratic part of the Athenian army.

Aristophanes made the leader of the left wing of democracy Cleon the main character of the comedy.

He called him the Leatherworker and presented him as a brazen, deceitful man who thinks only of his own enrichment.

Under the guise of old Demos, the people of Athens perform in the comedy.

Demos is very old, helpless, often falls into childhood and therefore listens to the Leatherworker in everything.

But, as they say, a thief stole a horse from a thief.

Demos transfers power to another swindler - Sausage Man, who defeats Leatherworker.

At the end of the comedy, the Sausage Man boils Demos in a cauldron, after which youth, reason and political wisdom return to him.

Now Demos will never dance to the tune of unscrupulous demagogues.

And the Kolbasnik himself subsequently becomes a good citizen who works for the good of his homeland and people.

According to the plot of the play, it turns out that the Sausage Man was just pretending to get the better of the Leatherworker.

21 BC e., during the period of peace negotiations between Athens and Sparta, Aristophanes wrote and staged the comedy "Peace".

Contemporaries of the playwright admitted the possibility that this performance could have had a positive impact on the course of negotiations, which ended successfully in the same year.

The main character of the play was a farmer named Trigeus, that is, a "collector" of fruits.

Continuous war prevents him from living peacefully and happily, cultivating the land and feeding his family.

On a huge dung beetle, Trigeus decided to rise into the sky to ask Zeus what he intended to do with the Hellenes.

If only Zeus does not make any decision, then Trigeus will tell him that he is a traitor to Hellas.

Rising to heaven, the farmer learned that there were no more gods on Olympus.

Zeus moved them all to the highest point of the sky, because he was angry with the people because they could not end the war in any way.

In a large palace that stood on Olympus, Zeus left the demon of war Polemos, giving him the right to do whatever he wants with people.

Polemos seized the goddess of the world and imprisoned her in a deep cave, and filled up the entrance with stones.

Trigeus called Hermes for help, and while Polemos was gone, they freed the goddess of the world.

Immediately after this, all wars ceased, people returned to peaceful creative work, and a new, happy life began.

Aristophanes drew a red thread through the entire plot of the comedy, the idea that all Greeks should forget enmity, unite and live happily.

Thus, for the first time, a statement was made from the stage, addressed to all Greek tribes, that there is much more in common between them than there are differences.

In addition, the idea was expressed of uniting all the tribes and the commonality of their interests. The comedian wrote two more works that were a protest against the Peloponnesian War. These are the comedies "Aharnians" and "Lysistrata".

In 405 BC. e. Aristophanes created the play "The Frogs".

In this work, he criticized the tragedies of Euripides.

As an example of worthy tragedies, he named the plays of Aeschylus, whom he always sympathized with.

In the comedy The Frogs, at the very beginning of the action, Dionysus enters the orchestra with his servant Xanthus.

Dionysus announces to everyone that he is going to descend into the underworld in order to bring Euripides to the earth, because after his death there was not a single good poet left.

After these words, the audience burst into laughter: everyone knew the critical attitude of Aristophanes to the works of Euripides.

The core of the play is the dispute between Aeschylus and Euripides, which takes place in the underworld.

Actors portraying playwrights appear in the orchestra, as if continuing the argument started off the stage. Euripides criticizes the art of Aeschylus, believes that he had too little action on the stage, that, having taken the hero or heroine to the platform, Aeschylus covered them with a cloak and left them to sit silently.

Thus, Euripides condemned the pompous and indigestible language in which Aeschylus wrote his works.

About himself, Euripides says that he showed everyday life in his plays and taught people simple everyday things.

Such a realistic depiction of the everyday life of ordinary people provoked criticism of Aristophanes.

Through the mouth of Aeschylus, he denounces Euripides and tells him that he has spoiled people: "Now market onlookers, rogues, insidious villains are everywhere."

Their competition ends with the weighing of the poems of both poets.

Large scales appear on the stage, Dionysus invites the playwrights to throw verses from their tragedies onto different scales in turn.

As a result, the poems of Aeschylus outweighed, he became the winner, and Dionysus must bring him to the ground. Seeing off Aeschylus, Pluto orders him to guard Athens, as he says, "with good thoughts" and "to re-educate madmen, of whom there are many in Athens."

Since Aeschylus returns to earth, he asks for the time of his absence in the underworld to transfer the throne of the tragedian to Sophocles.

Aristophanes died in 385 BC. e.

From the point of view of the ideological content, as well as the spectacle of the comedy of Aristophanes, this is a phenomenal phenomenon.

According to historians, Aristophanes is both the pinnacle of ancient Attic comedy and its completion. In the IV century BC. e., when the socio-political situation in Greece changed, comedy no longer had such a power of influence on the public as before.

In this regard, V. G. Belinsky called Aristophanes the last great poet of Greece.

The first comedian poet, "father of comedy". Born in Athens. His views on the topical problems of the era, clearly expressed in his work, corresponded to the moods of ordinary people of that time. He was distrustful of the radical demagogy that carried away the city's lower classes.

In the 5th century BC e., when there was no television, radio and newspapers, their functions in Greece were performed by the theater. In Athens, staged theatrical competitions - Dionysia. They took place once a year for three days from sunrise to sunset. And every morning, taking with them food and a pillow for the seat, almost all the inhabitants of Athens gathered for the performance. The amphitheater could accommodate 30,000 spectators. Until noon, people sympathized with the heroes of the tragedy, and towards evening they rolled with laughter from the antics of comedic characters.

Of all the works of ancient comedians, only the works of Aristophanes have survived to this day. He is called the "father of comedy" and one of the first literary critics. He is also called "an ill-mannered favorite of the Muses", because the characters' lines in his works sometimes seemed too harsh. Aristophanes used any means to arouse laughter from the public. However, behind the caustic comments and rude jokes of the poet in his comedies, a sincere desire to help people become better is visible.

He hates the hated with his soul,

He is not afraid of truthful speeches ...

The exact date of birth of Aristophanes, as well as the date of death, are unknown. He was probably born in 445 BC. e.

There is also an assumption that Aristophanes had either two, or three, or four sons. They probably wrote poetry, and maybe comedies in verse, continuing the work of their famous father. We can only say with certainty that the poet himself announced himself in one of his comedies - he was bald.

Aristophanes began to write comedies before he was even twenty years old, quite early by Athenian standards.

At first, with youthful maximalism, he ridiculed his compatriots: their cowardice, frivolity and absurd credulity. Not embarrassed in expressions, he also attacked powerful politicians. Plutarch wrote that when staging the comedy The Horsemen, all the actors flatly refused to play a role that satirically portrayed the ruler of Athens, Cleon. And Aristophanes himself took the stage in the mask of a powerful and vengeful politician. All Athens heard from his lips a confession: “I stole, but you, or something, didn’t?”.

The offended ruler Cleon, in retaliation, accused the poet of illegally holding the title of an Athenian citizen. At the trial, Aristophanes cited a quote from Homer in his defense: “My mother assures me that this man is my father. But can I say the same, if I myself did not see who gave birth to me? Aristophanes won the suit. The Athenians recognized his right to criticize, because they believed that freedom of speech is the pillar of democracy.

But with the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War between Athens and Sparta, a law was still passed on the restrictions on ridicule of the individual. Alas, this did not help defeat the Spartans. The war, against which Aristophanes so earnestly opposed in his comedies, brought defeat to Athens.

The most famous comedies of Aristophanes that have survived to this day are The Birds, Lysistrata and The Frogs. Having matured, Aristophanes tried no longer to interfere in politics and turned his critical eye on the figures of science and art. He did not spare even the great tragedians - Aeschylus, Socrates and especially Euripides. By the way, with the light hand of the comedian, many still believe that Euripides ended his days, torn to pieces by women. Although it was just a caustic joke, brought by Aristophanes to the point of absurdity.

And in the comedy Clouds, Aristophanes was not afraid to criticize Socrates himself:

The city is crazy if it feeds you

The corrupter of youths, the plague of the country.

And although Aristophanes was not distinguished by cruelty, his comedy "Clouds" became one of the reasons for the tragic death of the philosopher Socrates. In 399 BC. e. the popular assembly of Athens will accuse Socrates of "worshiping new deities", "corrupting the youth" and sentence him to death.

In his declining years, Aristophanes became even more cautious and turned to melodrama. The plot elements of his latest comedies are reminiscent of modern tearful television series: a noble young man seduces a simple girl, it soon turns out that the girl is actually of a noble family and that she was lost in childhood, then searched for for many years. It all ends with a happy wedding.

But be that as it may, until the end of his life, Aristophanes invariably followed one principle: a poet is a teacher of citizens. In the comedy The Frogs, he claims that poets are valued.

... for truthful speeches, for good advice and for

What is smarter and better

They make citizens of their native land.

Over time, Aristophanes has more and more followers - those who, through laughter, make their fellow citizens "wiser and better." They go to the hearts of the audience in their own way: television, radio and newspapers came to the aid of the ancient comedy.

VOCABULARY PRACTICE

I. Find in the text equivalents for the following.

Aristophanes - comedy "Horse riders" -

Athens - comedy "The Clouds" -

Greece-Aeschylus-

The year of 445 B.C. Sophocles-

Plutarch - "The Birds" -

The ruler of Athens, Cleon "Lysistrata" -

Homer - "The Frogs" -

Socrates - Euripides -

II. Match the following words and word combinations to their correct meaning:

1. audience litigation, service process, dispute

2. supposition audience, audience listeners

3. frivolity deity, God, divinity,

theology, theology

4. credulity recognition, confession

5. confession ridicule, ridicule

6.litigation viewers

7. Tragedian conjecture, hypothesis

8. ridicule credulity, gullibility

10. viewers frivolity, frivolous act

III. Translate the given adjectives, suggest their synonyms and word combinations, make up sentences of your own:

IV. Memorize the following collocations.

Perform on stage - to appear on the stage, to perform, to walk the boards, to play, to act;

freedom - liberty, freedom;

With. action - freedom of action;

With. print - freedom of the press (of speck);

With. conscience - liberty of conscience;

With. meetings - freedom of meeting (assembly);

With. trade - free trade;

provide freedom of choice (action) - a free hand, to give smb. carte blanche.

V. Make a list of key words and word combinations from the text with their translation equivalents.

spectators - spectators;

to make the audience laugh - to make the audience laugh;

youthful maximalism - youth extreme judgment (maximalism).

TRANSLATION/INTERPRETING PRACTICE

I. Snowball interpreting.

Train your memory and repeat after the speaker (without looking into the text)

a) in Russian b) in English

Continuation of the table.

II. Summary making (text compression).

Listen to the recorded text, make notes and write a summary in Russian /Ukrainian/ English.

(Reduce the text to the core, and then develop it back without consulting the text).

Translate into English using text compression (omit redundant words, convert nominative structure into verbal, use noun clusters etc.)

First, do it in writing; then orally, observe transformations in translation.

III. textdevelopment.

Develop a text from the given core (first do it in one language in writing, then with interpretation - orally).

Ancient Greek playwrights

This list can include such famous ancient authors as Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes, Aristotle. All of them wrote plays for performances at festivities. There were, of course, many more authors of dramatic works, but either their creations have not survived to this day, or their names have been forgotten.

In the work of ancient Greek playwrights, despite all the differences, there was much in common, for example, the desire to show all the most significant social, political and ethical problems that worried the minds of the Athenians at that time. In the genre of tragedy in ancient Greece, no significant works were created. Over time, the tragedy became a purely literary work meant to be read. On the other hand, great prospects opened up for everyday drama, which flourished most in the middle of the 4th century BC. e. It was later called "Novo-Attic Comedy".

Aeschylus ( rice. 3) was born in 525 BC. e. in Eleusis, near Athens. He came from a noble family, so he received a good education. The beginning of his work dates back to the time of the war of Athens against Persia. It is known from historical documents that Aeschylus himself took part in the battles of Marathon and Salamis.

Rice. 3. Aeschylus

He described the last of the wars as an eyewitness in his play The Persians. This tragedy was staged in 472 BC. e. In total, Aeschylus wrote about 80 works. Among them were not only tragedies, but also satirical dramas. Only 7 tragedies have survived to this day in full, only small pieces of the rest have survived.

In the works of Aeschylus, not only people are shown, but also gods and titans, who personify moral, political and social ideas. The playwright himself had a religious-mythological creed. He firmly believed that the gods govern life and the world. However, the people in his plays are not weak-willed beings who are blindly subordinate to the gods. Aeschylus endowed them with reason and will, they act, guided by their thoughts.

In the tragedies of Aeschylus, the chorus plays an essential role in the development of the theme. All parts of the choir are written in pathetic language. At the same time, the author gradually began to introduce into the canvas of the narrative pictures of human existence, which were quite realistic. An example is the description of the battle between the Greeks and Persians in the play "Persians" or the words of sympathy expressed by the Oceanides to Prometheus.

To intensify the tragic conflict and to complete the action of the theatrical production, Aeschylus introduced the role of a second actor. At that time it was just a revolutionary move. Now, instead of the old tragedy, which had little action, a single actor and a chorus, new dramas appeared. They clashed with the worldviews of heroes who independently motivated their actions and deeds. But the tragedies of Aeschylus nevertheless retained in their construction traces of the fact that they come from the dithyramb.

The construction of all tragedies was the same. They began with a prologue, in which there was a plot plot. After the prologue, the choir entered the orchestra to stay there until the end of the play. This was followed by episodies, which were the dialogues of the actors. The episodes were separated from each other by stasims - the songs of the choir, performed after the choir ascended the orchestra. The final part of the tragedy, when the choir left the orchestra, was called "exode". As a rule, a tragedy consisted of 3-4 episodies and 3-4 stasims.

Stasims, in turn, were divided into separate parts, consisting of stanzas and antistrophes, which strictly corresponded to each other. The word "strofa" in translation into Russian means "turn". When the choir sang along the stanzas, he moved first in one direction, then in the other. Most often, the songs of the choir were performed to the accompaniment of a flute and were necessarily accompanied by dances called "emmeley".

In the play The Persians, Aeschylus glorified the victory of Athens over Persia in the naval battle of Salamis. A strong patriotic feeling runs through the whole work, i.e. the author shows that the victory of the Greeks over the Persians is the result of the fact that democratic orders existed in the country of the Greeks.

In the work of Aeschylus, a special place is given to the tragedy "Prometheus Chained". In this work, the author showed Zeus not as a bearer of truth and justice, but as a cruel tyrant who wants to wipe out all people from the face of the earth. Therefore, Prometheus, who dared to rise up against him and stand up for the human race, he condemned to eternal torment, ordering him to be chained to a rock.

Prometheus is shown by the author as a fighter for the freedom and reason of people, against the tyranny and violence of Zeus. In all subsequent centuries, the image of Prometheus remained an example of a hero fighting against higher powers, against all oppressors of a free human personality. V. G. Belinsky said very well about this hero of the ancient tragedy: “Prometheus let people know that in truth and knowledge they are gods, that thunder and lightning are not yet proof of the rightness, but only evidence of the wrong power.”

Aeschylus wrote several trilogies. But the only one that has survived to this day in full is Oresteia. The tragedy was based on tales of terrible murders of the kind from which the Greek commander Agamemnon came. The first play of the trilogy is called Agamemnon. It tells that Agamemnon returned victorious from the battlefield, but at home he was killed by his wife Clytemnestra. The commander's wife is not only not afraid of punishment for her crime, but also boasts of what she has done.

The second part of the trilogy is called "The Choephors". Here is a story about how Orestes, the son of Agamemnon, becoming an adult, decided to avenge the death of his father. Sister Orestes Electra helps him in this terrible business. First, Orestes killed his mother's lover, and then her.

The plot of the third tragedy - "Eumenides" - is as follows: Orestes is persecuted by Erinyes, the goddess of vengeance, because he committed two murders. But he is justified by the court of the Athenian elders.

In this trilogy, Aeschylus spoke in poetic language about the struggle between paternal and maternal rights that was going on in Greece at that time. As a result, paternal, i.e. state, right turned out to be the winner.

In "Oresteia" Aeschylus's dramatic skill reached its peak. He so well conveyed the oppressive, ominous atmosphere in which the conflict is brewing that the viewer almost physically feels this intensity of passion. The choral parts are written clearly, they have a religious and philosophical content, there are bold metaphors and comparisons. There is much more dynamics in this tragedy than in the early works of Aeschylus. The characters are written out more specifically, much less common places and reasoning.

The works of Aeschylus show all the heroism of the Greco-Persian wars, which played an important role in educating patriotism among the people. In the eyes of not only his contemporaries, but also of all subsequent generations, Aeschylus forever remained the very first tragic poet.

He died in 456 BC. e. in the city of Gel, in Sicily. On his grave there is a gravestone inscription, which, according to legend, was composed by him.

Sophocles (Fig. 4) was born in 496 BC. e. in a wealthy family. His father had a gunsmith's workshop, which provided a large income. Already at a young age, Sophocles showed his creative talent. At the age of 16, he led a choir of youths who glorified the victory of the Greeks in the battle of Salamis.

Rice. 4. Sophocles

At first, Sophocles himself took part in the productions of his tragedies as an actor, but then, due to the weakness of his voice, he had to give up performances, although he enjoyed great success. In 468 BC. e. Sophocles won his first absentee victory over Aeschylus, which consisted in the fact that Sophocles' play was recognized as the best. In further dramatic work, Sophocles was invariably lucky: in his entire life he never received a third award, but almost always took first place (and only occasionally second).

The playwright actively participated in state activities. In 443 BC. e. the Greeks elected the famous poet to the post of treasurer of the Delian League. Later he was elected to an even higher position - a strategist. In this capacity, he, along with Pericles, took part in a military campaign against the island of Samos, which separated from Athens.

We know only 7 tragedies of Sophocles, although he wrote more than 120 plays. Compared with Aeschylus, Sophocles somewhat changed the content of his tragedies. If the first has titans in his plays, then the second introduced people into his works, albeit a little elevated above everyday life. Therefore, researchers of Sophocles' creativity say that he made the tragedy descend from heaven to earth.

Man with his spiritual world, mind, feelings and free will became the main character in tragedies. Of course, in the plays of Sophocles, the heroes feel the influence of Divine Providence on their fate. His gods are as powerful as those of Aeschylus, they can also overthrow a person down. But the heroes of Sophocles usually do not rely resignedly on the will of fate, but fight to achieve their goals. This struggle sometimes ends in the suffering and death of the hero, but he cannot refuse it, since in this he sees his moral and civic duty to society.

At this time, Pericles was at the head of the Athenian democracy. Under his rule, slave-owning Greece reached an enormous internal flowering. Athens became a major cultural center, which sought writers, artists, sculptors and philosophers throughout Greece. Pericles began building the Acropolis, but it was completed only after his death. Outstanding architects of that period were involved in this work. All sculptures were made by Phidias and his students.

In addition, rapid development has come in the field of natural sciences and philosophical teachings. There was a need for general and special education. In Athens, teachers appeared who were called sophists, that is, sages. For a fee, they taught those who wished to various sciences - philosophy, rhetoric, history, literature, politics - they taught the art of speaking to the people.

Some sophists were supporters of slave-owning democracy, others - of the aristocracy. The most famous among the sophists of that time was Protagoras. It is to him that the saying belongs, that not God, but man, is the measure of all things.

Such contradictions in the clash of humanistic and democratic ideals with selfish and selfish motives were also reflected in the work of Sophocles, who could not accept Protagoras' statements because he was very religious. In his works, he repeatedly said that human knowledge is very limited, that due to ignorance a person can make this or that mistake and be punished for it, that is, endure torment. But it is precisely in suffering that the best human qualities that Sophocles described in his plays are revealed. Even in cases where the hero dies under the blows of fate, an optimistic mood is felt in tragedies. As Sophocles said, “fate could deprive the hero of happiness and life, but not humiliate his spirit, could strike him, but not win.”

Sophocles introduced a third actor into the tragedy, who greatly enlivened the action. There were now three characters on the stage who could conduct dialogues and monologues, as well as perform at the same time. Since the playwright gave preference to the experiences of an individual, he did not write trilogies, in which, as a rule, the fate of a whole family was traced. Three tragedies were put up for competitions, but now each of them was an independent work. Under Sophocles, painted decorations were also introduced.

The most famous tragedies of the playwright from the Theban cycle are Oedipus the King, Oedipus in Colon and Antigone. The plot of all these works is based on the myth of the Theban king Oedipus and the numerous misfortunes that befell his family.

Sophocles tried in all his tragedies to bring out heroes with a strong character and unbending will. But at the same time, these people were characterized by kindness and compassion. Such was, in particular, Antigone.

The tragedies of Sophocles clearly show that fate can subjugate a person's life. In this case, the hero becomes a toy in the hands of higher powers, which the ancient Greeks personified with Moira, standing even above the gods. These works became an artistic reflection of the civil and moral ideals of slave-owning democracy. Among these ideals were political equality and freedom of all full citizens, patriotism, service to the Motherland, nobility of feelings and motives, as well as kindness and simplicity.

Sophocles died in 406 BC. e.

Euripides ( rice. 5) was born c. 480 BC e. in a wealthy family. Since the parents of the future playwright did not live in poverty, they were able to give their son a good education.

Rice. 5. Euripides

Euripides had a friend and teacher Anaxagoras, from whom he studied philosophy, history and other humanities. In addition, Euripides spent a lot of time in the company of sophists. Although the poet was not interested in the social life of the country, there were many political sayings in his tragedies.

Euripides, unlike Sophocles, did not take part in the staging of his tragedies, did not act in them as an actor, did not write music for them. Other people did it for him. Euripides was not very popular in Greece. For all the time of participation in competitions, he received only the first five awards, one of them posthumously.

During his lifetime, Euripides wrote approximately 92 dramas. 18 of them have come down to us in full. In addition, there are many more excerpts. Euripides wrote all the tragedies somewhat differently than Aeschylus and Sophocles. The playwright portrayed people in his plays as they are. All his heroes, despite the fact that they were mythological characters, had their own feelings, thoughts, ideals, aspirations and passions. In many tragedies Euripides criticizes the old religion. His gods often turn out to be more cruel, vindictive and evil than people. This attitude towards religious beliefs can be explained by the fact that Euripides' worldview was influenced by communication with the sophists. This religious free-thinking did not find understanding among ordinary Athenians. Apparently, therefore, the playwright did not enjoy success with his fellow citizens.

Euripides was a supporter of moderate democracy. He believed that the backbone of democracy was the small landowners. In many of his works, he sharply criticized and denounced demagogues who seek power with flattery and deceit, and then use it for their own selfish purposes. The playwright fought against tyranny, the enslavement of one person by another. He said that it is impossible to divide people by origin, that nobility lies in personal virtues and deeds, and not in wealth and noble origin.

Separately, it should be said about the attitude of Euripides to slaves. He tried in all his works to express the idea that slavery is an unjust and shameful phenomenon, that all people are the same, and that the soul of a slave is no different from the soul of a free citizen if the slave has pure thoughts.

At that time, Greece was waging the Peloponnesian War. Euripides believed that all wars are senseless and cruel. He justified only those that were carried out in the name of defending the motherland.

The playwright tried to understand the world of spiritual experiences of the people around him as best as possible. In his tragedies, he was not afraid to show the basest human passions and the struggle between good and evil in one person. In this regard, Euripides can be called the most tragic of all Greek authors. The female images in the tragedies of Euripides were very expressive and dramatic; it was not for nothing that he was rightly called a good connoisseur of the female soul.

The poet used three actors in his plays, but the choir in his works was no longer the main character. Most often, the songs of the choir express the thoughts and feelings of the author himself. Euripides was one of the first to introduce the so-called monodies into tragedies - arias of actors. Even Sophocles tried to use monodia, but they received the greatest development precisely from Euripides. At the most important climaxes, the actors expressed their feelings through singing.

The playwright began to show the public such scenes that none of the tragic poets had introduced before him. For example, these were scenes of murder, illness, death, physical torment. In addition, he brought children to the stage, showed the viewer the experiences of a woman in love. When the denouement of the play came, Euripides brought to the public a “god in a car”, who predicted fate and expressed his will.

Euripides' most famous work is the Medea. He took the myth of the Argonauts as a basis. On the ship "Argo" they went to Colchis to extract the golden fleece. In this difficult and dangerous business, the leader of the Argonauts, Jason, was helped by the daughter of the Colchis king, Medea. She fell in love with Jason and committed several crimes for him. For this, Jason and Medea were expelled from their native city. They settled in Corinth. A few years later, having made two sons, Jason leaves Medea. He marries the daughter of the Corinthian king. From this event begins, in fact, the tragedy.

Seized with a thirst for revenge, Medea is terrible in anger. First, with the help of poisoned gifts, she kills Jason's young wife and her father. After that, the avenger kills her sons, born from Jason, and flies away on a winged chariot.

Creating the image of Medea, Euripides several times emphasized that she was a sorceress. But her unbridled character, violent jealousy, cruelty of feelings constantly remind the audience that she is not a Greek, but a native of the country of barbarians. The audience does not take the side of Medea, no matter how much she suffers, because they cannot forgive her terrible crimes (primarily infanticide).

In this tragic conflict, Jason is Medea's opponent. The playwright portrayed him as a selfish and prudent person who puts only the interests of his family at the forefront. The audience understands that it was the ex-husband who brought Medea to such a frenzied state.

Among the many tragedies of Euripides, one can single out the drama Iphigenia in Aulis, which is distinguished by civil pathos. The work is based on the myth of how, at the behest of the gods, Agamemnon had to sacrifice his daughter Iphigenia.

This is the plot of the tragedy. Agamemnon led a flotilla of ships to take Troy. But the wind died down, and the sailboats could not go further. Then Agamemnon turned to the goddess Artemis with a request to send the wind. In response, he heard an order to sacrifice his daughter Iphigenia.

Agamemnon summoned his wife Clytemnestra and daughter Iphigenia to Aulis. The pretext was the courtship of Achilles. When the women arrived, the deception was revealed. Agamemnon's wife was furious and did not allow her daughter to be killed. Iphigenia begged her father not to sacrifice her. Achilles was ready to defend his bride, but she refused to help when she learned that she must be martyred for the sake of her fatherland.

During the sacrifice, a miracle happened. After being stabbed, Iphigenia disappeared somewhere, and a doe appeared on the altar. The Greeks have a myth that tells that Artemis took pity on the girl and transferred her to Tauris, where she became a priestess of the temple of Artemis.

In this tragedy, Euripides showed a courageous girl, ready to sacrifice herself for the good of her homeland.

It was said above that Euripides was not popular with the Greeks. The public did not like the fact that the playwright sought to depict life as realistically as possible in his works, as well as his free attitude to myths and religion. It seemed to many viewers that by doing so he violated the laws of the tragedy genre. And yet the most educated part of the public enjoyed watching his plays. Many of the tragic poets who lived at that time in Greece followed the path opened by Euripides.

Shortly before his death, Euripides moved to the court of the Macedonian king Archelaus, where his tragedies enjoyed well-deserved success. At the beginning of 406 BC. e. Euripides died in Macedonia. This happened a few months before Sophocles' death.

Glory came to Euripides only after his death. In the IV century BC. e. Euripides began to be called the greatest tragic poet. This statement remained until the end of the ancient world. This can only be explained by the fact that the plays of Euripides corresponded to the tastes and requirements of people of a later time who wanted to see on stage the embodiment of those thoughts, feelings and experiences that were close to their own.

Aristophanes

Aristophanes ( rice. 6) was born around 445 BC. e. His parents were free people, but not very wealthy. The young man showed his creative abilities very early. Already at the age of 12-13 he began to write plays. His first work was staged in 427 BC. e. and immediately received a second award.

Rice. 6. Aristophanes

Aristophanes wrote only about 40 works. Only 11 comedies have survived to this day, in which the author posed a variety of life questions. In the plays "Aharnians" and "Peace" he advocated an end to the Peloponnesian War and the conclusion of peace with Sparta. In the plays "Wasps" and "Horsemen" he criticized the activities of state institutions, reproaching dishonest demagogues who deceived the people. Aristophanes in his works criticized the philosophy of the sophists and the methods of educating youth ("Clouds").

The work of Aristophanes enjoyed well-deserved success among his contemporaries. The audience flocked to his performances. This state of affairs can be explained by the fact that a crisis of slave-owning democracy has matured in Greek society. In the echelons of power, bribery and corruption of officials, embezzlement and fraud flourished. The satirical depiction of these vices in the plays found the most lively response in the hearts of the Athenians.

But in the comedies of Aristophanes there is also a positive hero. He is a small landowner who cultivates the land with the help of two or three slaves. The playwright admired his industriousness and common sense, which manifested itself both in domestic and state affairs. Aristophanes was an ardent opponent of war and advocated peace. For example, in the comedy Lysistratus, he expressed the idea that the Peloponnesian War, in which the Hellenes kill each other, weakens Greece in the face of the threat from Persia.

In the plays of Aristophanes, an element of buffoonery is sharply noticeable. In this regard, the acting performance also had to include parody, caricature and buffoonery. All these tricks caused wild fun and laughter of the audience. In addition, Aristophanes put the characters in ridiculous positions. An example is the comedy "Clouds", in which Socrates ordered himself to be hung high in a basket so that it would be easier to think about the sublime. This and similar scenes were very expressive and from a purely theatrical side.

Just like tragedy, comedy began with a prologue with a plot of action. He was followed by the opening song of the choir as he entered the orchestra. The choir, as a rule, consisted of 24 people and was divided into two half-choirs of 12 people each. The opening song of the choir was followed by episodies, which were separated from each other by songs. The episodies combined dialogue with choral singing. They always had an agon - a verbal duel. In the agon, the opponents most often defended opposing opinions, sometimes it ended in a fight between the characters with each other.

There was a parabasis in the choral parts, during which the choir took off their masks, took a few steps forward and addressed directly to the audience. Usually parabaza was not connected with the main theme of the play.

The last part of the comedy, as well as the tragedy, was called the exode, at which time the choir left the orchestra. Exodus was always accompanied by cheerful, perky dances.

An example of the most striking political satire is the comedy "Horsemen". Aristophanes gave it such a name because the main character was the choir of horsemen who made up the aristocratic part of the Athenian army. Aristophanes made the leader of the left wing of democracy Cleon the main character of the comedy. He called him the Leatherworker and presented him as a brazen, deceitful man who thinks only of his own enrichment. Under the guise of old Demos, the people of Athens perform in the comedy. Demos is very old, helpless, often falls into childhood and therefore listens to the Leatherworker in everything. But, as they say, a thief stole a horse from a thief. Demos transfers power to another swindler - Sausage Man, who defeats Leatherworker.

At the end of the comedy, the Sausage Man boils Demos in a cauldron, after which youth, reason and political wisdom return to him. Now Demos will never dance to the tune of unscrupulous demagogues. And the Kolbasnik himself subsequently becomes a good citizen who works for the good of his homeland and people. According to the plot of the play, it turns out that the Sausage Man was just pretending to get the better of the Leatherworker.

During the great Dionysia of 421 BC. e., during the period of peace negotiations between Athens and Sparta, Aristophanes wrote and staged the comedy "Peace". Contemporaries of the playwright admitted the possibility that this performance could have had a positive impact on the course of negotiations, which ended successfully in the same year.

The main character of the play was a farmer named Trigeus, that is, a "collector" of fruits. Continuous war prevents him from living peacefully and happily, cultivating the land and feeding his family. On a huge dung beetle, Trigeus decided to rise into the sky to ask Zeus what he intended to do with the Hellenes. If only Zeus does not make any decision, then Trigeus will tell him that he is a traitor to Hellas.

Rising to heaven, the farmer learned that there were no more gods on Olympus. Zeus moved them all to the highest point of the sky, because he was angry with the people because they could not end the war in any way. In a large palace that stood on Olympus, Zeus left the demon of war Polemos, giving him the right to do whatever he wants with people. Polemos seized the goddess of the world and imprisoned her in a deep cave, and filled up the entrance with stones.

Trigeus called Hermes for help, and while Polemos was gone, they freed the goddess of the world. Immediately after this, all wars ceased, people returned to peaceful creative work, and a new, happy life began.

Aristophanes drew a red thread through the entire plot of the comedy, the idea that all Greeks should forget enmity, unite and live happily. Thus, for the first time, a statement was made from the stage, addressed to all Greek tribes, that there is much more in common between them than there are differences. In addition, the idea was expressed of uniting all the tribes and the commonality of their interests. The comedian wrote two more works that were a protest against the Peloponnesian War. These are the comedies "Aharnians" and "Lysistrata".

In 405 BC. e. Aristophanes created the play "The Frogs". In this work, he criticized the tragedies of Euripides. As an example of worthy tragedies, he named the plays of Aeschylus, whom he always sympathized with. In the comedy The Frogs, at the very beginning of the action, Dionysus enters the orchestra with his servant Xanthus. Dionysus announces to everyone that he is going to descend into the underworld in order to bring Euripides to the earth, because after his death there was not a single good poet left. After these words, the audience burst into laughter: everyone knew the critical attitude of Aristophanes to the works of Euripides.

The core of the play is the dispute between Aeschylus and Euripides, which takes place in the underworld. Actors portraying playwrights appear in the orchestra, as if continuing the argument started off the stage. Euripides criticizes the art of Aeschylus, believes that he had too little action on the stage, that, having taken the hero or heroine to the platform, Aeschylus covered them with a cloak and left them to sit silently. Further, Euripides says that when the play exceeded its second half, Aeschylus added more "words stilted, maned and frowning, impossible monsters, unknown to the viewer." Thus, Euripides condemned the pompous and indigestible language in which Aeschylus wrote his works. About himself, Euripides says that he showed everyday life in his plays and taught people simple everyday things.

Such a realistic depiction of the everyday life of ordinary people provoked criticism of Aristophanes. Through the mouth of Aeschylus, he denounces Euripides and tells him that he has spoiled people: "Now market onlookers, rogues, insidious villains are everywhere." Further, Aeschylus continues that he, unlike Euripides, created such works that call the people to victory.

Their competition ends with the weighing of the poems of both poets. Large scales appear on the stage, Dionysus invites the playwrights to throw verses from their tragedies onto different scales in turn. As a result, the poems of Aeschylus outweighed, he became the winner, and Dionysus must bring him to the ground. Seeing off Aeschylus, Pluto orders him to guard Athens, as he says, "with good thoughts" and "to re-educate madmen, of whom there are many in Athens." Since Aeschylus returns to earth, he asks for the time of his absence in the underworld to transfer the throne of the tragedian to Sophocles.

Aristophanes died in 385 BC. e.

From the point of view of the ideological content, as well as the spectacle of the comedy of Aristophanes, this is a phenomenal phenomenon. According to historians, Aristophanes is both the pinnacle of ancient Attic comedy and its completion. In the IV century BC. e., when the socio-political situation in Greece changed, comedy no longer had such a power of influence on the public as before. In this regard, V. G. Belinsky called Aristophanes the last great poet of Greece.

Aristotle

Aristotle was born in 384 BC. e., and died in 322 BC. e. From ancient times, only one single work written by a philosopher has survived to this day. This work is called Poetics.

Aristotle was an encyclopedic philosopher, wrote treatises on various topics: natural sciences, philosophy, law, history, ethics, medicine, etc. For artists and literature, the treatise Poetics is of the greatest interest.

This work has not come down to us in its entirety. Only the first part has survived, in which Aristotle discussed the aesthetic significance of art and the specifics of its individual types.

According to the philosopher, the main advantage of art is that it quite realistically reflects everyday life and the existence of the world. The main place in "Poetics" is given to the doctrine of tragedy, which the author considers the main genre of serious poetry. He characterizes it with the following words: “Tragedy is an imitation of an important and complete action, having a certain volume, imitation with the help of speech, differently decorated in each of its parts, through action, and not a story, which, through compassion and fear, purifies such affects.”

According to Aristotle, a tragedy should consist of 6 unequally significant parts. In the first place, he puts the plot (sequence of depicting events), which, in his opinion, should be complete, integral and have a certain volume.

The author divides the plot into simple and complex. In a play with a simple plot, the plot develops smoothly, without unexpected transitions and fractures. At the heart of a complex plot lies "twisting" (a sudden, unexpected change in someone's life) and "recognition" (the transition from ignorance to knowledge). Aristotle himself always preferred complex plots.

As for the characters derived in tragedies, Aristotle writes about them that they must be noble, believable and consistent. The hero of the tragedy must be the best, not the worst person, the one who suffers not from his criminality or inferiority, but from an accidental mistake.

In general, the treatise "Poetics" provides a lot of valuable information about the genre of drama. After many centuries, scientists of different directions, artists and literature more than once turned to this treatise. All of them accepted the provisions expressed by Aristotle as the norms of artistic creativity. Many of these sayings have not lost their meaning even today.