Goat Song
• Tragos - goat• Aoidé - song• All-male cast• Masks• Chorus:
12/15/50• Lyric Song• Dithyramb
Tragic Conventions• Violence, critical acts
usually offstage• Chorus almost never
effects action of play.• Sophocles often makes
chorus favor a character, interested in outcome.
• Unity of Time Violated• Change of Place Rare
(but Ajax)
Originators as Innovators
• Thespis: 1st actor• Aeschylus: 2nd• Sophocles: 3rd, and
maybe 4th• All adapted myths to fit
their needs (Euripides most of all)
Herakles as archetypal hero
• miraculous conception • threat to birth +
infancy • impossible adversaries • trips to Underworld • adventures in quest• magical tools/weapons• resistance of hero role
or temptation
Happily Ever After?
• Herakles & Megara
• 3-8 Kids!• BUT…• Maddened by
Hera, kills Family• Delphic Oracle
orders enslavement to Eurystheus for atonement
Hera’s Trick• "Listen to me, all you gods, and goddesses ... I
wish you to know that this day Eilithyia, the goddess of travail, will bring into the world a human child, born of a stock with my blood in their veins, who shall have dominion over all his neighbours." Zeus Iliad 19.100ff
• "I hasten to inform you that today there has been born a noble child who is to be King of the Argives. They have called him Eurystheus, and his father is Sthenelus, son of Perseus. So he comes of your stock, and it is quite a proper thing that he should have dominion over the Argives." Hera Iliad 19.122ff
Labors of Herakles: I-VI
1. Slay the Nemean Lion & bring back hide.2. Slay the 9-headed Lernaean Hydra.3. Capture the Golden Hind of Artemis.4. Capture the Erymanthian Boar.5. Clean the Augean stables in a single day.6. Slay the Stymphalian Birds.
Labors of Herakles: VII-XII
7. Capture the Cretan Bull.8. Steal Mares of Giant Diomedes.9. Obtain Girdle of Amazon queen Hippolyte.10. Obtain the Cattle of the Monster Geryon.11. Steal the Apples of the Hesperides,
guarded by Ladon (100-headed dragon).12. Capture Cerberus, guardian dog of Hades.
Herakles’ Wandering
Eye• Many
Extramarital Liaisons
• Iole different• “to lie under one
blanket” with Deianeira!
Mens Rea?
• Aphrodisiac as Poison• Excessively Lustful• Malleable at Home• Impotent• Dead…
• Deianeira “Man-destroyer”• DeMorgan