Selbst-Bildungen. The Tradition of Comedy and the Emancipation of German Jews in Carl Sternheim’s The Snob

The article explores the connection between enlightenment and comedy, as well as its importance for German Jewry. Following Hegel, whose thoughts on ancient drama as well as modern society have shaped the German discourse on comedy until today, this article demonstrates that questions of self-formation, emancipation, and historical self-location are central to comedy. In Carl Sternheim’s comedy The Snob, the idea of self-formation resonates with the historic concept of “civic improvement” through “Bildung”: Jewish emancipation in Germany stood at the end of an educational project that outlasted Jews’ achieving legal equality. The Snob is a comedy about Jewish acculturation and bourgeoisification and embodies Marx’s understanding of comedy as ambivalent: on the one hand, comedy helps people to part cheerfully from their past that was characterized by inequality, but, on the other, it indicates that a world-historic fact like Jewish emancipation may be prone to repeat itself as a farce. Sternheim’s comedy develops a poetic that embraces ambivalence, but also opens the genre of comedy to the question of therapy and healing. It depicts the struggle between autonomy and social formation – the dialectics of German “Bildung.”

Byzantijnse geleerden over Aristophanes

This article studies the reception of the comedies of the Athenian playwright Aristophanes in 12th-century Byzantium. It takes as its starting point various scholarly and didactic texts that facilitated this reception. These texts were written by Gregory of Corinth, John Tzetzes and Eustathius of Thessaloniki, who all used Aristophanes, and ancient literature more generally, in their teaching and scholarly practice. This article explores (1) what moral functions Byzantine scholars ascribe to ancient drama; (2) how they instruct Byzantine writers to weave elements of humour and ridicule into their own work by either imitating Aristophanes’ techniques or quoting his verses; (3) how they use the Athenian playwright as a model for correct atticizing language; (4) and how Tzetzes engages on a personal level with Aristophanes as a historical figure and with the comedies he wrote. This examination of the reception of Aristophanes in the work of Gregory, Tzetzes and Eustathius thus demonstrates the versatility of the Byzantine reception of ancient comedy.

Onlife Drama: Towards a Reference Framework for Hyper-Connected Activity

An important aspect of ICT, identified 25 years ago within the user interface design community, is dramatic interaction: The deep engagement promoted by digital technologies that can be better explored by adopting a conceptual framework traditionally used to describe and study theater. This framework offers a wider perspective that demonstrates a deep connection between the qualities of our hyper-connected era and drama as an art of representing action. These concepts transcend the prevailing technical mentality when addressing ICT. They imply that we all participate as “interactors” on the “onlife stage” where other agents (either humans or computer-controlled) are also present. By promoting deep experiences, the hyper-connected environment in which we live in, changes our metaphysics and self-conception. A dramatic framework can explain the power of ICT and help us work towards the development of an equilibrium both personally and collectively: When used to enrich our experiences and extend our agencies, ICT can be considered as an enhancement of reality. When, on the other side, they are used to promote a false reality experience, they should be rectified. Important ethical and anthropological concerns are framed on the same philosophical ground as ancient drama. Ancient drama was a major pillar of Ancient Democracy and served the need to educate citizens with empathy in order to participate as responsible actors in decision making processes.

FROM TESTIMONY TO HETEROGLOSSIA: THE VOICE(S) OF LAMENT IN WE ARE THE PERSIANS!

We are the Persians! was a contemporary adaptation of Aeschy-lus’s The Persians presented in June 2015 at the Athens and Epidaurus Festival. Performed by displaced people from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh, and directed by Yolanda Markopoulou, the piece grew out of the Station Athens group’s five-year theatre workshops. Extracts from the original play were intertwined with performative material brought to the project by the participants: from real-life testimonies to vocal improvisations, poems, and songs in different languages. High-lighting the historical thematic of the play, this adaptation was presented as a documentary theatre piece, and the participants as ‘modern-day heralds’ who provided on stage ‘shocking accounts’ concerning ‘contem-porary wars’ (programme notes, 2015). After briefly revisiting the main body of literature on the voice of lament in ancient drama and in Aeschylus’s The Persians in particular, but also after discussing the recent stage history of the play in Greece, I conduct a close reading of this adaptation. Based on semi-directed interviews and audiovisual archives from both the rehearsals and the final show,I argue that the participants’ performance cannot be limited to their auto-biographical testimonies, which identify their status as refugees and/or asylum seekers. By intertwining Aeschylus with their own voices and languages, they reappropriate and reinvent the voice(s) of lament in ancient drama. In this sense, I suggest that We are the Persians! can be read as a hybrid performance of heteroglossia, which disrupts and potentially transforms dominant ways of receiving ancient drama on the modern Greek stage.

‘Communal Hellenism’ and ancient tragedy performances in Greece (1975–95): The ritual quest

For the better part of the twentieth century, the quest for a ‘Greek’ continuity in the so-called revival of ancient drama in Greece was inextricably linked to what is termed and studied in this paper as a Ritual Quest. Rituality was understood in two forms: one was aesthetic and neoclassicist in its hermeneutic and performative codes, which were established and recycled – and as such: ritualized – in ancient tragedy productions of the National Theatre of Greece from the 1930s to the 1970s; the other, cultivated mainly during the 1980s, was cultural and centred around the idea that continuity can be traced and explored through the direct employment of Byzantine and folk ritual elements. Both aimed at eliciting the cohesive collective response of their spectators: their turning into a liminal ritual community. This was a community tied together under an ethnocentric identity, that of Greeks participating in a Greek (theatrical) phenomenon. At first through neoclassicism, then through folklore, this artistic phenomenon was seen as documenting a diachronic and essentially political modern Greek desideratum: continuity with the ancient past. Such developments were in tune with broader cultural movements in the period under study, which were reflected on the common imaginings of Antiquity in the modern Greek collective – consciousness – a sort of ‘Communal Hellenism’. The press reception of performances, apart from being a productive vehicle for the study of the productions as such, provides indispensable indexes to audience reception. Through the study of theatre reviews, we propose to explore the crucial shifts registered in the definition of Greekness and its dynamic connections to Antiquity.

СOMMONALITY OF PLAUTUS 'COMEDIES AND V. KATAEV'S COMEDY «QUADRATURE OF THE CIRCLE»

Статья посвящена исследованию литературных источников драматургической техники комедии В. Катаева «Квадратура круга». Исследование формальных приемов в структуре произведения строится на текстуальном анализе трех комедий Плавта и комедии «Квадратура круга». Анализ сходства драматургической техники производится путем сопоставления отдельных сцен в комедиях Плавта «Клад», «Близнецы», «Пленники» и комедии В. Катаева «Квадратура круга». Автором статьи используется терминология, существующая в научном обороте, но не имеющая нормативного употребления. Слова «схема», «фигура», «элемент» являются синонимами и обозначают отдельный прием драматургической техники. Процесс текстуального сличения отдельных сцен комедий Плавта и Катаева демонстрирует очевидную общность драматургической техники. Сходство приемов драматургической техники, их количественный уровень указывает на факт заимствования Катаевым отдельных элементов из комедий римского автора. Драматургические фигуры, составляющие общность приемов в комедиях Плавта и Катаева, различны на идейно-тематическом и структурно-композиционном уровне. Глубина профессионального освоения творчества Плавта вкупе с дарованием и талантом самого Валентина Петровича способствовали феерическому успеху «Квадратуры круга» на российской и мировой сценах. Использование литературно-исторических традиций античной драматургии Катаевым является бесценным опытом и примером создания произведения высокого художественного уровня. The article is devoted to the study of literary sources of the dramatic technique of V. Kataev's Comedy «the Quadrature of the circle». The study of formal techniques in the structure of the work is based on the textual analysis of three comedies by Plautus and V. Kataev's Comedy «the Quadrature of the circle». The similarity of dramatic technique is analyzed by comparing individual scenes in Plautus 'comedies «the Treasure», «the Twins», «the Prisoners» and V. Kataev's Comedy «the Quadrature of the circle». The author of the article uses terminology that exists in scientific circulation but does not have normative use. Words: the schematic of figure element are synonymous and refer to the individual reception of dramatic technique. The process of textual comparison of individual scenes of Plautus and Kataev's comedies demonstrates an obvious similarity of dramatic technique. The similarity of the techniques of dramaturgical technique ,their quantitative level, indicates the fact that V. Kataev adopted certain elements from the comedies of the Roman author. The dramaturgical figures that make up the commonality of techniques in the comedies of Plautus and V. Kataev are different on the ideological-thematic and structural-compositional level. The depth of Kataev's professional development of Plautus ' work, combined with the talent and talent of Valentin Petrovich, contributed to the enchanting success of the circle Quadrature on the Russian and world stages. The use of literary and historical traditions of ancient drama By V. Kataev is an invaluable experience and example of creating a work of high artistic level.

New Music in New York

The article reviews a production of Euripides’ Herakles mounted by Barnard Columbia Ancient Drama, with an historically informed vocal and aulos score. I discuss aspects of the treatment of music in both the play and the performance, and I assess the production in light of recent approaches to the musical reconstruction of Euripidean tragedy.

The Social and Cultural Characteristics of Shanxi Ancient Drama Costumes

The main research subject of this paper is the costume of Shanxi ancient drama, which is used to decorate the role in the form of drama performing art that spread in Ancient Shanxi. Drama costume is a kind of special performance costume which combines decoration, acting and symbolism. It is quite different from the traditional costume in aesthetic and functional aspects. The social and cultural factors that influence the costume of Shanxi ancient drama mainly include the system and rules of Chinese ancient costume, the subtle influence of Buddhist culture and Taoist culture, as well as the profound influence of loyalty culture.

Aias Mastigophoros: Divine Ostentation within a Play

In this paper, I analyse a short scene that forms part of the opening of Sophokles’ Aias (66-133): Aias, suffering from madness, that was inflicted upon him by Athena, is displayed by the goddess to Odysseus. In the corpus of extant ancient drama, this inset appears to be unique; its expressive power seems to be derived from the scene's specific structure that in many important ways doubles integral elements of theatre. I rationalize the reasons why the scene has been often labelled “a play-within-a-play”, describing and illustrating elements that can be paralleled with structural components of theatre. Taking as a basis some concepts and ideas proposed by modern theatre theoreticians (Anne Ubersfeld, Tadeusz Kowzan, Umberto Eco), I argue that the essence of the performative dimension of the scene is to be found in the phenomenon of “ostentation act” as first described by Umberto Eco. Tracing the meaning of the inset within the tragedy as a whole, I lay great emphasis on the fact that the “ostentation” in Aias is a divine creation, and examine how Odysseus, who is a privileged recipient of the spectacle, reacts to the display of Aias' shameful condition.

Bringing Classics to the State Schools of the Midlands: A Year in the Life of the WCN

The Warwick Classics Network (WCN) was created in July 2018 with funding from the Warwick Widening Participation Development Fund and the Warwick Impact Fund. Further funding from Widening Participation (WP) and the charity Classics for All secured the continuation of the position of Research Fellow in Outreach and Impact for the Dept. of Classics and Ancient History, a role given to Dr Paul Grigsby; WP funding was also used to cover the expenses of events such as our 2nd July 2018 WCN Launch event and the 2019 Warwick Ancient Drama Festival. For the period April 2019-April 2020 the WCN received further funding from WP, Classics for All, and the A. G. Leventis Foundation, and this report will detail the activities that this funding supported.