Bakkhai :: Classics

Bakkhai - Pentheus did not die within the house but his remains are taken inside at the end - Bacchic dancing is the ‘imitation’ of nymphs, Pans, sileni and satyrs; a form of mimesis - Dance as an aid to the spectators and pictorial clarification; complex metres of danced choral lyric vs. simple rhythms of sung lyrics, suggesting this complexity with its ‘resolutions, contractions and shifting rhythms, was first made possible by the interpretative power of dance - After Pentheus has departed for the mountains, the mood of the persecuted Lydian Bacchants is one of vengeance// strophe-refrain-antistrophe-refrain-epode - Refrain calls for Justice to kill Pentheus, and the epode calls upon Dionysus to manifest himself in his true form; strophe visualizes scene on Mount Citihaeron, while antistrophe is a credo of the chorus - Dominant metre is dochmiac (short long long short long), a metre associated with intense excitement - Strophe and antistrophe can be described in four movements: move within A from Pentheus to the vision of Agave, and within her from Pentheus to the vision of the chorus; correspondences are mimetically precise 1. Lines 1-5 Strophe evokes the hounds of Madness running to the Bacchants in the mountain and biting Pentheus; Pentheus in female garb starts to spy. Antistrophe evokes Pentheus going to the Bacchants on the mountain with a mad resolve, the madman attempts the impossible. The movement depicts running, the Bacchic orgy, and Pentheus’s madness. 2. Lines 6-8 Strophe represents Pentheus being seen by Agave. Antistrophe is syntactically obscure but is concerned with the idea of divine punishment. The movement represents a human being watched by someone stronger than a human, and the focus shifts from watched to watcher. 3. Lines 7-9 Strophe represents in direct speech the shout of Agave that someone has came. Antistrophe represents creed of the chorus ‘I reject rationality. I enjoy in the hunt. Other, greater, clearer things†¦ This is a public declamation about something seen, and the gestural action is deictic. 4. Lines 10-12 Strophe, Agave pronounces this is no human but is of a lion or a Gorgon. In antistrophe, the chorus conclude that they will reject an unjust way of life and reverence the gods. The focus shifts from what is seem in the vision: common humanity is contrasted with the divine or demonic - There is no way that an audience could grasp the intended symmetry without the medium of dance, which generalizes the concrete narrative of the strophe and concretizes the abstract lang of the antistrophe in order to draw action and thought together Idea of illusion Inside/outside * Tragic process puts insistent pressure on the faced of the masculine self in order to bring out that insistent pressure on