In Classical Greece, the relationship between philosophy and literature became well-established. This was clear in the work of Aristophanes (air-uh-STAHF-uh-neez; c. 450-c. 388 B. C.), an Athenian playwright known for his comedies. A friend of the old order, Aristophanes poked wicked fun at Socrates, Plato, and others who promoted new views of society. Certainly he was a conservative, but he was too hilarious to be a stuffed shirt. Plays such as The Clouds and The Frogs are still funny today. Only eleven of Aristophanes's forty plays have survived, and the work of the great tragic playwrights has suffered similar devastation. In fact, Aristophanes is the only comic playwright whose work is even known today; at least in the case of tragedy, works by three playwrights have survived to the present.
It should be noted that in the context of ancient Greece, comedy and tragedy did not mean exactly what they do today. Comedy was not necessarily funny, even if the satire (SA-tire) of Aristophanes was. Instead, the word comedy meant that at the end of the play, everything ended up well for the main characters. And whereas “tragedy” refers to a terrible misfortune, for Greek playwrights it had a much more specific meaning. As explained by Aristotle in his Poetics, a tragedy was a play about a great hero with a “tragic flaw,” usually pride or hubris (H'YOO-bris), that destines him for great suffering. The plot of the tragedy most often focuses on a great misfortune that befalls the hero, and it usually ends with him choosing to go down fighting rather than merely submit to fate.
The first great tragedian (tra-jeh-DEE-uhn) was Aeschylus (ES-kuh-luhs; 525-426 b. c.) Aeschylus won the first prize in tragedy thirteen times at an annual festival in Athens, where playwrights presented trilogies, or sets of three plays. His Oresteia (ohr-es-TIE-yuh) is the only such trilogy that has survived. The first play of the Oresteia centers on what happens to King Agamemnon after he returns from the Trojan War. In part because of his own tragic flaws, he is murdered by his cheating wife and her lover. The second play focuses on the revenge taken by his son Orestes (oh-REHS-teez). The third finds Orestes coming to terms with his murder of his mother.
Perhaps the most tragic figure in all of Greek drama was the central character in Oedipus the King by Sophocles (SAHF-uh-kleez; c. 496-406 b. c.) Without intending to, Oedipus fulfills a prophecy that he will kill his father and marry his mother. When he realizes what he has done, he pokes out his own eyes.
These are horrid events, to be sure, but as noted by Aristotle, himself a great admirer of Sophocles, watching a tragedy such as Oedipus gave the audience an opportunity for catharsis (kuh-THAHR-sis), or purification through art. Instead of having to go through things themselves, an audience could watch an actor on stage and thus get relief from their own pent-up emotions. Aristotle was not the only one to find deep psychological meaning in Sophocles' play. Sigmund Freud (FROID; 1856-1939), the father of modern psychology, believed that young men have a subconscious desire to replace their fathers as Oedipus did—symbolically, at least—as a way of establishing their own independence.
Also penetrating was the psychological approach of Euripides (yoo-RIP-uh-deez; c. 484-406 b. c.), whose works included the Medea (meh-DEE-uh) and The Trojan Women. In the latter play is a heartrending speech by Andromache (an-DRAH-muh-kee), wife of Hector, who is forced to give up her infant son to be killed by the Greeks: “Thou little thing that curlest in my arms,” she tells the baby, “What sweet scents cling all around thy neck! Beloved, can it be all nothing... all the weary nights wherethrough I watched upon thy sickness, till I grew wasted with watching? Kiss me. This one last time; not ever again.” These were words to break the heart of any parent. Euripides concluded her speech with a suggestion that, following the example of Socrates, he took a highly critical view of his own society: “O, ye have found an anguish that outstrips all tortures of the East, ye gentle Greeks!”
Sophocles and Euripides also took part in, and several times won, the drama competition in Athens. Apparently the competition was part of a festival in honor of the god Dionysus. Over time the plays developed a specific form. Usually there were a few central characters, along with a large group of people called a chorus, who provided a sort of voice-over narration to the play.
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