A Mostly Harmless Yet Slightly Crazy Undead Chick ([info]ardys_the_ghoul) wrote,
@ 2009-06-29 16:23:00
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Current location:Ancient Greece, in spirit
Current mood: accomplished
Current music:Cold Case Files

I Finally Finished Something
I finally finished and turned in my first paper for the Greek Independent Study I'm taking with my favorite professor. It's called, "Euripides' Alcestis: Satire or Tragedy?" and can pretty much be summed up like this: "I don't know what the hell is going on with this play, and I think Euripides wanted it that way, because he's weird like that."

Actually, I think it's probably a satire, but with Euripides, who knows? He likes to be clever, I think. Although, maybe in trying to out-clever Euripides, I'm really just out-clevering myself. I don't know. This paper has me thinking in circles.

As I told my sister-in-law, "I like it when I finish stuff. It makes me feel like less of a loser."


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[info]amysanderson
2009-06-30 10:05 am UTC (link)
Finishing stuff is always awesome. And I know what you mean about out-clevering yourself. I did that a lot with my dissertation. I probably made it twice as complicated as it needed to be.

I don't think I've read any Euripides. Despite half my degree being in Classics, I managed not to read much Greek literature, I suppose because I was focussing on the history and religious stuff. I did read a lot of Senecan tragedy though, which was mostly reworkings of Euripides' plays but apparently more gruesome.

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[info]ardys_the_ghoul
2009-07-01 12:55 am UTC (link)
Euripides is gruesome enough as it is. I mean, this is the guy who wrote Medea--who kills her own children to get back at her cheating husband. He also wrote The Bacchae, where a guy is torn to pieces by his own crazed mother.

I mean, it's not exactly cheerful. He's generally considered the "most brutal" of the Greek tragedians. I'm kind of trying to think of how you could get more gruesome, although I'm not sure I want to.

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[info]amysanderson
2009-07-03 10:52 am UTC (link)
I think the content of both Euripides' and Seneca's plays was pretty similar as far as the stories go, or at least that's what my tutor said. As for Seneca, he really liked to describe the gory scenes in detail. I remember in 'Phaedra' there were really graphic descriptions of Hippolytus being torn apart by being dragged over stony ground by stampeding horses. Then there was a scene with his father elbow deep in entrails trying to put Hippolytus' body back together and saying things like 'What body part is this? I think it might be a foot. I can't tell what this bit is though, so I'll just put it somewhere in the middle." Yeah, it wasn't quite like that, but you get the idea!

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[info]zoe_i_am
2009-06-30 04:14 pm UTC (link)
This paper has me thinking in circles.

Euripides will do that to ya! Way to go on finishing!!!

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[info]ardys_the_ghoul
2009-07-01 12:56 am UTC (link)
I think he liked to confuse his audience.

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