This book reads tragedy as a genre in which the protagonist is
estranged from the world around him, and, displaced in time, space,
and language, comes to inhabit a milieu which is no longer shared by
other characters. This alienation from others also entails a
decomposition of the integrity of the individual, which is often seen
in tragedy's uncertainty about the protagonists' autonomy: do they
act, or do the gods act through them? Where are the boundaries of the
self, and the boundaries of the human? After an introductory essay
exploring the theatrical and linguistic means by which the protagonist
is made to inhabit a strange and singular world, the book devotes
essays to plays from classical, renaissance, and neo-classical
literature by Aeschylus, Sophocles, Seneca, Shakespeare, and Racine.
Close attention is paid to the linguistic strangeness of the texts
which is often smoothed over by editors and translators, as it is
through the weirdness of tragic language that the deep estrangement of
the characters is shown. Accordingly, the Greek, Latin, and French
texts are quoted in the originals, with translations added, and
attention is paid to textual cruces which illustrate the linguistic
and conceptual difficulties of these plays.
Les mer
Produktdetaljer
ISBN
9780191610196
Publisert
2020
Utgiver
Vendor
OUP Oxford
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Digital bok
Forfatter