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Aristophanes, whose eleven surviving plays are all that remain of Old Comedy, has been stereotyped since ancient times as the poet who brought order and stability to this rowdy theatrical genre. But how did this image arise, and why were the rivals Cratinus and Eupolis relegated to secondary status and merely fragmentary survival? This book traces Aristophanes’ supremacy, paradoxically, back to the defeat of his Clouds at the Great Dionysia in 423 BCE. Both Wasps (422) and the revised Clouds (419–417), the two plays at the center of this study, depict the earlier Clouds as a failed attempt by Aristophanes, the good son, to heal the comic audience—reflected in the plays in a pair of dysfunctional fathers. Through this narrative of failure, Aristophanes advances a “proto-canonical” discourse that anticipates the contours of the Hellenistic comic canon by elevating his aesthetic mode while delegitimizing his rivals. Aristophanic comedy is cast as a prestigious object, an expression of the supposedly timeless values of dignity and self-control. This discourse, which depends on both internal and external textual connections, is grounded in the distinctive feelings that different comic modes purportedly transmitted to an audience. In Wasps and Clouds the Aristophanic style is figured as a soft, protective cloak meant to shield an audience from debilitating competitors and restore it to paternal responsibility and authority. Aristophanes’ narrative of afflicted fathers and healing sons, of audience and poet, is thus shown to be at the center of the proto-canonical discourse that shaped his eventual dominance.

Since Aristotle, text has been considered the essence of Athenian tragedy, while theatrical props have been relegated to the category of mere spectacle, external to the text. Objects as Actors argues that far from being inanimate, ancillary “things,” props are fully integrated in tragic text, agents that spark surprising plot turns and unexpected reactions from viewers inside and outside the theatrical frame while furnishing some of the genre’s most purely thrilling moments. Whether it’s the uncanny sword or the diachronic shield of Sophocles’ Ajax, the visually overpowering tapestry of Aeschylus’s Choephoroi, the mythically and politically charged recognition tokens of Euripides’ Ion, the canonical urn of Sophocles’ Electra, or the metatheatrical tablet of Euripides’ Hippolytus, props demand our attention. They bridge—even as they disrupt—time, space, and genre; they manipulate even as they are manipulated. Combining theater studies with cultural poetics, this book proposes a new dimension in the study of how tragic plays communicate with each other: not just intertextually, but also intertheatrically. Through their compelling presence and associative power, props provide the key to a new way of looking at the central tragic texts—and, indeed, at theater as a whole.

Ancient Greek tragedy has been an inspiration to Western culture, but the way it was first performed has long remained in question. This book provides a discussion of key issues relating to the use of the playing space and the nature of the chorus, offering a distinctive impression of the performance of Greek tragedy in the fifth century bce. Drawing on evidence from the surviving texts of tragedies by Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, it explains how scenes with actors were played in the open ground of the orchestra, often considered as exclusively the dancing place of the chorus. In reviewing what is known of the music and dance of Greek antiquity, the book shows that in the original productions, the experience of the chorus—expressed in song and dance, and in interaction with the characters—remained a vital characteristic in the performance of tragedy. It combines detailed analysis with broader reflections about the nature of ancient Greek tragedy as an art form.