Choreonarratives, a collection of essays by classicists, dance scholars, and dance practitioners, explores the uses of dance as a narrative medium. Case studies from Greek and Roman antiquity illustrate how dance contributed to narrative repertoires in their multimodal manifestations, while discussions of modern and contemporary dance shed light on practices, discourses, and ancient legacies regarding the art of dancing stories. Benefitting from the crossover of different disciplinary, historical, and artistic perspectives, the volume looks beyond current narratological trends and investigates the manifold ways in which dance can acquire meaning, disclose storyworlds ranging from myths to individual life-stories, elicit the narratees’ responses, and generate powerful narratives of its own. Together, the eclectic approaches of Choreonarratives rethink dance’s capacity to tell, enrich, and inspire stories. Contributors are Sophie M. Bocksberger, Iris J. Bührle, Marie-Louise Crawley, Samuel N. Dorf, Karin Fenböck, Susan L. Foster, Laura Gianvittorio-Ungar, Sarah Olsen, Lucia Ruprecht, Karin Schlapbach, Danuta Shanzer, Christina Thurner, Yana Zarifi-Sistovari, Bernhard Zimmermann
Ever since Aristotle opened the discussion on the role of the chorus in Greek tragedy, theories of the chorus have continued to proliferate and provoke debate to this day. The tragic chorus had its own story to tell; it was a collective identity, speaking within and to a collective citizen body, acting as an instrument through which stories of other times and places were dramatized into resonant heroic narratives for contemporary Athens. By including detailed case studies of three different tragedies (one each by Aeschylus, Euripides and Sophocles), Claude Calame's seminal study not only re-examines the role of the chorus in Greek tragedy, but pushes beyond this to argue for the 'polyphony' of choral performance. Here, he explores the fundamentally choral nature of the genre, and its deep connection to the cultic and ritual contexts in which tragedy was performed.
The history of dance theory has never been told. Writers in every age have theorized prescriptively, according to their own needs and ideals, and theorists themselves having continually asserted the lack of any pre-existing dance theory. Dance Theory: Source Readings from Two Millenia of Western Dance revives and reintegrates dance theory as a field of historical dance studies, presenting a coherent reading of the interaction of theory and practice during two millennia of dance history. In fifty-five selected readings with explanatory text, this book follows the various constructions of dance theories as they have morphed and evolved in time, from ancient Greece to the twenty-first century. Dance Theory is a collection of source readings that, commensurate with current teaching practice, foregrounds dance and performance theory in its presentation of western dance forms. Divided into nine chapters organized chronologically by historical era and predominant intellectual and artistic currents, the book presents a history of an idea from one generation to another. Each chapter contains introductions that not only provide context and significance for the individual source readings, but also create narrative threads that link different chapters and time periods. Based entirely on primary sources, the book makes no claim to cite every source, but rather, in connecting the dots between significant high points, it attempts to trace a coherent and fair narrative of the evolution of dance theory as a concept in Western culture.
A COMPANION TO ANCIENT GREEK AND ROMAN MUSIC A comprehensive guide to music in Classical Antiquity and beyond Drawing on the latest research on the topic, A Companion to Ancient Greek and Roman Music provides a detailed overview of the most important issues raised by the study of ancient Greek and Roman music. An international panel of contributors, including leading experts as well as emerging voices in the field, examine the ancient 'Art of the Muses' from a wide range of methodological, theoretical, and practical perspectives. Written in an engaging and accessible style, this book explores the pervasive presence of the performing arts in ancient Greek and Roman culture—ranging from musical mythology to music theory and education, as well as archaeology and the practicalities of performances in private and public contexts. But this Companion also explores the broader roles played by music in the Graeco-Roman world, examining philosophical, psychological, medical and political uses of music in antiquity, and aspects of its cultural heritage in Mediaeval and Modern times. This book debunks common myths about Greek and Roman music, casting light on yet unanswered questions thanks to newly discovered evidence. Each chapter includes a discussion of the tools or methodologies that are most appropriate to address different topics, as well as detailed case studies illustrating their effectiveness. This book Offers new research insights that will contribute to the future developments of the field, outlining new interdisciplinary approaches to investigate the importance of performing arts in the ancient world and its reception in modern culture Traces the history and development of ancient Greek and Roman music, including their Near Eastern roots, following a thematic approach Showcases contributions from a wide range of disciplines and international scholarly traditions Examines the political, social and cultural implications of music in antiquity, including ethnicity, regional identity, gender and ideology Presents original diagrams and transcriptions of ancient scales, rhythms, and extant scores that facilitate access to these vital aspects of ancient music for scholars as well as practicing musicians Written for a broad range of readers including classicists, musicologists, art historians, and philosophers, A Companion to Ancient Greek and Roman Music provides a rich, informative and thought-provoking picture of ancient music in Classical Antiquity and beyond.
In this volume, Carolyn M. Laferrière examines Athenian vase-paintings and reliefs depicting the gods most frequently shown as musicians to reconstruct how images suggest the sounds of the music the gods made. Incorporating insights from recent work in sensory studies, she applies formal analysis together with literary and archaeological evidence to reconstruct the musical culture of Athens. Laferrière shows how images suggest the sounds of the gods' music. This representational strategy, whereby sight and sound are blurred, conveys the 'unhearable' nature of their music: Because it cannot be physically heard, it falls to human imagination to provide its sounds and awaken viewers' multisensory engagement. Moreover, when situated within their likely original contexts, the objects establish a network of interaction between the viewer, the visualized music, and the landscape, all of which determined how divine music was depicted, perceived, and reciprocated. Laferrière demonstrates that participation in the gods' musical performances offered worshippers an multisensory experience of divine presence.
This is the second volume of A Social and Economic History of the Theatre to 300 BC and focuses exclusively on theatre culture in Attica (Rural Dionysia) and the rest of the Greek world. It presents and discusses in detail all the documentary and material evidence for theatre culture and dramatic production from the first two centuries of theatre history, namely the period c.500 to c.300 BC. The traditional assumption is laid to rest that theatre was an exclusively or primarily Athenian institution, with the inclusion of all sources of information for theatrical performances in twenty-two deme sites and over one hundred and twenty independent Greek (and some non-Greek) cities. All texts are translated and made accessible to non-specialists and specialists alike. The volume will be a fundamental work of reference for all classicists and theatre historians interested in ancient theatre and its wider historical contexts.
Experience, Narrative, and Criticism in Ancient Greece pursues a new approach to ancient Greek narrative beyond the taxonomies of structuralist narratologies. Focusing on the phenomenal and experiential dimension of our response to narrative, it triangulates ancient narrative with ancient criticism and cognitive approaches, opening up new vistas within the study of classical literature while ably deploying the ancient material to demonstrate the value of a historical perspective for cognitive studies. Concepts such as immersion and embodiment help to establish a more comprehensive understanding of ancient narrative and ancient reading habits, as manifested in Greek criticism and rhetorical theory. The thirteen chapters presented here tackle a broad range of narrative genres, broadly understood: besides epic, historiography, and the novel, tragedy and early Christian texts are also considered alongside non-literary media, such as dance and sculpture. Authored by international specialists in the language, literature, and culture of ancient Greece, each chapter utilizes a rich set of theoretical and methodological tools drawn from cognitive studies, phenomenology, and linguistics that place them at the vanguard of a strong new current in classical scholarship and literary criticism more generally.
Discover the power of Greek lyric with essays from some of the foremost scholars in the field today Recent decades have seen a strong resurgence of interest in Greek lyric, resulting in this topic becoming one of the most dynamic areas of Classical scholarship. In A Companion to Greek Lyric, renowned Classical scholar Laura Swift delivers a collection of essays by international experts and emerging voices that offers up-to-date approaches on the methodology, contexts, and reception of Greek lyric from the archaic to the Hellenistic period. This edited volume includes detailed analyses of the poets themselves, as well as a reflection of the current state of play in the study of Greek lyric. It showcases the scope and range of approaches to be found in scholarly work in the field. Newcomers to the subject will benefit from the range of contextual and technical information included that allows for a more effective engagement with the lyric poets. Readers will also enjoy: Guidance on working with texts that are mainly preserved as fragments A selection of ways in which lyric poetry has influenced and inspired writers from Rome to the modern era Recommendations for further reading that offer a starting point for how to follow up on a particular topic Perfect for undergraduate and master’s students taking courses on Greek lyric or survey courses on classical literature, A Companion to Greek Lyric also belongs in the libraries of students of English or Comparative Literature seeking an authoritative resource for Greek lyric.
