Unspeakable Words in Greek Tragedy

Teiresias has “stirred up a word” as if words were things with a dormant life of their own. In Teiresias’ last words to Oedipus, the word for parricide is separated. The name Teiresias frames remain unspoken. It is one of the unspeakable words of Greek tragedy. What Teiresias knew was all too human and, in the context of Athenian society, the words to express this knowledge were either forbidden or unspeakable. In Greek, words, even those expressing the truth, could be felt as sticks and stones, as we have seen in Strepsiades’ violent reaction to Socrates’ recitation of what must have been Makareus rhesis from Euripides’ Aiolos. Oedipus’ reaction to the charge of incest is as precise a gauge as we could want for the power of unspeakable words in Greek and in Greek tragedy. The theme of incest could be translated from the language of tragedy, with its necessary restraint, remoteness, and seriousness, into the language of comedy

Art · Greek tragedy · Literature · Classical Antiquity Studies · History