Introduction

Pantomime, A Lost Chord of Ancient Culture

Bibliographic Data

ID23403365
AuthorsEdith Hall (0000-0002-8438-6814, corresponding author)
Year2008
Pages1-40
Publication date2008-11-20
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeCHAPTER
VenueNew directions in ancient pantomime (SOURCE_BOOK)
PublisherOxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199232536.003.0001
OpenAlexW2502578201
ISBN9780199232536
LanguageEN
Citations received4

In a broad contextualization of ancient pantomime within cultural history, the reasons for the importance of research into ancient pantomime are explored: it represents a lost aesthetic of profound and widespread influence in ancient imperial culture; it played, quantitatively speaking, a more important role in educating the majority of inhabitants of the Roman empire in mythology than, for example, recitations of poetry; it was the main medium in which the prestigious tradition of classical tragedy was kept alive in the theatres of the Roman empire; it played a seminal role in the emergence of classical ballet, and subsequently, in the twentieth century, of avant‐garde Tanztheater (dance theatre). The theatrical spaces and the musical accompaniments (provided by the chorus and the hydraulis), of pantomime are given detailed attention. The hostile response that aspects of the perfomance: the dancer, his mask and the music, evoked from the Church Fathers and the place of pantomime in their rhetoric of anti‐theatricalism is also briefly explored.

Ancient history · Art · Ballet · Chorus · Dance · Empire · Literature · Musical · Mythology · Poetry · Rhetoric · Classical Antiquity Studies · Historical Geography and Cartography · History · Maritime and Coastal Archaeology · Philosophy

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