Oral Composition in the Oedipus Tyrannus of Sophocles
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4270677 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Eric A Havelock (corresponding author) |
| Year | 1984 |
| Volume | 16 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 175 |
| Publication date | 1984-01-01 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | New Literary History (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0028-6087 • E-ISSN: 1080-661X |
| Publisher | JSTOR (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.2307/468781 |
| OpenAlex | W2316702070 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 5 |
A STAGE PLAY is by definition composed for performance by action and elocution. To argue for composition may seem to be arguing for the obvious. The orality of Greek drama, however, if it exists, goes deeper than a mere management of stage conventions. It would mean that what had to be spoken on the Greek stage in the fifth century before Christ was molded in a very special way. There are of course compositional rules common to all drama qua drama. But I shall argue that there were certain rules operating in classic Greek drama which were peculiar to it, and which stage production of later periods from the Hellenistic age to the present has, in the nature of things, been unable to share. The surviving plays have come down to us as texts carefully read, copied, and transmitted over hazardous centuries and now at last printed in books. It is surely as texts that they deserve to be estimated, that is, as creations by authors. So runs the consensus of scholars, critics, translators, and adapters, to whom it would not occur that something like the oralism now accepted as inherent in the Homeric poems would survive in a Greek tragedy and be detectable there, let alone one so tightly constructed as the Oedipus Tyrannus. These plays were written down at the time of composition, else we would not have them. They were composed, so we usually think, with that kind of economy that is expected of the written word, and so rank as literate composition. But suppose the case is more complicated than that? Allowing their share in literacy, does one also perceive a share in preliteracy? Historically speaking, these are admittedly unique productions. It has not occurred to any postclassical playwright to put anything quite like them on stage, or if he has tried this he has failed. Even as we translate, imitate, or adapt, we are aware of our modern distance from them. Could it be that the uniqueness of their nature derives from a uniqueness in their cultural position, poised midway between previous centuries of oral composition and coming centuries of composition? The case for orality as a genre of verbal composition specifically
Art · Composition (language · Literature · Classical Antiquity Studies
| Citations per year | 0.13 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 1988 - 2019 (32) |
| Highly cited | No |