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Summary OCR Classical Civilisation A Level: Tragedy Notes on Oedipus & Bacchae
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TRAGEDY THEMESThe role of the Gods
Characters: Oedipus, Oedipus Chorus, Cadmus, Dionysus, Pentheus
Uncaring attitude the Gods display: D
Gods are vengeful/personally motivated.
Modern audience: shocking, used to a loving deity,
Greek audience: believed that the gods were as concerned with their honour as
human beings are, and this explains their need for worship.
The gods have a need for worship:
In tragedy, the failure of heroes to honour the gods is often responsible for their
downfall.
Bacchae: D&P
o Dionysus announces at the start of the play that he will punish Thebes for
refusing to worship him.
o Pentheus is warned repeatedly about the dangers of dishonouring a god - for
example by Tiresias ‘advice Pentheus…accept the God in this country’
o Pentheus adds to his folly as he refuses to acknowledge Dionysus' divinity and
attempts to humiliate him. ‘to honour this new God Dionysus, whoever he is’
‘I will cut of your curls’ curls were sacred to bacchic worship
o This disregard for divine power could not be tolerated, and a Greek audience
would not expect Dionysus to be merciful when treated with contempt.
o Scholar Micheal Scott: Bacchae is fuelled by the introduction of new cults and
Athens watching would not be unused to this idea (I.e cult of Asclepius) so
Athenians would have understood P’s scepticism.
Oedipus to a degree too: O
o He doesn’t fail to honour the Gods but has hubristic moments - ‘You pray to
the Gods? Let me grant your prayers’
o Scholar Knox: in Sophocles the Gods aren’t “just” they’re “real” and must be
worshipped
The punishments meted out by the Greek gods are not limited to the wrongdoer
Oedipus: O Chorus
o The whole city is afflicted by plague as a punishment for harbouring the killer
of Laius – C comes back from oracle, where he asked how to save Thebes and
it said ‘drive the corruption from the land’
Bacchae: C&D
o All the women of Thebes are driven mad by Dionysus because his mother's
sisters denied that she was impregnated by Zeus. ‘I have stung them into a
frenzy’
o Cadmus suffers greatly as a result of his grandson's actions, although he has
never rejected Dionysus.
‘I have come wearing these clothes of the God, Dionysus’
, ‘I will go into exile’
o At the end of the play, when Cadmus suggests that Dionysus' punishment
was excessive, the god replies "yes, for I am a god, and I was insulted by you'.
In other words, just as the gods' power surpasses that of human beings, so
does their anger, and they will punish transgressions against them with
disproportionate violence.
The gods put little emphasis on whether a human has transgressed intentionally:
Oedipus:
o This issue lies at the heart of Oedipus the King, where Oedipus has
committed terrible crimes in ignorance.
o We learn at the start of the play that the gods wish the killer of Laius to be
punished, and the characters assume that he is a wicked man who has acted
out of viciousness. When Oedipus' identity is unveiled, no one doubts that he
must be punished, vet his ignorance makes his fate horrifying.
Sophistry too
Fate and free will
Characters: Oedipus, Jocasta, Pentheus
Oedipus: O
Oedipus is a victim of his fate, but it is also his own actions that brought it to pass.
Double determination (the outcome is a combination of fate/the gods and human
actions):
o Scholar Rutherford:
‘the divine power and the human agent are working together, hardly
separable’
Argues that fate isn’t entirely fixed – Jocasta chooses to commit
suicide, Oedipus chooses to blind & exile himself O&J
J’s death: ‘and there we saw the woman hanging by the neck’ ‘the
queen is dead….by her own hand’
o Scholar Knox:
Believes that Oedipus is not a puppet – in Greek eyes fate is
predictable and inescapable but within it there is choice and freedom
of action.
Oedipus’ own character leads him to finding the truth:
“What causes his ruin is his own strength and courage, his
loyalty to Thebes, and his loyalty to the truth”
o EXAMPLE: When asked by the chorus which of the gods led him to blind
himself, he names Apollo and himself - emphasises that both divine influence
and human will acted together - ‘Apollo- he ordained my agonies’
o BUT Divine influence does not diminish the human characters' responsibility
for their actions.
His fate seems particularly unfair since he takes steps to avoid it:
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