Sophocles ' Greek Tragedy And The Chorus

A chorus is a common element to Greek tragedy’s and in ancient theatre consisted of a group of people who provide a number of different contributions to a play, providing a historical perspective, acting as counsellors and advisors to the plays characters and at times representing various groups such as villagers or a jury. Within this essay, I will consider the main contributions of the chorus within “The Burial at Thebes”

Sophocles has a harsh and tragic style. He is a master at dramatic tragedies and irony. Oedipus Rex is scattered with ironic and very tragic moments. He also uses the chorus as a way to comment on a subject in the play. Foreshadows using various methods. He also uses imagery, rhetoric questions and metaphors.

The chorus plays a vital role in interpreting what occurs throughout the play, just as the media plays a vital role in interpreting whether TV is good or bad. Reporters can be nosy and sometimes rude. At the same time, so can the chorus. "Do you really intend to steal this girl from your son?" (Sophocles 324). He's just saying it as if it is and laying out the facts, even though it may seem harsh. This makes it easier for the audience to better appreciate the play. The chorus says, "But the ancient wisdom speaks for our own

Greek tragedies Oedipus the King and Euripides’ Bacchae are both timeless stories in Greek literature. The engaging plot of both is what is most rememberable however the significance of the chorus is overlooked. The chorus can be defined simply as a group of dancers and singers that participate in dramas by singing poetically and lyrically in certain pauses of the play. The music, movements and gestures of the chorus symbolically define the mood and the themes of the play as the story line develops. The flow of Oedipus the King and Bacchae are dependent on the chorus, proving their significance.

The point of this paper is to show how the chorus in Greek Theater tragedy performances affect the way the play Antigone is performed. Through the use of mask, staging, and speech, Sophocles best distinguishes the chorus.

Throughout the play the use of dramatic irony is used to a wide extent, adding to this is the use of realism, focusing on the words. We are introduced the chorus in the first Parodos, they all look fairly identical dressed in black and white symbolising knowledge and wisdom. Don Taylor has used the chorus very well in this version of Oedipus; they always seemed to be making distinctive sharp shapes and movements in order. The chorus are directly speaking to the Gods, visually portraying this by focusing on the heavens above when they spoke. Don Taylor modernises them to seem like jury, at the end of each episode reflecting upon the events happening. Their language and the way they are presented are fast pasted and have a very flowing rhythm.

1. Oedipus is an everyman figure because of how he represents his people despite being king. He represents a normal everyday person and how they can be knowledgeable, but also make mistakes and be foolish. Despite being King, Oedipus still has actions for his consequences. Oedipus shows arrogance and blindness and he is a narcissist towards the beginning of the story.

Moving on, Choral Odes are a prominent feature in all of Sophocles plays, especially in Oedipus. Sophocles uses this group of Thebans to comment on the play's action and to foreshadow future events and to be used as a response to unseen events. He also uses it to comment on the larger impact of the characters' actions and to explain the play's central themes. The Chorus, who were almost always an anonymous collective, in many cases were representatives of the citizens of the city where the action takes place. The chorus acted as an intermediary between the actors and the audience, they were both spectator the action, like the audience, but were also affected by the action. In Oedipus, Sophocles wrote choral odes on everything, from tyranny

The chorus is an essential feature of Greek classical drama. Instances of various types of dance, singing, and speech are some elements of a Greek chorus. “Composed of similarly costumed men, they performed on the orchestra located beneath the stage. The chorus stayed in the orchestra for the duration of the performance from which vantage point they observed and commented on the action of the characters.” Oedipus is a play written by Sophocles, a respected playwright, and it is “generally assumed that the main function of the Sophoclean chorus is a philosophical one; that it serves above all as the spokesman for a certain view of life.” The chorus can be dramatic in the following ways: “through the personality of the group forming the chorus and the appropriateness of their relationship to the action and the characters, through the iambic lines spoken by the coryphaeus, through physical participation in the action and through the choral songs.” The chorus is an important component of the Greek Tragedy Oedipus. Aside from its responsibility to effectively represent the people of Thebes, the chorus in Oedipus has a powerful influence over audience perceptions and emotions.

trying to imply through his work. Sophocles and other dramatists use "the chorus" as a notable element to portray an

For this play report, I read Oedipus Rex by Sophocles. The thing I most took away from this show was the differences and similarities in theatre between when it was written, circa 441 b.c.e, and now. Ancient Greek theatre is obviously very different from the theatre we perform today in many respects. Particularly, there were many performance elements that were very different and deemed unacceptable, such as female actors, within ancient Greek theatre; I would be fascinated to see how modern day adaptations went with the production. Additionally, the use of the chorus shows a need for less nuance than the theatre we use today, with a lot more explicit exposition; this is something that is used mainly as a joke or a parody in modern theatre. Finally, the plot itself is so crazy, yet there are a lot of parallels between it and popular books, theatre and other media today. Ultimately, this play was a really interesting look back in time as to what theatre was like thousands of years ago, and finding similarities and differences between now and then was a really enriching experience.

Through the Chorus Sophocles is able to add a great deal of suspense, irony and contrast to the story. They are the commentary, the advisors, the questioners, the conscience, the fearful and the ignorant. They are also very powerful stage openers as they introduce characters that are about to approach Oedipus. Overall, the chorus keeps the audience feeling that Oedipus is not alone because the communal voice of the chorus is guiding his actions and reactions during the unfolding of the

Thus the Chorus represents the citizens and the audience in particular. The function of chorus was singing the praises of god and his achievements at the festival of Dionysus. The role of Chorus was to do commenting on the incidents of the play but taking no part in action. The Chorus tells about the present, past and also do commenting on future events.

A final cultural difference is the importance of the chorus and its use in the plays Agamemnon, Oedipus, and Medea. The chorus was not highly involved in the action of the plays. In general, the chorus’ main functions were to create a psychological and emotional background to the action through its odes. It introduces and questions new characters, as well as point out the importance of events as they occurred, to establish facts and avow the outlook of society. Finally, the chorus covers the passage of time, between events, and separates episodes (Calder 21). Within the play Agamemnon, by Aeschylus, the chorus represents the voice of wisdom of the city as well as its limitations (Novelguide). The chorus’ limitations are clear when they fail to

        I think that in the play Oedipus, Sophocles intended the Chorus to be a constant significant part of the play, observing and reacting to situations, whilst never being the centre of attention during the main story, and only coming to the fore during the narrative passages of the play.