Seneca: Phaedra (Duckworth Companions to Greek & Roman Tragedy) (Duckworth Companions to Greek & Roman Tragedy)

"Phaedra is one of Seneca's most successful tragedies. It was the first ancient drama to be performed in the Renaissance, marking an epoch in European theatre. The myth, as reworked by Seneca on the basis of dramas by Euripides, was endowed with fresh power, and his characterisation of Phaedra, especially in her frank avowal of love to her stepson, Hippolytus, fired the imagination of later tragic poets, especially Racine. Roland Mayer introduces the reader to the complex dramatic and literary inheritance which Seneca appropriated and in his turn bequeathed, and he sets out some of the main lines of contemporary interpretation and performance practice."--Bloomsbury Publishing Phaedra is one of Seneca's most successful tragedies. It was the first ancient drama to be performed in the Renaissance, marking an epoch in European theatre. The myth, as reworked by Seneca on the basis of dramas by Euripides, was endowed with fresh power, and his characterisation of Phaedra, especially in her frank avowal of love to her stepson, Hippolytus, fired the imagination of later tragic poets, especially Racine. Roland Mayer introduces the reader to the complex dramatic and literary inheritance which Seneca appropriated and in his turn bequeathed, and he sets out some of the main lines of contemporary interpretation and performance practice "Roland Mayer introduces the reader to the complex dramatic and literary inheritance which Seneca appropriated and in his turn bequeathed, and sets out some of the main lines of contemporary interpretation and performance practice."--Jacket Lucius Annaeus Seneca was born shortly before the Christian era - the exact date is not known - in the Roman province of Baetica, in southern Spain, at Coduba (modern Cordoba).