Tragic Narrative: A Narratological Study Of Sophocles' Oedipus At Colonus (untersuchungen Zur Antiken Literatur Und Geschichte, Bd. 63)

This study of Sophocles' Oedipus at Colonus demonstrates the applicability of narrative models to drama. It presents a major contribution not only to Sophoclean criticism but to dramatic criticism as a whole. For the first time, the methods of contemporary narrative theory are thoroughly applied to the text of a single major play. Sophocles' Oedipus at Colonus is presented as a uniquely rich text, which deftly uses the figure and history of the blind Oedipus to explore and thematize some of the basic narratological concerns of Greek tragedy: the relation between the narrow here-and-now of visible stage action and the many off-stage worlds that have to be mediated into it through narrative, including the past, the future, other dramatizations of the myth, and the world of the fifth-century audience. Frontmatter......Page 1 Foreword......Page 5 Acknowledgements......Page 9 Contents......Page 11 Preface......Page 13 1. Tragic Narrative......Page 15 2. Narrative Past......Page 43 3. Narration and the Battle......Page 91 4. Narration and Death......Page 129 5. 'Viewing' Colonus......Page 181 Conclusion......Page 235 Bibliography......Page 241 Indexes......Page 305 The series consists of a variety of monographs from the fields of Classical Philology and Ancient History. While maintaining a broad thematic and methodological scope, the editors are especially keen on studies showing a thorough and critical engagement with the relevant literary texts and primary sources. This chapter will argue that in view of the special parameters for an application of narratology to Greek tragedy drama presents a wide range of ploys to compensate for the narrative restrictions of the genre, so much resented by Italian film director, Michelangelo Antonioni.