The Agamemnon
0
Aeschylus's play
1 Pride
Paying for Fame
Pride,
of course, goeth before a fall. But Homeric Greeks seeking a place in stories,
seeking life beyond the grave in the memories of future audiences, are far
from discounting the works of pride. Greeks seek as well, however, to
appreciate the costs attending the pursuit of excellence. Without
extraordinary ambition, yoked in action with notable capability, neither
Agamemnon nor Clytaemnestra would achieve recognition, would live on and
on in memories after death. Those lacking such ambition fade as shades,
dissipated in cold darkness. Those manifesting arête, excellence, are
necessarily few and extraordinary. Like all Greeks, such characters are
flawed. Removing the likelihood of flaws, however, would remove as well
the strength of ambition, of competition, of achievement. Aristotle
considers those who presume to achievements beyond their character not
proud, but merely vain. His concern is with those whose pride prevents
them from bothering to attend to the concerns of lesser associates.
Greek Tragedy, however, arises in democratic Athens, a culture markedly
different from the aristocratic past, where the heroic exploits of a
chosen few define ideals. Athenian tragedy, experienced by audiences
priding themselves on the collective virtue of democratic citizens, offers
a dialogue between the mixed blessings of the past, and opportunities for
new strategic political allegiances. Tragic heroes bring to life the
Homeric grandeur of heroic aspirations, retaining Homeric attention to
costs attending heroic character. Even in an Athens priding itself on
intellectual vigor and subtlety, the recognition of blood-passion as a
force which can surface is a requirement manifested with every sacrifice
to Dionysus, the god of theatre, which precedes tragic performances.
Athenians experiencing tragic action may also recognize the price they pay
for constraining activities of the powerful few, while appreciating
participation by all citizens in Athenian politics. The chorus in Greek
tragedy appears as an intermediary between tragic heroes undergoing
reversal and recognition, and modern audiences more or less committed to
democratic government. Calling for Apollo to bring light and reason to
Dionysian events, they look forward to rational approaches to character,
government, and action. But the power of Dionysus, rather than Apollo,
animates Greek tragedy. Despite philosophical exploration of
first causes, the power of fate and the limits of reason remain present in
Athenians.
2 Nemesis
Cursing Atreus
What
goes around comes around. Clytaemnestra’s outrage follows the course of
prior events. She inherits the curse Thyestes calls down on his brother.
She experiences the madness attending blood-conflict within families.
Following the death of their father, the brothers Atreus and Thyestes
compete for prominence. Atreus was to rule for an agreed-upon time, followed
by Thyestes. When Atreus refuses to relinquish power, Thysestes seduces
his brother’s wife, enjoying an alternative precedence over his brother.
Atreus’ recognition of his brother’s triumph fuels retribution
(Nemesis). He prepares a banquet to honor Thyestes, and the guest of honor
first tastes choice morsels from the banquet stew. Before others follow
his lead, Atreus uncovers the heads of Thyestes’ children, the remains
of the butchered meat Thyestes has enjoyed.
3 Recognition
Understanding Reversals
Atreus’
recognition
– the disorienting period between his sense of honor and his subsequent
lust for vengeance – moves him to call a curse upon his brother, a curse
blighting progeny as compensation for his own dismembered children.
Clytaemnestra, enraged by Iphigenia’s sacrifice, enjoys the company of
Aegisthus, a son of Thyestes, to stage a recognition worthy of Atreus’
son Agamemnon. The chorus in Aeschylus’ play shows an awareness not only
of the cohabitation of this unusual couple, but also of the backgrounds
which will fuel subsequent action. Dispirited by age and war, however,
they repress their approach to activities too dark to acknowledge. Their
murmurings, however, anticipates the recognition they seek to delay.
Driven by grief and pride, Clytaemnestra will lead Agamemnon to his ritual
bath of hospitality. She with her lover Aegisthus, will open wounds,
allowing time for Agamemnon to recognize his altered circumstances. They
seek not merely his death, but his recognition.
4 Recognition and Prophecy
Seeing Through
Cassandra’s Eyes (pictures
will appear)
Cassandra
provides a telling case of recognition. Apollo, taken with her beauty, her
position, her character, seduces her. But when she turns from him in
passion, he bestows upon her the bitter-sweet gift of prophecy. She will
foresee and foretell the future. But she is powerless to affect the events
she fears: her visions gain belief only after events unfold.
Consider Cassandra approaching Argos. Clytaemnestra, of course,
takes note of Agamemnon’s prize, sees her diminution as wife and queen
in the presence of a rival for Agamemnon’s desires. Cassandra, along
with Agamemnon, will die. But if Agamemnon may harbor some anxieties about
his wife’s character and desires, Cassandra comes to see, in vivid and
sensory detail, the events which will undo not only Agamemnon, but also
herself. Apollo’s gift enables her to appreciate fully reversals before
they actualize for others. Foretelling the future meets with disbelief.
Her insight isolates her just when most in need of company.
5 Athenian Recognitions
Following Agamemnon (buildings
will appear)
Athenian
audiences, of course, know the plot of the story they anticipate.
Participation does not provide the excitement of the thriller: whodunit is
obvious. Drawn into the action, however, by words, by voices, by music, by
gesture, the audience shares with the chorus not understandings, but
recognitions. Like Cassandra, observers see what will happen. And like
Cassandra, observers, however insightful, will not alter the course of
events, the working out of nemesis. Unlike Cassandra, however, audiences
do not truly see their own futures. Leaving a performance, Athenian
citizens may well appreciate the architecture of their city, famous in
their own day and anticipated as a prime influence for millennia on future
building. In democratic Athens, some relief may attend the downfall of a
king, undone by pride. But recollections of Cassandra may undermine such
satisfactions. While we appreciate Agamemnon’s reversal, we cannot
foresee and foretell our own fate. Athenians justifiably proud of their
city, unprecedented for proportionate beauty, recall in the ritual
sacrifice and celebration of Dionysus which precedes and influences tragic
performances, the dark foundations of all building.
6 Drama
Practicing Rituals
An
altar serves as the site where a sacrifice to Dionysus invites celebrants
to experience true recognition, a state qualitatively different from
ordinary sensation and reasoning. Originally a priest would call upon
Dionysus to move the celebrants. Ritual actions accompanied the sacrifice,
and such actions developed into a re-enactment of circumstances where
recognition might occur. Aeschylus added additional participants, who
presumably experienced the situations conducive to recognition. Audiences
understood such occurrences as possibilities for their own recognition,
but sought the actual experience in the theater, an experience
qualitatively different from rational understanding. Aeschylus’ chorus
observe the course of recognition, approaching their own involvement.
Desiring harmony, but anticipating conflict, the chorus, like their
audience, will attend to Agamemnon’s homecoming, wishing the restoration
of psychic, familial and social harmony, but anticipating circumstances
which inevitably will replace apparent harmony with conflict.
7 Apollo and Dionysus
Recognizing The Birth
of Tragedy
Apollo
and Dionysus appear in performances of Greek tragedy. Apollo, formerly the
archer-god who brings health or disease in the Iliad,
now appears as the sun-god, the bringer of light, of harmony, of reason.
“Apollo, bring light” is the frequent call manifesting desires for
order in the most disruptive of times. But Dionysus presides, not only in
the essential action of the tragedy, but also in the theatre itself, where
a sacrifice to him precedes and influences all subsequent action. Dionysus
energizes darkness, rouses dancers with rhythm, percussion and sound,
fosters and recognizes passion. In the nineteenth century Nietzche
develops an account of the divided mind in The
Birth of Tragedy. Nietzche’s Greeks accept the appeal of two
desires, the desire for order and the desire for energy. They recognize as
well the costs of each appeal. Like Freud’s superego and id, Apollo and
of Dionysus offer not balance, but competing appeals. Dionysus encourages
the voice of sensation and desire, Apollo the voice of reflection and
reason. The sun-god Apollo offers order, reason, harmony. Attention only
to his practices however rouses desires from the wine-god Dionysus.
Freedom, feeling, dancing, passion repressed, overwhelm restraints.
Dionysus, not Apollo, is the patron of theatre, a form which works with
impassioned participants.
8 Aeschylus and Athens
Inventing the Future
Like
the Iliad, the Agamemnon
demonstrates the price attending the quest for fame. Unlike the Iliad,
however, this play occurs in a worldly, self-conscious, media-savvy city,
Athens. And unlike the story-telling of Homeric bards, audiences now come
together to see acted out in primitive encounters, events not current, but
ancient. What, then, is the purpose of exposing modern Athenians to events
from the vital but primitive past? Aeschylus fought at Marathon, proud of
Athenian leadership in repelling Persian forces which would constrain
Greek diversity under the rule of absolute king and empire. Following
victory, Aeschylus presented The Persians, a tragedy showing the fall of a great king. His
Persian King, recalling the invaders of Greece Darius and Xerxes, presents
reversals: how the mighty are fallen. And such reversals may please
audiences recalling invasion, particularly audiences
priding themselves on powers attending democratic freedoms. But
recognition, if apparent in the Persian king, works without much surprise
in such audiences. The Persians
presents not tragedy, but Athenian vindication. Consider the temple of
Athena Nike (victory) which graces the approach to the acropolis. Athena
inspires as well as protects her chosen subjects, the crafty, innovative
Athenians, against the massive powers of Persian empire. Her independence
seeks fellows in Athens, a place and population suited to her character
and desires.
But
in the Agamemnon Aeschylus deploys the crucial change necessary for tragic
recognition: the audience will share in recognition when the tragic hero
is a successful Greek. Opportunity and dangers now are at home. Agamemnon,
no longer the enemy, discovers the costs of striving for excellence, the
cost of fame. Perhaps democratic Athenians, skeptical of prior kingships,
enjoy the more or less justified downfall of a proud king. But Agamemnon
also incorporates the pride valued by Athenians. Without the striving for
excellence, even the external forms of Athenian building, the architecture
of Periclean Athens which will shape much of the Western world for
millennia, would never take shape. Nietzche’s insight, that Dionysian
recognition of desires encompasses competition as well as cooperation,
passion as well as restraint, dying as well as living, works still in
Apollonian societies, including Periclean Athens and America in the 21st
century. Faced with devastations during the civil war which would undo not
only Athens, but also Greece, Thucydides presents a key event in the form
of tragedy. The dialogue between Athenians and Melians shows Apollo and
Dionysus at work. The island of Melos, settled by Spartan ancestors, lies
scant miles off the Athenian coast. Athenians understandably demanded
Melian allegiance in the war with Sparta. Melians understandably request
continuing neutrality lest they face descendents of founding fathers in battle.
Athens had appealed to Greeks to join in empire, potentially profitable
allegiances. If Athens remained the first among fellows, thoughtful
negotiations would allow others to negotiate shares in growing resources.
When Melians appealed to Athens to honor their policy allowing free
choice, Athenians, decimated by war, voted to blockade the island to
starve out its citizens. Upon surrender, Melian men were slaughtered, and
women and children sold into slavery. Such attitudes, Thucydides implies,
squandered Athenian possibilities for productive allegiances, one act of a
developing tragedy. The defeat of Athenian forces in the invasion of
Syracuse appears to Thucydides as the final act of this tragedy.
Aristotle’s identification of catharsis as a
consequence of experiencing recognitions and reversals appears in his
Poetics.
Aristotle: Poetics
Picasso's Weeping Women
9 Another Weeping Woman
Pouring Unhappiness
Out
Consider
Clytaemnestra’s grief. The wife and queen of Agamemnon surely
appreciates the plight of Hecuba and Andromache, though she may well take
pride in Greek prowess. Following the death of Hector, Greek soldiers
hidden within the wooden horse the Trojans believe to be a guarantor of
Athena’s protection descend in darkness to open Troy’s gates.
Following the sack of Troy Odysseus recognizes the dangerous potential of
Astyonax to rally Trojans and Trojan sympathizers. He directs a messenger
to remove the child-prince from his widowed mother and widowed
grandmother, to throw him alive from Troy’s walls to be eaten by dogs
and kites. Andromache, forseeing Achilles' rage for vengeance on Hector,
had previously pleaded with Hector not to return to battle. Hector too
forsees not only his future, but also that of Andromache.
Andromache as a Weeping Woman
Hecuba as a Weeping Woman
This lesson to would-be resistance appears a generation after Aeschlus’ Agamemnon in
Euripides’ tragedy, The Trojan
Women. Euripides’ display of ancient strategies followed fast upon
the Melian slaughter. Consider Melian women, husbands slaughtered, serving
their killers. Consider fellow sufferers Andromache and Hecuba, Cassandra
and Clytaemnestra. Consider not all weeping women, but particular weeping
women at particular times and places, one at a time. How does each pour
the unhappiness out? Agamemnon’s recognition of Clytaemnestra surely
involves horror. But would he not finally recognize the circumstances in
which her actions work? Aeschylus’ offering
invites us to leave for the moment the Apollonian potential for
light and reason to experience the complementary world embodied in
timely passion. Now you pour the unhappiness out, grow black blooms in
this interior
world —
Pour
the unhappiness out
from your too bitter heart,
which grieving will not sweeten.
Poison
grows in this dark.
It is in the water of tears
Its black blooms rise.
The
magnificent cause of being,
The imagination, the one reality
In this imagined world
Leaves
you
With him for whom no phantasy moves,
And you are pierced by a death.
|