Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Aesthetic Response and Traditional Social Valuation in Euripides' >Electra: Tragic >Kunstsprachekharaktēr

Aesthetic Response and Traditional Social Valuation in Euripides' >Electra: Tragic >Kunstsprachekharaktēr

Baechle, Nicholas

Hardcover

Series: Beiträge Zur Altertumskunde, Book 379

Literary Criticism

ISBN10: 3110613107
ISBN13: 9783110613100
Publisher: De Gruyter
Published: Jun 22 2020
Pages: 171
Weight: 0.99
Height: 0.56 Width: 6.14 Depth: 9.21
Language: English

Euripides' Electra opened up for its audience an opportunity to become self-aware as to the appeal of tragic Kunstsprache: it both reflected and sustained traditional, aristocratically-inflected assumptions about the continuity of appearance and substance, even in a radical democracy. A complex analogy between social and aesthetic valuation is played out and brought to light. The characterization of Orestes early in the play demonstrates how social appearances made clear the identity of well-born, and how they were still assumed to indicate superior virtue and agency. On the aesthetic side of the analogy, one of the functions of tragic diction, as an essential indication of heroic character and agency, comes into view in a dramatic and thematic sequence that begins with Achilles ode and ends with the planning of the murders. Serious doubts are created as to whether Orestes will realize the assumed potential inherent in his heroic genealogy and, at the same time, as to whether the components of his character as an aesthetic construct are congruent with such qualities and agency. Both sides of this complex analogy are thus problematized, and, at a metapoetic level, its nature and bases are exposed for reflection.

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