Rebel Women: Staging Ancient Greek Drama Today

Description

A collection of essays by many distinguished contributors, focused on the portrayal of rebel women in ancient Greek drama. Ancient Greek drama provides the modern stage with a host of powerful female characters who stand in opposition to the patriarchal structures that seek to limit and define them. For contemporary theatre directors their representation serves as a vehicle for examining and illuminating issues of gender, power, family and morality, as germane today as when the plays were first written. Rebel Women brings together essays by leading writers from across different disciplines examining the representation of ancient Greek heroines in their original contexts and on today's stage. Divided into three sections, it considers in turn international productions, Irish versions, and studies of the original texts. The articles explore how such characters as Iphigenia, Medea, Antigone and Clytemnestra have been portrayed in recent times and the challenges and provocation they offer to both contemporary audiences and dramatists alike. 'Seamus Heaney and Athol Fugard are brought together as contributors by the inspiration that ancient Greek tragedy has offered to them both. There are offerings here on Iphigenia, edea, Antigone, Clytemnestra, film, drama, Greece, Russia ... and especially Ireland. Amidst all this variety, the level of interest and of scholarship are consistently high.' Oliver Taplin, Professor of Classical Languages and Literature, Oxford University

Stephen Wilmer is a Senior Lecturer in Drama and Fellow of TrinityCollege Dublin. He is the author of Theatre, Society and the Nation:Staging American Identities (Cambridge University Press, 2002), and hasedited a number of theatre studies books. John Dillon is RegiusProfessor of Greek in Trinit y College, Dublin and is the author of anumber of works. Amongst the contributors are Seasmus Heane y, MichaelWalton, James Diggle, John Dillon, and Edith Hall.

'This is a book that will continue to stimulate and instruct for a long time to come.' * The Anglo-Hellenic Review (Spring 2007) *