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GENERAL INTRODUCTION
I. Tragedy
ALL the extant plays of Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides were written
during the fifth century B.C. Behind them lies a rich literary and
dramatic, or at least quasi-dramatic tradition, which accounts in no
small measure for the depth, scope and complexity of the art form which
the plays embody. The problem of apprehending and fully understanding
the dramas is therefore not a simple one, since they cannot be
divorced completely from the epic, lyric, and dramatic tradition which
precedes them. By far the most important factor in the tradition is the
epic which we know chiefly through the great Homeric masterpieces, the
Iliad and the Odyssey, These poems present a most comprehensive view
of human life, marked by an astonishing sophistication, coupled with a
most refreshing naivete. These two attributes are so blended in the
Homeric epics that they possess a distinctive and unique flavour as well
as a real depth of perception, a combination which is not to be found
elsewhere in literature.
In the interval between the epics of Homer, which scholars date variously
from the tenth to the eighth century B.C., and the age of the three
great tragic poets, many advances were made by the peoples who inhabited
the Balkan peninsula, the shores of the Aegean Sea and its islands.
It is in this epoch that Western philosophical speculation commenced,
when thinkers began to explore the various phenomena of the external
world, and came to understand many aspects of nature which had
hitherto been shrouded in complete mystery. The creative literary activity
of this epoch likewise betokens on the part of the Greeks an increasingly
higher level of self-understanding and self-consciousness, in
the best sense of the word. At this time appeared a group of lyric poets,
who were capable of brilliant self-expression. Such writers as Sappho,
Alcaeus, and Simonides had looked deeply within their own natures,
and through the vehicle of their poetry made abundantly evident how
thoroughly they understood the essential character of man's inner being.
Not only did the creators of Greek drama in the fifth century draw
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