Greek Tragedy: A Literary Study

Greek Tragedy: A Literary Study

Greek drama (Tragedy) -- History and criticism

"A book on Greek tragedy may be a work of historical scholarship or of literary criticism; this book professes to be a work of criticism. Criticism is of two kinds: the critic may tell the reader what he so beautifully thinks about it all, or he may try to explain the form in which the literature is written. This book attempts the latter task. I make one basic assumption. It is that the Greek dramatist was first and last an artist, and must be criticized as such. He felt, thought and worked like a painter or a musician, not like a philosopher or teacher." [Preface] This book has been increasingly recognized as the most important modern study of the plays of Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripedes, and has overturned a good number of the received academic opinions about Greek drama.

H.D.F. Kitto

London, Methuen

Series: Anchor Books; 38.

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