An Introduction to Greek Drama

Contents: Preface. I: Greek Tragedy: Antigone. 1. Greek Tragedy: A Brief History. 2. Distinguishing Features of Greek Tragedy. 3. Sophocles: An Introduction. 4. Antigone: An analysis and appreciation. 5. The problem of the Hero in the Antigone. 6. Chorus in the Antigone. 7. The Basic Theme of Antigone. 8. Some authorities on the antigone. 9. Main characters of the play. 10. Antigone in the light of Aristotle’s theory of tragedy. 11. The text of antigone. II: Greek Comedy. 1. Greek Comedy. 2. A Brief History of Greek Comedy up to Aristophanes. 3. A Brief Account of Aristophanes. 4. Botraxoi of The Frogs: A Critique. 5. The Significance of the Title of the Play. 6. The Text of The Frogs. 7. Notes on the Text of Antigone. 8. Notes on the Text of The Frogs some Critical Questions on Greek.

As a teacher of English drama both at the undergraduate as well as postgraduate levels, I have sincerely felt that for a proper understanding of the English Drama, a good student must needs have a fair acquaintance with the Greek drama which is the basis of the western drama as a whole. And Greek drama means Greek tragedy and Greek comedy, taken together as a unit. So a student of the English drama is well-advised to get acquainted with at least one Greek tragedy and one Greek comedy. I believe that Greek tragedy is best represented by Sophocles’s Antigone and Greek comedy by The Frogs of Aristophanes with this conviction I am presenting here before the students of English drama these two Greek plays in their standard English translations – Antigone as translated into English prose by the great classical scholar R.C. Jebb and The Frogs in the version of David Farrett. Ample textual annotations have been supplied in both cases for the clearing up of the difficulties of the texts. Critical essays from the pen of the present editor in both cases will give the readers the required information on the Greek drama in general and on the selected plays in particular.(jacket)