Description
Book SynopsisThe Greek polis was the first society to be monetised and the first to produce drama. This pioneering book seeks to uncover the relationship between these two momentous inventions by examining the clash between the old world of ritual and the new world of money in the tragedies of Aeschylus.
Trade Review'This is an important work that redefines our conception of central categories of early Greek thought: space, time, ritual, and money. It will be of interest to scholars and advanced students working in the areas of classical Greek literature, Greek history, philosophy, and theatre.' Vayos Liapis, The Classical Journal
'The five parts of this ambitious book examine the chronotopes in Homer and archaic Athenian society, money and ritual in the Dionysiac festival, the chronotopes in Aeschylus's plays … the unity of opposites in Aeschylus's theology and Heraclitus's cosmology, and the sociocultural implications of the Pythagorean way of life and Pythagorean opposites in Aeschylus's Oresteia. This brilliant study opens up new vistas on old problems.' J. Bussanich, Choice Review
Table of ContentsIntroduction; Part I. The Social Construction of Space, Time and Cosmology: 1. Homer: the reciprocal chronotope; 2. Demeter Hymn: the aetiological chronotope; 3. From reciprocity to money; Part II. Dionysiac Festivals: 4. Royal household and public festival; 5. Aetiological chronotope and dramatic mimesis; 6. Monetisation and tragedy; Part III. Limit and the Unlimited in Confrontational Space: 7. Telos and the unlimitedness of money; 8. Suppliants; 9. Septem; 10. Confrontational space in Oresteia; 11. The unlimited in Oresteia; 12. Persians; Part IV. The Unity of Opposites: 13. Form-parallelism and the unity of opposites; 14. Aeschylus and Herakleitos; 15. From the unity of opposites to their differentiation; Part V. Cosmology of the Integrated Polis: 16. Metaphysics and the polis in Pythagoreanism; 17. Pythagoreanism in Aeschylus; 18. Household, cosmos and polis; Appendix: was there a skēnē for all the extant plays of Aeschylus?
