CSTS/COML 212: Refashioning the Classics: Dramatization and Illustration (HC)

Beginning with an introduction to the Greco-Roman gods and heroes, the book then focuses on three stories: * Orpheus, the great musician and his quest to free his wife Eurydice from death * Venus and Adonis, the love goddess and the beautiful youth she loved * Pygmalion, the master sculptor who fell in love with his creation. Each section begins with classical sources and ends with contemporary versions, showing how the myths have been used or appropriated.

Classical material was traditionally used to express colonial authority, but it was also appropriated by imperial subjects to become first a means of challenging colonialism and then a rich field for creating cultural identities that blend the old and the new. Nobel prize-winners such as Derek Walcott and Seamus Heaney have rewritten classical material in their own cultural idioms. These developments are explored in this collection of essays by international scholars.

This book traces modern versions and adaptations of Greek tragedies in the recent past. The 1960s were interested the recreation of the power in Greek tragedy by re-introducing its supposed ritual origins. Plays discussed include: The Prodigal by Jack Richardson, Prometheus Bound by Robert Lowell, Heracles by Archibald MacLeish, Dionysus in '69 by The Performance Group, Antigone by The Living Theatre, and The Orphan by David Rabe.