Adapting Greek Tragedy: Contemporary Contexts for Ancient Texts

Description

Adaptations of Greek tragedy are increasingly claiming our attention as a dynamic way of engaging with a dramatic genre that flourished in Greece some twenty-five centuries ago but remains as vital as ever. In this volume, fifteen leading scholars and practitioners of the theatre systematically discuss contemporary adaptations of Greek tragedy and explore the challenges and rewards involved therein. Adopting a variety of methodologies, viewpoints and approaches, the volume offers surveys of recent developments in the field, engages with challenging theoretical issues, and shows how adapting Greek tragedy can throw new light on a range of contemporary issues - from our relation to the classical past and our shifting perceptions of ethnic and cultural identities to the place, function and market-value of Greek drama in today's cultural industries. The volume will be welcomed by students and scholars in Classics, Theatre, Drama and Performance Studies, as well as by theatre practitioners.

Vayos Liapis is Professor of Ancient Theatre and Its Reception at the Open University of Cyprus. He is the author of A Commentary on the Rhesus Attributed to Euripides (2012) and co-editor of Greek Tragedy after the Fifth Century (Cambridge, 2018). He is the recipient of the 2018 National Prize for the Translation of Ancient Greek Literature into Modern Greek (Hellenic Ministry of Culture and Sports). Avra Sidiropoulou is Associate Professor of Contemporary Theatre Theory and Practice at the Open University of Cyprus, and Artistic Director of Persona Theatre Company. She is the author of Directions for Directing: Theatre and Method (2018) and Authoring Performance: The Director in Contemporary Theatre (2011). She was nominated for the 2020 Gilder/Coigney International Award by the League of Professional Theatre Women in New York.

'... this is a volume that is broad in its aims and encompasses vast swathes of intellectual enquiry, political event, and theatrical activity. It will be especially useful for teachers of Greek tragic reception, and of interest to wider audiences too.' Lucy Jackson, Bryn Mawr Classical Review