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Emotion in Greek Tragedy

Professor Stanford thinks that the emotional elements of Greek tragedy have been unduly neglected, and he offers the present book as an introductory study of how the tragedians represented emotion and how they aroused emotion in their audiences. In ch. 1 he discusses ancient evidence for ' strong emotionalism among Greek theatrical audiences' (p. 3). Views will differ about the reliability of some of the stories that he cites, and his interpretation of the more plausible ones is sometimes open to question: there is nothing in Herodotus' account (6. 12. 2) of the Athenians' reaction to Phrynichus' Capture of Miletus that suggests ' an outburst of mass hysteria that threatened public order' (p. 5), and the point of the story, in any case, is that the Athenians' distress was not typical of their response to drama. Similarly, Odysseus' weeping at Demodocus' songs (Od. 8. 83-6, 521-31) is not due, as S. suggests (p. 50), to the emotional power of music but is an unusual reaction caused by his personal involvement in the events narrated. The usual and appropriate response to song in Homer is quiet attention and pleasure (cf. Od. 8. 91, 538, 542). Plato was surely more likely to exaggerate the effects of tragedy for being hostile to it (just as modern campaigners against pornography make more of its effects than liberals) and is not 'all the better as a witness for being hostile' (p. 3).