What You Need to Know about "Prometheus Bound"

The subject of discussion at our meeting on Monday, February 27th will be the drama "Prometheus Bound."  Prometheus is chained to a crag in the Caucusus. In a twist on the idea of "crimes against humanity, Prometheus is being punished for "crimes for humanity"!  He gave humankind fire and other useful arts.

"Prometheus Bound" consists of a sequence of dialogues between Prometheus and the other characters: Oceanos, Io, Hermes, and perhaps most significantly, the daughters of Oceanos who form the Chorus. 

The Greek divine order, or "pantheon" forms an important backdrop to the work. There had been a dynastic struggle among races of gods. Prometheus's kin, the titans, were overthrown by the Olympian gods. In essence, "Prometheus Bound" is about the aftermath of this struggle.

Below is a glossary of some of the names of the play. I hope it helps you to follow the story line.

Amazons: A race of warrior women.

Armipasians: A one-eyed people who live near a gold-bearing river

Atlas: A titan, best known as the giant who held the earth separate from the sky.

Hades: the underworld

Haephaestus: God of metallurgy

Hera: wife of Zeus

Hermes: Messenger of the gods

Io: A daughter of the river god Inachus; changed in to a cow by Zeus

Loxias: a title of Apollo meaning  “interpreter,” relating to Zeus’s prophetic power.

Might: a demon and servant of Zeus

Oceanos: A river and its god

Phorcys: A sea-god

Prometheus: A titan

Rhea: a titaness

Tartarus: A dark region below the earth, far below Hades

Themis: mother of Prometheus

Thetys: a sea goddess

Typho: a monster

Uranos: God of the sky

Violence: like Might, a demon and servant of Zeus; “muta persona”, or “silent character”

Zeus: The top Olympian god.

Questions on Gilgamesh

At our meeting on Monday, January 23rd, we will discuss the questions on pp. 58 and 59 in Great Conversations I, and take a close look at these sections of the work:

The Killing of Humbaba: Tablet IV (columns iii and iv)
The Spurning of Ishtar: Tablet VI (columns ii and iii)
The Death of Enkidu: Tablet VII (columns i, iii and iv)

And here's a bonus question:

Since the "Epic of Gilgamesh" is a title given by modern redactors of this work, if you could assign an alternate title, what would it be?

See you on the 23rd!

Epic of Gilgamesh

We usher in 2012 with the Epic of Gilgamesh, famous in the popular imagination as the oldest written epic of any civilization (at least as far as we know). The modern-day text comes to us via clay tablets painstakingly translated by British archaeologists in the nineteenth century.  Versions of the saga have since been discovered in various places in the Middle East. In approaching this text, I found a need to suspend my strong curiosity concerning the context of the Gilgamesh epic, and just enjoyed the story of Gilgamesh the king and demi-god who visited the "other" world and returned to tell the tale.

Cunieform table containing famous Gilgamesh epic version of the flood.

Statue of Gilgamesh at University of Sydney, Australia (credit: D. Gordon E. Robertson)

9th century BC orthostat relief found in Kapara's palace, Tell Halaf, depicting "Gilgamesh Between Two Bull-Men Supporting a Winged Sun Disk".

Some Afterthoughts on Our Discussion of Plato's "Republic"

Our reading selection focused on Socrates's discussion about justice with Glaucon and Adeimantus from Books II and IV of the "Republic," and hinges on a proof of the proposition that it is good to be just both for its own sake and for what comes of it. Here's Glaucon:

If life doesn't seem livable with the body's nature corrupted, not even with every sort of food and drink and every sort of rule, will it then be livable when the nature of the very thing by which we live is confused and corrupted, even if a man does whatever else he might want except that which will rid him of vice and injustice and will enable him to acquire justice and virtue? [Emphasis added]

Socrates has led the discussion to the point where to think otherwise would be considered, in his words, "ridiculous." Did Socrates set out to argue this point, or did he become convinced of it during the course of the discussion? It's a tough call in the Platonic dialogues.

We're left with a defense of "justice" (or "virtue," or "goodness," or whatever you choose to call it) arrived at through dialogue. It is an appeal to maintain order in one's soul ("the very thing by which we live") by means of the guidance of reason.

Shown above: Sculpture of Plato at the modern Academy in Athens. Below: Our group after its Socratic experience on the 26th of November.

Questions on Plato's "Republic"

Interpretive Questions

What does it mean for a person to be "just"?

Socrates says (p. 243) that there are three kinds of good: (1) things we desire for their own sake, ( (2) things we desire both for their own sake and because of what comes of them, (3) things we desire only because of what comes of them. Is this a useful construct in talking about justice? In which category does justice belong?

Why does Plato have Glaucon and Adeimantus believe it is better to be just than unjust before Socrates begins is argument. Isn't Socrates trying to persuade them to his view and away from theirs (p. 244)?

Does Socrates believe that a man who is unjust yet self-controlled, like Glaucon's perfectly unjust man, could actually exist? (pp. 247-248, 268-9)

Can one, according to Socrates, be just in a society that is not properly ordered?

Do the guardians act from altruism or self-interest? (p. 259-260)

Is Plato correct in ordering both the individual and society according to the reasonable, spirited, and appetitive parts of the soul?

Evaluative Questions

Should only a small group of wise and just men rule society?

Are some people cut out to debate amongst themselves and govern, and others to do manual labor?

Is it better to be just but perceived as injust, or to be injust and perceived virtuous?

Simon Blackburn has written, "Our future may well depend on how profoundly we respond to the 'Republic.'" Based on what you've read, what do you think of this statement?

For Textual Analysis

Pages 245 to 247, starting "They say that doing injustice is naturally good, and suffering injustice naturally bad" to "So much for that."

Pages 264 to 266, "So we won't be irrational" to "and the many do so quite late."

Pages 267 to 269, "Then we must remember that, for each of us too, the one within whom each of the parts minds its own business will be just and mind his own business" to the end of the selection.

Some Afterthoughts on Monday Night's Discussion

Left: Aristotle (384 B.C. to 322 B.C.), computer generated graphic by Kolja Mendler.

Kudos to the twelve participants in Monday night's discussion of Aristotle's "On Tragedy," a selection from his "Poetics."

We talked about Aristotle's prescription for tragedy: it must contain (a) a peripety, or turning point, (b) a discovery, or revelation, and (c) "suffering." He also says tragedy must elicit fear and pity in the audience.

Aristotle's tragic hero is what he calls an "intermediate type," i.e., neither a very good person nor a very bad one, and the hero's change in fortune "must be due not to any depravity, but to some grave mistake on the part of a man ..."

In looking back at Sophocles's Oedipus the King (the subject of our Aug. 2010 meeting), we talked about how the play fits the bill for an Aristotelian tragedy. When I asked the group what was Oedipus's "grave error", the response was his slaying of his father Laius in an ancient act of "road rage."

Further questions: What if Oedipus had never discovered that he had killed his birth father and married his birth mother? Does the tragedy lie solely in finding out that he has commited parricide and engaged in incest? Or does it lie in the actions that ensue (Joscasta killing herself, Oedipus poking his eyes out and fleeing Thebes)?

If he had never found out, would his ignorance be at the expense of Thebes, which would still suffer pestilence because of Oedipus's actions years earlier? Oedipus must take the hit so that his city can heal itself.

Questions on "On Tragedy," by Aristotle

Interpretive Questions

Aristotle says (p.227) the six elements of tragedy are (a) Spectacle, (b) Melody, (c) Diction, (d) Character, (e) Thought, and (f) Plot. He then says that of these, the most important is plot. Why?

"Peripety" is defined by Aristotle as the change from one state of things to its opposite. "Discovery" is defined as moving from ignorance to knowledge. The third part of tragedy, he says, is "Suffering" (p. 234). Does knowledge help to lessen suffering?

He says the aim of tragedy should be to arouse "pity and fear," and that the plot must be "not simple but complex" in order to arouse pity and fear. Do you agree with these stated aims of tragedy? What about the mechanism to achieve it?

According to Aristotle, these "incidents arousing pity and fear provide an outlet for such emotions." The Greek word for "outlet" is "catharsis." What does a "catharsis" feel like?

Do you agree with what Aristotle says in the section on "Delineation of Character" (p. 238) to the effect that all characters in a tragedy should be good?

In the section on "the Proper Length of a Tragic Play," Aristotle discusses the importance of magnitude of a plot. A tragic play must not only have a beginning, middle, and end, it must also have the proper magnitude, which he defines as "sufficient if the period allows the hero to pass by a series of probable or necessary stages from happiness to misfortune, or vice versa (p. 231)." How do you know when the proper magnitude has been achieved?

On p. 235 it is stated that a character's tragic fate must be the result not of any moral failing ("depravity") but of an "error of judgement." Can a depraved person have a tragic end? If there's no error in judgement but only an accidental circumstance, can there still be a tragedy?

Does Sophocles Oedipus Rex (cf. volume 1, Fifth Series, Great Books Reading and Discussion Program) fit Aristotle's criteria for a well-wrought tragedy?

Evaluative Questions

Why do we enjoy tragedy? Is it because we take solace in viewing the misfortunes of others? A voyeuristic thrill? Or to cultivate, as Unamuno put it, philosophical tragic sense of life? Why do we need art to do this, isn't there enough tragedy in real life?

What is this text for? To make tragedians better at what they do? To make us appreciate tragedy as an art form better? To show us how tragedy works?

Is there still a market for tragedy in America? If so, is it tragedy of a different nature than it was in Aristotle's time? Can you give examples?

For Textual Analysis

pages 227 to 228, from the beginning of the selection to "... admit of Spectacle, Melody, Diction, Character, Thought, and Plot."

pages 231 to 232, beginning, "It is clear from what has been said ... " to "...and they are a delight none the less to all."

pages 235 to 236 beginning "After what has been said above ..." to "... no one is slain by anyone."