Creating Tragic Spectators: Rebellion and Ambiguity in World Tragedy.

Abstract

This dissertation considers adaptations of Greek tragedy in contemporary novels, television, and theater in order to develop a theoretical and comparative perspective on the possibilities of tragedy today. Adaptations in various genres and media are considered within the context of modern theories of tragedy, including a lecture by Camus delivered in Athens in 1955, and more recent debates among critics such as George Steiner, Raymond Williams and Terry Eagleton about the death and rebirth of tragedy. Rather than assuming a continuum between ancient and modern cultures, the dissertation argues that there is a distinct formal process according to which modern tragedy creates its tragic spectators. The first chapter explores the idea of tragedy proposed by Camus, who argues that tragic consciousness is defined by rebellion and ambiguity, and the following chapters take up the implications of his call for the renovation of tragic form. Focusing on The Human Stain by Philip Roth and Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee, the second chapter demonstrates how these novels find a model of the spectator's relationship to tragedy in Sophocles' Oedipus Tyrannus. The third chapter turns to The Wire, demonstrating how this HBO television serial uses epigraphs, repetitions of dialogue and self-consciously theatrical staging as a formal analogue to the symbolic network of Aeschylus' Oresteia. The fourth chapter demonstrates how Koffi Kwahulé from Côte d'Ivoire creates a counter-Antigone in Bintou, a play recently performed in Paris, London and New York. An emphasis on form in all these adaptations forces the spectator to acknowledge the aesthetic composition of tragedy and the process of modern adaptation itself. The dissertation crosses boundaries of genre and nation in order to reflect on the emergence of “world” tragedy at the turn of the millennium. It contributes to the field of classical reception studies and the study of ancient Greek drama and tragic theory, as well as twentieth-century literary theory, studies in the novel, and performance/media studies.