I started reading again and got back to where I left last time, to the end of the parodos at 200. I didn’t re-read the comments by Finglass though, except here and there. From there on, I’ll be paying more attention to Finglass’s notes while reading.
The structure of tragedy is still more or less a mystery to me. I’d be grateful if someone can guide me to something that would explain things to me, like what exactly are “parodos” and “episode”, “strophe”, “antistrophe” and “epode”, how they relate to each other and what their meaning is, etc. I’d like something short and simple, something I might actually read and not just add to my reading list (a web link would be best!). Something that would help me understand what the h*ll Finglass is talking about e.g. on p. 189!
The chorus marches in during the parodos, usually singing or chanting anapests.
An episode is an exchange of speeches or dialogue between or among the characters in iambic trimeter, occurring between choral songs.
A choral song usually consists of groupings of three “stanzas”: a strophe, an antistrophe and an epode. The strophe and antistrophe “respond”, i.e., the metrical schemes are identical (allowing in some cases for anceps syllables and substitution of two shorts for a long, in accordance with the metrical scheme). The epode is metrically different from the strophe and antistrophe. The three-stanza pattern of strophe, antistrophe and epode can be repeated as many times as the poet wants, but generally (there are probably exceptions somewhere) all of the strophes and antistrophes are in “responsion” with one another, and all of the epodes are also in responsion with one another, but not with the strophes and antistrophes. (This is an important point for the textual criticism of the choral songs of Greek drama.) The metrical patterns of choral odes are very complex.
Generally, the choral odes of drama don’t have more than two or three cycles of strophe, antistrophe and epode, but Pindar’s choral songs can go on endlessly.
Hope this helps.
Thanks. That’s about how much I knew, but actual commentaries make it seem a lot more complicated. Somehow the exact manner in which the writer deploys these seems to be very meaningful, and I always get immediately lost when I try to read those discussions.
I think you may find that the discussions of specific metrical patterns can be very difficult to follow. The patterns of choral odes aren’t repetitive like iambic trimeter or dactylic hexameter.
Hmm. Maybe I’ll just skip those then.
As Hylander says in the parodos the chorus usually enters chanting anapaests. In the Ajax the chorus sing lyric after the anapaests and Finglass observes that this is paralleled only in Aeschylus. He doesnt much care for the idea of “marching” as both lacking any evidence and implying a restrictive use of anapaests to the entrance. I think more important are his observations on the strophe antistrophe where he says that the metre is “of the Pindaric type” but that one should not take this as evidence that Sophocles is evoking Pindar. The rest of page 189 looks quite technical.
I must start on the text but it will take me sometime to reach where you are as I want to read the commentary and haven’t actually got through the introduction yet.
I agree with Hylander that discussions of metre in lyric can be hard to follow especially if you dont know your glyconics from your iambics.
I actually don’t remember whether I read the introduction or not! Probably I read part of it. I decided for now to read the play first (or a large part of it at least) and only then come back to read the introduction, which assumes you already know what the play is about. I should actually do this more often – how often I feel I can’t start reading a book before reading the introduction and force myself to read the intro without really understanding what it’s talking about.
My experience is that French books are especially talented in making introductions that do very little in the way of introducing into anything… (This isn’t meant to be a criticism of Finglass, which is clearly intended for a quite advanced audience.)
EDIT: If someone noticed, I first actually accidentally clicked “edit” instead of “quote” on Seneca’s post, which with my moderator privileges made me destroy it. Luckily I was able to recover it. I’ve done this twice now… Hmm. Sorry.
You should be able to read trimeters metrically, either aloud or in your head. Try reading the choral songs metrically, giving effect to heavy and light syllables, even if you can’t always recognize the patterns offhand.
I think I usually recognize iambic trimeter and anapests, but the more complicated rhythms are over my head. I could pay more attention to the rhythm though.
I’d also like to know more about the structural units of the play, how that relates to performance etc.
If someone noticed, I first actually accidentally clicked “edit” instead of “quote” on Seneca’s post, which with my moderator privileges made me destroy it.
I am sure it would be no loss.
Following Hylander’s advice on reading is a surer way to understand the rhythm rather than staring at the metrical patterns.
Certainly, but Finglass won’t have it! 
I would suggest a little of both–reading aloud or silently trying to give effect to heavy/long and light/short syllables, and also looking at the metrical schemas provided by Finglass. Bear in mind that the analyses into various components symbolized by inscrutable little abbreviations, as opposed to the schemas showing the heavies and the lights, are a matter of judgment, and you may find different analyses in different commentaries. Even the division of stanzas into lines is sometimes controversial.
Two of the most common types of choral meters are Aeolic and “dactylo-epitritritic” (a term, like most of the metrical terminology, invented in the 19th century).
Aeolic patterns are at least somewhat familiar from Sappho and Alcaeus. These patterns are generally built around a nucleus of one or more choriambs: _ υ υ _ .
Dactylo-epitritic patterns are built largely from
(1) hemiepes: _ υ υ _ υ υ _ , familiar from elegy, a kind of expanded choriamb, which can be further expanded;
(2) cretics: _ υ _ , which can be expanded to _ υ _ υ _ υ _ ,
usually or at least often with an anceps syllable υ separating the hemiepes and cretic elements.
There is also a pattern known as the dochmiac, υ _ _ υ _ , with a possible resolution of each of the heavies/longs into two shorts, so that you can have a segment consisting of υ υ υ υ υ υ υ υ. As I recall, this occurs in Philoctetes. There are other patterns that don’t fall into the aeolic or dactylo-epitritic categories, too, but the dochmiac is noteworthy because of its mnemonic, “the WISE KANGaROOS”.
If you try to read giving effect to heavies and lights, eventually the Aeolic and dactylo-epitritic patterns will emerge and even, maybe, come to seem somewhat familiar.
I’ve been trying to learn a little about meter in reading tragedy and Pindar. I invite mwh, who’s an expert on meter (as on so many other subjects), to set me straight where I’ve gone astray.
There are two very useful books: West’s Greek Metre, and A.M. Dale’s The Lyric Metres of Greek Drama.
Would it be helpful if I posted on another thread lines from 1-200 which I had some trouble with and which havent been dealt with here? Or is that too confusing?
Thanks, Hylander. It helps to try to figure these meters out in their constituent parts. West’s book has been on my reading list and my bookshelf for some time already… How about Dale’s book – is it more or less advanced than West’s? Is it long?
But what about their meaning? I’m not so much interested in analyzing the meters into detail as I’m interested about their codified meanings – each meter is used in specific contexts, they mean something. Or so I presume. What did ancient Athenians think (or feel) when they heard a dactylo-epitrite rhythm?
This doesn’t mean I don’t think it’s a good idea to be able to recognize what basic sort of meter one is dealing with in each case.
Seneca: I think it’s a good idea to start a new thread for specific passages. This thread is already hypertrophic and hard to follow for anyone catching up later.
I may be wrong, but I don’t think anyone has been able to explain convincingly why a particular metrical pattern would have been chosen over a different one (leaving aside meters such as hexameter, elegy, and trimeter with genre-specific functions). The choice was more like the choice a composer of classical music might make in choosing rhythms for a composition, which would be inextricably linked with melodies.
To avoid hypertrophy, maybe start a new thread for each 200 lines, e.g., “Ajax 1-200.”
One of the great difficulties of imagining the performance of the choruses of Greek Tragedy is that they were sung and that the lyric sections may have been quite operatic. There would also have been dancing and elaborate costumes. In theatrical terms it would have been spectacular.
Attempts have been made at reconstruction. Musical Design in Sophoclean Theater by William C. Scott (1996) investigates the link between metrical patterns, music and meaning. He contends that music was a central feature which elucidated the meaning for the original audience.
The obstacles which have to be overcome are formidable. It looks as if there are cheap copies of Scott on amazon. There is also West’s book on Ancient Greek music.
Less comprehensive there is some useful stuff in the Cambridge companion to Greek Tragedy which along with Simon Goldhill’s “Reading Greek Tragedy” are excellent introductory texts.
Jebb’s metrical analysis of Ajax is very complete, together with nice charts:
https://books.google.com/books?id=VXc0AQAAMAAJ&dq=sophocles%20the%20ajax&pg=PR60#v=onepage&q&f=false
I found Maas’ book on meter in a used bookstore the other month, and I think that he is my favorite discovery since Chandler.