Off-stage groups in Attic drama

This thesis discusses the off-stage assemblies, populations, armies and other groups found in extant Athenian drama. It argues that such groups are often depicted as holding considerable power over events on stage. It demonstrates that extant plays take advantage of the fact that off-stage groups can only be depicted from the viewpoints of on-stage characters by portraying groups and their psychology in highly nuanced fashion. In this regard, plays often undercut the stereotypes used in Athenian prose texts to depict the psychology of groups in political contexts. The introduction explains this thesis’ methodology and position relative to existing scholarship and explains how groups are defined. Chapter 1 surveys the stereotypical tropes which are used to portray group activity and thought in fifth- and fourth-century Athenian prose texts. Chapter 2 uses the assembly scenes in Euripides’ Suppliants, Aeschylus’ Suppliants and Euripides’ Orestes to discuss the portrayal of off-stage group decision-making in Attic tragedy. Chapter 3 analyses off-stage group decision-making as portrayed in Aristophanic comedy, covering Knights and Assembly-Women before applying these findings to Birds. Chapter 4 discusses amorphous groups whose role is not clearly defined in plot terms, focusing on Sophocles’ plays, and argues that such populations are made deliberately difficult for on-stage characters to read. Chapter 5 demonstrates how Euripides’ ‘Trojan’ plays and Sophocles’ Ajax encourage us to view the Achaean army as a shifting combination of democratic polis and menacing collective. Finally, Chapter 6 argues that groups of women in Bacchae, Hecuba, Thesmophoriazusae and Lysistrata are designed to resist straightforward categorisation.