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University of California Press

About the Book

This is the first book to approach the visuality of ancient Greek drama through the lens of theater phenomenology. Gathering evidence from tragedy, comedy, satyr play, and vase painting, Naomi Weiss argues that, from its very beginnings, Greek theater in the fifth century BCE was understood as a complex interplay of actuality and virtuality. Classical drama frequently exposes and interrogates potential viewing experiences within the theatron—literally, “the place for seeing.” Weiss shows how, in so doing, it demands distinctive modes of engagement from its audiences. Examining plays and pottery with attention to the instability and ambiguity inherent in visual perception, Seeing Theater provides an entirely new model for understanding this ancient art form.

About the Author

Naomi Weiss is Professor of Classics at Harvard University. She is author of The Music of Tragedy: Performance and Imagination in Euripidean Theater.

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The Story Behind the Cover of Seeing Theater

By Naomi Weiss, author of Seeing Theater: The Phenomenology of Classical Greek DramaThe cover of Seeing Theater, thoughtfully designed by my late brother-in-law and artist David Palacios, offers a succinct visual encapsulation of the book and an interesting twist on the only surviving image in c
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Table of Contents

Contents

List of Illustrations 
Acknowledgments 
Note on Texts, Translations, and Abbreviations 

Introduction 
Phenomenology, Aristotle, and Classical Greek Drama 
Theōrein and Seeing Theater 
The “Play of Actuality” beyond Fifth-Century Theater 
Engaged Spectatorship 
Genre and Scope 

1. Opening Spaces 
Tragic and Comic Space 
Seeing the Setting 
Staged Spectatorship 
Seeing Theater, Seeing Assembly 
Atopic Beginnings 
The Phenomenology of Space in the Classical Greek Theater 

2. Seeing What? 
Is This That? Aeschylus’s Theoroi 
Visual Indeterminacy in Aeschylus’s Suppliants 
Winging with Words in Aristophanes’s Birds

3. Pain Between Bodies 
Dustheatos 
Blinded Bodies I: Euripides’s Cyclops and Hecuba 
Blinded Bodies II: Sophocles’s Oedipus the King 
Sympathetic Bodies: [Aeschylus’s] Prometheus Bound 
Pleasure in Pain 

4. Pots and Plays 
Actor, Mask, Costume 
The Basel Chorus Krater 
The London Pandora Krater 
The Naples Birds Krater 

Epilogue 
Works Cited 
General Index 
Index Locorum

Reviews

"What does it mean to 'see' theater? This ambitious and wonderfully engaging book turns the spotlight on the theater spectator, finding the drama hidden away in the very act(s) of watching Greek drama. Weiss's phenomenological approach foregrounds the multisensory nature of theatrical performance. Reading the tragedians—especially Aeschylus and Sophocles—will never feel quite the same again."—Melissa Mueller, author of Objects as Actors: Props and the Poetics of Performance in Greek Tragedy

"Naomi Weiss breaks new ground, powerfully reconceptualizing theatrical visuality on a phenomenological basis. Informed by the fluidity of roles and positions in vase paintings’ views of viewing, her fresh, engaging, and sophisticated analyses not just from the genre of tragedy but also from comedy and satyr drama, bring much-needed emphasis to the aesthetic. Seeing Theater is poised to become a classic that will shape performative criticism of ancient Greek drama for many years to come."—Mario Telò, author of Archive Feelings: A Theory of Greek Tragedy

"An original and outstanding contribution, Seeing Theater opens up an entirely new approach to ancient drama and related artifacts, yielding conclusions that are of fundamental interest to Greek drama and art."—Eric Csapo, coauthor of A Social and Economic History of the Theatre to 300 BC