The Ancient Greek Tragedy Competitions
Untying Aristotle’s Poetics
Before Hollywood, before Elizabethan drama, before even Roman theatre, were the Ancient Greek tragedy competitions. They were held during the big City Dionysia in Athens, in front of up to 15000 spectators. It is, in more ways than one would imagine, the cradle of modern storytelling.
The Dionysia were festivals held in honor of Dionysus, the god of the grape harvest and winemaking. As one might expect, these were big parties with ritualistic drinking, singing, and dancing. Live entertainment was the thing in those days, as it was the only option. Recording technologies would not be invented for another couple of millennia unless you count writing, which, let’s be honest, does not lend itself to partying.
There were two Dionysia, the small rural Dionysia, held in winter, and the huge City Dionysia in Athens, held during spring. One can imagine the festival crowd of the day wanting a taste of both.
The tragedy may have evolved from the dithyramb, a ritualistic song and dance number performed in honor of Dionysus. During the sixth century BCE, the shining star on the dithyramb sky was the singer Thespis, who is often credited with inventing both acting and tragedy. He is known for putting his show on the road, and some say he invented theatrical touring as well.
The word tragedy means goat song.
The genre may have gotten its name from the first prize in early competitions. The first one we know of was won by Thespis at the City Dionysia in Athens in 534 BCE.
During the following centuries, these tragedy competitions were, second only to athletic competitions, the big thing in ancient Greek entertainment. In time there were comedy competitions as well, but if Aristotle is to be trusted, it took a while for the genre to be taken seriously (Poetics 5.1449b1).
The three competition playwrights were selected half a year ahead. In a measure to cut public spending, they were assigned private sponsors who would pay for much of the production cost. Customarily each playwright took part with three tragedies and one satyr play, which were shown to the festival crowd during a three-day binge-watching marathon.
The best playwright was chosen by a secret jury. Formally the winner was the man who sponsored him, but of course, the playwright won as well.
The tragedy competitions were an ideal arena for testing ideas and learning what worked with the audience or not. During the first hundred or so years, the principles for evoking suspense and empathy were found and refined to the level that is still practiced today. The evolution of the genre was spearheaded by stars like Aeschylus (winner in 472, 467, 463, and 458 BCE), Euripides (winner in 441, 428, and 405 BCE), and Sophocles (winner in 468, 447, 438, 409 and 401 BCE), who we still have plays by.
On average, the names of fifty playwrights are known from each century. Nine tragedies, five comedies, and three satyr plays were shown in a normal year, which means about 1700 original plays were written for the City Dionysia per century.
Thus, when Aristotle (384 – 322 BCE) came around to analyze the genre, a vibrant entertainment scene and a large body of work were in existence.
