AT a very early stage of their history the Greeks had begun to collect
the poems, which had been written in honor of their brave ancestors who
had driven the Pelasgians out of Hellas and had destroyed the power of
Troy. These poems were recited in public and everybody came to listen to
them. But the theatre, the form of entertainment which has become almost
a necessary part of our own lives, did not grow out of these recited
heroic tales. It had such a curious origin that I must tell you
something about it in a separate chapter
The Greeks had always been fond of parades. Every year they held solemn
processions in honor of Dionysos the God of the wine. As everybody in
Greece drank wine (the Greeks thought water only useful for the purpose
of swimming and sailing) this particular Divinity was as popular as a
God of the Soda-Fountain would be in our own land.
And because the Wine-God was supposed to live in the vineyards, amidst a
merry mob of Satyrs (strange creatures who were half man and half goat),
the crowd that joined the procession used to wear goat-skins and to
hee-haw like real billy-goats. The Greek word for goat is "tragos" and
the Greek word for singer is "oidos." The singer who meh-mehed like a
goat therefore was called a "tragos-oidos" or goat singer, and it is
this strange name which developed into the modern word "Tragedy," which
means in the theatrical sense a piece with an unhappy ending, just as
Comedy (which really means the singing of something "comos" or gay) is
the name given to a play which ends happily.
But how, you will ask, did this noisy chorus of masqueraders, stamping
around like wild goats, ever develop into the noble tragedies which have
filled the theatres of the world for almost two thousand years?
The connecting link between the goat-singer and Hamlet is really very
simple as I shall show you in a moment.
The singing chorus was very amusing in the beginning and attracted large
crowds of spectators who stood along the side of the road and laughed.
But soon this business of tree-hawing grew tiresome and the Greeks
thought dullness an evil only comparable to ugliness or sickness. They
asked for something more entertaining. Then an inventive young poet
from the village of Icaria in Attica hit upon a new idea which proved a
tremendous success. He made one of the members of the goat-chorus step
forward and engage in conversation with the leader of the musicians who
marched at the head of the parade playing upon their pipes of Pan.
This individual was allowed to step out of line. He waved his arms and
gesticulated while he spoke (that is to say he "acted" while the others
merely stood by and sang) and he asked a lot of questions, which the
bandmaster answered according to the roll of papyrus upon which the poet
had written down these answers before the show began.
This rough and ready conversation--the dialogue--which told the story
of Dionysos or one of the other Gods, became at once popular with the
crowd. Henceforth every Dionysian procession had an "acted scene" and
very soon the "acting" was considered more important than the procession
and the meh-mehing.
AEschylus, the most successful of all "tragedians" who wrote no less
than eighty plays during his long life (from 526 to 455) made a
bold step forward when he introduced two "actors" instead of one. A
generation later Sophocles increased the number of actors to three. When
Euripides began to write his terrible tragedies in the middle of the
fifth century, B.C., he was allowed as many actors as he liked and
when Aristophanes wrote those famous comedies in which he poked fun
at everybody and everything, including the Gods of Mount Olympus, the
chorus had been reduced to the role of mere bystanders who were lined up
behind the principal performers and who sang "this is a terrible world"
while the hero in the foreground committed a crime against the will of
the Gods.
This new form of dramatic entertainment demanded a proper setting, and
soon every Greek city owned a theatre, cut out of the rock of a nearby
hill. The spectators sat upon wooden benches and faced a wide circle
(our present orchestra where you pay three dollars and thirty cents for
a seat). Upon this half-circle, which was the stage, the actors and the
chorus took their stand. Behind them there was a tent where they made
up with large clay masks which hid their faces and which showed the
spectators whether the actors were supposed to be happy and smiling or
unhappy and weeping. The Greek word for tent is "skene" and that is the
reason why we talk of the "scenery" of the stage.
When once the tragedy had become part of Greek life, the people took
it very seriously and never went to the theatre to give their minds a
vacation. A new play became as important an event as an election and
a successful playwright was received with greater honors than those
bestowed upon a general who had just returned from a famous victory.