Blindness in a Culture of Light - Especially the Case of "Oedipus at Colonus" of Sophocles
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Eleftheria A. Bernidaki-AldousBlindness in a Culture of Light
Especially the Case of "Oedipus at Colonus" of Sophocles.
Book published by Peter Lang, Inc., New York, Bern, Frankfurt, and Paris, 1990.
PETER LANG
New York - Bern- Frankfurt am Main - Paris
Περίληψη
This book examines the paradox: sight in blindness in Ancient Greek culture. Deprivation of light is almost as undesirable as death, yet blindness bestows a status of distinction in a culture where choice between light and honor is difficult. Blindness is punishment for breaking the limits of human knowledge, yet it is also the means to insight (truth-vision of metaphysical light). The (polluted) blind seers and poets enjoy the highest religious, social and political powers.In the first part of the text, solutions to this paradox are provided through an examination of attitudes towards blindness in an analytical durvey of Greek Literature. In the second part (an analysis of the Oedipus Coloneus), Oedipus' blindness is viewed as the key for unraveling the mystery of the drama and of the hero's fate. Oedipus is viewed as supreme seer, and his presentation indicative of Sophocles' ideas, since Sophocles is fascinated with blindness, especially the blind poets and seers - the epitome of the paradox: sight-in-blindness in a culture of light.
Σύντομο βιογραφικό όπως εμφανίζεται στο βιβλίο
Eleftheria A. Bernidaki-Aldous is an Assistant Professor of Classics at Creighton University in Nebraska. She has also taught at Oberlin College in Ohio as Visiting Assistant Professor. She has authored articles on Greek literature and culture. She received her Ph.D. and M.A. in Classics from the Johns Hopkins University in Maryland, and an M.A. and B.A. in History from the University of Rochester in New York. Among her many honors and awards are: felloships and scholarships, from the Johns Hopkins University, a Charlotte W. Newcombe Dissertation Fellowship from the Woodraw Wilson Foundation, and fellowships from the Greek Ministry of Culture and Sciences, and from the Alexandros S. Onassis Institute for Scholarship and Research.Bernidaki-Aldous was born and raised in Crete, Greece and after graduating from Pierce College High School she studied in the U.S.A. She has been blind (as a result of an accident) since the age of three. Therefore her interest in this topic is scholarly and personal.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments ixPreface xiii
I Blindness and the Blind in Greek Culture
Prologue 3
1. Attitudes towards Blindness and the Blind: The Importance of Light in Greek Culture 11
2. Blindness Especially Combined with Old Age:
A Condition of Utter Helplessness, Dependence and Misfortune 33
3. Blindness as Ignorance: Seeing as Light, Truth, Moral Goodness 49
4. Blindness as Punishment 57
5. Differences in the Attitudes toward Blindness: Sophoclean Drama as a Microcosm of Greek Society ... 95
II Oedipus at Colonus
Prologue 135
1. The Significance of Oedipus' Blindness 137
2. Sight Imagery: Light-Darkness Motif 147
3. Identification with the Topos 155
4. Human Recognitions and Their Effect on the Hero 163
5. Development of the Hero: Development of the Drama 173
6. Conclusions 185
Epilogue: Oedipus and Demeter 193
Appendix: Criticism on the Oedipus at Colonus 213
Bibliography 233
Preface
This study examines the paradox: sight in blindness. Greek culture (immersed in light, literally and metaphorically) is characterized as a "culture of light." Greek literature is dominated by the dialectics of light (light-darkness imagery, blindness and insight vs. eyesight). Light is so desirable that in Greek phos is synonymous with life. Deprivation of light is almost as undesirable as death, yet blindness bestows a status of distinction in a culture where choice between light and honor is difficult. Achilles chooses time over life in the Iliad, but in the Odyssey he would give up the highest honors in Hades to see the light again.As deprivation of light, helplessness and dependence, blindness is imposed as punishment by gods and men alike. The blind inspire pity and fear because their fate is awful (deinon). Polluted and sacred, they inspire disgust, compassion and the noblest humanity. Blindness is punishment for breaking the limits of human knowledge, yet it is the means to insight, truth—vision of metaphysical light. Blind seers and poets enjoy the highest religious, social and political powers. Solutions to this paradox are provided which, though careful, may not be definitive or exhaustive.
In the first part (analytical survey of Greek literature), attitudes towards blindness (as condition and metaphor) are examined. Implications are drawn from the disagreement between Chorus and Oedipus in the Tyrannus regarding the self-blinding. Does this disagreement reflect the range of attitudes of various classes? Do attitudes differ among various groups of social hierarchy: from intellectuals to common folk? Is Sophocles representative of such attitudes?
In the second part, the Oedipus Coloneus is analyzed. Oedipus' blindness is viewed as the key for unraveling the mystery of the drama and of the hero's fate. Oedipus is viewed as supreme seer, and his presentation indicative of Sophocles' ideas. Understanding the role of Oedipus' blindness is crucial for understanding the drama, and interpretation of the Coloneus enhances understanding of Greek culture. Sophocles is fascinated with blindness, especially the blind poets and seers—the epitome of the paradox: sight-in-blindness in a culture of light.
My interest in this topic arose naturally from two very significant personal experiences: I was born and raised in Crete where the cultural values of light and honor are as much a way of life as they were in the time of Homer; second, I became blind at the age of three. If these two facts of my life were accidents of fortune, my interest in the topic of "blindness in a culture of light" seems to me all but inevitable.
In my analysis of Greek literature I examine the sources carefully. The translations from Greek and other texts are my own because I believe strongly that translations are also interpretations. On the rare occasions where I borrow from other translators, I acknowledge this fact in the notes. My debts to scholarly criticism are indicated in the notes for Part One. For Part Two, however, all references to criticism and the premises accepted in my analysis are included in the Appendix. In the chapters where the Oedipus at Colonus is analyzed, I choose to refer the reader mainly to the text itself because I believe that the text of Sophocles demands and deserves undivided attention. Although I found that the Greek fascination was equally great in regard to both the blind seer and the blind poet, I concentrate on the blind seer. The topic is enormous and choices had to be made. The fact that I concentrate on Sophocles determines this choice to a great extent. The play in which he presented us with his tragic blind poet - Thamyras - is lost to us. The plays in which he treats the blind seer—Oedipus—are, fortunately, extant.
Κριτικές Βιβλίου
«A splendidly searching study of the meaning of blindness in a culture that, from Homer onwards, was pervaded by a love of light felt to be one with life itself. The author provides an invaluable compendium of ancient Greek attitudes as they get into literature and as literature transforms and revalues them. The second part of this study is an incisively detailed analysis of Sophocles' 'Oedipus at Colonus', showing how the idea of blindness operates to express the poet's cyclical sense of tragedy and the "enfolded opposite" of human existence. Professor Bernidaki-Aldous' book will be welcomed by all those who find in Greek drama the texts of our Western humanity.»William Arrowsmith
Boston University
More Book Reviews - 140 Kb
- Blindness in a culture of light: Especially the Case of "Oedipus at Colonus" of Sophocles. A dissertation submitted to the Johns Hopkins University, published by University Microfilms International, Ann Arbor, Michigan, U.S.A. - London, England, 1985.
- Book review of my book, Blindness in a Culture of Light: Especially the Case of "Oedipus at Colonus" of Sophocles, by D. Dombrowski, in the Classical Review, Oxford University Press, Vol. XLI, Number 1, pp. 15-16, Spring, 1991.
- Cited in the World Literature: A Catalog of Selected Doctoral Dissertation Research. Published by University Microfilms International, 300 N. Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106, p.3, February, 1987.
- Cited in the Classical Studies: A Selected Collection of Doctoral Dissertations from 1908-1985, Ed. Sarah Marianne Bonnycastle, Published by University Microfilms Inc., 300 N. Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106, p. 13, 1987.
Άλλες Δημοσιεύσεις
- My Poetry in the Magazine Sunny Days (Published by Pierce College), Athens, 1965-1970.
- "Insight in Blindness in a culture of Light", Creighton University Faculty Journal. Volume 5, pp. 29-37, 1986.
- Article, "The Power of the Evil Eye in the Blind: Oedipus Tyrannus 1306 and Oedipus at Colonus 149-156", in the book Text and Performance (Volume VIII of the proceedings of the Comparative Drama Conference, University of Florida at Gainesville), Published by University press of America, Inc., Spring, 1988.
- "Hero and Choros in the Oedipus at Colonus", in the Program of the Eighty-second Annual Meeting of the Classical Association of the Middle West and South, The Classical Journal Vol. 81, No. 3, p. 268, 1986.
- "Hero and Choros in the Oedipus at Colonus" in the Abstracts of papers of the Eighty-second annual Meeting of the Classical Association of the Middle West and South, April, 1986.
- "Sophron Polis: on the Pension of the Handicapped Athenian (Lysias 24.)", in the Abstracts of papers of the Eighty-third annual Meeting of the Classical Association of the Middle West and South. April, 1987.
- "Oedipus and Demeter, an Odd Couple: Solutions to the Paradox of the Phos Apheaaes in the Oedipus at Colonus" in the Abstracts of papers of the Eighty-fourth annual Meeting of the Classical Association of the Middle West and South, April, 1988.