The Birth of Tragedy Sections 10-12

(Originally written June 26, 2007 in Book 15)

The Birth of Tragedy
Friedrich Nietzsche

Section 10

Dionysus was himself the original and only hero in stage and the other heroes who gradually emerged - Prometheus, Oedipus, etc. are really mere masks of Dionysus.

The sufferings of Dionysus is the agonizing experience of individuation.

Dionysus was torn to pieces by the Titans according to Greek mythology. The true Dionysian suffering is the dismemberment of an individual and a transformation into the elements.

The world out to be as one, but the tearing of Dionysus made the world individualized. The rebirth of Dionysus is the coming together and re-harmonizing of all individuals into a oneness.

Oneness is the fundamental part of existence. Individuation is the primary cause of evil. Art is the joyous hope that individuation may be broken and a openness can be restored.

[page 75] an attack on religion.

Section 11

As Hellenism aged tragedy died out. Euripides discarded Dionysian elements and thus the Apollonian counterpart as well. He replaced the god-like hers with the every man character and the New Comedy emerged out of the suicide of tragedy.

Euripides brought the spectator onto the stage.

But, Euripides felt himself better than the public he put on stage.

Euripides relied on himself as a critic. That is Euripides the thinker, not Euripides the poet. HE did not understand the tragedy and that is why he sought to reform drama.

Euripides found one other person who shared his opinion.

Section 12

Euripides attempted to reconstruct Greek tragedy on the basis of an un-Dionysian art and morality.

Socrates shared Euripides view of the tragedy.

The art of Greek tragedy was shipwrecked by Socratic thinking. The Dionysian and the Socratic were enemies.

The combination of Euripides the actor and Euripides the thinker is the combination of cool rational thoughts and fiery passionate portrayals of emotion. Euripides is a paradox.

Euripides reduced tragedy to aesthetic Socratism: "To be beautiful everything must be intelligible" (Nietzsche, 83-84).

Euripides dramas in following the Socratic maxim that "knowledge is virtue" became naturalistic and inartistic.

Euripidean plays rested on rhetorical features that lead the groundwork for pathos, not action.

Euripides found suspense made audiences so anxious to solve the mystery that it distracted from the pathos of the play and thus was removed from his plays.

"Euripides as a poet is essentially an echo of his own conscious knowledge" (Nietzsche, 85).