According the Nietzsche, there are two sides of the spectrum that must be considered before speaking on tragedy and these are Apollo and Dionysus. Apollo is the order and structure of the world, having control over both “the beautiful illusion of the inner fantasy world” and “higher truth” (16). Dionysus is pleasure and primal, tied to the idea of “enchantment” (18). Tragedy was born out a desire for both the Apollo and Dionysus — the idea of structure and civility and the idea of pleasure and emotions. The artists were imitating both sides of the spectrum, “the Apolline dream artist” and the “Dionysiac ecstatic artist” (18), where the artist would be one and the same in tragedy, rather than separate entities. In tragedy, the artist was able
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For Apolline, it is this: “How else could life have been borne by a race so sensitive, so impetuous in its desires, so uniquely capable of suffering, if it had not been revealed to them, haloed in a higher glory, in their gods?” (23). Through tragedy, there was the ability to combine the two — the scream of horror and the higher purpose — in a way that other arts had never been able to before. Tragedy had the primal nature of the Dionysiac ingrained within it from the beginning, and the Apolline made sense of the primal in a way that had never been seen before.
The decay and death of tragedy, according to Nietzsche, left a whole in society where it had once been. The power of tragedy had been so great, and the fall of tragedy was so devastating. It all began with Euripides and Socrates. The only thing that remained of tragedy was comedy, a sad representation of what had once been a great source of Apolline and Dionysiac ties. “It was in comedy that the degenerate figure of tragedy lived on, a monument to its miserable and violent death” (55). Euripides’ greatest flaw was that he allowed the spectator on the stage, allowing them to find pieces of themselves in the …show more content…
He suggests that through music tragedy can be reborn once more, that the “tragic myth” (79) had find its foothold in the world once more. However, he asserts that it is only through both Apollo and Dionysus that the tragic can become what it had once been before. He states: “Tragedy absorbs the highest musical ecstasies, and thus brings music to a state of true perfection” (100). Together, they can become the true Greek tragedy that had once been so powerful. It is important that art be a conversation of both sides of the spectrum, where it is neither entirely Apolline nor entirely Dionysiac but a middle ground of the two. In order for there to be rebirth of tragedy, there must be a rebirth of the aesthetic listener, which will replace the critic: “Thus the rebirth of tragedy also means the rebirth of the aesthetic listener, his place in the theatre having been occupied by a strange quid pro quo, with pretensions that are half moral and half scholarly — the ‘critic’” (107). It move back to the way it had been done with an aesthetic listener, someone there looking for the beauty in the performance rather than searching for the structure as the critic does. The critic loses things through this method of studying art and it is time to bring back “critics” who aren’t about the structure but rather about the beauty and the enjoyment of the
For Apolline, it is this: “How else could life have been borne by a race so sensitive, so impetuous in its desires, so uniquely capable of suffering, if it had not been revealed to them, haloed in a higher glory, in their gods?” (23). Through tragedy, there was the ability to combine the two — the scream of horror and the higher purpose — in a way that other arts had never been able to before. Tragedy had the primal nature of the Dionysiac ingrained within it from the beginning, and the Apolline made sense of the primal in a way that had never been seen before.
The decay and death of tragedy, according to Nietzsche, left a whole in society where it had once been. The power of tragedy had been so great, and the fall of tragedy was so devastating. It all began with Euripides and Socrates. The only thing that remained of tragedy was comedy, a sad representation of what had once been a great source of Apolline and Dionysiac ties. “It was in comedy that the degenerate figure of tragedy lived on, a monument to its miserable and violent death” (55). Euripides’ greatest flaw was that he allowed the spectator on the stage, allowing them to find pieces of themselves in the …show more content…
He suggests that through music tragedy can be reborn once more, that the “tragic myth” (79) had find its foothold in the world once more. However, he asserts that it is only through both Apollo and Dionysus that the tragic can become what it had once been before. He states: “Tragedy absorbs the highest musical ecstasies, and thus brings music to a state of true perfection” (100). Together, they can become the true Greek tragedy that had once been so powerful. It is important that art be a conversation of both sides of the spectrum, where it is neither entirely Apolline nor entirely Dionysiac but a middle ground of the two. In order for there to be rebirth of tragedy, there must be a rebirth of the aesthetic listener, which will replace the critic: “Thus the rebirth of tragedy also means the rebirth of the aesthetic listener, his place in the theatre having been occupied by a strange quid pro quo, with pretensions that are half moral and half scholarly — the ‘critic’” (107). It move back to the way it had been done with an aesthetic listener, someone there looking for the beauty in the performance rather than searching for the structure as the critic does. The critic loses things through this method of studying art and it is time to bring back “critics” who aren’t about the structure but rather about the beauty and the enjoyment of the