Nietzsche Birth Of Tragedy Analysis

In the Birth of Tragedy, Friedrich Nietzsche describes with great detail what he found to be the death of old tragedy. Primarily, Nietzsche depicts a tragedy that was based on tension between two elements that derived from Apollo and Dionysus: The Apollonian and Dionysian. The Apollonian was defined as all forms, structures, and order that individualized. In contrast, the Dionysian involved ecstasy, madness, and all that was mystical - where common revelry is experienced - while also breaking down the individual to emerge them in a community. The tension produced by these two opposing principles was found in any true tragedy according to Nietzsche. Therefore, the death of tragedy came when both principles were not present. But who could be at fault for such a death? Nietzsche found the playwright Euripides culpable of constructing a new tragedy that immersed itself in Socratic philosophy.
Nietzsche writes that “Euripides dared to be the herald of a new creativity” …show more content…
He tells us who he is, why he has driven the women of Thebes into madness, and what he plans on doing to those who oppose his followers. Nietzsche writes that such a prologue is the “repudiation of the effect of suspense” since the audience no longer feels the tension of waiting to find out what occurs during the play (Nietzsche 62). Hence, in the simple opening of The Bacchae, Euripides incorporates rationality by focusing on the dialectic and comprehensibility of Dionysus’ words rather than the uncertainty of the plot. By doing so, the prologue of the tragedy now meets the main criterion of aesthetic Socratism: “to be beautiful everything must first be intelligible” (Nietzsche 62). Euripides chose to ignore the effect of suspense and finds more importance in the audience’s ability to understand Dionysus opening rhetorical scene. He is consumed with the dialectic of the protagonist rather than the actual plot of the