/lit/ - Literature

>all those lost plays

>>15783522
its an okay jack of all trades collection but the best translations are found in author specific volumes.

>>15783522
i literally just downloaded pic related. plan on reading after homer. making my foray into the Classics.

>>15783542
I hear you pseud faggots whining about them all the time, but none of them were important. Case in point, you can't even name 5.

>>15783582
>none of them were important
They would have been if we didn't lose them
>you can't even name 5
Because they are lost

>>15783621
Half of what we have for Sophocles is crap, yet those were deemed good enough to represent him as a standardized reference work. Since Sophocles is generally regarded as their single best, I can't imagine the quality being even as consistently high as that. If they're lost, good riddance.

>>15783522
Stop infecting your mind with childish Greek plays. Read my works instead.

>>15783709
>Half of what we have for Sophocles is crap,
You present yourself as an expert, so I am in good faith asking you what are your top 5 Greek plays?

>>15783743
In Symposium, Socrates remarks that a truly great playwright can write both tragedies and comedies. Did any Greek actually succeed in doing this?

Are the Loeb Classical Library editions the best?

Wait, starting with the Greeks isn't a meme?

>>15783743
>fascist
>demiurge
>noble lie
Aristotle > Plato
>>15783763
no

>>15783522
>No Aristophanes
Dropped

>>15783522
>Aristophanes
Lyisistrata
The Frogs
The Clouds

>Sophocles
Oedipus Trilogy
Ajax
Electra

>Euripides
Medea
The Trojan Women
Helen
Cyclops

>>15783937
Caring about memes is a meme.

>>15784671
>The Clouds
Is it true this play made Plato seethe?

>>15785051
It led directly to his arrest and suicide.

https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/series/CGT.html
Are these good editions?

>>15783522
yeah I read it, it's decent, haven't read other collections so can't compare though.

>>15785051
Socrates brings up Aristophanes in Plato's Apology. Here is the quote.

I will begin at the beginning, and ask what the accusation is which has given rise to this slander of me, and which has encouraged Meletus to proceed against me. What do the slanderers say? They shall be my prosecutors, and I will sum up their words in an affidavit. "Socrates is an evil-doer, and a curious person, who searches into things under the earth and in heaven, and he makes the worse appear the better cause; and he teaches the aforesaid doctrines to others." That is the nature of the accusation, and that is what you have seen yourselves in the comedy of Aristophanes; who has introduced a man whom he calls Socrates, going about and saying that he can walk in the air, and talking a deal of nonsense concerning matters of which I do not pretend to know either much or little - not that I mean to say anything disparaging of anyone who is a student of natural philosophy. I should be very sorry if Meletus could lay that to my charge. But the simple truth is, O Athenians, that I have nothing to do with these studies. Very many of those here present are witnesses to the truth of this, and to them I appeal. Speak then, you who have heard me, and tell your neighbors whether any of you have ever known me hold forth in few words or in many upon matters of this sort. ... You hear their answer. And from what they say of this you will be able to judge of the truth of the rest.


>>15785073
You are thinking of Socrates.

>>15783522
just download the plays off of gutenberg legally for free
Lysistrata
Prometheus Bound
Oedipus Rex trilogy
Oresteia trilogy

>desire to learn ancient greek, rising

>>15783522
Obviously Lattimore anywhere you can.

Aeschylus is the best, but start with Sophocles who is second best, and only read Euripides after reading all of the two prior. They all have their own value of course, sine being the three great tragedians, but you can still rank them. Start with the Oedipus trilogy by Oedipus, and read the rest of him, then read the Oresteia by Aeschylus and the rest of him and so on. But I'd advise you to read Homer and Hesiod before anyone, and then Aristotle's Poetics(considering that you've read Plato and this is your first Aristotle work; it's also an extremely enjoyable read) and then the Greek tragedies.

I also miss the lost plays, same with the lost epics.

>>15783763
>In Symposium, Socrates remarks that a truly great playwright can write both tragedies and comedies. Did any Greek actually succeed in doing this?
Yes, oh I wonder who it could be.

>>15786289
so what is even the value of studying these plays?

>>15786313
I wasn't aware Shakespeare was Greek.

>>15786280
There's probably three or four other languages worth it on the same level, from what I can think of, them being : German, Latin, Sanskrit and Classical Chinese.

>>15783522
I say read all the tragedies and The Clouds of Aristophanes.

>>15785073
No it didn't.
Socrates' death occurred almost 25 years after The Cloud was produced.
Socrates' death was politically motivated because many of his associates and students took part in the Tyranny of the 30.

>>15786337
What's the value or point of studying Shakespeare? If you're trying to say you're not one much for art and literature -- an obvious failure on your part that is -- then yes, historically for understand Greek culture it is of enormous value. But of course, their classics and so the value they can give us as an art are also innumerable, more so than the value of what they can tell us about Greek culture... Art is after all the greater of history, as Aristotle says. And now that I think about it, Aristotle perfectly answers your question in the Poetics.

>>15786344
Oh yes, German too.

>>15786375
Plato seems to differ, Socrates just btfo'd too many losers and they were like "ughnugh this cracka gotta die".

>>15786386
Would you recommend Nietzsche's Birth of Tragedy as a companion to reading the Greeks?

>>15783522
>lefkowitz

yeah go ahead. read pic related while you're at it

>>15786423
Quick rundown?

>>15786418
No, Nietzsche is not always a very accurate portrayal of Greece, and this is his Romanticism. Just read him when you get to him chronologically for philosophy, and find a use in him, but don't read him with the Greeks.

>>15786439
It's the result of a kosher hijacking of classics scholarship after the germans gave it up and anglos failed to fill the void. if you have any inclination to truly study the greeks you must also learn german. otherwise you're left with antagonistic trash like that.

>>15786396
Honestly don't blame them. If I were an Athenian chosen for jury duty I would vote to kill Socrates too. For fucks sake Socrates I'm just trying to work out the gymnasium. Stop asking me what a sophist is. Also the last time you helped me work out you had a "seizure" that ended with you grabbing my butt. I'm not falling for it this time.

>>15786543
Well surely a seizure would not be something to scold a person for?
>implying you proceed to say "of course"
And so no doubt it cannot either be, as by definition a seizure is, either the divine will and direction of the Gods, my daemon, or an uncontrollable effect of the physical world, no?

>>15786289
Thanks, would you recommend the Oxford or Penguin edition of Poetics?

>>15786289
>oedipus trilogy by oedipus
now that's a mothafuckin autobiography

>>15786543
his philosophy produced both alcibiades and critius, so yeah, they had a pretty big reason to kill the dude

>>15786575
The Complete Works of Aristotle.

Also if you want to give a teenager something, give him this:

-Plato Five Dialogues
-Aristotle Poetics
-The Three Theban Plays
-Works and Days
I'd say it's a pretty good start into the Greeks for a youth, they can continue with the rest of the works themselves.

>>15786641
Oh fug, I meant Sophocles obviously.

for me it's prometheus bound and trojan women

>>15786797
BASED

For me, it's Hippolytus.

Oedipus Rex

>>15787681
Normie tier but classic.

>>15783522
Excuse me where is the Aristophanes?

The Assemblywomen for a 2400 year old explanation for current year cuckery

>>15787695
I've read over a dozen different Greek plays now and Oedipus is the one that holds up best to re-reading in my opinion. Antigone is good as well. I'm not really a fan of Aristophanes' comedies as much, Clouds and Birds are enjoyable though. I've only read Prometheus Bound by Aeschylus, what else would you recommend from him?

>>15783522
Just read Hamiltons Mythology instead

>>15787795
>he thinks the value of the Greek tragedies is in their mythology and not in their examination of the human condition
lmao

>>15783542
Lost knowledge and media always makes me sad. It's not even a distant thing either: something like 90% of silent films are completely gone aside from their names and maybe some synopsis.