Tragedy and Ritual

Recent work on ritual has had a stimulating effect on the interpretation of Greek tragedy. Critics have at last felt free to set aside the old question of origins and the search for archetypal patterns, and to focus attention instead on the ritual language used in tragic texts. The impetus has come from outside – from structuralist anthropology and the work of such writers as Karl Meuli, René Girard and Victor Turner – but the application of these theories to ancient drama has only been possible because the groundwork had been laid by generations of scholars active in the field of Greek religion, with their studies of sacrifice, mysteries, festivals, cult songs, funerary practices and the rest. 1