Aeschylus And Other Play example essay topic

In times of struggle and hardship, people are constantly looking for ways to escape their reality. They have found release from their stress in practices such as exercise, therapy, and meditation. In the ancient times of Greece, life for citizens was strict and sometimes harsh. During these times of struggle, people search for ways to vacation from the laws that bore down upon them, one of the ways they accomplished this was through art. Art was a way to express true feeling and emotion and unite a sometimes-divided population. Drama served as one escape for the citizens in Greece.

Attending the plays written by Euripides, Aristophanes, Sophocles and Aeschylus, gave people the time to get away from their worries and chores and drift into a world of drama. A world where laws can be broken, women can have intelligence and slaves outwit their masters. One of the reasons the plays written by the authors of this time were so popular was because people were able to leave reality behind and slip into a world where none of the truths they held proved to be true. A famous playwright during the times of Ancient Greece was Aeschylus. Aeschylus was thought to have been born in 525 bc, although no official record has been found. Aeschylus fought the Persians at Marathon and Salamis offering great first hand detail for his play, The Persians.

Aeschylus was the first man to write plays or dramas as we know them. He was the oldest of the three great writers of Greek tragedy - the other two writers were Sophocles and Euripides - who were active in Athens during the 5th century before Christ. Before the times of Aeschylus, there were no proper plays, only songs and recitations given by one person with the help of a chorus (group of singers or reciters that usually played villagers etc.) Aeschylus change Greek drama by writing his songs and recitations for two people, each one representing a character in the story. Sometimes the actors would play more than one character. Aeschylus also got his actors to appear on stage wearing costumes and masks, beginning the use of costumes to distinguish different characters. Aeschylus was born at Eleusis near Athens.

The Athenians call him "The Father of Greek Tragedy". All of Aeschylus' plays are about the power of the Gods over men, the problems of leadership, and the mysterious workings of fate. In his lifetime he wrote more than 90 plays, but only seven now survive. Aeschylus won 13 prizes at the Festival of Dionysus, a religious festival where dramas were performed. Aeschylus was supposed to have fought with the Greek forces at the Battles of Marathon and Salamis against The Persians. His earliest play the Persians celebrates Greece's victory over the invaders.

His other surviving plays include The Suppliants, Seven Against Thebes, Prometheus Bound, and a trilogy called the Oresteia, telling the stories that befell the family of Agamemnon, the king of the Greek city Mycenae. Aeschylus works were greatly influenced by the events in Athens during the 5th century BC. Events that had major effects on his works included the Persian Wars, The Ionian War and the evacuation of Athens in 479 BC. Aeschylus used his first hand involvement in the Persian wars as the basis for his play and also used research skills to create in depth plays. Aeschylus' plays appear more like a first hand account of the events. The plays written by Aeschylus and other play writes allow us to have a first hand view of the events that happened during 5th century BC.

Although the plays might not be accurate due to present bias they can still be interesting and informative. Plays were the only form of entertainment in Greek times and they were popular. A lot of thought and practice went into the plays to make them the best they could be for the audience. Aeschylus is probably the most famous and celebrated Greek writer. He is celebrated because of his accuracy and commitment to his career. He died 456 BC in Sicily.

Legend has it that Aeschylus met his death when an eagle mistook his bald head for a rock and dropped a tortoise on it. Whatever the cause of his death, his life laid the groundwork the dramatic arts would need to flourish, and by the time of his death, there were two notable successors ready to take his place - Sophocles and Euripides. In addition, Aeschylus left behind two sons who would carry on his dramatic legacy, and one of them, Euphorion, would even claim first prize at the City Dionysia, defeating both Sophocles and Euripides in 431 BC.