Polytheism and the Polis: The Drama of the Individual Before the Self with Paul Epstein | Ralston College

Ralston College Humanities MA

Dr Paul Epstein is a distinguished classicist and Professor Emeritus of Classics at Oklahoma State University, renowned for his extensive knowledge of Greek and Latin literature. 

In this lecture and discussion—delivered in Savannah during the x term of the inaugural year of Ralston College’s MA in the Humanities program—classicist Dr Paul Epstein considers how Sophocles’s tragedy Women of Trachis and Aristophanes’s comedy Frogs arise from—and reflect upon—the polis-centered polytheism of ancient Greece as it appeared during the Athenian flourishing of the fifth century BC. Professor Epstein explores how these Greek dramas articulate the relationship between human beings, the gods, and the community. Tragedy, in Professor Epstein’s account, is about the overall structure of the community, while comedy starts with the individual’s exploration of that community. Yet both forms ultimately reveal an understanding of the individual that is inseparable from the polis in which he or she lives. Professor Epstein argues that our contemporary notion of the self as an entity fundamentally separate from context would be entirely alien to the ancient Greeks. Grasping this ancient understanding of the individual is vitally necessary if we are to correctly interpret the literary and philosophical texts of Hellenic antiquity. *In this lecture and discussion, classicist Dr. Paul Epstein considers how Sophocles’s tragedy Women of Trachis and Aristophanes’s comedy Frogs arise from—and reflect upon—the polis-centered polytheism of ancient Greece during the Athenian flourishing of the fifth century BC. Professor Epstein explores how these Greek dramas articulate the relationship between human beings, the gods, and the community. Tragedy, in Professor Epstein’s account, is about the overall structure of the community, while comedy starts with the individual’s exploration of that community. Yet both forms ultimately reveal an understanding of the individual that is inseparable from the polis in which he or she lives. Professor Epstein argues that our contemporary notion of the self as an entity fundamentally separate from context would be entirely alien to the ancient Greeks. Grasping this ancient understanding of the individual is vitally necessary if we are to correctly interpret the literary and philosophical texts of Hellenic antiquity.

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0:00 Introduction of Professor Epstein by President Blackwood

6:25 The Polytheistic World of the Polis

01:09:35 Dialogue with Students on Polytheism and the Polis

01:22:40 Sophocles’s Women of Trachis

01:44:10 Dialogue with Students About Women of Trachis

01:56:10 Introduction to Aristophanes' Frogs

02:24:40 Dialogue with Students About Frogs 

02:49:45 Closing Remarks for Professor Epstein's Lecture

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Authors, Ideas, and Works Mentioned in This Episode: 

Athenian flourishing of the fifth century BC 

Sophocles, Women of Trachis 

Aristophanes, Frogs

William Shakespeare

Plato, Symposium

Aristophanes, Lysistrata

Homer, Odyssey 

Aristotle, Poetics

Peloponnesian War  

Plato, Apology

nomizó (νομίζω)—translated in the talk as “acknowledge”

nous (νοῦς)

binein (Βινέω) 

Johann Joachim Winkelman 

Nicene Creed 

Titanic v. Olympian gods 

Hesiod 

Jane Austen, Sense and Sensibility 

Sigmund Freud 

Existentialism 

techne (τέχνη)

logos (λόγος)

eros (Ἔρως) 

hubris (ὕβρις)

Philip Larkin, “Annus Mirabilis” 

Athansian Creed

psuche (ψυχή)—translated in the talk as “soul”

thelo (θέλω)—translated in the talk as “wishes” 

Aristophanes, Clouds

mimesis (μίμησις) 

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Additional Resources 

Dr Stephen Blackwood 

Ralston College (including newsletter)

Support a New Beginning 

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Thank you for listening!