PLATO’S CHORAL THEATER IN THE REPUBLIC

Abstract

In this paper I explore certain aspects of Plato’s engagement with song-and-dance performances as theatrical practices.1 As we know, Greek theaters hosted song-and-dance shows that were not limited to drama. For instance, the theater of Dionysus hosted dithyrambic performances, a quintessentially lyric genre. Here I will be using the term theater primarily as a deep cultural structure that splits and at the same time links the functions of viewing and being viewed; in other words, I will assume that the concept and function of theatron is operative even when theater as a built venue is absent. My general thesis is that Plato has a double strategy regarding theatron, which has important consequences for the way he handles song-and-dance performances. On the one hand he explicitly or implicitly attacks his contemporary theatrical culture. On the other hand, however, he himself stages quite strange spectacles that are evocative of song-and- dance performances; at the same time, he sets up quite peculiar spectatorships as well. In all of these cases, while elaborating on theater as a deep structure, he completely alters the forms of theatrical attendance of his time by way of fantasies that are vaguely reminiscent of, and at the same time at odds with, contemporary theatrical culture.

I will focus on one such case of strange song-and-dance spectacle, that of the tenth book of the Republic. More specifically I am referring to the section of the myth of Er that extends between 614a and 617d and I will discuss the parts that in my view are absolutely relevant to what I call Plato’s choral theater.