This book explores the many productions and festivals of classical drama that were staged in the ancient theatres of Greece and Spain from the 1860s to the 1970s. Because so much of the twentieth century was marked by dictatorships and authoritarian rule, it provides a fascinating and comprehensive account of how classical plays were co-opted by authoritarian regimes and placed in the service of various right-wing political ideologies, both to shape visions of national identities and aesthetics and to create a collective heritage linked to a perceived glorious ancient past. The book is impressive in its depth and scope. B. examines a broad and exciting range of archives and materials – which include ministerial reports and decisions, personal correspondence, newspaper articles and reviews, tourist brochures and archaeological reports – to reveal the broader cultural, financial and political contexts at play in each country and the way in which these intersected with a desire to stage classical drama in ancient Greek and Roman theatres. Though the title references only Greece and Spain, B.’s account also analyses the rise of productions and festivals of classical theatre in Italy and France – and across the southern Mediterranean, in broad chronological order and in five phases that structure the book’s five chapters.
One of the book’s strengths is its thorough grounding in archival research. From the outset B. outlines the advantages of conducting performance and theatrical history from the archive, accentuating the uncovered stories that it enables, ones that furthermore offer a more nuanced examination of how ancient Greek and Roman heritage was manufactured and managed in these two countries and beyond. His account, for example, reveals Spain’s interest in nationalising its Roman past, and how Seneca, who was born in Roman Córdoba, was reconceived as a national author. To celebrate the legalisation of divorce in the country in 1931, for example, Seneca’s Medea was staged a year later in a translation by famed writer Miguel de Unamuno. In 1953, when the Roman theatre of Mérida was re-inaugurated, it was through a performance of Seneca’s Phaedra. B.’s account illuminates how this nationalisation of Roman art was linked with the Spanish Golden Age, an act that later empowered supporters of the dictator Francisco Franco to employ classical drama to articulate Catholic values. In Greece the ancient past was not only co-opted by modern Greeks but also by invading Germans, who celebrated their might through performances of Sophocles, who in their view was an ‘Aryan’ author. In Axis-occupied Athens the National Theatre successfully staged Sophocles’ Antigone in June 1941 in a modern Greek production that was attended by collaborationist prime minister Georgios Tsolakoglou and other Greek intellectuals as well as members of German and Italian military authorities. The production was received so enthusiastically that it was even broadcast on national radio in Germany. The book’s five chapters feature similar fascinating stories that emerge from B.’s meticulous scrutiny of multiple archives.
The first two chapters examine the emerging interest in classical theatre from the nineteenth century into the first quarter of the twentieth, emphasising how ancient monuments were transformed into sites of heritage, nostalgia and modern national identity. Chapter 1 is concerned with the way in which these classical venues functioned as lieux de mémoire, evoking national history and stimulating collective memory of a glorious past. After discussing the influential 1869 Chorégies d’Orange festival in France, B. highlights how tourism and a desire to invent a collective tradition propelled a newly unified Italy to repurpose ancient theatres. He draws attention to how Spain and Greece followed the Sicilian model that coupled heritage and tourism in Syracuse, and how plans for the excavations of ancient theatres took place amidst discussions of reusing these venues for tourism. Chapter 2 focuses on the 1920s and 1930s, when efforts doubled to develop ancient theatres as sites of national heritage and tourism amidst increasing socio-political instability. In his study of the Delphic festivals from 1927 to 1930, in which the American dancer Isadora Duncan played a prominent role, B. unveils ‘an experiential view of classical culture’ reliant on the escape that the Greek landscape offered to those seeking to flee temporarily the pressures of modern society (p. 35). The chapter emphasises how in the interwar period ancient theatres became political and ideological spaces, controlled by various agents keen to produce a new aesthetic that reflected European, national and/or universal values.
Chapter 3 turns to the late 1930s and 40s, when the political use of classical drama is consolidated within Fascist and ultra-nationalist contexts. Central to the chapter is the contention that performances of classical drama were ‘thanatopolitical technologies which produce new collective narratives that expose the public to death and operations of power’ (p. 77). B. mobilises Giorgio Agamben’s concept of thanatopolitics to illustrate how these festivals and plays were themselves mechanisms for control, shaping people’s realities while articulating a strong vision of the nation. The chapter charts legislative reforms aimed at censoring and controlling theatre, many of which were inspired by the cultural aesthetics of Mussolini’s Italy, which valorised Romanità. This chapter also discusses how Greek investment in the physical remains of antiquity increased with German occupation and involvement, whereas in Spain productions cohered with Franco’s call towards a national Catholicism. In the latter case this memorably included a 1946 adaptation of Sophocles’ Antigone by José María Pemán, which recast the ancient heroine as a humble Christian woman who sacrifices herself to preserve her family’s moral values.
The fourth and fifth chapters cover the 1950s to the mid-1970s. Chapter 4 examines how the creation of the Spanish Ministry of Information and Tourism and the Greek National Tourism Organization in the 1950s enabled dramatic festivals to proliferate and multiply by showcasing ancient architectural sites as monuments of ancestral and national pride. The book’s comparative mode accentuates the different trajectories of archaeological tourism in each country and their overall impact: in Greece these festivals formed a key part of the country’s international and national image whereas in Spain they functioned as a tool for unifying the population and introducing them to new European artistic trends. The chapter also emphasises the commercial interests at play around newly discovered ancient sites, which encouraged the rapid development of infrastructure to make them accessible to tourists. When the Roman theatre at Málaga was discovered in 1951, it was quickly redeveloped as a modern theatrical venue eight years later; the discovery of the theatre of Dodona inspired similar actions. In both cases ancient drama and the festivals around them became products for tourist consumption while functioning as emblems of cosmopolitan tastes. Chapter 5 focuses on the authoritarian intervention of the dictatorial regimes in Greece and Spain in the 1960s and the mid-1970s, when public enthusiasm decreased. Governmental reforms placed restrictions on artistic expression in Greece, which led to Festival modifications and cancellations. In Greece a production of Electra in 1969 featured costumes designed by Pavlos Mantoudis that resembled Balkan clothing, which were deemed inappropriate. When Mantoudis refused to change them, the play was initially cancelled until he agreed to replace them with more ‘suitable’ ones.
Overall, the book showcases how festivals of ancient drama in Greece and Spain operated at the nexus of various ideological and political axes, reflecting and articulating varying socio-political realities from the late nineteenth century to the 1970s. B.’s account convincingly reveals the various parallels between Spain and Greece in their manufacturing and management of the ancient past, and the advantages of treating the two countries together through careful scrutiny of archival material. The book should be essential reading for scholars and students interested in political appropriations of classical texts (especially under authoritarianism), in the history and emergence of large-scale contemporary festivals of classical drama and in the modern performance reception of Greek and Roman drama.
