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A couple days ago, I mentioned the purchase of a book called Forms of Verse: British and American by Sara deFord and Clarinda Harriss Lott. (I did not cite any information beyond the title, sans subtitle, so you didn't miss anything.) When I was reading, I came upon an interesting vocabulary term associated with the concluding sentence of Sir Walter Raleigh's History of the World, quoted below for convenience:
This segment of "rhythmical prose" appears on pg. 4 of Forms of Verse, with stresses and pauses marked. It is part of the introduction to rhythm and meter that makes up the first chapter of the book. However, in one of the following paragraphs describing features of the sentence, the authors state that, "since Raleigh addresses the personified Death, [he utilizes] the rhetorical figure of APOSTROPHE." (5)
This use of the term "apostrophe" startled me. I soon turned to the glossary, however, and found it there defined as
However, I suspect that a more detailed etymology would require mention of Greek plays. (Note the "I suspect". The remainder of this entry is pure speculation.)
(Incidentally, "speculation" comes from the Latin "specere" ("to look, look at"), by means of "specula" ("watchtower") and ... err ... never mind.)
Last year, I attended an "Intro to Drama" class at the University of Maryland. In that class, around the start of the semester, we studied two Greek plays, "Oedipus Rex" and "Lysistrata". (Incidentally, the latter is one of the bawdiest plays of all time. Be warned.) In reading the stage directions, quite frequently the following pair of words arise: "strophe" and "antistrophe". These terms are stage directions for the chorus in the play; the strophe and antistrophe refer to turns in opposite directions as the chorus sings its lines. In fact, in the later plays (and "Lysistrata" is among these) there are sometimes a pair of choruses, and each addresses the other: one during the strophe, the other during the antistrophe.
Therefore, it is my suspicion that "apostrophe" came from the Greek plays, and was a direction for either a chorus or a player to address someone off-stage, or to address some non-person concept, off the stage.
A fascinating word indeed.
O eloquent, just, and mighty Death! whom none could advise, thou hast persuaded; what none hath dared, thou hast done; and whom all the world hath flattered, thou only hast cast out of the world and despised; thou hast drawn together all the far-stretched greatness, all the pride, cruelty, and ambition of man, and covered it all over with these two narrow words, Hic jacet!
This segment of "rhythmical prose" appears on pg. 4 of Forms of Verse, with stresses and pauses marked. It is part of the introduction to rhythm and meter that makes up the first chapter of the book. However, in one of the following paragraphs describing features of the sentence, the authors state that, "since Raleigh addresses the personified Death, [he utilizes] the rhetorical figure of APOSTROPHE." (5)
This use of the term "apostrophe" startled me. I soon turned to the glossary, however, and found it there defined as
a figure of rhetoric in which an address is made to someone not present, or to an abstraction[.] (310)Subsequent examination of the Merriam-Webster Online definition of apostrophe and the Wikipedia "Apostrophe" entry confirmed this, as well as offering the etymology; the word is derived from the Greek "apo" ("away from") and "strephein" ("to turn"), and therefore literally means "to turn away".
However, I suspect that a more detailed etymology would require mention of Greek plays. (Note the "I suspect". The remainder of this entry is pure speculation.)
(Incidentally, "speculation" comes from the Latin "specere" ("to look, look at"), by means of "specula" ("watchtower") and ... err ... never mind.)
Last year, I attended an "Intro to Drama" class at the University of Maryland. In that class, around the start of the semester, we studied two Greek plays, "Oedipus Rex" and "Lysistrata". (Incidentally, the latter is one of the bawdiest plays of all time. Be warned.) In reading the stage directions, quite frequently the following pair of words arise: "strophe" and "antistrophe". These terms are stage directions for the chorus in the play; the strophe and antistrophe refer to turns in opposite directions as the chorus sings its lines. In fact, in the later plays (and "Lysistrata" is among these) there are sometimes a pair of choruses, and each addresses the other: one during the strophe, the other during the antistrophe.
Therefore, it is my suspicion that "apostrophe" came from the Greek plays, and was a direction for either a chorus or a player to address someone off-stage, or to address some non-person concept, off the stage.
A fascinating word indeed.
Into the community, into the Abyss...
I'm a somewhat reluctant Aristophanes fan myself. I repspect the Old Comedy format, believe that he was darn good at it, and want to appreciate his grasp of it, only it's a little bit.. No, it's a LOT harder to grasp biting political commentary and wordplay in translated ancient Greek than it is a timless tragedy (say, the Oedipus Trilogy). Aristophanes can come off as so dry and incomprehensible in some places, and so bawdy in others. I just picked up my copy of his plays the other day and am starting to read through them from beginning to end, slowly and carefully.
Lysistrata is probably his most famous, and most accessible. A war and a sex strike are things that come through to modern times, attacks on the sophist movement and Cleon the ruler are not so simple. I haven't gotten to re-reading Lysistrata yet, but I do recall one scene where the leader of the women is dealing with a lot of her underlings pleading that they're pregnant and asking to go home, and she thumps one on the stomach and hears a metal sound, meaning the girl is carrying her helmet under there. ::snickers:: And that's just such a great image.
An interesting side note to the production of Greek Comedy: while they were engaging in biting, sophisticated political commentary, the members of the chorus and other players were usually outfitted in riduculous, characiture masks, and giant fake phalluses. I guess if you don't laught at one, you'll laugh at the other. A good afternoon's entertainment in Athens.
Re: Into the community, into the Abyss...
I'm afraid Lysistrata is the only Aristophanes I've read, but I don't doubt that he's good. I wonder: whose translations would you recommend for Aristophanes? I've only read the one from my class textbook, and in that one the translator gave all the Spartans heavy American-Southern accents. I suspect that it is not the preferred one.
I did hear about the phalluses, though. Supposedly, a lot of the performances of the play were surrounded by controversy because of that aspect of the play.
Re: Into the community, into the Abyss...
The editor of the book seems to prefer B. B. Rogers. But there are other translations used from R. H. Webb, Jack Lindsay (one of his is Lysistrata) and Moses Hadas (the editor himself).
Re: Into the community, into the Abyss...