Of Greats, Greeks ...and Goats

The serial disruptors who broke their backs working the thin stony soil pictured in the photo below probably named one of their many innovations ‘Tragedy’ ('the song of the goat') because someone with a highly developed sense of humour thought that the wailing, woe-struck characters and choruses sounded like the goats they heard bleating on these same rocky hillsides morning, noon and star-heavy night. Thin soil made for fine soldiers back then, because you had to look to other peoples’ land to fill your larders, and a couple of hundred years later these same fierce and fiercely inquisitive people conquered the known world (as it was known then). Their leader was a young rich kid from Macedonia, the rockiest region of this rocky country. And everywhere he travelled the young Alexander took a jewelled casket that he’d acquired in battle from the previous ‘King of the Then Known World,’ the Persian Emperor Darius III. This casket contained Alexander’s most precious possession, and we are told that he slept with it by his side every night. In West End terms it contained the book and lyrics for a ten-hour through-sung touring production that had played to packed Houses across the country for hundreds of years (eat your heart out Cameron and Andrew) and was known on the road as Homer’s The Iliad. Okay, it is a war story, and Alex was something of a legendary bruiser (and boozer). And yes in the story the Greeks eventually beat the Trojans -but it’s not what you’d call a 'happy' ending for either side. So what was the real appeal to Alexander? This special copy of the Iliad had been given to Alexander by his teacher, and contained his teacher, Aristotle’s, own notes on the text. The great philosopher (some would call Ari ‘The Greatest’) had been appointed as tutor when Alexander was thirteen, and had taught the young thug (no-one messed with young Alex) medicine, philosophy, morals, religion, logic, and art. But of course we know Aristotle best as the author of the oldest surviving book on dramatic theory (The Poetics) in which he nails down ‘the song of the goat’ and describes the components needed to draw audiences in, engage their emotions, and send them out with a greater understanding of their own humanity.

We’ll never know the extent to which the Aristotle-annotated Iliad inspired, informed and sustained Alexander on his insatiable pursuit of travel and conquest. We do know that his march into Asia spread Greek culture, including theatre, as far as India and Afghanistan. But this wasn’t all one-way-traffic (think West End and Broadway). In exchange for epics and plays (and epic plays) Europe and the Mediterranean were introduced to Eastern religious culture and the non-violent, compassionate ideas that would form the gentle bedrock of Christianity (and, much more importantly, dramatically increase the range of emotions, characters and characterisation that could be portrayed …uh, dramatically). So when you do go back to the theatre, spare a thought for Aristotle and the others who carried the song of the goat all the way from these rocky hillsides to the concrete cash cows of Shaftesbury Avenue. But whatever you do, DON’T accidentally step on the toes of the diminutive young man, with the fiery eyes, sitting next to you…