Introduction: Pantomime, A Lost Chord of Ancient Culture
In a broad contextualization of ancient pantomime within cultural history, the reasons for the importance of research into ancient pantomime are explored: it represents a lost aesthetic of profound and widespread influence in ancient imperial culture; it played, quantitatively speaking, a more important role in educating the majority of inhabitants of the Roman empire in mythology than, for example, recitations of poetry; it was the main medium in which the prestigious tradition of classical tragedy was kept alive in the theatres of the Roman empire; it played a seminal role in the emergence of classical ballet, and subsequently, in the twentieth century, of avant‐garde Tanztheater (dance theatre). The theatrical spaces and the musical accompaniments (provided by the chorus and the hydraulis), of pantomime are given detailed attention. The hostile response that aspects of the perfomance: the dancer, his mask and the music, evoked from the Church Fathers and the place of pantomime in their rhetoric of anti‐theatricalism is also briefly explored.
Keywords: pantomime, dance, ballet, mask, music, hydraulis, rhetoric, anti‐theatricalism, Church Father, Roman empire, theatre
Oxford Scholarship Online requires a subscription or purchase to access the full text of books within the service. Public users can however freely search the site and view the abstracts and keywords for each book and chapter.
Please, subscribe or login to access full text content.
If you think you should have access to this title, please contact your librarian.
To troubleshoot, please check our FAQs , and if you can't find the answer there, please contact us .