In discussing my next book, which I’ll begin working on shortly, I wrote:
I’m going to pick one of the Old or Middle Comedy poets – I’m thinking Kratinos or Kinesias, but might go with Philexenos or Sannyrion; another possibility is to pick a Magna Graecian playwright, but alas they are not as well known these days – and put, in the words of Luke the Evangelist, “οἶνον νέον εἰς ἀσκοὺς παλαιούς.” That is to say, I am going to take the meager fragments, synopses, scholia, and play titles that have come down to us, and weave them into weird hybrid productions, plays that, while incorporating all of this ancient source material, will tell entirely new Starry Bull myths. A Bacchic Orphic bricolage collaboration across the centuries, if you will.
Well, I am a fickle bastard and couldn’t decide which one playwright I wanted to poetically resurrect – so instead I’m going to pick seven! The book is going to be called:
Hilarious Tragedies: 7 Fragmentary Plays Reimagined
And the source material I’ll be adapting is:
- Dionysalexandros by Kratinos
- The Cretans by Euripides
- Amphitryon by Rhinthon
- Kinesias by Strattis
- Sardanapalus by Sannyrion
- The New York Goose Play by the Tarporley or Dolon Painter
- The Vindemiatores by Quintus Novius
I chose these pretty much at random, but I’m already noticing some interesting recurring themes, such as disguise and blurring identities. I’ll probably do brief explanatory notes, discussing what we know of the author, the degree of preservation of their work and how I’ve developed and or deviated from that. I don’t know how thorough I’ll be, and doubt I’ll provide annotations for the texts themselves – but if any of my works warrant that it’ll probably be this one. So I just might!
I’m pretty excited about this project. While a lot of my work is very metatheatrical and I’ve written a number of plays (a couple of which have even been performed!) this is on quite another level. I really hope I’m able to shift between the different voices and successfully stitch their words into my own, while telling engaging stories that can be appreciated on their own apart from all of the literary hocus pocus and legerdemain. And to top it off I’ll be doing it live (but most assuredly not without a net!) in front of a paying audience. Could I possibly put more pressure and expectation on myself?!?
Will He Deliver? Stay Tuned To Find Out!
