Situation-Drama:

In Greek the word character is denoted by ethos (guiding beliefs or ideals that characterize a community, nation or ideology).  Aristotle (in Poetics, 335 BC) identifies character but claims it is only one of many elements of Athenian tragedy.  A character was not a fictional person but the quality of the person reacting to situations, he who reveals decisions.  It is possible to have stories without characters since “character” involves demonstrating the ethical choice of those performing. If this is not done the story is devoid of character.  He argued for the primacy of plot over character; tragedy is a representation of action & life; happiness & unhappiness lie in action; in the end life is about action, not a quality.  People are of a certain sort (according to character), but happy or unhappy according to action.  Actors do not perform to represent character, but include character for the sake of their actions.  Psychological & ethical considerations are secondary to events; he focuses all of his attention on the plot, leaving the characters as conveyors of situations rather than humans with convictions & motives, the canvas on which the dramatist paints his plot.

 

synchronously:

occurring at the same time; coinciding in time; contemporaneous; simultaneous

 

discountenance:

to show disapproval of something

 

apogee:

the highest or most distant point; climax.

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votive offerings:

objects displayed or deposited, without the intention of recovery or use, in a sacred place for broadly religious purposes; generally made in order to gain favor with supernatural forces; the Athenian Treasury was a building in Athens to hold its own votive offerings in money & precious metal as well as votive sculptures, all intended to glorify the city as well as to give thanks to the gods.

 

Demetrius of Alopece:

Greek sculptor (early 4th century BC) famed for the lifelike realism of his statues.  Especially notable was his portrait of Pellichus (a Corinthian general) with a fat paunch, bald head & bulging veins in a cloak leaving him half exposed, his hair flowing in the wind.  Admired by Lucian, a Hellenized Syrian satirist & rhetorician of the 2nd century AD Roman Empire.  He was contrasted with Cresilas, an idealizing sculptor of the generation before.

 

Middle Comedy:

style of drama in Athens 400 to 320 BC; preoccupied with social themes, represents a transition from Old Comedy (which had presented literary, political & philosophical commentary interspersed with scurrilous personal invective) moving towards New Comedy (characterized by its gently satiric observation of contemporary domestic life).  Examples of this genre are Aristophanes’ last play, the Plutus.  Famous Middle Comedy dramatists include Antiphanes & Alexis (none of their plays survived).

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somatic:

of the body; bodily; physical (and by contrast not psychological or of the mind)

 

physiognomically…dumb…corporal…nude:

denoting the face or countenance as an index to character; Spengler is referring to the masked actors in Greek drama; the masks are silent, and though physical they show no other traces such as characteristic ornament or emotion.