S4, Episode 5: Choral Deception in Sophocles’ Philoctetes

[00:00:00] Nicolas: Hi, and welcome back to Musings in Greek Literature, Season 4, Episode 5. I’m Nicolas Larimer, your host for this episode, and I’m joined today by Zach Springer as co host. In this episode, we will examine the choral stazamon in Sophocles Philoctetes and the elements of pity and deception present in the stazamon.

There’s only one choral stazamon in the Philoctetes, and it occurs from lines 676 to 729. We will begin today’s podcast episode by discussing Sophoclesian choruses broadly, and the more specifically two passages from the Stasimont in the Philictetes. We will compare the pity and empathy exhibited by the chorus in the first two selections with the deceit exhibited in the last section.

We will conclude with a broader discussion of Odysseus’s character and how Sophocles portrays it differently in the Ajax and the Philictetes. To start, let’s address the characteristics of the chorus in Sophocles and Tragedy. In the Poetics, Aristotle tells us that the chorus should be considered more an actor, and as such, should play an important part in the action, as opposed to being unimportant to the plot, which Aristotle accuses a lot of the later playwrights of doing.

Aristotle describes these choruses as Sophoclean. This is especially true in the Philoctetes, where we see the chorus takes an active role in an attempt to deceive Philoctetes. Not only are they just an inactive observer observing the deceit, but they really have that, that integral role as kind of the underlings of Odysseus.

Is there anything you want to say, Zach?

[00:01:25] Zach: Yeah, Sophocles has this particular Uh, way of, um, integrating the chorus into the, uh, this tragedies and you’ve, you’ve hit that very well. So, yes,

[00:01:36] Nicolas: yes, thanks. Yeah. And, uh, you know, we, uh, we’ve already kind of started talking about deception here and deceit, which is definitely it.

very important part of the Philoctetes, especially in contrast to how we see Odysseus’s character generally. But before we continue on with that discussion of deception, I think we should, uh, examine maybe the very beginning of this choral episode where we see the chorus as more of an empathetic character.

Um, so in the, in the class when I was teaching it, I had everyone read the first 10 lines of the Stasman, which is line 676 through 686. I mean, in these lines, we kind of see a comparison of the suffering of Philoctetes to Ixion on its wheel. Um, and then I, I’m going to pick an even shorter segment today.

We’re not going to do all of 676 through 686, but I really want to focus in on line 681 through 686. And in this, Zach will first read the Greek for you, followed by an English translation by Ian Johnston.

[00:02:58] Zach: Out, out

in on.

But from all I’ve seen and all that, but from all I’ve heard and seen, I know no other mortal man who’s running to a fate as harsh as has locked it to use a man who did no wrong to anyone by thievery or violence. But acted fairly towards those who treated him respectfully, and then without deserving it, he was abandoned here to die.

[00:03:51] Nicolas: basis of these couple of lines, we see that Ixion is being justly punished for his actions against Hera. Whereas Philoctetes, he seems to suffer this fate that’s harsher than what any other mortal seems to suffer. And the chorus is saying very directly, um, they say, Oida, Cluon, Ood, Esedon, Moirai, right?

They’ve seen, um, no Alan, Ootenna, no other, right, who suffered a fate, Exeoni, uh, like, more hateful than Philoctetes has. And that’s Uh, no one is nocturne. So we get like a nice genitive, uh, there, uh, a partitive genitive, like no other of all of the mortals, right? So you really get this kind of isolation of phylactides of most mortal people as suffering this incredibly harsh punishment.

And then we, directly after that, uh, are told, Isois honor, right? But he’s a, he’s a man who is a sauce. He’s, he’s equal. He’s just two Isois, two other men who are just an equal, right? So it’s this idea of fairness, right? It really brings in this idea that this punishment is, is not fair to Phil, like tdi.

Right? And then the last line there in the Greek that we read, it really kind of sums all this up, especially the word an iNOS, right? Which your, your adverb, that just means like unworthy. It’s, it’s an alpha pri of Axios, right? So it’s this undeservedly, he is destroyed, right? He’s been left here to die on this island.

For no good reason, right? And that really brings out this pitiful, um, and empathetic feeling that the, uh, the chorus is feeling towards Philoctetes. They’ve seen him destroyed, destroyed by their own, uh, leader, Odysseus, right? Um, so, so there’s really this kind of Feeling of empathy towards his suffering that we see and how, how pitiable his situation is.

Is there anything you’d like to add, Zach?

[00:05:57] Zach: Uh, yes. Just that, uh, the, uh, the chorus is pretty explicit with the, uh, the, uh, and that the oxes neither. Did any wrong or robbed anyone. It’s like, I think it’s literally did, he neither did any violence or robbed anyone, uh, this, this sort of sense. Um, so he’s like, he’s an innocent man, right?

It isn’t just that he’s, uh, suffered unjustly, but he’s, he’s innocent. And it’s very clear that the chorus on account of this, uh, is. Uh, kind of showing compassion to him or, you know, um, what is it having a kind of petty on him through their words here. So, um, so, yeah.

[00:06:49] Nicolas: Yeah, certainly, and I think that if we go all the way back to the section that I did cut out for the brevity here.

But the very, very beginning of this stasmod, we’re, we’re told Ixion’s crime, right? Ixion is described as the man approaching to the, the, the bed of, uh, of Zeus, right? So you get this, uh, very worthy punishment, right? Ixion suffers this horrible punishment, but he’s worthy of it, right? And then directly afterwards we’re told, but there’s one other man that suffers a punishment like this, right?

And that’s Philoctetes, right? And then directly after that, we get this exactly what you just said. But Philoctetes, Philoctetes is innocent, right? He has harmed no other man, right? He’s unworthy of this punishment, right? So I think that that’s a, that’s an excellent thing right there that we like kind of, that’s been brought out that you, uh, have this incredible comparison kind of, right?

That really emphasize, emphasizes the, uh, the necessary for empathy in the audience and in the chorus. And I think that we see this play out even furthermore, kind of with the, uh, the change up of Neoptolemus after kind of witnessing this, this pitiable state of the Lactides, right? It, this, this brings out empathy in the audience, the chorus, and in Neoptolemus.

Um, so now I kind of want to go on and I want to look at a very different passage. Um, we’re going to go all the way to the end of the Sazamon where the chorus After having spoken for almost the entire stasmon in an empathetic way, saying, I don’t even know how Philoctetes could have survived here, listening to the waves all alone with nobody to help him, they now suddenly switch up in a antistrophe beta, which is lines 719 through 729, and they, they attempt to kind of deceive Philoctetes, playing their role as the henchman of Odysseus.

So I’ll, I’ll, uh, first read the Greek here and then I’ll read a short English translation, um, once again by Ian Johnston Nun.

Pontaporoi durati plethe. Polon meinon, patrion alge pros aulon. Meliadon numfan. Sperceiutepar. Ox Ice Hawk Haw Hospice on Air.

P. P Ika Who Bear Oxone. But now, with all these troubles past, he’ll find success and happiness. He’s met a noble family son who’ll take him, after all this time, abroad his own seaworthy boat and sail to his ancestral home, the place where nymphs of mollusk dwell, along Sperkaeus riverbanks, where high up on Oisha’s heights, that bronze shielded warrior rose up and moved up to the gods blaze in his own father’s sacred fire.

So here we kind of get this, this claimed by the chorus out loud, right? That the son of Achilles, you know, Ptolemus, right? Is going to take, uh, Philoctetes home. He’s going to take him to the place where the nymphs of mollusk dwell, where Oetas high, uh, to, to where the bronze shielded warriors, that’s Heracles, right?

He, he rose up to the gods, right? Which is a direct tie back to how Philoctetes got the bow, right? He got the bow of Heracles by lighting the fire, um, the fire that, uh, the funeral pyre for Heracles. And there’s a very direct shift here, right? What we read at the very beginning of this choral stasimon, and what continued all the way until this very ending part, was the chorus empathizing for Philoctetes.

And now it almost seems like they’re still showing empathy for Philoctetes, right? They’re still lamenting his suffering and how he’s so lucky that he’s met Neoptolemus because now he’ll be so blessed as to go home. And so it seems to continue on a very base level with this empathy. But then it has to be considered that the chorus is cognizant of the plan to deceive Philoctetes.

They, they know that he doesn’t actually go home. That’s not actually the plan. The plan is either to just take his bow and leave him there or to take him with them to Troy. But the plan is not to take Philoctetes home. So it kind of brings into question how this purposeful deceit, while you’re also feeling pity for somebody, how it, how it.

I think it certainly impacts how the audience sees the events. Um, I think it, in the end, it impacts Neoptolemus, who’s kind of this wavering character. And I think the chorus almost embodies this wavering ness that is so important to Neoptolemus character, in that Neoptolemus at first wants to act, uh, heroically.

Then he’s kind of taken into this plot of deceit by Odysseus as his teacher, right? But then we see he witnesses the suffering of Philoctetes until suddenly he feels so bad about it that he gives back the arrows, right? So, uh, I certainly think this kind of wavering ness between purposeful deceit while still feeling bad for somebody plays a really integral role in how we’re supposed to and how we can read deception within the Philoctetes broadly.

Um, is there anything that you want to say, Zach?

[00:12:40] Zach: Uh, yes, just, uh, it’s interesting to note maybe that the chorus like Neo Ptolemus himself may be kind of caught in the middle of this conflict that we’ve discussed in class between, uh, as it were, the hyper rational deceptive. uh, type in Odysseus and the kind of hyper emotional, uh, type in, uh, Vlachtis himself.

So in this way, the chorus is sort of channeling both, as you say, pity and, uh, deception. And but what I think is particularly interesting here to note is just that the chorus, as they express Empathy and pity for, um, philoctetes and, uh, express deception, right, by kind of saying, Oh, these troubles are past, he’ll find success and happiness, et cetera, et cetera.

When they know this isn’t the case because of the oracle. Um, it, I think it’d be good to keep in mind that the course is composed of the sailors under the command of Odysseus, right? And while they’re expressing a certain empathy for him here, there’s a kind of surreal quality to this second, uh, Stasovan, um, or this, uh, Antistrophe B, I think, because as you say, they’re kind of simultaneously channeling pity and deception, where they seem to be relieved that it seems that, uh, Bloch Tetis suffering is over.

But at the same time, they know that what they’re saying isn’t actually true, because As you say, either his bow or and or himself will have to be dragged to Troy to end the war. Um, so, uh, so yeah, I just, I think that that’s kind of important to know that there’s this kind of surreal, uh, quality to this, um, to this ancestry here.

[00:14:29] Nicolas: Oh, yeah. And I think that’s definitely kind of part of choral episodes as a whole, right? That’s kind of what they give us. We have this idea that Aristotle told us at the very beginning, right? He presented his idea that the chorus should be more. Involved in kind of being an actor, right? They should have a larger play, a larger role in the plot of the tragedy, right?

Which Aristotle does say is more Sophoclean and we get that here, definitely, but they’re still somewhat removed, right? They’re not one of the three actors, right? They, they, they are still this group of people that have a very, very different kind of lamentation and a very different meter than the dialogue, right?

So we get this separate, it is separate in this way, and it’s kind of still removed. It’s closer to being not fully removed in, I think, the Philippines than other places. But I think that that gives it this surreal quality, right? This, this removal from being one of the actors. They’re not actually, and they are involved in being under the, the crew, right?

They’re not one of the people that are in charge that is making this decision. They’re still kind of an observer and an actor simultaneously. I think for sure, it gives it that surreal quality. And yeah, now I just kind of want to, um, talk about how. We can see this idea of, I don’t want to call it deceit, but more so Odysseus character on a whole within both the Ajax and the Philoctetes, right?

So in the Ajax we see Odysseus portrayed in his usual kind of clever, wily way, right? He’s many minded. Um, in the Philoctetes we see, This incredibly rational and almost, uh, emotionless character, right? He, he doesn’t feel the same empathy when witnessing the suffering of Philoctetes that Neoptolemus seems to feel or that the chorus seems to feel here, right?

And you also have him almost as the villain of it, right? Because we, we know this entire time, while we’re witnessing this suffering, this suffering is being portrayed. The chorus is describing the misery of Philoctetes life. We know that this misery is caused by Odysseus. Odysseus is the one that, that left him there, right?

The Odysseus and the Atreides. Which really kind of puts a slant on how we see Odysseus character. Odysseus character throughout the entire play, I think. And it’s interesting because in one case, the Ajax, right, Odysseus character seems to be to his benefit. It seems to help that he is Kind of clever and trickery tricky, right?

It allows him to see past these harsh, uh, these harsh ideas of the Atreidei to leave Ajax unburied, right? It allows him to see past when Athena says, Oh, it’s nice to laugh in the face of your enemies, isn’t it? Right? He, he looks at Ajax’s suffering and says, why no, I actually see my own suffering here. I see myself in this.

I feel like this could be me, right? It allows him to kind of see past this. very kind of, I don’t want to say low, but this almost, uh, more mortal way of thinking. Right. Um, but then in the Philoketes, he’s still portrayed as like a clever and kind of wily character. Right. But, I’d certainly say that it’s in a very bad sense, right?

He’s, he’s deceitful. He, he seems to not care about how he’s affecting people. He, he straight up says, you know, the ends justify the means. Um, so I think, you know, and I think that this juxtaposition kind of empathy in the chorus, right? Deceit in the chorus, right? This lack of empathy in Odysseus. The deceit of Odysseus, right?

It really kind of pushes the deceit to a, to a negative. side, right? Which is already important when you’re thinking about the whole play kind of, it’s a little bit of a question of how, how is the right way to approach it, right? In the end, I think, uh, uh, Luke in our class, he brought up that Odysseus was right in a way, right?

The, the, they couldn’t take the arms by force. They couldn’t persuade, uh, Philoctetes. In some ways, the only thing that actually works is deceit. It might work. It came the closest to where it got the bow. Phenphylactides. If Neopolymas hadn’t kind of, um, felt really bad for Philoctetes and given the bow back, they would have made off with it and the fall of Troy would have occurred there.

It did, but they only kind of accomplish this through a deus ex machina, right? So it really does bring into question, is deceit the right choice? But then it’s also being painted in such a negative light that I think that’s a really hard argument to make. So that’s just a, that’s at least my thoughts on how the Philoketes and the Ajax seem to be talking about Odysseus character.

I don’t know if there’s anything you really want to add in here, Zach?

[00:19:38] Zach: Uh, yeah, just that It may be that the crucial difference between the Odysseus of the Ajax and the Odysseus of the Thalaptites is the character of humility or the characteristic of humility because in the opening lines of the Ajax, Odysseus very famously says, we are all adrift.

Right. We don’t know how to make proper judgments. So we should really, uh, exercise kind of this pity towards others that he does. So in the case of Ajax, allow them to be buried later when he appeals to Menelaus and so on. Um, but that humility is not present in the Odysseus. So the philoctetes, it seems that the Odysseus of the philoctetes thinks that he can freely, uh, manipulate.

human events as if she were a god. Uh, and it may be that there’s a reading here where Sopocles is criticizing this view and says at the end by the deus ex machina of the appearance of Heracles that in fact what Odysseus was seeking to do, um, wasn’t Uh, possible for merely human actors, but you need a, a God to actually impact the, uh, kind of result that Odysseus was seeking to affect, right?

Um, anyway, so this is just what occurs to me is that, uh, The, uh, Odysseus of the HX has this kind of humility that kind of, uh, leads him to be more empathetic in the Odysseus of the Phylactices, um, doesn’t really have that. And as kind of a last note, uh, I, I find it interesting that the chorus is in C.

Kind of indicates, uh, that they have quality, uh, in the phylactates that, um, Odysseus lacks, even though they are Odysseus henchmen, right? Um, indicating that they’re kind of caught in the middle, maybe, kind of like Neotolomus himself, right? Between kind of the manipulative demands of Odysseus and, uh, then also the suffering of phylactates and his appeals for help.

So, well, anyway, those are my thoughts.

[00:21:39] Nicolas: No, yeah, I certainly agree with that. The, the, the aspect of Odysseus is kind of the, the removed manipulator, which I think almost comes into more effect when we think about the fact that he’s absent for most of the first part of the tragedy, right? We have.

Neoptolemus acting for him. It’s not necessarily a god like interaction at the beginning, but there is something I think to him kind of giving this order to Neoptolemus and giving him kind of a, almost a quest, right? He’s telling him, go and go and accomplish this for me, right? And I’m going to stand back here and not take any part in it, but I’m telling you how to do it, why you need to do it, I’m going to tell you to go do it, you know what I mean?

And he is then kind of removed from the action for a bit. Which I think gives him this very, like, removed, stance where he is just kind of manipulating everything in this very broad sense, almost a divine sense. And I certainly think that he doesn’t have that same kind of removed quality in the Ajax. He is much, much more human.

He, he, and I think that’s part of the idea of when he’s talking to Athena at the beginning, and he doesn’t feel that same kind of desire to laugh in the face of his enemy’s suffering, right? Because he sees himself in this kind of humble human position where that might be him tomorrow. So yeah, just to close out the discussion today.

I’d like to kind of just recap what we’ve said. Um, so we first examined the, the very beginning of the Coral Scasmon, um, where we saw this very empathetic view of the chorus. We saw them comparing the suffering of Philoctetes to the punishment of Ixion. And then we saw them very clearly make the distinction, um, between Philoctetes suffering unjustly and Ixion suffering for a crime that he’s committed.

And Um, and then from there we read at the very end, uh, Antistrophe Beta, where we see Philoctetes being convinced by the chorus that he’s gonna, well, we don’t, uh, there’s actually a lot of debate on whether Philoctetes is there to witness it, but either way we see the chorus, um, saying that Philoctetes will be going home.

Which, they know is not the case, so they’re at least speaking deceptively, whether it’s for the audience, or philictetes, or anyone. But at the end, we then kind of talked about how this contrast between empathy and deceit characterizes deceit within the philictetes, and how this allows us to view differently Odysseus character, Neagex, and the philictetes.

So now I just want to talk a little bit about my, uh, my time teaching. Uh, the class, uh, I really felt like it was a, it was a definitely experience that I’m not sure I’ve ever had before. Um, I was not necessarily sure how I was going to balance kind of running a lead, uh, a leading discussion where I, I was leading the class to a conclusion that I kind of, uh, wanted to argue and wanted to talk about and that I was reading in the text while still allowing the class to come to their own ideas, to, to argue what they wanted.

And to, to be able to defend them with the text, which was really my main goal, really wanted to kind of go through these passages that I chose and see where the class took them. And we, we did come to different conclusions, a lot of people in the class. And it was really good, I think, to see how people kind of defend their conclusions, how they, how they look at the text and say, well, I, I’m not sure how, how deception is being portrayed here.

I’m not sure how Odysseus is being portrayed here. I’m not sure. Um, and I think that that’s probably, to me, that was simultaneously the best part and the hardest part about teaching the class. And trying to do this without feeling like I was lecturing, for sure. It’s very easy, I think, to want to defend your own ideas without letting the class come to their own.

And it’s easy to then tell them what you’re thinking before you allow them to come up with their own conclusions, which then influences them, which is what I was trying not to do. And I think that we had success in the, uh, the diversity of ideas that the class came up with. So I, I really enjoyed doing that teaching.

Thank you for joining us today. Once again, my name is Nicolas Larimer, and this was episode five of season four of Musings in Greek Literature. My cohost, Zach Springer, will be back soon and posting the next episode. Thank you for listening and please submit a comment or review of the podcast so that others can find it.

Have a good day. Thank you. Bye.