Download or read book Looking at Persians written by David Stuttard and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2022-10-20 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Aeschylus' Persians is unique in being the only extant Greek tragedy on an historical subject: Greece's victory in 480 BC over the great Persian King, Xerxes, eight years before the play was written and first performed in 472 BC. Looking at Persians examines how Aeschylus responded to such a turning point in Athenian history and how his audience may have reacted to his play. As well as considering the play's relationship with earlier lost tragedies and discussing its central themes, including war, nature and the value of human life, the volume considers how Persians may have been staged in fifth-century Athens and how it has been performed today. The twelve essays presented here are written by prominent international academics and offer insightful analyses of the play from the perspectives of performance, history and society. Intended for readers ranging from school students and undergraduates to teachers and those interested in drama (including practitioners), this volume also includes an accurate, accessible and performance-friendly English translation of Persians by David Stuttard.
Download or read book Women in Ancient Persia 559 331 BC written by Maria Brosius and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 1996 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ancient Greek writers on Persian history give us a glimpse of the influential role played by some individual women at these courts, but these are sporadic and hardly reliable accounts of a few colourful femme fatales in the royal family, designed to show up the scandalous machinations of barbarian women gaining political control and causing the decline and effeminacy of the Persian kings. This book is the first to demonstrate the true importance of not only royal but non-royal women in Persia, with the benefit of contemporary Persian and Babylonian sources.
Download or read book Greek Perspectives on the Achaemenid Empire written by Janett Morgan and published by Edinburgh University Press. This book was released on 2016-11-15 with total page 392 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How did the Greek view of Persia and Persians change so radically in the archaic and classical Greek sources that they turned from noble warriors into peacock-loving cross-dressers with murderous mothers? This book looks at the development of a range of responses to the Achaemenids and their Empire. Through a study of ancient texts and material evidence from the archaic and classical periods, Janett Morgan investigates the historical, political and social factors that inspired and manipulated different identities for Persia and the Persians within Greece.
Download or read book Real Birds in Imagined Gardens written by Kavita Singh and published by Getty Publications. This book was released on 2017-03-07 with total page 120 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Accounts of paintings produced during the Mughal dynasty (1526–1857) tend to trace a linear, “evolutionary” path and assert that, as European Renaissance prints reached and influenced Mughal artists, these artists abandoned a Persianate style in favor of a European one. Kavita Singh counters these accounts by demonstrating that Mughal painting did not follow a single arc of stylistic evolution. Instead, during the reigns of the emperors Akbar and Jahangir, Mughal painting underwent repeated cycles of adoption, rejection, and revival of both Persian and European styles. Singh’s subtle and original analysis suggests that the adoption and rejection of these styles was motivated as much by aesthetic interest as by court politics. She contends that Mughal painters were purposely selective in their use of European elements. Stylistic influences from Europe informed some aspects of the paintings, including the depiction of clothing and faces, but the symbolism, allusive practices, and overall composition remained inspired by Persian poetic and painterly conventions. Closely examining magnificent paintings from the period, Singh unravels this entangled history of politics and style and proposes new ways to understand the significance of naturalism and stylization in Mughal art.
Download or read book Looking Toward Salamis and The Persians of AEschylos written by William Cranston Lawton and published by . This book was released on 1892 with total page 44 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Persian Fire written by Tom Holland and published by Anchor. This book was released on 2007-06-12 with total page 466 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A "fresh...thrilling" (The Guardian) account of the Graeco-Persian Wars. In the fifth century B.C., a global superpower was determined to bring truth and order to what it regarded as two terrorist states. The superpower was Persia, incomparably rich in ambition, gold, and men. The terrorist states were Athens and Sparta, eccentric cities in a poor and mountainous backwater: Greece. The story of how their citizens took on the Great King of Persia, and thereby saved not only themselves but Western civilization as well, is as heart-stopping and fateful as any episode in history. Tom Holland’s brilliant study of these critical Persian Wars skillfully examines a conflict of critical importance to both ancient and modern history.
Download or read book Choral Mediations in Greek Tragedy written by Renaud Gagné and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2013-10-17 with total page 441 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume explores how the choruses of Ancient Greek tragedy creatively combined media and discourses to generate their own specific forms of meaning. The contributors analyse choruses as fictional, religious and civic performers; as combinations of text, song and dance; and as objects of reflection in themselves, in relation and contrast to the choruses of comedy and melic poetry. Drawing on earlier analyses of the social context of Greek drama, the non-textual dimensions of tragedy, and the relations between dramatic and melic choruses, the chapters explore the uses of various analytic tools in allowing us better to capture the specificity of the tragic chorus. Special attention is given to the physicality of choral dancing, musical interactions between choruses and actors, the trajectories of reception, and the treatment of time and space in the odes.
Download or read book The Persians written by Geoffrey Parker and published by Reaktion Books. This book was released on 2016-11-15 with total page 210 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Now in paperback, this is a history of an incomparable culture whose influence can still be seen, millennia later, in modern-day Iran and the wider Middle East. During the first and second millennia BCE a swathe of nomadic peoples migrated outward from Central Asia into the Eurasian periphery. One group of these people would find themselves encamped in an unpromising, arid region just south of the Caspian Sea. From these modest and uncertain beginnings, they would go on to form one of the most powerful empires in history: the Persian Empire. In this book, Geoffrey and Brenda Parker tell the captivating story of this ancient civilization and its enduring legacy to the world. The authors examine the unique features of Persian life and trace their influence throughout the centuries. They examine the environmental difficulties the early Persians encountered and how, in overcoming them, they were able to develop a unique culture that would culminate in the massive, first empire, the Achaemenid Empire. Extending their influence into the maritime west, they fought the Greeks for mastery of the eastern Mediterranean—one of the most significant geopolitical contests of the ancient world. And the authors paint vivid portraits of Persian cities and their spectacular achievements: intricate and far-reaching roadways, an astonishing irrigation system that created desert paradises, and, above all, an extraordinary reflection of the diverse peoples that inhabited them.
Download or read book Persians and Other Plays written by Aeschylus and published by . This book was released on 2009 with total page 436 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The volume brings together four major works by one of the great classical dramatists: Prometheus Bound, translated by James Scully and C. John Herrington, a haunting depiction of the most famous of Olympian punishments; The Suppliants, translated by Peter Burian, an extraordinary drama of flight and rescue arising from women's resistance to marriage; Persians, translated by Janet Lembke and C. John Herington, a masterful telling of the Persian Wars from the view of the defeated; and Seven Against Thebes, translated by Anthony Hecht and Helen Bacon.
Download or read book Ancient Persia written by Matt Waters and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2014-01-20 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Achaemenid Persian Empire, at its greatest territorial extent under Darius I (r.522–486 BCE), held sway over territory stretching from the Indus River Valley to southeastern Europe and from the western Himalayas to northeast Africa. In this book, Matt Waters gives a detailed historical overview of the Achaemenid period while considering the manifold interpretive problems historians face in constructing and understanding its history. This book offers a Persian perspective even when relying on Greek textual sources and archaeological evidence. Waters situates the story of the Achaemenid Persians in the context of their predecessors in the mid-first millennium BCE and through their successors after the Macedonian conquest, constructing a compelling narrative of how the empire retained its vitality for more than two hundred years (c.550–330 BCE) and left a massive imprint on Middle Eastern as well as Greek and European history.
Download or read book Athens and Persia in the Fifth Century BC written by Margaret C. Miller and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2004-08-19 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First comprehensive collection of evidence of the relations between Athens and Persia in fifth century BC.
Download or read book Iran at War written by Kaveh Farrokh and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2011-12-20 with total page 489 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Following on from his award-winning book on the history of ancient Persia, Kaveh Farrokh goes on to examine Iran's wartime history from the Safavid dynasty of the 16th and 17th century through to the 1979 Revolution and beyond. He shows how the early military successes were followed by centuries of defeat as the external influences of nations like Russia and Britain began to shape the internal history of Iran, before unraveling the complex, violent 20th century military history of the country, which encompasses two world wars, regional movements, foreign intervention, anti-government revolts, conflicts on the Soviet border, a revolution and an eight-year war with Iraq. Illustrated with contemporary illustrations and photographs this book provides an unparalleled investigation into the bloody martial history of Iran.
Download or read book The Persian Boy written by Mary Renault and published by Open Road Media. This book was released on 2013-09-10 with total page 818 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A New York Times–bestselling novel of the ancient king of Macedon and his lover by the author Hilary Mantel calls “a shining light.” The Persian Boy centers on the most tempestuous years of Alexander the Great’s life, as seen through the eyes of his lover and most faithful attendant, Bagoas. When Bagoas is very young, his father is murdered and he is sold as a slave to King Darius of Persia. Then, when Alexander conquers the land, he is given Bagoas as a gift, and the boy is besotted. This passion comes at a time when much is at stake—Alexander has two wives, conflicts are ablaze, and plots on the Macedon king’s life abound. The result is a riveting account of a great conqueror’s years of triumph and, ultimately, heartbreak. The Persian Boy is the second volume of the Novels of Alexander the Great trilogy, which also includes Fire from Heaven and Funeral Games. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Mary Renault including rare images of the author. “Mary Renault is a shining light to both historical novelists and their readers. She does not pretend the past is like the present, or that the people of ancient Greece were just like us. She shows us their strangeness; discerning, sure-footed, challenging our values, piquing our curiosity, she leads us through an alien landscape that moves and delights us.” —Hilary Mantel
Download or read book Aeschylus Persians written by David Rosenbloom and published by Bristol Classical Press. This book was released on 2006 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Aeschylus' Persians is the earliest extant Greek tragedy and sole surviving historical tragedy. It tells the story of the Persian king Xerxes' disastrous invasion of Greece in 480/79 and dramatises his return to Persia in rags to face the condemnation of his elders and to lament his defeat. The first Western depiction of the causes and limits of imperialist conquest, the Persians is especially relevant today. The play is unflinching in its portrayal of the horrors of the Persian defeat, but it is not merely a paean to Western freedom, democracy, courage and military supremacy; it is a meditation on the tendency of wealth, power and success to take on a momentum of their own and to push societies to the brink of ruin. This companion to the play provides historical context, thematic discussion, literary and performance history, bibliography and glossary. It is entirely accessible to those studying the play in translation as well as the original Greek.--Back cover.
Download or read book The Emptiness of Asia written by Thomas Harrison and published by Bloomsbury Academic. This book was released on 2019-05-02 with total page 193 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a literary study of Aeschylus' Persians alongside Herodotus' Histories, which offers a comprehensive understanding what actually happened at the battle of Salamis and afterwards. Thomas Harrison examines the political and ideological motivating factors underpinning Persai in the context of the times. Aeschylus' Persians is not only the first surviving Greek drama. It is also the only tragedy to take for its subject historical rather than mythical events: the repulse of the army of Xerxes at Salamis in 480 B.C. It has frequently been mined for information on the tactics of Salamis or the Greeks' knowledge of Persian names or institutions, but it also has a broader value, one that has not often been realised. What does it tell us about Greek representations of Persia, or of the Athenians' self-image? What can we glean from it of the politics of early fifth-century Athens, or of the Athenians' conception of their empire? How, if at all, can such questions be approached without doing violence to the Persians as a drama? What are the implications of the play for the nature of tragedy?
Download or read book Ancient Persia written by Josef Wiesehöfer and published by . This book was released on 2001 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Persian Nights written by Diane Johnson and published by Plume. This book was released on 1998-02 with total page 378 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Chloe, a contented and unliberated wife and mother, follows her physician husband on a visit to Iran. When he is summoned home, she has no choice but to continue on alone.
