It’s crazy to me how dismissive the comments here have been. This is an impressively researched, well-written article that presents a very earnest attempt to help people work through difficult times through the medium of theater. The theater group is founded by someone with extensive knowledge of classics and antiquity, and it seems like it tries to draw a direct parallel between the very human experiences in Greek tragedy to those experienced by people today. This seems no more unreasonable to me than learning about the human condition from Shakespeare.
Art is and has always been one of the most well-used means for us to connect with and contemplate our own humanity. The approach outlined in the article is a really interesting take on the active use of art to drive psychological catharsis. I for one really enjoyed it, and I’m inspired to see that these actors, directors, and playwrights are trying to use what they know to help others.
> you know deep down that the only thing that can get us through this Pandemic is this: wake up and realize its not worse than the flu.
It's objectively far worse than the regular seasonal flu. Probably not as bad, on balance (in part because of better technology) than the 1918 pandemic flu, though we in the US are trying really hard to make up for that by bungling the policy response.
Even if that were true, mortality rate isn't alone the complete measure of a disease’s danger, among other reasons because death isn't the harm diseases do.
And it's not, at all, true. The extremely low of estimates of the infection fatality rate for COVID-19 are around the rate of the symptomatic case fatality rate of the seasonal flu, compare IFR to IFR (even with rosy estimates for COVID) or CFR to CFR and COVID-19 is much worse.
How many hospitalizations have there been compared to the ordinary flu though? Continuing this line of thought, how many of these hospitalizations have prevented a mortality?
> not it isnt. the mortality rate is in the same ballpark.
You are trolling. Please cite sources if you are going to make claims like these. We don't have an accepted mortality rate for Covid-19 yet[1]:
In the US:
US mortality due to influenza for 2018-2019: 34,200 [2]
Death to Covid-19 in the US is currently: > 170,000 [3]
We don't have a proven viable vaccine for Covid-19.
yeah. the numbers make zero sense. thats why you need to look at the numbers of deaths that dont have x amount of comorbidities. look at sweden by the way. they have herd immunity now and they didnt ruin their economy. they also didnt have this much deaths. so something is messed up about the US numbers if we are talking about the same desease.
Please stop spouting nonsense, it is downright embarrassing.
Sweden does not have herd immunity, they had far more cases and fatalities than their neighboring countries and is not to be compared to the US when it comes to geography, education, general demographics and general state of health and healthcare.
lol you sound like trump all you say is:"sweden bad! sweden really bad! sad!" But please look at the numbers: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/sweden/ why are the daily deaths practically zero now? why are there almost no new cases? But I get why you talk like this. The framing is intense. Just ease up on reading the news and try to explain these numbers. Its funny how all the Americans seem to hate on sweden now for no reason. Its a wonderful country. :-)
Objectively not scary? Do fuck off. 200K people dead in the USA in 7 months and nowhere near the end of the epidemic and that's just the dead. I've been out for the count for three weeks continuously in March / early April and to this day I'm not at my old energy level. No flu ever hit me that hard, even the really bad ones, and I had - apparently - a mild case.
You are utterly clueless and part of the problem, I wouldn't wish this bug on my worst enemy.
Not very long ago, as time is reckoned, one needed to read Greek and Latin to be considered educated. One was expected to be familiar with certain cultural idioms of Western Civilization relearned from antiquity during the Renaissance. The classical ideas of virtue, rhetoric, politics, mathematics, and natural philosophy still hold value. To ignore this tradition and relegate it to a "statistically insignificant minority" is, I believe, a mistake.
The essence of tragedy is a conflict between two equal values. Despite some superficial similarities, we generally don't share ancient Greek values and so we cannot properly experience this conflict. These are beautiful works of art but they won't resonate with us like they did with the original audiences.
The example they use is Antigone. However, the unburied body goes deeply against the ancestor worship common for early societies. While we honour our ancestors, worship is largely gone not just for ancestors but from our daily lives in general with the lessening or religious practices.
There's no debating with results, and if it helps, go for it, but I doubt moderns can feel catharsis when watching a performance of ancient plays like Greeks did.
That play isn’t about burial, it’s about the difference between the private and public. The difference between the story we tell to the public and in person.
Art is and has always been one of the most well-used means for us to connect with and contemplate our own humanity. The approach outlined in the article is a really interesting take on the active use of art to drive psychological catharsis. I for one really enjoyed it, and I’m inspired to see that these actors, directors, and playwrights are trying to use what they know to help others.