The opening chapters focus on plays that mobilise Greek tragedy to inspire political change, discussing how Sophocles’ Antigone is reconfigured as a freedom fighter and how Euripides’ Dionysos is transformed into a revolutionary leader. The later chapters focus on the costs and consequences of political change, examining how the violence dramatised in Aeschylus’ Oresteia acquires relevance in post-apartheid South Africa, and how the mourning of Euripides’ Trojan Women resonates in Nigeria. Throughout, the emphasis is on how playwrights, through adaptation, perform a cultural politics directed at the Europe that has traditionally considered ancient Greece as its property, foundation, and legitimisation.

The Politics of Adaptation

• Astrid van Weyenberg
• Amsterdam/New York: Rodopi, 2013
• ISBN 978 90 42 03700 7