Sex-change..blinded..gift of augury..

In the play Oedipus the King, the character Teiresias is from the city of Thebes and played a major role in the story. When Oedipus asked him how to lift the pestilence from Thebes, Teiresias replied that Oedipus was the cause of all their problems; this answer almost cost Teiresias his life but Oedipus had sympathy for Teiresias’ age and blindness and spared him. I had no intention to find out more about Teiresias till my class was asked to do research on him by our lecturer and I found interesting facts about him. The great priest.
Eighteen allusions to mythic Teiresias, noted by Luc Brisson, fall into three groups: one, in two episodes, recounts Teiresias' sex-change and his encounter with Zeus and Hera; a second group recounts his blinding by Athena; a third, all but lost, seems to have recounted the misadventures of Teiresias. Teiresias was a prophet of Zeus. According to the mythographic compendium Bibliotheke, different stories were told of the cause of his blindness, the most direct being that he was simply blinded by the gods for revealing their secrets. An alternate story told by the poet Pherecydes was followed in Callimachus' poem "The Bathing of Pallas"; in it, Teiresias was blinded by Athena after he stumbled onto her bathing naked. His mother, Chariclo, a nymph of Athena, begged her to undo her curse, but Athena could not; instead, she cleaned his ears, giving him the ability to understand birdsong, thus the gift of augury.
On Mount Cyllene in the Peloponnese, as Teiresias came upon a pair of copulating snakes, he hit the pair a smart blow with his stick. Hera was not pleased, and she punished Teiresias by transforming him into a woman. As a woman, Teiresias became a priestess of Hera, married and had children, including Manto, who also possessed the gift of prophecy. According to some versions of the tale, Lady Teiresias was a prostitute of great renown. After seven years as a woman, Teiresias again found mating snakes; depending on the myth, either she made sure to leave the snakes alone this time, or, according to Hyginus, trampled on them. As a result, Teiresias was released from his sentence and permitted to regain his masculinity. This ancient story is recorded in lost lines of Hesiod.
In a separate episode, Teiresias was drawn into an argument between Hera and her husband Zeus, on the theme of who has more pleasure in sex: the man, as Hera claimed; or, as Zeus claimed, the woman, as Teiresias had experienced both. Teiresias revealed woman's greatest secret: that she receives the greater pleasure: "Of ten parts a man enjoys one only." Hera instantly struck him blind for his impiety. Zeus could do nothing to stop her, but he did give Teiresias the gift of foresight and a lifespan of seven lives. Stripped of its narrative, anecdotal and causal connections, the mythic figure of Teiresias combines several archaic elements: the blind seer; the impious interruption of a natural rite (whether of a bathing goddess or coupling serpents); serpents and staff (Caduceus); a holy man's double gender (shaman); and competition between deities.
Teiresias's background, fully male and then fully female, was important, both for his prophecy and his experiences. Also, prophecy was a gift given only to the priests and priestesses. Therefore, Teiresias offered Zeus and Hera evidence and gained the gift of male and female priestly prophecy. How he obtained his information varied: sometimes, like the oracles, he would receive visions; other times he would listen for the songs of birds, or ask for a description of visions and pictures appearing within the smoke of burnt offerings, and so interpret them. As a seer, "Teiresias" was "a common title for soothsayers throughout Greek legendary history" (Graves 1960, 105.5). In Greek literature, Teiresias's pronouncements are always gnomic but never wrong. Often when his name is attached to a mythic prophecy, it is introduced simply to supply a personality to the generic example of a seer, not by any inherent connection of Teiresias with the myth: thus it is Teiresias who tells Amphytrion of Zeus and Alcmena and warns the mother of Narcissus that the boy will thrive as long as he never knows himself. This is his emblematic role in tragedy. Like most oracles, he is generally extremely reluctant to offer the whole of what he sees in his visions.
In Hellenistic and Roman times Teiresias' sex-change was embroidered upon and expanded into seven episodes, with appropriate amours in each, probably written by the Alexandrian Ptolemaeus Chennus, but attributed by Eustathius to Sostratus. Teiresias is presented as a complexly liminal figure, with a foot in each of many oppositions, mediating between the gods and mankind, male and female, blind and seeing, present and future, and this world and the Underworld.
(Taken from www.answers.com)
Well, there you go. I find this information quite interesting because I never thought that a blind priest like Teiresias would have such an interesting background. I hope you enjoyed reading. See you in another post!

Learn or not to learn..

A lecture is an oral presentation intended to present information or teaches people about a particular subject, for example by a universtiy or college teacher. Usually the lecturer will stand at the front of the room and recite information relevant to the lecture's content. (Wikipedia) My lecturer Dr. Edwin is teaching the class on Oedipus the King for the past four weeks. I find the play quite interesting. I have learned so many interesting facts about theatre. Now I can proudly say that I know the names of Tragedy and Comedy playwright’s. The three most famous Tragedy writers are Aeschylus, Euripides and Sophocles. Oedipus the King is written by Sophocles.
Critics point out that lecturing is mainly a one-way method of communication that does not involve significant audience participation. Therefore, lecturing is often contrasted to active learning. But lectures delivered by talented speakers can be highly stimulating; at the very least, lectures have survived in academia as a quick, cheap and efficient way of introducing large numbers of students to a particular field of study. (Wikipedia) My lecturer Dr. Edwin is a very knowledgeable person who knows how to address to us the importance of his teachings. Personally, I am very thankful to have him as my lecturer for this subject because the way he teaches makes me think and analyse more about the play. I like his style of asking us to underline or highlight phrases or words that are important. Whenever I was asked to do that, I will put more importance on that particular phrase as a preparation for my examination.
A tutorial is a weekly meeting. I consider it as tuition for the subject Drama. The tutorial is a creative and flexible teaching method that enables the tutor to adapt a course to the precise requirements of students, and to give that student individual attention and supervision. Miss Kasthoori as our tutor will point out to us the most important aspects of the Drama and as we are doing Oedipus Rex she teaches us on how to find the evidence from the text. What have I learned by this? I have learned to critically analyse the text so that I can get the proper textual evidence when I was asked certain question like, ‘How do you know that Oedipus Rex is short tempered?’ By analysing the text critically, in no time I can get the evidence. The purpose of this exercise is not merely to test a student’s ability to amass facts, but to develop powers of critical analysis so that he or she can identify and interpret significant information and present facts and conclusions in a clear and precise form.
I can conclude that, I am learning something from the lectures and tutorial being held and not just going to class for the sake of getting full attendance or to sit for the final exam.

Drama tutorial

First week
Naomi : When our tutorial Drama ah?
Huey Fen : Friday, 3-6pm.
Naomi : What?! Are you saying that I can’t go back on Friday’s? I wonder what’s our tutor going to teach us. It must be a boring class.
Huey Fen : Well we have to wait for next Friday.

This was the conversation of me and my friend on Monday of first week but I need to admit that my perception changed after attending the first tutorial. Our tutor’s name is Miss Kasthoori. The class was very interesting. The way she conduct the class makes it very lively and none of us were bored to death. We were asked to get in group of six by Miss Kasthoori and start acting a scene from the book Now Read On. Each group came up with different acting scenes. Miss Kasthoori implied that everybody thinks differently. As for me, my first act was to act with a guy who wants to bring me out. The guy who happened to act with me was Wafi. It was funny to act with him and the whole class watching at us was another thing. All of us were very excited and was waiting for the third week. This class is all about acting and bringing out the talents in us.

Talking about talents, I was surprised and impressed to see some of my friends acting especially Jeremy acting the role of Raj and Huda the role of Leila from the play, The Ring. It was nice to see them acting but then it was kind of boring to see just the two of them in front talking to each other. Miss Kasthoori then asked us what would be nice to make the play more interesting and everyone of us start giving our opinions. This class gave me inspiration to write a play which I have already submitted before the Chinese New Year break. I hope Dr. Edwin likes it. This tutorial class is one of the best classes for this semester and I am enjoying every bit of it. Thank you to Miss Kasthoori and to all of my classmates who has made this class one of my favourite and I hope I will be able to understand better all the plays which will be taught throughout this semester by Dr. Edwin and Miss Kasthoori. I’m waiting for Drama class!

Is theatre out of date?

Theatre is the branch of the performing arts defined by Bernard Beckerman as what "occurs when one or more persons, isolated in time and/or space, present themselves to another or others." As for me, I feel it is out of date because with the technology that we have right now, we can do more things then produce a play. A movie you can go most anywhere to find or see something but for a theatre or drama you have to be in one place all the time and if you miss anything you cant replay it! Plus movies have the advantage that if you miss it in a theater, you can wait it out and rent the VCD or DVD and watch it in leisure, whereas plays you need to enjoy then and there, or else they are gone.
In a theater, the audience can see only the whole stage at one time. This is the main reason that action in plays is often over-dramatised to make emotions and actions clearer to the audience that may or may not be near the stage. Movies, however, can use close-ups, zoom shots, long shots and jump cuts to exercise a mastery over the audience's perspective.
Whenever I am watching a movie and there’s a scene where someone goes to a play (theatre), I get so bored and start going to the kitchen or get myself busy with something else. I feel that theatre is for old people who have nothing much to do. I also feel that, why waste time and energy on a stage when we can take that so called play in a real place just like in the movies.
This is just my opinion and I would like to end with a quote by M. Moussorgsky which goes, “Art is not an end to itself, but a means of addressing humanity.”

How similar or different is theatre and cinema.

Theatre is a building, room, or outdoor structure for the presentation of plays, films, or other dramatic performances whereas cinema is a building with screens to show a film or movie. Both are similar because, they are connected with actors, script, plot, conflict, music and so on. Obviously they will differ in some aspects such as language used by actors, music which is being played in the background, structure of the plot and etc. It is also worth mentioning the difference between the effort which must be put and experience of the actors when it comes to playing in the movies and in the theatre. I think it is obvious that playing in the theatre requires years of practicing one’s memory and improving one’s abilities. In theater, the action is aimed at the audience but in cinema, the audience is aimed at the action so there’s more work in organising a play then a movie. Theatre gives the terror of failing. In a live performance, anything can go wrong. In cinema, you can't tell lies in a close-up shot, so both have their challenges. In my opinion, being a theatrical actor is a bigger challenge than playing in movies.
Secondly, according to the readings that I did, both cinema and theatre have the same history and roots. In the beginning there was a theatre which took its first steps in Ancient Greece. Tragedy, comedy and satyried plays were the earliest theatrical forms in the world. As far as the technology was modernised people were looking for something new, state-of-the-art. In the 1860s the first two-dimensional images in motion were demonstrated. After many years of improving and innovating a lot of breakthroughs, a new technology were introduced which are altogether called special effects. However, many viewers aren't attracted by them and choose spontaneous, old-fashioned theatre with a specific sense of realism. What we have to remember is that both cinema and theatre have the same origin which makes them strictly connected with one another.
Finally, one of the many differences between these two art-forms is that cinema has a much wider range of subject matter than theatre which is usually based on literature. Movies present almost in every aspect of our life, bring up topics and histories which may concern almost every viewer, unlike theatrical plays which are usually based on literary work, however it is not a must.
In conclusion theatre has been changing for centuries. Nowadays we can distinguish two main branches: film and theatrical production which are similar when it comes to their roots, origin and structure including actors, music, script, plot. However, one of the differences between these two forms is that movies range of subject matter is much wider. Despite similarities and differences, both cinema and theatre have their true followers who are attracted by their originality, charm and entertaining values.