The final section on the aorist indicative in Goodwin'sMoods and Tensesidentifies the following usage: ‘In questions with τί οὐ [‘why not’], expressing surprise that something is not already done, and implying an exhortation to do it’. Other scholars identify urgency or impatience in these questions. Albert Rijksbaron writes: ‘Questions with the 1stor 2ndperson of the aorist indicative, introduced by τί οὖν οὐ or τί οὐ, often serve, especially in Plato and Xenophon, asurgent requests[original emphasis] … The aorist indicative is more (...) emphatic than the present: the speaker observes that a state of affairs which he apparently wants to occur has, in fact, not occurred, and he asks his interlocutor why it has not.’ Kühner and Gerth explain it as follows: ‘Der Redende wünscht in seiner Ungeduld gewissermassen die begehrte Handlung als eine schon geschehene zu sehen’ (‘the speaker impatiently wants, as it were, to see the desired action as one that has already been done’). They contrast allegedly less urgent examples in the present (‘der Ton der Frage ist alsdann ruhiger’, ‘the tone of the question is thereby milder’). These scholars stress the pastness of the aorist tense in communicating urgency and impatience: ‘Why have you not …?’. This remains the dominant view, regularly repeated in commentaries. (shrink)

This paper explores how gender can operate as a disguise for class in an examination of the self-sacrifice of the Maiden in Euripides' Children of Herakles. In Part I, I discuss the role of human sacrifice in terms of its radical potential to transform society and the role of class struggle in Athens. In Part II, I argue that the representation of women was intimately connected with the social and political life of the polis. In a discussion of iconography, the (...) theater industry and audience I argue that female characters became one of the means by which different groups promoted partisan interests based on class and social status. In Part III, I show how the Maiden solicits the competing interests of the theater audience. After discussing the centrality (as a heroine from an aristocratic family) and marginality (as a woman and associated with other marginal social groups) of the Maiden's character, I draw upon the funeral oration as a comparative model with which to understand the quite different role of self-sacrifice in tragedy. In addition to representing and mystifying the interests of elite, lower class and marginal groups, the play glorifies a subordinate character whose contradictory social status (both subordinate and elite) embodies the social position of other “marginal” members of Athenian society. The play stages a model for taking political action to transform the social system and for commemorating the tragic costs of such undertakings. (shrink)

This paper explores how gender can operate as a disguise for class in an examination of the self-sacrifice of the Maiden in Euripides' Children of Herakles. In Part I, I discuss the role of human sacrifice in terms of its radical potential to transform society and the role of class struggle in Athens. In Part II, I argue that the representation of women was intimately connected with the social and political life of the polis. In a discussion of iconography, the (...) theater industry and audience I argue that female characters became one of the means by which different groups promoted partisan interests based on class and social status. In Part III, I show how the Maiden solicits the competing interests of the theater audience. After discussing the centrality and marginality of the Maiden's character, I draw upon the funeral oration as a comparative model with which to understand the quite different role of self-sacrifice in tragedy. In addition to representing and mystifying the interests of elite, lower class and marginal groups, the play glorifies a subordinate character whose contradictory social status embodies the social position of other “marginal” members of Athenian society. The play stages a model for taking political action to transform the social system and for commemorating the tragic costs of such undertakings. (shrink)