Customer Reviews

Sophocles' Tragic World: Divinity, Nature, Society

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I am a scholar of Ancient Greek Tragedy and as such an expert I can say that Charles Segal has the most unique opinon of Oedipus in particular, although his book covers various Sophoclean heroes, that I have come across in recent years. This text is fresh, and suprisingly clear and easy to understand. He leaves no rock unturned, no theory unaddressed. If you are looking on a guide to Oedipus, Antigone, Ajax, or Trachinian Women, you have come to the right place. Buy this book, it's good.

This is a traditional "collection of essays" as opposed to an ordered and sustained argument. As such, I find it invaluable. Indeed, there are multiple essays on Oedipus Tyrannus that everyone should read. I was particularly taken by his analysis of the Chorus. His (loosely) psychoanalytic reading of lament in Antigone is also, I think, something every scholar must at least be aware of. And he even tackles Lacan in what I found to be an unusually dense text for Segal. The subject itself is quite abstract, and as far as applying it to classical studies goes, I think Segal makes sense of Lacan without appropriating him.