The Apollonian and Dionysian man complete each other in the sense that these two
terms create our society. The Apollonian man was given its name from Apollo, the sun-
god. He represents light, clarity, and form. The Dionysian man was given its name from
the Greek god Dionysus. As the wine-god, he represents drunkenness and ecstasy. The
Dionysian was the primal aspect of reality, as well as raw nature, life and death, pleasure
and pain, desire, passion, sex, and aggression. It is the source of primal instincts. "The
Dionysian with its primal pleasure-experienced even in pain- is the common womb of
music and tragic myth...the Apolline is the realm of dreams and ideal forms."("The Birth of
Tragedy" Nietzsche, 1871) The Apollonian is the humanized aspect of reality, civilization,
harmony, and balance. It follows order, form, status, peace, moderation, permanence,
symbolism, language, and reason. In modern psychological terms it is the Ego and
Superego. The complexities of the Dionysian person verses the Apollonian person will be
explored using Robert Johnson's Ecstasy.
The Dionysian name emphazing the irrational element of frenzy was found in the
rites of Dionysus. This book explores the nature of ecstasy through the myth of Dionysus.
In ancient Greece, Dionysus was the god of wine and ecstasy. "The myth of Dionysus is a
picture of the forces, behaviors, and instincts that shape our inner world. He is a complex
figure who symbolizes the irrational world of our senses as it interacts with the rational
world of rules and limitations."(Johnson, 11)
Zeus, in disguise, traveled on earth and came upon the city of Thebes. He fell
hopelessly in love with Semele, the daughter of King Cadmus. She became pregnant and
wanted to look into the eyes of her lover. She asked Zeus to grant her a boon. He made
an oath with the River of Styx. This oath exclaimed she could have anything. She asked to
see the god of the thunderbolt in his true splendor. She persisted and sadly he kept his
word. This meant her death. She was immediately incinerated. Only her womb, wrapped
in ivy, escaped the flame. Zeus was furious, therefore he cut an incision in his thigh, and
tucked the child into it. The baby continued to gr...
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The Birth of Tragedy)
“The Apollonian tendency is associated with the instinct for form, beauty, moderation, and
symmetry. It is the basis of all analytic distinctions.”(Nitezsche The Birth of Tragedy)
The Apollonian and Dionysian are two terms that consummate each other in the sense that they
structure our society. The Apollonian is the humanized aspect of reality, civilization, harmony, and
balance. It follows order, form, status, peace, moderation, symbolism, and reason. The Dionysian was
the primal aspect of reality, as well as nature, life and death, desire, passion, sex, and aggression.
Robert Johnson’s Ecstasy explored the nature of ecstasy throught the ancient Greek myths of Dionysus
and Apollo. Ecstasy was once considered a favor of the gods, a divine gift that could lift mortals out of
ordinary reality and into a higher world. The myth of Dionysus and the rise and fall of his cult, offer the
best elucidation of our loss of ecstatic experience. He is a complex figure who symbolizes the irrational
world of our senses as it interacts with the rational world of rules and limitations.
...ty since "things could happen in the real life of Athens which were virtually unthinkable in tragedy, and vice versa." Perhaps the safest assessment of Dionysus is that while not a direct opponent of the traditional ways, his presence, and especially his effect on other characters, serves to highlight many social norms. According to Bernad Knox, "From start to finish, Euripides was 'attempting to show citizens bred in the traditional views...that such conceptions of the gods should offend them.'" Perhaps we as readers will never fully understand the Dionysus that appears in this play, but a closing look at a remark of the Chorus may bring us a step closer to this understanding:
Dionysos, also known as Dionysus, is an Olympian god of many things such as festivity, pleasure, wine, and vegetation. Dionysos is the god of wilderness and one of his attributes are large cats, helping me recognize the statue of him wearing clothes made of animal skin. According to Metropolitan Museum, it stated that, Dionysos wore panther skin over his skirt like clothes and animal head shaped like a huge cat on his high sandals that look like boots” (MET). Also, despite being a male figure, Dionysos has a petite face and is often attractive or even beautiful because he represents youth. Looking at the statue, another attribute that I recognized was that his face looked pretty and had long hair, making him look very young and feminine while having a masculine body.
...t is also important to notice that every character seems to have wide eyes and dark circles drawn under their eyes. This is perhaps one of the most important aspects because the eyes show the underlying theme of complete inebriation. This in turn, proves the impact that Dionysus had on his followers as well as those who he conquered. Wine brought great power to its creator, and made a lasting impact on history. With these devices of communication, we are able to see that the follower wanted to capture Dionysus’s legacy by creating a sarcophagus of remembrance in his honor.
The Differences between Apollo and Dionysus are not difficult to see. Though both Gods are associated wi...
I decided to analyze the similarities and differences between the two gods: Zeus and his son Dionysus. Even though Dionysus is of the same lineage of Zeus, this does not mean they share all of the same characteristics of one another. They differ greatly in attitude, appearance and morals. Zeus is considered the king of all gods, and he proudly uses his powers for his own amusement and pleasure, often at the expense of others lives. Whereas, Dionysus is the god of wine and fertility and he uses his powers to bring both pleasure and an escape from the grief that plagues ones mind but this can come at a cost leading the consumer to become unpredictable and easily influenced through overindulgence and addiction.
The importance of maintaining a balanced lifestyle will allow one to achieve the most worthwhile existence. Nikos Kazantzakis’ Zorba the Greek dramatizes the significance of balance between the Apollonian and Dionysian dichotomy, through the characterization of the contrasting protagonists, Boss and Zorba. Kazantzakis typifies the differences amid the philosophical ideologies through the comparison of Boss and Zorba’s beliefs. Moreover, he represents Boss by his willingness to try to improve oneself and live more like Zorba. Through the progression of their journey, Zorba’s Dionysian lifestyle becomes a primary influence to Boss and begins to alter his perspectives on the true meaning of life. Throughout the novel, Kazantzakis outlines the
Hart Crane’s poetry is a perfect example of an Apollonian art with Dionysian qualities. Hart Crane, the American poet and author of “Eternity”, “O Carib Isle!”, and “The Hurricane”, demonstrates elements of destruction and tragedy within his poems. The Apollonian dreamworld is “the father of all the imagistic arts […] [including the] good half of poetry”(Nietzsche, 29). Because poetry is an art form of the Apollonian world Crane’s poems become an Apollonian work. It is through the poems themselves, however, the Dionysian world comes into play. In all of Crane’s poems a major tone of Dionysian qualities are exemplified. Crane’s poem “Eternity” illustrates Dionysian tragedy. The poem describes the people of a town, and the town itself, after
the texts stem from the reasons they are the same; why certain people are chosen,
Nietzsche introduces the Apollonian and the Dionysian as being part of the “Greek Life.” The Apollonian was based off of the Greek god Apollo. It represented culture, order, and art. The Dionysian was based off of the Greek god Dionysus. It represented nature, chaos, and feeling. Both the Apollonian and the Dionysian were combined with the creation of tragedy and became the core o...
They had similar beliefs, but also immeasurable differences. It was composed of many meaningful gods and goddesses that all played a part in the everyday life of the average Roman and Greek person of that time.
America in the mid to early nineteenth century saw the torture of many African Americans in slavery. Plantation owners did not care whether they were young or old, girl or boy, to them all slaves were there to work. One slave in particular, Frederick Douglass, documented his journey through slavery in his autobiography Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. Through the use of various rhetorical devices and strategies, Douglass conveys the dehumanizing and corrupting effect of slavery, in order to show the overall need for American abolition. His use of devices such as parallelism, asyndeton, simile, antithesis, juxtaposition and use of irony, not only establish ethos but also show the negative effects of slavery on slaves, masters and
power than many men do. For instance she is able to convince Zeus, ruler of
...trated this by betraying the trust that people had in men and the gods with his foolish and reckless action against Cadmus and his family. Dionysus refuted rational thinking by letting his emotions for revenge stand in the way of his contemplating how a god should behave. In doing all the things Dionysus has destroyed the ideal way one would expect a god to conduct their self. Euripides portrays a Dionysus that single handily destroys all the cultural values of Hellenic Greece; however, Euripides is able to capture the changing values of his audience and pave the way for the culture of Hellenistic Greece to begin to dominate societal thought.
Zeus filled with the paranoia that one of his sons would overthrow him and not knowing that Metis was pregnant with Athena, a daughter, ate Metis. Zeus was unaware that Athena continued to grow until he had a splitting headache which could only be relieved by Hephaestus striking Zeus in the head with an axe. This
Greek tragedies began at a festival in honor of Dionysius, who was the god of wine. At the early festivals, drinking, quarrels, and sexual activity occurred frequently. Later on, tragedies gained much more respect and were taken very seriously. The plays dealt with man's relationship with god(s). These plays also dealt with a specific instance of life. The chorus wore goat-skins and served a great purpose in the tragedies, themselves. Thespis, the father of the tragedy, created an actor who talked with the leader of the chorus to further make the importance of the chorus seen.