Apollonian and Dionysian Perspectives, and Tiresias

Sarah Lederman

In his work The Birth of Tragedy from the Spirit of Music, Friedrich Nietzsche proposes a model of thought in which all artistic energy stems from two differing ways of interacting with the world, which he calls Apollonian and Dionysian after the ancient Greek deities. Nietzsche’s Apollonian viewpoint is a constructive and analytical one; it isolates each element and, through this isolation of parts, seeks to understand and preserve it. It is associated with dreams, particularly lucid dreams, where the dreamer seeks to recreate the image of the world in their mind. For Nietzsche, it is inherently linked to the visual and the comprehensible. The Dionysian view is more like intoxication than dreams. It is a dismantling of boundaries; a way of seeing everything as part of a universal primal whole. Moreover, as it ignores boundaries, it sees everything as inherently mutable. Nietzsche describes it in terms of music: in its lack of adherence to finite descriptors, it is not fully expressible in spoken or written language. Although Nietzsche’s model was intended for an examination of artistic history, particularly in relation to the origin and development of ancient Greek theatre, it is useful on a broader scale for examining the different ways people engage with their surroundings. Indeed, in Euripides’ The Bacchae and Homer’s The Odyssey, three distinct classifications of characters are possible: those who see the world in a purely Dionysian manner, perhaps unsurprisingly best exemplified by Dionysus in The Bacchae; those who are solely Apollonian, such as the titular character of The Odyssey; and those who manage to balance the two. In his writings, Nietzsche suggests that artists need both modes to reach their true potential. Indeed, while most real-world individuals and fictional characters demonstrate elements of both methods on occasion, few manage to achieve true balance. The tale of Tiresias intertwines with many others. In this character’s many wanderings, he maintains a balanced outlook, while the more important characters fall into the trap of relying on only one of the approaches.

In looking for the epitome of the Dionysian mode in ancient Greek texts, it is only natural to turn to the namesake of and prime model for Nietzsche’s concept: that of Dionysus as he appears in Euripides’ The Bacchae. While the only other surviving Greek drama featuring Dionysus as a character, The Frogs, portrays him as ‘the god incarnate of masquerade, impersonation, paradox, pretense, in-jokes, theatre, and metatheatre, all with a happy outcome,’ The Bacchae takes a darker approach, instead showing the horror stemming from an unmoderated and infinitely powerful Dionysian perspective. This is not to say that the Dionysian is inherently sinister—it is not inherently violent to people, though it is fundamentally aligned with chaos and is destructive to social hierarchies—rather, that, when wielded without any traces of the Apollonian, it does not recognise either moderation or the concept of the individual within a social unit. Through the use of a multifaceted representation of the Dionysian in The Bacchae, Euripides examines the flaws of an unrestrainedly-Dionysian society; namely, its lack of consideration for the safety of the individual.

The first few violent acts of retribution in The Bacchae are not physical; rather, Dionysus influences the minds of first his aunts, and later, Pentheus, making the former unwillingly into his revellers and distorting the latter’s view of reality. In doing so, he shows a careless disregard for the character’s will, treating his usurpation of Pentheus as a simple joke by forcing him to dress in women’s clothes and parade through the main street of Thebes. While Dionysus does see this as part of Pentheus’ punishment for denying Dionysus’ divinity, he does not view this as a serious assault, saying, ‘I long to set Thebes laughing at him, as he walks/In female garb through all the streets; to humble him’ It is the cross-dressing that he sees as the punishment, not the loss of autonomy. However, when Pentheus first reappears after being ensorcelled, he is clearly neither at ease nor simply embarrassed; instead, he is unsettlingly unlike his former self. He says, ‘I seem to see two suns; a double Thebes;/Our city’s wall with seven gates appears double/…Were you a beast before? You have become a bull.’ In addition to his tenuous hold on reality, his behaviour is docile, allowing Dionysus to rearrange his hair and attire. This is in sharp contrast to his former self-assured pugnacious attitude. As in the Dionysian view there is no emphasis on individuality, this act of mental manipulation does not seem overly intrusive to the deity and is almost an afterthought to the gruesome death to Pentheus at his unknowing mother’s hands. Yet the death of Pentheus is not shown directly in the play; instead, it is related by a messenger, losing much of its immediacy through the use of a filtering narrator. Moreover, should the play be staged, the violence would not be seen by the audience at all. Instead, the only aggressive act of Dionysus that is depicted outright is that of a denial of personal thought.

The true tragedy of the play, however, is in the eventual senselessness of Dionysus’ revenge as he takes his revenge to an excess. Ignoring the problem of the justness of Pentheus’ and his mother and aunts’ punishments for failure to recognise Dionysus’ divinity, he also punishes Cadmus and Harmonia, Pentheus’ grandparents, who take no action against Dionysus during the play. Indeed, the latter never appears and is only mentioned as her punishment is announced. Cadmus, though initially somewhat unconvinced of Dionysus’ divinity, never speaks against him, as do the others who Dionysus punishes. Indeed, he performs the prescribed rites to Dionysus to the best of his ability even when mocked by his grandson. Dionysus is unable to recognise the individual actions of Cadmus as opposed to Pentheus, instead revenging himself upon the entire the family. Moreover, although the vengeance falls mostly on Pentheus and his mother, even the absent character of Harmonia is sentenced to exile and transformation into a snake-beast that will pillage many cities. This prompts the only direct criticism of Dionysus’ actions in the entire play; Cadmus says, ‘your revenge is merciless/…Gods should not be like mortals in vindictiveness.’ The Dionysian does not allow for individualisation or temperance, and as Dionysus sees the world with that viewpoint alone, he creates horror out of what might have been deserved punishments.

Odysseus, on the other hand, relies entirely on the Apollonian method of rationalizing the world. Throughout The Odyssey, he uses a logical way of deconstructing his problems to escape peril. For example, when he and his crew are trapped in the Cyclops’ cave, he deals with each element of the situation separately, but with each action in accordance with a pre-formulated plan. However, it is his reliance on the rigid, fixed understanding of the the Apollonian worldview that leads him into trouble. He knows his crew is loyal to him and will obey his instructions. Even their repeated insubordinations, such as when they open Aeolus’ bag of the winds, believing that Odysseus is hiding treasure from them, do not alter his actions towards them in the slightest. Instead, Odysseus continues to trust them implicitly in the face of all evidence to the contrary until they are all dead due to yet another failure to follow instructions.

In the end, it is his inability to comprehend the fluidity of the world that leads him to commit a final act of barbarism at the end of his journey. Even though he has been away from home for twenty years, at least eight of which were spent lingering with beautiful women even though he would have been able to leave at any time, he does not realise that his family and household may not be as he left it. Indeed, although he has heard hints of the suitors, he clearly is not emotionally prepared to learn more fully about their presence in his home, instantly planning ‘woe and ruin’ for them when he hears of them upon returning to Ithaca. However, their presence should not come as a surprise; he knows that all the others who fought in the Trojan war have either returned home or perished on the voyage, and therefore could only assume that he was presumed to be dead due to the length of his absence. Moreover, Tiresias specifically mentioned the suitors to Odysseus when urging him to press onwards in his journey home. In his anger at the suitors’ intrusion into the household that used to be his, Odysseus slaughters not only the suitors, but also all of the maidservants who aided them, even though no one could know he would return. Odysseus views this as a betrayal, but the maidservants likely had little choice but to comply with the often-violent suitors who, though boorish and overly aggressive in their demands of marriage towards Penelope, and certainly motivated at least partially by greed, made their offers truly believing Odysseus dead. Odysseus lacks the ability to realise that twenty years is long enough for many to move on, especially as all his surviving comrades had long since returned. This static view of the world results from his overuse of Apollonian revisualization of a comprehensible and permanent reality.

While both Dionysus and Odysseus find moral peril in their reliance on only a single worldview, another iconic character in ancient Greek tragedies, Tiresias, manages to find a middle path, using both Apollonian and Dionysian methods of interacting with the world. Tiresias, the blind seer of Thebes who, although not a protagonist in any surviving long form Greek text, appears in many other works. Although the character is written differently by each author, the one constant is that Tiresias is always a liminal figure. In The Bacchae, it is Tiresias who urges Cadmus to participate in the rites celebrating Dionysus, a naturally-Dionysian activity, and indeed Tiresias is depicted in the attire of a Bacchic celebrant and seems eager to participate, saying, ‘I feel…Bursting with youth! I’ll try it—I’ll dance with the rest [of the celebrants].’ Yet the arguments Tiresias uses to persuade Pentheus to join in the rites is fundamentally Apollonian in its structure, focusing on an etymological analysis of the origins of the Dionysus story.

And Why do you scorn this legend, that [Dionysus] was sewn up

In Zeus’ thigh? I will explain the truth to you.

When Zeus snatched Dionysus from the lightning-flame

And took the child to Olympus as a god,

Hera resolved to cast him out of [Olympus]. But Zeus

Found such means to prevent her as a god will find.

He took a fragment of the ether that surrounds

The earth, fashioned it like a child, presented it

To Hera as a pledge to soothe her jealousy,

And saved Dionysus from her. Thus, in time, because

The ancient words for ‘pledge’ and ‘thigh’ are similar,

People confused them, and the ‘pledge’ Zeus gave to Hera

Became transformed, as time went on, into the tale

That Dionysus was sewn up in Zeus’ thigh.

Even the Chorus notes that the construction of using Apollonian reason to support a Dionysian ceremony is interesting, saying, ‘What you have said, Teiresias, shows no disrespect/To Apollo; at the same time you prove your judgement sound/In honouring Dionysus as a mighty god.’ While this statement was likely intended as a reference to Apollo’s status as Tiresias’ patron god, rather than an allusion to a philosophical theory that would not exist for over two thousand years, it is nonetheless a confirmation that Tiresias finds a way to balance potentially-conflicting ideologies. Paul Roth also notes that in this scene, Tiresias is neither solely mystic nor intellectual, adding yet another dimension to Tiresias’ liminality.

Tiresias’ role as a figure who draws upon both the Apollonian and Dionysian is further displayed in two of Sophocles’ Theban Plays, namely Oedipus Rex and Antigone. In both plays, Tiresias’ role is to speak unwelcome and unheeded truths to authority as manifested in the kings of Thebes. In openly mocking and defying the rulers of the city, Tiresias uses a Dionysian approach to convey Apollonian wisdom and prophecy. Lowell Edmunds notes Tiresias’ ‘characteristically taunting reply’ to Oedipus’ interrogation about the old king’s death and the repeated statements that Tiresias ‘does not fear Oedipus’. In Antigone, Tiresias’ conflict with Creon is more direct. In response to Creon’s scepticism, Tiresias replies, ‘All kings, say I, seek gain unrighteously.’ Throughout the Theban plays, Tiresias breaks down the power structure of Thebes; as a revered seer Tiresias is fundamentally a part of the city. Yet instead of remaining within this role, Tiresias acts in opposition to the city’s rulers, not in a straightforward denial of information, but instead by conveying words that the rulers find unfathomable in a mocking tone. Although the seer is a respected Apollonian part of the city’s order, Tiresias’ actions in the Theban plays are just as Dionysian in their refusal to adhere to a confining power structure and use of the incomprehensible.

By combining the Apollonian and Dionysian, Tiresias manages to gain a more complete understanding of the world than the characters who rely heavily on only one system. Instead of failing to see the individual, like Dionysus in The Bacchae, Tiresias uses an understanding of the personal natures of Oedipus and Creon to tell them truths that their own views of the world will fail to understand, thereby preserving the course of events within the plays while still conveying the future to the audience. Unlike Odysseus, Tiresias is fluid enough to allow for both reason and irrationality to have a place, as seen in the character’s defence of the celebration in The Bacchae. Just as Nietzsche wrote that the ‘sublime and highly praised work of art of Attic tragedy and the dramatic dithyramb offers itself to our eyes as the common goal of both [the Apollonian and Dionysian] drives’, it is the combination of the two that results in the most complete and true understanding of the world, without the flaws of either method on its own.

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