Off Stage Violence

Question 1

Is violence shown on stage ?

Answer 1

No
Conventionally plays use a messenger speech and the result of the violence shown on stage

You therefore experience it twice mentally and then literally in front of yoh

Question 2

What type of language do messenger speech’s use ?

Answer 2

Evocative and graphic language and description

Question 3

Oedipus the king messenger speech?

Answer 3

Focus shift: from Jocasta to Oedipus

It’s like an eyewitness account
- battles report by eye witnesses and what happened to individual adding an extra element to a contemporary Greek audiance

Graphic detail of Oedipus own self harm: prepares audience for what they will then seen
- twist in convention as Oedipus demands to show himself instead of a character demanding to see the ekkyklema