Summary: This is the stunning Kennedy Center production of Euripides' great classic about a woman driven by emotion beyond the brink of rationality. With Zoe Caldwell as Medea and Judith Anderson as the nurse. The English text is by Robinson Jeffers.
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
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Summary: Sophocles often won the leading prize at the Dionysia, the principal dramatic festival of Athens; but Oedipus the King was a runner-up, winner of the second prize. Posterity, however, considers the play second to none. The play tells the beginning of the Oedipus saga, setting the stage and creating the characters who will continue the story to its conclusion in Antigone. With Michael...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
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Summary: Bearer of an almost unspeakable, immutable fate, Oedipus yet feels himself a man chosen-that is, favored-by the gods. Now an old man, blind and outcast, Oedipus wanders through Greece guided by his daughter Antigone until he comes to Colonus, where he knows he will die. Protected by the ruler of Thebes against the armies of Creon who have come in pursuit, he curses his son Polynices for...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
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Summary: They gave their names to some of the most memorable plays in Western history, and, thousands of years later, they are still very much a presence in contemporary culture. Who were the women of classical Greek drama? In this program, the presentation of powerful women in Medea, Antigone, and Lysistrata is contrasted with the circumscribed role of women in Athenian society by Princeton...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
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Summary: This program covers the purpose, design, and uses of the ekkyklema for showing the victims and perpetrators of off-stage violence; the deus ex machina, a crane mechanism to suspend gods above the stage; Charonian steps, for ghosts from the underworld; and other means of entrance and exit. It also explains the reasons for New Comedy, its audience, and its physical requirements.
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
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Summary: Drawing upon the insights of numerous international scholars-and illustrating crucial passages with stunning animation sequences-this program guides viewers through the Inferno of Dante's Divine Comedy. With detailed analysis of the poet's descent into Hell and navigation through its various levels, the program interprets Dante's motives for embarking on such a journey, explains his...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
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Summary: The Greeks worshipped Dionysus and honored him widely and often. In fact, Greek drama was written as part of the great Dionysian celebrations. In this program, we learn about Semele, Dionysus’ mother, and the efforts of Hermes and Apollo to save the baby’s life; the purification of Dionysus; how mortals received the gift of the grape, and the dangers it can cause; and how Dionysus freed Hera...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
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Summary: The early Church saw a proliferation of writings all claiming divine authority. This program surveys many of these texts and their adherents, as well as traces the course of the New Testament's codification. Original manuscripts and critical commentary are used to explore the infancy gospels, St. Clement's letters to the Corinthians, and the Gnostic gospels, including the Gospel of Thomas,...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
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Summary: In the beginning was Chaos. And Eurynome divided the seas from the sky, set the wind in motion, and released the forces of nature. Out of the Universal Egg emerged the sun and moon, the planets, the stars, the earth, and all living things. This program tells that story, and that of the first family: Gaea, Uranus, and Cronus. It then moves on to Zeus: his birth on Crete, the trick by which he...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
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Summary: In the ancient Malian city of Timbuktu, thousands of scientific and religious texts-among Africa's oldest literature-have been hidden for centuries. This program examines the rich history and variety of Timbuktu's lost libraries and shows how they have recently garnered the world's attention. Viewers meet local scholars, as well as experts from across Africa and the Western world, who elucidate...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
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Summary: Artemis, Apollo’s twin sister, was noted for both her beauty and her cruelty. She protected flora and fauna, especially wild animals, and was not reluctant to punish those who acted against nature. In this program, we visit the temple at Brauron, Arcadia, Mount Cithaeron, and other Artemisian haunts, and learn about Artemis’ birth and youth. Also told are the stories of Orion, Niobe, Callisto,...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
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Summary: In this program, we discover that Athene sprang full-grown and fully-armed from Zeus’s head, and that Aphrodite emerged from the sea where the physical evidence had landed of Cronus’ castration of Uranus. Also explored are love stories of Aphrodite, the myths of Neritis, Anchises, Pygmalion, and Galatea, the mythological roots of the Trojan War, and the lives of Ares and of Adonis. Athene gives...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
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Summary: The most celebrated work of Dante Alighieri is certainly the Divina Commedia-a vision of hell, purgatory, and heaven that provides a strangely surrealistic view of medieval attitudes on religious dogma and the price of disobedience. In this program, dramatizations of scenes depicting courtly love, sexual love, love of God, and love of the Virgin Mary are featured.
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
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Summary: What is "the good," and why is it that one can never step into the same river twice? This program featuring Princeton University's Alexander Nehamas and Richard Sorabji, honorary fellow at Wolfson College, the University of Oxford, addresses core topics in ancient philosophy such as freedom and fate, permanence and change, happiness, the nature of the cosmos, and the immortality of the soul....
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
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Summary: If wisdom were given me under the express condition that it must be kept hidden and not uttered, I should refuse it. Thus wrote the 1st-century Roman philosopher Seneca in one of the many letters he wrote to his disciple, Lucilius. These letters were later collected together to form Moral Epistles, one of the central ethical works of the classical period. This program examines Seneca's...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
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Summary: A contemporary interpretation of Jason's quest for the Golden Fleece, this beautifully crafted program scrutinizes what is colloquially referred to as the battle of the sexes. Production values convincingly re-create the world of the Bronze Age, but commentary from modern scholars evokes themes easily recognizable in the 21st century: Who holds the real power in male/female relationships? Why...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
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Summary: The main event in Greek mythology was the Trojan War, in which thousands of mortals died, while the gods watched and laid wagers on the outcome. Among the war’s prime movers were Ares, god of war, whose stone heart thrived on quarrels and wars; his sister Eris, whose name means discord; and her dolorous offspring Ponos (pain), Mahes (battles), Foni (murder), Dysnomia (anarchy), Limos (famine),...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
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Summary: This ambitious program, produced by the award-winning film director Peter Greenaway and internationally known artist Tom Phillips, brings to life the first eight cantos of Dante's Inferno. Featuring a cast that includes Sir John Gielgud as Virgil, the cantos are not conventionally dramatized. Instead, the feeling of Dante's poem is conveyed through juxtaposed imagery that conjures up a...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
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Summary: Systematic thought about the true nature of things is the very foundation of philosophical reasoning: idealism and materialism.realism, nominalism, and conceptualism.the noumenal and the phenomenal.logical positivism, emergentism, and modal realism. In this program, Rutgers philosophers Brian McLaughlin, Barry Loewer, John Hawthorne, Ted Sider, and Dean Zimmerman discuss the nature of this most...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
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Summary: This episode of Clash of the Gods examines Homer's The Odyssey, one of the most famous epics ever written. Follow its archetypal hero, Odysseus, as he sets sail on a twenty-year journey to return home from battle to reclaim his wife and kingdom. It's a timeless tale of adventure filled with mythological beasts, vengeful gods, and enchanting seductresses. But could it have actually happened?...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
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Summary: With a novelist's attention to psychological detail, a diarist's love of personal history, and a moralist's penchant for spinning parables, the Roman writer Plutarch created an altogether new kind of biographical history with his Parallel Lives, a series of paired portraits of major figures from classical Greece and Rome. In this program, Plutarch himself is held up for scrutiny, and he gives...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
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Summary: The Greeks prayed to Poseidon before embarking on sea journeys. They offered him the first fish caught, called him "the savior," and attributed their naval victory over the Persians to him. In this program, we learn how Poseidon was saved by his mother Rhea, and how he acquired his trident and used it to help his brother Zeus in his struggle against the Titans and Giants. We see some of the...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
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Summary: Tragedy upholds traditional values and comedy attacks them-which explain much of the change from Aristophanes to Plautus, from Old Comedy to New, reflecting as it does the change from Athenian democracy to Roman totalitarianism. Wary of creating permanent spaces that might be used for mass meetings, the Romans constructed temporary wooden structures to house their theatrical productions. Since...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
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Summary: The Greeks also called Apollo, Phoebus—brilliant one, perpetually reborn, who shoots darts from afar, and who incorporates the radiant characteristics of the sun. In this program, we learn about Apollo’s mother Leto, his birth on the island of Delos, his twin sister Artemis, Python and Pythia, and the oracle of Delphi. Also discussed are Cassandra’s prediction of the fall of Troy; Apollo and...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010