Aeschylus & Arizona

Watching the memorial service in Arizona, I am reminded that the classical Greeks knew more about human affairs and the human heart that we do. Because they so valued the need for communal reflection on the nature of human tragedy, on the sharing of pain and sadness, that they did not have to wait for literal tragedy to happen in order to express it. They gathered to watch  plays that told tragic stories, and -- so valued was the imagination in that time -- these stories felt real.  In our own time and place, the imagination is under-valued, and we experience what the Greeks felt only when literal opportunity occurs, as last weekend and tonight. We have lost much in losing the communal ritual of these distant citizens, the ritual of classical Tragedy. They knew more about the human heart and human needs than we do.