Beyond the body-beyond the mind: the politics of the tragic nosos

• Main Author: Anastasia SERGHIDOU
• Format: Article
• Language: Spanish
• Published: Ediciones Universidad de Salamanca 2013-07-01
• Series: Studia Historica: Historia Antigua
• Subjects: cordura; salud mental; tragedias; kakos polîtes; sophrosynè
• Online Access: https://revistas.usal.es/index.php/0213-2052/article/view/10052

This study deals with the idea of sanity and mental health and the way they are discussed by the Tragedians. The investigation focuses on sanity as a social phenomenon which affects both individual and multitudes. More accurately it examines the moral and political traits which define the limits between sane and insane behaviour. Special interest is given on heroic deviated attitudes and the affective expressions which marked the abnormal. From this point of view a parallelism is to be noted between civic values and normal mental attitudes. The study examines the idea of kakos polîtes as a metaphorical expression of insanity and analyses the ethical malignity and disobedience to laws, often generated by incorrect politai as a refusal oí sophrosynè. Creon serves as a significant example of such an attitude. An equivalent state of affairs may be noticed within a divine context where divine power functions as a guarantor of mental order. The questions posed by the Tragedians have a broader interest given that they interrogate a personal phenomenon under the scope of a public and political context. Interestingly, models of insanity become visible through specific hegemonial figures.