Seneca's Agamemnon: The Entropy of Tragedy

The paper deals with some issues related to the much-discussed structure of this play, arguing that it is best understood in connection with its epic models. Seneca offers an original take on the characters and events of the war at Troy from a tragic angle, focusing on the theme of repetition-as-reversal and exploiting an unusual, fragmented dramatic structure to highlight the faultlines of epic narrative. In this context, the long rhesis which dominates the play emerges as a key element in the process of alluding to, and distancing himself from, the epic tradition.