Prometheus Bound

Aeschylus, _

doi:10.5040/9781408190807.00000015

Cited by 12 publications

(5 citation statements)

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“…41 Mark Griffith observes that 'death by exposure, whether through crucifixion, impaling, or fastening to a board, seems to have been a familiar punishment for lower-class criminals and traitors'. 42 More recently, Ruffell has confirmed that, in the Greek world, punishments like that of Prometheus, who is 'not only fixed [to a crag] to suffer exposure, constrained position, and sleep deprivation, but is actually impaled onto the rock', were 'the privilege of traitors or the lowest sort of criminals'. 43 Ruffell's brief sketch of the terms of Prometheus's punishment is suggestive, but he doesn't develop its implications, which I propose to explore here with particular emphasis on the sleep deprivation he suffers.…”

Section: IImentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The Aeschylean Prometheus is 'compelled to keep watch unceasingly', as Griffiths puts it, 'like a guard on duty'. 69 He transforms himself, through righteous resistance to his despotic ruler, into the foremost saint and martyr of sleeplessness. He converts a state of wakefulness into a state of watchfulness.…”

Section: IVmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…See in how cruel a grip, Pinned on the craggy peak of this ravine, I must endure my fearful watch. (137- 42) In representing his punitive wakefulness as a 'watch' (phrourá), albeit a 'fearful' one, Prometheus opens up the prospect of combating Zeus's unsleeping hold on power with his own unsleeping watchfulness. The adjective 'unsleeping', applied to Oceanus's tide in these lines, appears in retrospect, reading back from the end of this short speech, to adhere to Prometheus.…”

Section: IVmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Standing upright, unsleeping: sleeplessness, wakefulness and watchfulness in Prometheus Bound

Beaumont¹

2021

Textual Practice

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This article reinterprets and reinvents Prometheus as an archetype of sleeplessness, wakefulness and, finally, watchfulness, for the twenty-first centurya period characterised by proliferating discourses about the so-called epidemic of insomnia suffered in advanced capitalist societies. In the Aeschylean version of the story, as I contend, this mythical hero, who is at once a god and a prophet, is a victim of what might be characterised, with certain qualifications, as sleep deprivation. The article begins by situating Prometheus in mythographic terms, underlining that scholars have tended to overlook the importance of sleeplessness and wakefulness to Zeus's punishment of him. It then proceeds to trace the changes between Hesiod's and the Aeschylean account of Prometheus, with particular attention to matters of crime and punishment. The article goes on to offer a detailed rereading of Prometheus Bound, focusing first on Hermes's threats at the end of the play, which provide an important context for thinking about the penal torture of Prometheus, especially the assault on his sight or vision; and, second, on the torture to which he is subjected by Bia and Kratos at the start of the play, above all the component of it that comprises some form of sleep deprivation. After briefly outlining the importance of sleep deprivation in torture practices of the medieval and early modern periods, the article returns to the classical period and, specifically, the part that remaining awake and hence being conscious of pain plays in an episode in the Odyssey. Finally, in a concluding section, it argues that Prometheus's sleeplessness, though the result of torture, acquires a positive, even heroic value in the Aeschylean play because it is implicitly associated with a state of political vigilance that resists the panoptic surveillance of tyrants. Here, wakefulness is redeemed as watchfulness.

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Section: IImentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: IVmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: IVmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Standing upright, unsleeping: sleeplessness, wakefulness and watchfulness in Prometheus Bound

Beaumont¹

2021

Textual Practice

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“…Prometheus stole it as a "flower" (ánthos) gathered into the narthex-thyrsus from Hephaestus, and that deity is also the one who chained the Titan to the rock of his torment. 99 The depiction of the "flower" on the Etruscan mirror has not only deformed the mushroom to illustrate its sexual imagery as a fire-drill, but it has endowed it with an anomalous stem supporting a calyx widening into a trumpet-shaped blossom. The mushroom is morphing into a lily.…”

Section: The Lily-mushroom Of Ixion's Tormentmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Beast Initiate: The Lycanthropy of Heracles

Ruck¹

2019

AJHIS

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“…Medice, cura te ipsum, or physician heal thyself, is attributed to ancient Greek playwright Aeschylus and emphasizes the incongruity between a physician's readiness to care for others while neglecting personal well-being (Aeschylus, 1995). As an occupational phenomenon, burnout is caused by unsuccessfully managed chronic workplace stress Dajani T, Bryant V, Sackett D, Allgood J MedEdPublish https://doi.org/10.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“Your Wellness Program Is Interfering With My Well-Being”: Reducing the Unintended Consequences of Wellness Initiatives in Undergraduate Medical Education

Dajani¹,

Bryant²,

Sackett³

et al. 2021

MedEdPublish

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Physician burnout rates are on the rise due to increasing clerical workload, reduced sense of efficacy, and moral injury. Untreated, burnout can lead to medical errors, a decline in empathy, and, in extreme cases, suicide. Medical students experience burnout associated with maladaptive coping strategies, and lack of exercise. Physicians and medical students who practice regular self-care have higher well-being scores and better patient outcomes. To mitigate burnout, undergraduate medical institutions have adopted student wellness programs. However, medical students may perceive mandatory wellness activities as ineffective, promoting unhealthy competition and cultivating toxic positivity. At A.T. Still University's School of Osteopathic Medicine in Arizona, we have worked to reduce the unintended consequences of wellness programs. Strategies to reduce these consequences include providing optional activities at meetings, detailing related scientific evidence and encouraging faculty and staff participation. The current article delineates these mitigation strategies.

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Prometheus Bound

Cited by 12 publications

References 0 publications

Standing upright, unsleeping: sleeplessness, wakefulness and watchfulness in Prometheus Bound

Standing upright, unsleeping: sleeplessness, wakefulness and watchfulness in Prometheus Bound

The Beast Initiate: The Lycanthropy of Heracles

“Your Wellness Program Is Interfering With My Well-Being”: Reducing the Unintended Consequences of Wellness Initiatives in Undergraduate Medical Education

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