Back in 2001, Elton John performed in the ancient Amphitheater in the ruins of Ephesus. Ephesus is an ancient city that archaeologist have uncovered. It is an incredible tourist attraction in Western Turkey, on the Aegean Sea built by the ancient Greeks. That whole area is often referred to as the cradle of civilization. If you have seen video clips of the Elton John Concert, it’s incredible to think that those theaters, many built all over the region, thousands of years ago, were designed by the engineers of their time and built by the lower class of people, slaves. The acoustics engineered by these very smart Greeks at the time allowed for tens of thousand of people to hear performers and speakers. No doubt the Elton John’s of Ancient Greek times performed in those highly cultivated theaters. Back then, without the advent of adequate lighting most shows back then took place during the daytime. On a trip to Ephesus we were told by our guide that the theater held at it’s heyday, 24,000 citizen.
Even though there was an educational system in Ancient Greece, there was a hierarchy of who received an education. Most often, it was upper class young men who received the best of the system. Ancient Greeks felt that a good education consisted of math, including geometry, reading, philosophy, literature and physical education so that men could converse and function within a society. Most women were trained in the home to learn domestic duties and how to raise children. The lower class citizens and slaves learned the lessons of the day from their everyday work and from the polis, the city-state government, production performed in the theaters.
A drawing of what an outdoor amphitheater might have looked like in Ancient Greece…A drawing of the Globe Theater in Avon where Shakespeare’s works were performed. Upper class spectators would have sit in the seats and the lower class people would have stood. Same in both theaters.
Greek Tragedies were many of the performances that were held to both entertain but predominately to ‘teach’ valuable social lessons of the day. If you think back to your literature classes in high school or college, you may remember reading a Greek Tragedy or two. Oedipus Rex, Agamemnon, Medea and The Bacchae. Some of these were stories that included the Greek God’s, long before the time of Christianity, and some were about the leaders of their time. Many of these told a story of a hero with an inflated ego and how his hubris causes his down fall and calamity in his life. They also told story of love, loss and how bad behavior got someone in to trouble. Without the access of books to the common citizen, these production were how many were educated.
Throughout history, it was not just Greek Tragedies but also the Bible, folktales, fairy tales and other literature that taught the lessons of life. Most adults can remember the story of Pinocchio the little puppet whose nose grew every time he told a lie and how his lying got him into trouble when he did not listen to his loving father, Gepetto. Think of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s classic tale of colonial times, The Scarlet Letter, which told the story of how an adulterous woman was treated when her sin was made known and how she became an outcast as she raised her illegitimate daughter, Pearl. At the time, most likely a lesson to young woman as to how to behave within a community. Although the book was published in 1850, the story takes place in the Puritan Massachusetts Bay Colony sometime between 1642 and 1650. The Scarlet Letter was one of the first mass produced books in the United States and is considered a classic work of American Literature. When Literature can stand the test of time in terms of plot, lesson, elements and characters it is just as stirring and moving as it was when it was written, be it the bestselling book of all times, The Bible, the works of Shakespeare, Chaucer, the Iliad and the Odyssey or other enduring published manuscripts…
It may take some recollection to go through some of your literature classes from the past to come up with memorable characters like, Hester Prynne. From The Scarlet Letter. From the Old Testament of Bible consider characters to look up to like Jobe, Moses, Ruth, Naomi, Ester, David, Samson and Solomon, known for his wisdom. In the New Testament, Jesus, Paul, Matthew and numerous characters both good and bad who left their mark in history. In Shakespeare’s works who can forget such evil characters like Claudius from Hamlet, Iago, the Green Eyed Monster from Othello, what happened to Romeo and Juliet…
The Ancient Greeks had it right, there are lessons to be learned from literature, whether it’s a Greek Tragedy of a hero’s hubris or the lesson of how jealousy can get the best of someone, as it did in Shakespeare’s Othello. There is a place for good literature both in a society or in a school’s curriculum as it can teach students lessons to learn for life. At Grand Blanc High School in the late seventies and early eighties, some of the teachers who led stimulating discussing on Shakespeare, Early American Literature and British Literature were Mrs. Staley, Mr. Carrol and Mrs. Yates. A good foundation in literature allows for a child to not only learn valuable lessons for life to function in society, but moral lessons for a good life. References to these characters and lessons come up in other subjects or situations as well out in the real world...
When you have read history and good literature, it’s easy to make parallels when you see personalities, either in the news or in your own community or circle with some of these memorable characteristics. Consider the meddling neighbor who stirs up a whole hornet’s nest of trouble who ends up getting her due. You watch her over and over make a fool of herself and eventually, something she does gets her deeper in and eventually ‘she cooks her own goose.’ You may think to yourself, “why couldn’t she just stop?” “What was the point of her causing a ruckus complaining about this or that?” And eventually she does herself in to embarrass herself and no one wants to talk to her. The only way out is to come clean, apologize to those she offends and hopefully apologies accepted and all move on. IF she has it in her to do so…
….Or it’s the upstanding member of the community who has something going on that’s illegal or inappropriate. They keep the lie going and the secret from their family. Eventually, people find out and the innocent family members get hurt because of the lie and bad behavior. Everyone in the community knows and it’s an embarrassing situation. Sometimes things are so bad that a marriage can’t endure the stress, someone goes to jail and if the family stays in tact, sometimes they have to leave the community to start over…
…..Consider the investment or financial planner who appears to be a trustworthy person and maybe they are to begin with and then they get stuck with a bad investment and to ‘make-up’ for the bad investment they take on a bigger investment to get them out of the previous one and then maybe they get a little greedy and seeing that they have a pot of money that belong to other people, maybe, just maybe, they can use that to make the situation better and THEN they’ll get out this mess. Maybe there is some gambling involved to get out of the mess or maybe they start going down the wrong path with shady characters. They start robbing Peter to pay Paul. Then realizing that they need to protect themself they move money around so that what they do have is hidden. In the mean time, they have left honest, trusting, well meaning people who trusted this (phoney) professional with there hard earned money. Or maybe that charlatan skips town with the money and leaves their family and investors in the dust to pick up the pieces. Both characters let their hubris get the best of them and it caused their own demise. Consider Bernie Madoff. Left in the dust were his sons, both dead now, one who committed suicide and the other died of cancer. Following Bernie’s incarceration, Ruth moved to an apartment in Florida and then to an apartment in Connecticut. Since 2020 she has lived with her former daughter-in-law, wife of her deceased son, Mark. Bernie had to live with the knowledge of this and of all the troubles he caused for his investors. Many of Madoff’s clients were high profile people or people with considerable amounts of money invested. Their story got attention. What’s equally tragic is the others smaller investors who lost life savings or retirements who’s situations didn’t get the attention and and help going after the bad financial planners who steered them poorly in terms of their finances…
…Turn on the television or read an online news source and you have many characters to see who resemble characters through history or literature who should have learned from the lessons of the past. Consider the politicians who lie, pay people off to protect their reputation, who do back door deals in the middle of the night take bribes or pay offs and think no one will find out. The men who pay women off or women who behave poorly. It’s men, it’s women it’s this side it’s that side you can find these characters everywhere. Human nature is human nature. Power and money can corrupt. Sex sells in the news. Again, the writers of literature throughout history had a good handle on how the human mind works and how one’s behavior can put them and those they love in a bad spot. Times can change, the years can go by, but right is still right and wrong is still wrong. The key is to stay out of the bad behavior that can take you down. We all make mistakes and slip up here and there. Most likely, some of the characters in history who made ‘bad news’ didn’t set out to do it. Probably most of the bad charlatan financial planners didn’t set out to be that way and take advantage of investors just hoping to retire. These bad apples make it harder for the good ones out there who are honest and decent. There was something that went wrong. Either they got too greedy or got themself in a bad situation over extending themself or they developed an expensive bad habit and did all they could do to satisfy that habit. Bad behavior never pays off. When you do something bad, it usually does come back to haunt you. What goes around, DOES come around. It never pays off to take advantage of someone. That’s pretty much a universal lesson. WE may not see that person face the consequences but one way or another them or those they love do and will. Have you every heard the saying “The sins of the fathers?” Yes,sometimes innocent people end up paying the consequences for others bad behavior. That would be the worst lesson to have to learn, to have your loved ones pay the consequences for your bad behavior…
The moral of the story, learn from the mistakes of others. Read the classics to your children and maybe you do a refresher of them yourself. Shakespeare, Greek Tragedies, Classic Traditional Literature written by good authors are interesting to read and so entertaining. These stories tell timeless lessons that have been told through the generations. Some of these characters are figures who we may remember from our high school or college history class and sometimes our knowledge of history will put these stories into context. From there, get up in the morning with a feeling of gratitude and humbleness in your heart with the desire to get through the day without starting trouble (you can laugh out loud if you wish, but it’s true), and maybe even hoping to do some kindness for others, even if it’s just being friendly in the grocery line or holding the door for the person behind you….And then, when you are feeling like you are observing a Greek Tragedy or observing a story from classic literature, grab yourself a bag of popcorn, sit back and watch the show of life and see how it all plays out (you can laugh out loud on this one too)…Or, better yet, get yourself busy trying to make the world a better place, yourself…I think I like that option best…
It’s a Great Day ❤️
