Thersites
Fictional Character
Jasper Britton...company at the National Theatre in 1999, revealing a more playful side as an irreverant character actor in the eccentric repertoire of Thersites in Troilus and Cressida, Ryumin in Maxim Gorky's Summerfolk '', Smooth in ''Money directed by... In this article: Jasper Britton, Jonathan Miller, Royal National Theatre, John Caird, Macbeth, Thersites, King Lear, Royal Shakespeare Company, Macbeth, and Caliban |
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Guardian Unlimited | August 21, 2009
Dangerous liaisons
...2009 Diomedes and Cressida in foreground, Troilus held by Ulysses and Thersites in background ... Act V, Scene II, from William Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida, engraved by Luigi Schiavonetti Photograph: Bridgeman Art Medieval...
In this article: Troilus, Giovanni Boccaccio, Troilus and Cressida, William Shakespeare, Robert Henryson, Cressida, Benoit de Sainte-Maure, and Briseida
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Daily Express | July 23, 2009
War and lechery played for laughs
...Hunter. Squat and limping along with a hunchback, gammy leg, eye patch and open sores, he apes it up as the traditional fool even as he pronounces on the pointlessness of the conflict ( All the argument is a whore and a cuckold ). Similarly,...
In this article: William Shakespeare, Troilus, Troilus and Cressida, Cressida, Pandarus, Laura Pyper, and Helen
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Wikipedia | October 07, 2009
Thersites
...the loathsomest scab in Greece." Thersites soon leaves Ajax and puts himself into the service of Achilles (portrayed by Shakespeare as a kind of bohemian figure), who appreciates his bitter, caustic humor. In Part Two of Goethe's ''Faust ''...
In this article: Homer, Agamemnon, Kenneth Burke, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Achilles, Ajax, Odysseus, William Shakespeare, and History
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Independent.co.uk - Commentators | June 16, 2008
Boyd Tonkin: Tales of the City
...at the Barbican. In Shakespeare's darkest satire, Thersites dares to voice the toxic truth about a society of gruesome spectacles where celebrity matings and political spin conspire with the perpetual threat of slaughter. "Lechery, lechery;...
In this article: The Edge of Love, Dylan Thomas, Couscous, John Maybury, Cheek by Jowl, William Shakespeare, and Steve McQueen
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John Marston
...some indirect flyting in at least one of the satires. Some see William Shakespeare's Thersites and Iago, as well as the mad speeches of King Lear as influenced by The Scourge of Villanie. Marston had, however, arrived on the literary scene as...
In this article: John Marston, Ben Jonson, Blackfriars, Philip Henslowe, The Malcontent, The Dutch Courtesan, and Joseph Hall
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Description from Wikipedia:
In Greek mythology, Thersites, son of Agrius, was a rank-and-file soldier of the Greek army during the Trojan War.
Homer described him in detail in the Iliad, book II, even though he plays only a minor role in the story. He is said to be bow-legged, lame and had shoulders that caved inward. His head was covered in tufts of hair and came to a point. He was vulgar, obscene, somewhat dull-witted, and Homer has much fun at his expense. He called Agamemnon greedy and Achilles a coward, causing Odysseus to hit him with Agamemnon's sceptre.
In his Introduction to The Anger of Achilles, Robert Graves speculates that Homer might have made Thersites a ridiculous figure as a way of dissociating himself from Thersites, whose remarks seem entirely justified, while letting these remarks, along with Odysseus' brutal act of suppression, remain in the record. In fact, Thersites was venerated by marxist literature in Soviet times.
According to later stories, Achilles eventually killed him for making fun of Achilles' grief over the death of Penthesilea.
In Part Two of Goethe's Faust, Act One, during the Masquerade, Thersites appears briefly and criticizes the goings-on. He says, "When some lofty thing is done / I gird at once my harness on. / Up with what's low, what's high eschew, / Call crooked straight, and straight askew," Trans. Wayne, Philip, copyright 1959 (Penguin Books). The Herald, who acts as Master of Revels or Lord of Misrule, strikes Thersites with his mace, at which point he metamorphoses into an egg, from which a bat and an adder are hatched.
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