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Versions of plays on Lucius Junius Brutus’ expulsion of the Tarquins illustrate the continuing removal of the barrier between actor and audience . Not only must the audience understand an allusion to a contemporary political figure effected through a character onstage, but it must also understand the relevance of this allusion to previously staged versions of the same play or theme. The (re)interpretation of stage reality in relation to the audience’s reality results in the audience’s growing theatricalized perception of its own reality: would Accius’ play Brutus have alluded to Caesar’s assassin, who himself imitated the actions of his putative ancestor Brutus? A similar dynamic is apparent with plays centering upon the Atreus-Thyestes myth, in particular the extent to which fixed dramatic texts continued to be understood as topical through allusions both to a contemporary political figure using a character portrayed onstage, and to previously staged versions. T H Y E S T E S O N T H E RO M A N S TA G E The myth relating the rivalry between Atreus and Thyestes was popular on the Roman stage and involves three main episodes in dramatic versions , two of which take place in Mycenae and the third in Epirus. These episodes include Thyestes’ adultery with Atreus’ wife Aerope and his attempt to usurp the throne, Atreus’ revenge at the infamous banquet in Mycenae, and Thyestes’ exile to Epirus, where he rapes his daughter Pelopia and begets Aegisthus.77 The myth was extremely popular on the Greek stage in the fifth and fourth centuries.78 Roman versions include the Thyestes of Ennius, the Atreus of Accius, the Thyestes of Gracchus, the Thyestes of Cassius Parmensis, the Thyestes of Varius Rufus, the Atreus of P. Pomponius Secundus, the Atreus of Mamercus Aemilius Scaurus, the Thyestes of Seneca, and the Thyestes of Maternus.79 In recent studies, mythological tyrants on the Roman stage are treated as analogues to historical persons.80 Separating drama from reality is difficult, however, when allusion is the means by which to distinguish the two. As a figurative device, allusion avoids direct analogy, thereby producing an “out” for dramatists undertaking dangerous themes, and for their perceived targets, of the “no offense intended, none taken” variety. When offense is actually taken, whether by the alleged target or by those pointing fingers (animus nocendi), only then does a generic description of a stage tyrant become a perceived insult. A ruler who is viewed as tyrannical differs from a self-styled tyrant who may c r e at i n g m e tat r a g e d y 101 choose to reciprocate the charges of tyranny, through mythological allusion , against those who make them. When an all-but-in-name king, like Augustus, presents a play that seems to draw attention to his precarious constitutional position, the intended meaning of the allusion becomes more complicated to interpret. What message(s) did Augustus intend to send by commissioning a seemingly anti-tyrannical play, the Thyestes, for his triumph in 29 b.c.e.? To consider this, one must place the play in the wider context of dramas either written or perceived to have been written as condemnations of Imperial power. A closer look at tragedies on the Thyestes theme at Rome and allusions to the mythological king on the political stage reveals that there was a strong interrelationship between theatrical and political allusion, but the exact nature of this relationship is often difficult to reconstruct.81 It seems that a myth depicting fraternal or civil strife was perennially apposite at Rome. From this observation, however, it cannot be argued that all references to tyranny and all plays on the Atreus-Thyestes myth were intended as specific attacks against contemporary figures, unless we have the cultural contexts surrounding original or restaged versions. Although we know that Ennius’ Thyestes was presented at the ludi Apollinares in 169 b.c.e., for example, we do not know specific details surrounding the occasion of performance, and therefore it is impossible to place the play in its cultural context. The same is true of Accius’ Atreus in the Gracchan era. As discussed at the beginning of this chapter, one may suspect anti-tyrannical sentiment and allusions to the political struggle at Rome between the Optimates and the Populares, yet without the original date of production, it is impossible to argue with any certainty the presence of contemporary allusions within the play. The plays presented...

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