Silences and words: identity and otherness in Sophocles’ Ajax Parodos

Abstract

The Parodos of Sophocles’ Ajax can be read as an epinicion that builds the image of the protagonist as an epic and cultic hero. Scholarly analysis of the choral discourse referred to the rumor that weighs on Ajax allows to elucidate two dimensions of the hearsay: a) a human one, sensorial and morally characterizable, which leads to describe the Achaeans who carry the rumor as enemies, and the hero as great-hearted but isolated; and b) a divine one, which exhibits both the gods’ superiority and Ajax’s retreat before the insults that weigh on him. Additionally, the analysis of the omissions and polarizations of the choral discourse reveals the aggrandizement of Ajax’s portrait, not only by praises to him, but also by the minimization of his enemies and even the sailors who make up the chorus.

Keywords

• sófocles
• áyax
• identidad
• alteridad
• palabra