Intro -- Contents -- Preface -- Introduction -- 1 Approaches to Guilt in Tragedy and Life -- 2 Performance -- 3 Words -- 4 Phèdre -- Chapter 1 Helplessness -- 1 Fatalism in Racine -- 2 Agamemnon -- 3 The Seventeenth Century -- 4 Divine Authority -- 5 Genetic Determinism -- 6 The Sense of the Inevitable -- Chapter 2 Flaws, Errors and Excuses: Theories of Hamartia -- 1 Aristotle -- 2 Flaw versus Error -- 3 Renaissance and Pre-Classical -- 4 Racine -- 5 Hamartia Re-Assessed -- Chapter 3 Ignorance -- 1 Theories -- 2 Oedipus at Thebes and at Colonus -- 3 Deianeira -- 4 Hercules, Agave and Others -- 5 Credulity - Macbeth and Others -- 6 Phèdre -- 7 Oedipus Revisited -- Chapter 4 Diminished Responsibility: Medea and the Crime passionnel -- 1 Euripides -- 2 Early-Modern and Modern Medeas -- 3 Corneille -- Chapter 5 Provocation: The Defence of Clytemnestra -- 1 Racine -- 2 Twentieth-century France: Giraudoux and Sartre -- 3 Marguerite Yourcenar -- 4 Jean Anouilh -- 5 Jean-Jacques Varoujean, Jean-Pierre Giraudoux -- Chapter 6 Saul, King of Israel, as Tragic Hero in French Drama -- 1 Jean de la Taille -- 2 Pierre du Ryer -- 3 Augustin Nadal -- 4 Voltaire -- 5 Alphonse de Lamartine -- 6 André Gide -- Chapter 7 Scapegoats: Passing the Buck to Snakes, Partners, Parents and Others -- 1 Parents -- 2 Teachers, Advisors, Counsellors -- 3 Spouses and Other Partners -- 4 Devils and Demons -- Bibliography -- Index of Names and Subjects -- Index of Plays.
