22 Jul 2010, 12:10pm
Pentheus Thebes:
by Abbot

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Time for a Regular Schedule?

The new panel, pentheus27, has been posted.

One of those things that literal critics wonder about in Greek drama is the cause of Cadmus’ exile from Thebes, which is mentioned at the end of The Bacchae. After all, he was not guilty of impiety like his grandson, Pentheus. Tiresias and he were even prepared to go out into the countryside to worship Dionysus, before Pentheus caught and shamed them. One criticism that I have read conjectured that his punishment was due to his belief not being genuine. Instead he was motivated to acknowledge Dionysus as a god by the selfish hope that doing so would bring honor to their family.

I myself never bought into this sort of reasoning. Euripedes had Cadmus exiled at the end of his drama because that was his traditional fate according to mythology. To be sure dramatists did change Mythological “facts” to suit their dramatic needs. But I believe that here Cadmus’ exile was always fated to happen. What’s in question here is whether his exile always had something to do with Dionysus’ dishorable treatment by Pentheus or was it due to something else. Like perhaps some wrath of Ares that carried over from the slaying of the Draco? Many ancient dramas that may have helped explain this are now lost… and even a rather large portion of Dionysus’ speech at the end of The Bacchae is missing from the Greek text. We may never know the answer for sure.

But on a more personal note, I’ve decided to try a schedule for regular updates. I’ll be updating twice a week (for the forseeable future, at least) on Mondays and Thursdays. Most web-comics are either once a week (Like Maakies), three days a week (like Penny-Arcade or xkcd) or five times a week (like PvP or Diesel Sweeties). The typical schedule for a three day a week comic seems to be Monday, Wednesday, & Friday (though the now completed 8-bit Theater ran Tuesday, Thursday, & Saturday). I have decided to “meet in the middle” and update Monday and Thursday. If I can increase my productivity I may move to a Monday, Wednesday, & Friday schedule… but I wouldn’t hold my breath.