62 Nietzschewere a vision of the chorus. And, Nietzsche declared, the chorus allows
the writer of tragedy to bring the audience and its visions up onto the
stage. Attic theatergoers sought a state of reverie when settling down
under the open afternoon sky on the stones of the wide rotunda, and
their wishes were fulfilled. They were in a festive mood and prepared to
be transformed and to step outside of themselves. Then the music
sounded, the rhythmic song of the chorus, which set the bodies of the
singers and listeners in motion. An expectant atmosphere arose, and
when the individual figures took the stage, it was as if a common vision
had been born from this atmosphere. The protagonists acted in front
of the chorus, first just one, then several at a time.
But some individuals asserted their individuality against the collective
chorus, coming to the fore and embodying "living dissonance." As is
typical of dissonance, a dramatic tension ensued onstage. The protago-
nists detached themselves as a single voice from the chorus, developed
their dissonant role, and were resubmerged into the unison of the cho-
rus. The dissonant individual could not hold up for long, and when he
foundered, he returned to the lap of the music and the chorus reab-
sorbed him. The characters and their actions stood out from the music
like an island from the ocean. The chorus and its music were
omnipresent. The action onstage was public, in the full light of day.
Nothing remained hidden from the chorus. The individual had nowhere
to hide; the music of the world would devour him. For the Greeks,
insisted Nietzsche, the task of music was to "transform the suffering...
of the heroes into intensely strong sympathy from the audience" (1,528;
GMD).
Greek tragedy dramatized power plays. The protagonist controlled
the words, but it was the choral music that controlled the maker of
words. Words are subject to misunderstandings and misconceptions;
they do not originate in our innermost being, and they also do not reach
that far. They hover at the periphery of being. Music is different It
"goes right to your heart, as the true universal language that is under-
stood everywhere" (l,528f.; GMD).