1. Introduction: Performing Catharsis; 2. Light in the Darkness: In and out of the Paleolithic; 3. The Kathartei – healers, philosophers and performers; 4. Knowing Thyself at the Lesser Mysteries; 5. Demeter’s Rude Medicine; 6. Pity and Fear at Eleusis; 7. The Iliad: Performing Pain; 8. The Odyssey’s therapeutic bard; 9. Healing Dionysos; 10. Staging Psychagogia; 11. Cathartic Narratives; 12. Aristotle’s Cathartic Theatre.
Biography
Peter Meineck holds the endowed chair of Professor of Classics in the Modern World at New York University (USA). Publications include The Routledge Handbook of Classics and Cognitive Theory (2019), Theatrocracy: Greek Drama, Cognition and the Imperative for Theatre (2018), Aristophanes Frogs (2021) and Tony Stark, Odysseus and the Mythology Behind Marvel (2026). He founded Aquila Theatre in London in 1991 and has produced and directed over 50 professional stage productions and directed several national arts and humanities public programs in the United States. He holds a PhD from the University of Nottingham and is also a volunteer firefighter, emergency medical, and rescue technician.
