Reading comp PrepTest 110 · Section 4 · Question 8

Topic: Humanities

Paragraph 1

• Paragraph note
  • Scholars including Snell and Barbu argue that fifth century Greek tragedies by authors like Aeschylus allow protagonists to choose their own paths.
• Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
  • Fifth century Greek tragedies are the subject of a lot of scholarly debate (first sentence)
  • Snell: Aeschylus’s dramas develop a model of individual autonomy (second sentence)
    • Protagonist confronts paralyzing and fateful situation; examines their deepest motives, then acts according to own free will (third-fourth sentences)
    • The central theme of the plays is personal autonomy (sixth sentence)
  • Barbu: Aeschylean drama shows the emergence within Green civilization of individual free will (seventh sentence)
  • Author’s attitude: “considerable scholarly debate” (first sentence); “deepest motives” (fourth sentence); “grave consequences” (fifth sentence); “tortured internal debate” (fifth sentence); “personal autonomy” (sixth sentence); “psychological conclusions” (seventh sentence)

Paragraph 2

• Paragraph note
  • Rivier argues that the protagonists’ actions are dictated by the gods.
• Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
  • Rivier: divine forces are external to the protagonist and experienced as an internal compulsion to act in a certain way (second sentence)
    • Protagonist has no free will; is aware of the impasse, and acts out of necessity along the only path that the gods have left open (third-fourth sentences)
    • Protagonist merely “recognizes” there is only one course of action (fifth sentence)
    • The fact that there is no room for free will is what makes the dramas truly tragic (first sentence)
  • Author’s attitude: “misrepresents” (first sentence); “truly tragic dimension” (second sentence); “what are claimed to be” (second sentence); “necessity imposed by the deities” (third sentence); “necessity dictates a path” (fourth sentence)

Paragraph 3

• Paragraph note
  • Lesky argues that, in Agamemnon, Agamemnon’s character chooses a path dictated by the gods because of his own desires.
• Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
  • Lesky: in Agamemnon, the title character is told that only the sacrifice of his daughter will bring a wind to blow his ships to battle (third sentence)
    • Agamemnon knows goddess Artemis wants him to sacrifice his daughter (fourth sentence)
    • He is also militarily ambitious and wants to win the battle (fifth sentence)
    • He chooses to sacrifice his daughter because of his own desires, and happens to fall in with a course of action dictated by the gods (sixth sentence)
    • Tragic action is a combination of human desire and supernatural forces (seventh sentence)
  • Author’s Attitude: “disputes both views” (first sentence); “brutally sacrifice” (second sentence); “constrained” (fourth sentence); “deeply desires” (fifth sentence); “violence of his passion” (sixth sentence); “constant tension” (seventh sentence)

Main Point: There are many scholarly viewpoints about the extent to which the protagonists’ actions in fifth century Greek tragedy are influenced by free will on the one hand and divine necessity on the other.

Paragraph 1, Sentence 1 (P1 S1) - Introduces topic of passage

P1 S2 - Snell’s view

P1 S7 - Barbu’s view

P2 S4 - Rivier’s view

P3 S6 - Lesky’s view

Describing a Debate: This passage uses a Describing a Debate Meta-Structure. With respect to fifth-century Greek tragedy, including plays by Aeschylus, the passage highlights the differing views of four scholars on the topic of how much individual autonomy and divine necessity drive human action. Both Snell and Barbu believe that human free will is paramount, while Rivier believes that divine compulsion is the sole driving force behind the protagonists’ actions. Lesky’s view is somewhere in the middle, positing that it is tension between human and divine forces that drives tragic action in Aeschylus’s plays.

The minor Meta-Structure used in this passage is Comparison. The author is constantly comparing the views of these four scholars to each other. The author begins with Snell’s perspective, then defines each additional scholar’s views relative to the views of their colleagues that were described earlier.

The author’s viewpoint is entirely absent from this passage, so it is not possible to classify this passage as a “Resolving a Debate” passage.

The author of this passage works their way methodically and neutrally from one end of the continuum between human free will and divine necessity to the other, defining where each scholar falls on the spectrum. In some passages that describe a debate, it is possible to discern where the author falls in terms of their own viewpoint on the topic under discussion, but this passage is worded quite neutrally, so this kind of inference is not possible here. The focus in this passage is on how the views of the thinkers described relate to each other, rather than on how the author relates to the topic.