Dionysus: Lord of Misrule

The ancient Greeks themselves were never comfortable about their god Dionysus, or Bacchus, treating him as a foreign intruder. This is because he was patron of wine, with all its exciting, convivial and destructive effects. As such he was associated with community, sociability, reconciliation, inspiration and salvation, but also with madness, violence, transgression and fear. He was both the ultimate party animal and the leader of the hippies from hell. This lecture steers a course through his various different attributions, to see if a unity and logic can be found at the heart of them.