Beginning with his 1936 master's thesis, Theodor H. Gaster (1906–1992) focused most of his research on the analysis of Ancient Near Eastern mythological compositions (especially those from Ugarit, modern Ras Shamra in Syria) as religious dramas that were performed within a ritual setting. Gaster was deeply influenced by James G. Frazer's (1854–1941) understanding of the relation between myth and ritual, as well as by his preoccupation with seasonal patterns in mythological narratives and discourses. Although this approach, exemplified by Gaster's famous work Thespis, was predominant in North American and British scholarship during the 1950s and 1960s, now it can also be regarded as a modern intellectual construct rather than as a historical reconstruction.

Ancient Egypt

Gaster was excessively optimistic about the possibilities of knowing the actual setting of many ancient compositions. In the case of the Ancient Egyptian, some...