Electra (or Elektra) by Euripides and the Electra myth

As I read the play in Gilbert Murray’s translation, I will use his spellings (Latinised names such as Clytemnestra, rather than Greek transliterations such as Klytaimestra). 

1/ Among the ancient Greek plays that survive today about the killing of Clytemnestra (Klytaimestra), the first was Aeschylus’s Libation Bearers, part of the Oresteia, first performed in 458 BC. 

Sophocles and Euripides, from the same generation, both wrote a play named Electra, though it’s not certain which one came out first: the one by Euripides was written in the mid-410s BC, the one by Sophocles is dated around 420–414 BC (wouldn’t it have been funny though if they were first performed the same year?). 

These two Electra plays don’t seem to reference each other, but there’s one scene in which Euripides clearly mocks a scene in Libation Bearers: how could Electra recognise Orestes from some strand of hair, or footprints? Don’t be ridiculous, Aeschylus. 

2/ Like Sophocles, Euripides focuses on the character of Electra. 

“ELECTRA […] Brother, brother, on some far shore 

Hast thou a city, is there a door

That knows thy footfall, Wandering One? 

Who left me, left me, when all our pain 

Was bitter about us, a father slain, 

And a girl that wept in her room alone. 

Thou couldst break me this bondage sore, 

Only thou, who art far away, 

Loose our father, and wake once more…

Zeus, Zeus, dost hear me pray?... 

The sleeping blood and the shame and the doom! 

O feet that rest not, over the foam

Of distant seas, come home, come home!” 

Sophocles’s Electra is a larger-than-life character: striking, intense, deformed by hate. Euripides’s Electra appears more vulnerable and fragile. 

One of the changes Euripides makes is that Clytemnestra and Aegisthus (also known as Aigisthos) don’t imprison Electra, but marry her off to a poor peasant so that she doesn’t have the power to wage war against them. She’s stripped off the position of princess. The peasant however doesn’t sleep with her, out of respect for her and her father. We then have this interesting passage:  

“ORESTES How dark lies honour hid! And what turmoil 

In all things human: sons of mighty men 

Fallen to naught, and from ill seed again 

Good fruit: yea, famine in the rich man’s scroll 

Writ deep, and in poor flesh a lordly soul!

As, lo, this man, not great in Argos, not 

With pride of house, uplifted, in a lot

Of unmarked life hath shown a prince’s grace…” 

Not hard to see why some people call Euripides modern. 

3/ In this play, Orestes is much weaker and more passive. The old man who rescued him as a child is now the one to come up with the plan to kill Aegisthus. The plan to kill Clytemnestra comes from Electra. 

Orestes hesitates. 

“ORESTES ’Tis my mother comes: my own

Mother, that bare me. 

[…]

ORESTES What would we with our mother? Didst thou say

Kill her? 

ELECTRA (turning on him) What? Is it pity? Dost thou fear 

To see thy mother’s shape? 

ORESTES ’Twas she that bare

My body into life. She gave me suck. 

How can I strike her?”

(The word “bare” is in my copy, shouldn’t it be “bore”?). 

“ORESTES I was a clean man once. Shall I be thrust 

From men’s sight, blotted with her blood? 

ELECTRA Thy blot 

Is black as death if him thou succour not!” 

Euripides humanises Orestes and removes Apollo—there is no command from the gods—it is Electra who pushes Orestes into it. 

Like Sophocles, he lets us see Electra’s point of view and then shows us Clytemnestra’s: not only did Agamemnon kill her daughter Iphigenia…

“CLYTEMNESTRA […] Nay, for long, 

I never would have killed him. But he came, 

At last, bringing that damsel, with the flame

Of God about her, mad and knowing all; 

And set her in my room; and in one wall 

Would hold two queens!...” 

In a way, Aeschylus sees and depicts the tragedy from a distance; Sophocles and Euripides come close to the characters and depict their clashing perspectives; both give us a confrontation between mother and daughter. 

4/ Sophocles’s play focuses on Electra’s state of mind that leads to the killing. Euripides’s play has the revenge, and also depicts the horror of Electra and Orestes when they realise what they have done. 

“ORESTES Saw’st thou her raiment there, 

Sister, there in the blood?

She drew it back as she stood, 

She opened her bosom bare, 

She bent her knees to the earth, 

The knees that bent in my birth…

And I… Oh, her hair, her hair…

(He breaks into inarticulate weeping)”

I would guess that Euripides’s Electra was after Sophocles’s. 

There are mentions of gods throughout the play and a god does appear at the end telling what Orestes and Electra have to do to pay for the murder of their mother, but I would say that the play is humanist, not mythic: unlike the characters in Aeschylus’s and Sophocles’s plays, Euripides’s Electra and Orestes choose to kill their mother themselves, without an oracle. A god only appears after the deed is done. Not only so, the killings are more brutal: Orestes kills Aegisthus after being welcomed as a guest to his feast; Electra lures Clytemnestra to the house and pretends to reconcile with her before having her killed. 

All three plays are wonderful, in different ways. 

The Oresteia by Aeschylus: Eumenides

1/ As the final part of the Oresteia, this is quite a strange play. After the murder of his mother Klytaimestra (better known as Clytemnestra), Orestes is pursued by the Furies.

“PRIESTESS […] But all around this man there slept 

a terrifying crowd of women resting on our seats. 

Not really women—they were more like Gorgons; 

but I cannot truly liken them to Gorgons

nor Harpies—for I saw a picture once 

of Harpies stealing Phineus’ feast, and they 

had wings; but these have none, and they are black 

and horrible in every way. They’re snoring, 

and the stench around them is unbearable. 

Disgusting streams of filth 

Pour from their eyes…” 

(translated by Michael Ewans) 

Horrifying stuff.

I note that the murder of Aigisthos (better known as Aegisthus) is fair game; even Klytaimestra’s murder of her husband Agamemnon, for the Furies, is not the worst; but matricide is the greatest evil. 

Haunted, Orestes asks for help from Apollo (the one who told him to kill his mother) and also asks Athena. She then sets up a trial for him in Athens, judged by 12 Athenian citizens. 

2/ The imagery in Aeschylus’s plays is interesting. 

“KLYTAIMESTRA You’re hunting in a dream! You’re barking like a sleeping dog 

that can’t forget its need to kill.” 

That’s the ghost of the dead woman, in case you’re wondering. 

“FURIES While I still slept, reproaches came in dreams

and struck me like a horseman with his whip 

in the belly, down below the liver. 

Here, the chill, the heavy chill, 

the dreadful whip-lash of the executioner!” 

3/ It is, however, a strange play because Apollo, a god, appears at the trial and argues in defence, and because the trial ends up not being about morality or justice but essentially boils down to the question “To which parent does the child owe more?”. 

“APOLLO […] The person called the mother is no real parent

of a child; she simply nurses foetuses once they’ve been sown. 

The parent is the man, who mounts; the woman is a hostess 

who preserves a stranger’s offspring—if they are not harmed by any god. 

Now I will show you living proof of what I say. 

A father can beget a child without a mother; see, right here

as witness stands the child of Zeus himself:

she was not nurtured in the dark depths of a womb, 

yet she is such an offspring as no goddess ever bore…” 

That is Athena. But isn’t this sophistry? The vote is split, Orestes is acquitted, the play ends with a triumphant tone, but this is nevertheless troubling.   

Michael Ewans points out: 

“In Agamemnon, [Apollo] punishes the girl who broke her pledge by a hideous death; in Libation Bearers he is ruthless once again, commanding matricide, warning of terrible penalties should Orestes try to evade it, and ordaining that Orestes must sink to treachery in order to achieve that end. Nor was his oracle, in real life, always above the charge of deviousness and trickery.” 

In a way, the acquittal of Orestes (probably) means the end of the cycle of violence, but at the same time I would guess that Aeschylus does mean the trial and Apollo’s interferences to be troubling. 

The Oresteia by Aeschylus: Libation Bearers

1/ As written in the previous blog post, this is the second part of the trilogy, and about the killing of Klytaimestra (also known as Clytemnestra). 

I read the translation by Michael Ewans, who uses transliterations from Greek. 

2/ Aeschylus’s plays are rich in metaphors and similes. 

“ELEKTRA […] We call upon the gods, who know 

that great waves toss us all around

like men at sea; but when we’re fated to survive, 

a small seed often grows into a great tree-root.” 

Some animal imagery: 

“ORESTES Zeus! Zeus! Look down and witness this! 

You see the orphaned offspring of the eagle who has died – 

a fearful serpent’s trapped him in its coils. They are bereft 

of father-love, and suffer pangs of hunger; they’re not strong enough 

to hunt food like their father, bring to the nest. 

[…] If you were to destroy the eagle’s brood, you could not send 

back any sign of hope to mortal men; 

and if this tree of kingship shrivels up and dies 

we will not be your ministers upon the festive days of sacrifice…” 

Mixed metaphors. 

Klytaimestra’s nightmare also has an interesting image: “she dreamt she gave birth to a snake” and “a clot of blood poured out into the milk.” 

Orestes later compares her to snakes: 

“ORESTES […] If she had been a seasnake, or a viper, she could make men’s flesh dissolve

without a bite, so great her daring 

and the power of her evil mind…” 

3/ This is an interesting passage: 

“LIBATION BEARERS The earth 

breeds terrifying beasts. 

In her embrace the sea 

encompasses a multitude 

of monsters that can kill a man. 

Up in the sky are comets, meteors—

like flying torches which descend 

to harm us. Then think of the hurricane, 

the anger of the stormwind. 

But who can find words to speak 

of the ever-daring mind of man

or woman’s love that dares all, 

wedded to disaster? 

When passion overcomes 

the female, it destroys 

the unions of animals, 

the marriages of men and women.” 

The play is full of such wonderful passages. I can see why my friend Himadri thinks the Oresteia is monumental. 

4/ It’s fascinating to see that Aeschylus and Sophocles tackle the same myth in completely different ways. 

In Liberation Bearers, Aeschylus does repeat the point about the cycle of violence, but presents Orestes’s killing of Klytaimestra and Aigisthos (better known as Aegisthus) as fulfilling the wish of many people, even a god: Orestes has doubts but Apollo tells him of “vile and frosty torments” and the pursuit of the Furies if he doesn’t avenge the murder of his father; the Libation Bearers or the female slaves of the house (the chorus) also egg him on, and take an active role in the revenge plot… 

In Elektra—I will stick to Greek transliterations for consistency—Sophocles does something different: he changes the circumstances of the sacrifice, thus making Artemis appear petty and Klytaimestra’s killing of Agamemnon more justified or at least less of a wanton act of violence; concentrates on Elektra and her state of mind; brings in the counter-voices of Elektra’s sister and the chorus, clashing with Elektra’s thirst for revenge; gets the audience to feel compassion for Elektra but also see something perverse in her love of her father and hatred of her mother, etc. 

However, Aeschylus adds some discordant notes towards the end of his play.

“ORESTES […] I’m like a charioteer who’s forced to drive 

outside the course; I am beaten, and cannot control 

my senses. Terror comes prepared to sing its song of hate 

beside my heart, and join the dance…” 

He is haunted. Did Apollo lie? Or did he warn Orestes of the father’s Furies if the murder’s not avenged, and not of the mother’s Furies if Orestes killed her?

“LIBATION BEARERS […] Where will it end? When will it be sated, 

lulled to sleep, the force of destruction?” 

5/ Another notable difference is that Sophocles reverses the order: Aeschylus has Orestes kill Aigisthos first and then Klytaimestra; Sophocles starts with, and focuses more on, Orestes’s killing of his mother Klytaimestra. 

In Libation Bearers, Elektra also seems to be dropped in the latter part of the play—Aeschylus focuses more on Orestes. 

6/ As my main frame of reference is Shakespeare, it’s hard to read these plays without wondering if Shakespeare knew them—just look at Libation Bearers, look at the confrontation between Orestes and his mother Klytaimestra—do you not think about Hamlet and Gertrude? For 400 years, people have debated the phrase “small Latin and less Greek” that Ben Jonson wrote about Shakespeare—most people seem to take it literally, though there is influence of Latin works on Shakespeare’s plays and scholars generally say Shakespeare may just have “small Latin and less Greek” compared to the learned Ben Jonson—I’ve recently read an essay in The Antigone Journal arguing that the sentence may have been misunderstood as “though” also has an archaic sense of “even if”. Do we know if Shakespeare knew these plays? If not in the original then perhaps in Latin translations? I need to look more into this. 

The Oresteia by Aeschylus: Agamemnon

1/ First, some context: the Oresteia was first performed in 458 BC. Agamemnon is about the murder of Agamemnon by his wife Clytemnestra, or Klytaimestra in my copy (Michael Ewans uses Greek transliterations rather than Latinised or Anglicised versions). The Libation Bearers is about the murder of Klytaimestra by her son Orestes. Eumenides is about the trial of Orestes.

The killing of Klytaimestra is the subject of two other plays: we don’t know when Sophocles wrote Electra (or Elektra), scholars date it around 420–414 BC; Euripides’s Electra was written in the mid-410s BC. 

The fascinating thing about reading ancient Greek drama, which I don’t get from Elizabethan and Jacobean drama, is that I can watch these great playwrights play with the same myths, and respond to each other. 

2/ Of about 300 known tragedies, only 32 complete plays survive from ancient Greece. I wonder how many of the plays back then were about the Trojan war or the murder of Klytaimestra, or it just so happened that quite a few plays that survived were about these subjects. 

“ELDERS […] and all through Greece a woman waits at home

with patient sorrow in her heart 

for each of those who went to Troy. 

Many things touch their feelings: 

each one knows the person she sent out; 

instead of him

a pot of ashes comes back home. 

The god of War’s a money-changer, dealing in bodies; 

he lifts his scales in the combat of spears

and from the funeral fires of Ilion 

he sends the relatives 

the heavy dust for which they’ll weep

cramming the urns with ashes 

easy stowed 

in place of men. 

Then they lament: this one 

they praise – he was well skilled in fighting; 

this one died nobly, as the battle raged

–but all for someone else’s wife…” 

Euripides’s The Women of Troy is also about the destruction of war, and it focuses on women. 

3/ It’s fascinating to read Aeschylus after Sophocles and Euripides, and see how different he is: he uses the chorus a lot more. In performance it’s probably different, I know much of the chorus is sung; read, Agamemnon often feels more like a poem than a play. 

It’s very quotable though. Lots of good passages. 

“ELDERS […] Among the worst of men 

an ancient Violence always breeds 

a new, young Violence at some time

or other, when the day comes round

appointed for its birth; 

the goddess who cannot be fought, 

unholy daring of black Ruin on the halls, 

the very image of its parents.” 

 Or: 

“ELDERS Tell me, why does this 

persistent fear

hover in front of my prophetic heart? 

My song is full of prophecies, 

unbidden and unpaid, 

and my heart doesn’t have the daring and the trust 

to spit away their meaning like

a dream of doubtful outcome. 

Ruin passed its prime when mooring-ropes 

were cast back on the sand, and our fleet sailed 

for Ilion.” 

This is the moment after Agamemnon has been killed: 

“ELDERS […] Oh, my king, my king, 

how shall I weep for you? 

What can my loving heart tell you? 

You lie here in this woven spider’s web 

breathing your life away murdered outrageously, 

trapped like a slave, 

tamed to a treacherous death, 

struck by her double-sided sword.” 

The cycle of violence is the central theme of the play, but Aeschylus picks Kassandra as the voice of terror and suffering—Paris steals Menalaos’s wife Helen; Menalaos and his brother Agamemnon then attack Troy; feeling pity for Troy, Artemis makes Agamemnon sacrifice his daughter Iphigeneia; Klytaimestra kills Agamemnon to avenge the killing of her daughter; she herself will pay for that murder with her own death—it is a cycle of violence, but what does Kassandra, like many others in the Trojan war, have to do with any of this? 

4/ I’ve noted some of the bird imagery. Kassandra, a slave from Troy, wishes her fate to be like a nightingale’s (“a feathered shape and a sweet life free from pain”); Klytaimestra compares Kassandra in her last moments to a swan, singing “her funeral lament”; an Elder (in the chorus) compares Klytaimestra to “a hostile crow”, who “glories in her tuneless, bitter song.” 

5/ Here’s something else interesting: in this play, Artemis demands Agamemnon to sacrifice Iphigeneia “in pity for the wretched”, as Agamemnon leads the ships attacking Troy. 

Sophocles changes that detail in Electra: 

“ELECTRA […] My father once, they tell me, hunting in

A forest that was sacred to the goddess,

Started an antlered stag. He aimed, and shot it,

Then made a foolish boast, of such a kind

As angered Artemis. Therefore she held up

The fleet, to make my father sacrifice

His daughter to her in requital for

The stag he’d killed…” 

(translated by H. D. F. Kitto) 

This changes matters: Artemis appears frivolous and petty, and the killing of Agamemnon becomes in a way more justifiable. 

6/ Whilst reading these plays, I’ve also been reading A Guide to Greek Theatre and Drama by Kenneth McLeish, which is probably not of much use to those of you familiar with ancient Greek drama but which is extremely helpful to me. 

This is interesting: 

“[Aeschylus’s] drama is not one of consecutive narrative (of the kind which predominates in Sophocles’ and Euripides’ surviving plays, where action is continuous) but of a systematic alteration of focus, pulling away from intimacy to reveal the wider perspective, and then closing back on another specific instance and another confrontation. In pre-Aeschylean drama, the hero’s main action might have been the subject of an entire play; in Aeschylus it is shown to be part of a much larger ‘action,’ of wider significance than the fate of a single individual.” 

This is true. The plays of Sophocles and Euripides that I’ve read (except for The Women of Troy) are about the main characters; Agamemnon is different, even Kassandra is part of the bigger picture. 

Electra (or Elektra) by Sophocles

1/ Nobody told me about the parallels between Electra and Hamlet. 

“ELECTRA […] There is my mother: she,

My mother! has become my bitterest enemy.

And then, I have to share my house with those

Who murdered my own father; I am ruled

By them, and what I get, what I must do

Without, depends on them. What happy days,

Think you, mine are, when I must see Aegisthus

Sitting upon my father’s throne, wearing

My father’s robes, and pouring his libations

Beside the hearth-stone where they murdered him?

And I must look upon the crowning outrage,

The murderer lying in my father’s bed

With my abandoned mother—if I must

Call her a mother who dares sleep with him!

She is so brazen that she lives with that

Defiler; vengeance from the gods is not

A thought that frightens her! As if exulting

In what she did she noted carefully

The day on which she treacherously killed

My father…” 

(translated by H. D. F. Kitto) 

I guess it’s my own ignorance—I knew about the myth of Oedipus but not the myth of Electra—but I can now see parallels between two of the greatest revenge plays. Like Hamlet, Electra focuses all her hatred on her mother, even though in Sophocles’s play, Aegisthus also took part in the killing. 

One of the important differences however is that the play of Electra is long after the murder. 

“ELECTRA […] I’ll not enjoy dishonourable ease,

Forget my grief, or cease to pay

Tribute of mourning to my father.

For if the dead shall lie there, nothing but dust and ashes,

And they who killed him do not suffer death in return,

Then, for all mankind,

Fear of the gods, respect for men, have vanished.” 

A few times in the play, Electra is compared to the nightingale, “bird of grief, always lamenting.” 

“CHORUS Electra, child of a most pitiless mother,

Why are you so wasting your life in unceasing

Grief and despair? Agamemnon

Died long ago….” 

Because of the time past, this speech is very different from the speeches of Claudius and Gertrude chiding Hamlet for grieving his father. Electra is consumed—and deformed—by hate. 

2/ As I have earlier noticed, the plays of the 16th century and later are (generally) about people doing things; the ancient Greek plays are about people talking, listening, and reacting to things. 

In this play, Sophocles focuses on Electra’s state of mind—he also shows the contrasting points of view of Electra and her sister Chrysothemis: 

“CHRYSOTHEMIS […] If I could find

The power, they soon would learn how much I hate them.

But we are helpless; we should ride the storm

With shortened sail, not show our enmity

When we are impotent to do them harm.

Will you not do the same? The right may lie

On your side, not on mine, but since they rule,

I must submit, or lose all liberty.” 

This is similar to the contrast between Antigone and her sister Ismene. There is some similarity in the doggedness and inflexibility of Antigone and Electra, but of course Antigone is a softer, more lovable character. There’s something perverse in Electra’s grief: 

“ELECTRA […] if I give up my grief, what should

I gain?” 

The more interesting part however is when Sophocles shows us the perspective of Clytemnestra, the mother. 

“CLYTEMNESTRA […] This father of yours, whom you are always mourning,

Had killed your sister, sacrificing her

To Artemis, the only Greek who could endure

To do it—though his part, when he begot her,

Was so much less than mine, who bore the child.

So tell me why, in deference to whom,

He sacrificed her? For the Greeks, you say?

What right had they to kill a child of mine?”

Menelaus and Helen have two sons, why not sacrifice them? 

“CLYTEMNESTRA […] Or had the god of death some strange desire

To feast on mine, and not on Helen’s children?

Or did this most unnatural father love

His brother’s children, not the one I bore him?

Was not this father monstrous, criminal?” 

There was surprise because of my ignorance—perhaps the effect would have been reduced if one had known the myth—but it is a magnificent moment to switch to Clytemnestra’s perspective after the consuming hate of Electra. It complicates things. It raises questions about Electra’s devotion to the father and indifference to the dead sister. 

3/ Like Hamlet, and unlike the revenge plays of the Elizabethan and Jacobean eras, Electra is not really about the revenge. Shakespeare’s play has Hamlet meditating on the meaning of existence and the point of revenge. Sophocles’s play is about an obsessive hate that deforms a person.  

I like this passage from Kenneth McLeish’s A Guide to Greek Theatre and Drama: 

“When we see Orestes follow Aigisthos into the palace to kill him and Elektra standing alone, watching them leave, we know that the ending is no ending, that the rest of the story must mean pain and suffering of which neither she nor Oreste have so much as dreamed. Although Elektra doesn’t realise it, she ends the play as alone, bereft and desolate as ever.” 

This is a magnificent play. 

4/ Another comment: I first read Electra in the translation of Robert Bagg. 

“ELEKTRA That’s what they plan to do to me? 

CHRYSÒTHEMIS Yes. When Aegisthus gets back.

ELEKTRA That’s it? Then I hope he comes soon.

CHRYSÒTHEMIS You’re crazy! What a sick wish!

ELEKTRA Let him come, if that’s what he intends.

CHRYSÒTHEMIS So you can suffer? How insane is that?

ELEKTRA It will put plenty of distance

between me and the likes of you.”

Imagine being used to the poetry of Shakespeare and having recently enjoyed Richard Wilbur’s rhyme verse translation of Molière and then reading that translation. 

This is the same passage in H. D. F. Kitto’s translation (the version I read): 

“ELECTRA Will they do that to me?

CHRYSOTHEMIS They will; it is

Decreed, the moment that Aegisthus has returned.

ELECTRA Then let him come at once, for all I care!

CHRYSOTHEMIS How can you say it? Are you mad?

ELECTRA At least,

I shall be out of sight of all of you.”

Sounds much better.  

One of the headaches of reading ancient Greek plays is finding a good translation. 

The Women of Troy and Helen by Euripides

Welcome to another episode of Shakespeare fan talking nonsense about ancient Greek drama. 

1/ The Women of Troy is rather static and I personally don’t find it a very satisfying play—the dramaturgy is so unlike what I’m used to—but it does show Euripides’s tremendous sympathy for the suffering of Trojan women. 

“HECABE: […] My heart would burst, 

My sick head beats and burns, 

Till passion pleads to ease its pain 

In restless rocking, like a boat 

That sways and turns, 

Keeping sad time to my funereal song. 

For those whom Fate has cursed 

Music itself sings but one note – 

Unending miseries, torment and wrong!” 

(translated by Philip Vellacott)

The play is filled with images of horror—the Greeks kill Trojan men and enslave the women. 

“CHORUS I: […] As we sat there indoors, 

Thinking of slavery with bitter tears, 

Your cry of agony came to us, and we all 

Shuddered with nameless fears.” 

The entire play is about the women reacting to what has happened to Troy and what’s going to happen to them. 

“HECABE: […] The father of them all, Priam, 

Is gone. No message taught me to weep seemly tears; 

Myself, with these same eyes, I saw him hacked to death

At his own altar; and his city laid in dust. 

My virgin daughters, whom I cherished as choice gifts 

For husbands worthy of them, were torn from my arms, 

Given to our enemies. There is no hope that they

Ever again will see their mother, nor I them.

Now comes the last, the crowning agony; that I 

In my own age shall go to Hellas as a slave.” 

Apart from the Chorus, Hecabe is the main voice for the anguish and suffering of the Trojan women; we also hear the voices of Cassandra (Hecabe’s daughter) and Andromache (Hecabe’s daughter-in-law).

The interesting part is that Hecabe has no compassion, no mercy for Helen—she is filled with hate.  

“HECABE [also kneeling]: Think of your fellow-soldiers whom this woman killed. 

I beg you not to fail them, and their children, now.

[…] 

HECABE: Menelaus, let her not sail on the same ship with you!”

She seems to concentrate in Helen all her hatred for the Greeks. 

2/ Helen is quite a strange play to read after The Women of Troy.

After The Women of Troy (first performed in 415 BC), a play about the suffering and destruction of Troy because of Helen, Euripides gave the audience Helen (412 BC), the premise of which is that Helen never went to Troy with Paris—the gods took her away, wrapped in a cloud, and placed her in Egypt and gave Paris a phantom lookalike, “an airy delusion”. 

“MESSENGER: What? All our sweat and blood – spent for a ghost?” 

(translated by Philip Vellacott)

Held in Egypt, she doesn’t know what has happened to her husband Menelaus. 

“HELEN: What bitter fate has my husband found 

Does he live to see the sun 

Charioting the sky, 

And the journeys of stars and moon? 

Or has his soul begun 

Its endless, lifeless exile under ground?” 

The most interesting moment in the play is probably the reunion of Helen and Menelaus. 

“MENELAUS: Who are you? Whose face am I looking at? 

HELEN: But who are you? We are both in the same perplexity.”

Reminds me of the sense of wonder in the reunion scene in Twelfth Night, but of course this is stranger. 

“HELEN: And I, accursed, unhappy, not untrue, 

Exiled perforce, guiltless of broken vows, 

Was robbed of city, home, my husband, and my peace!”

All this pain, all this destruction, for what? For the whims of the gods. 

To quote King Lear: 

“As flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods 

They kill us for their sport.” 

The rest of the play is about Helen and Menelaus planning their escape, tricking the King of Egypt (who wants to marry Helen), and getting away. Even though Dioscori, now a god, appears to stop King Theoclymenus from pursuing Helen, and the play ends with the Chorus saying “The gods reveal themselves in many forms/ Bring many matters to surprising ends”, I can’t help thinking that Euripides doesn’t seem to particularly like the gods. 

It is a strange play, fascinating. It is especially fascinating as Euripides creates a very different image of Helen: pure, faithful, and intelligent. 

Ion by Euripides

1/ Many years before the play begins, Creusa, daughter of King Erechtheus, was raped by the god Apollo. She abandoned the child, not knowing that he would be raised at Apollo’s temple. 

“CREUSA: […] Oh! the wrongs of women! the wickedness of gods! When our oppressor is all-powerful, where shall we fly for justice?” 

(translated by Philip Vellacott) 

Now, after many years of marriage, they still have no child, so they go to the temple of Apollo to ask the oracle. Apollo deceitfully tells Xuthus that Ion is his son, who’s actually the child of Apollo and Creusa. Creusa doesn’t know that, however—all she knows is that Xuthus, not a native Athenian like her, now has a son whereas she herself has no children—Ion is a threat she must eliminate.     

“CREUSA […] Now by the starry throne of Zeus, 

By the Guardian of the Rock of Athens, 

By the holy shore of the Tritonian Lake, 

I will ease the lead from my heart, 

Hold my secret no longer. 

With tears falling from my eyes, my soul tormented 

By the scheming cruelty of man and god alike, 

Who demand love and give treachery in return – 

I will expose them! 

Listen, Apollo, you who can wake to song

The seven strings of your lifeless lyre 

Till they cheat immoral music to lonely shepherds – 

Here in the white light of heaven I denounce you!...” 

As I’m ignorant about ancient Greek culture, I have no idea how shocking or blasphemous that speech was to Euripides’s audience, but I like that. You can see her anger, her anguish, her sense of injustice. 

Creusa then decides to poison Ion at the sacrificial ceremony—the entire scene is not depicted, but reported, so we have this interesting image: 

“MESSENGER: […] The bird sipped; at once its whole body shook; it was convulsed; then it uttered an extraordinary scream of agony. The whole company in amazement watched the bird writhing; it struggled; then lay dead; its purple claws dropped.” 

Surviving the murder attempt, Ion has to kill the “evil stepmother”, only to discover that Creusa’s actually his mother and Apollo’s his father. Here I must be honest: I was enjoying the play up till this point, but the reunion scene was not satisfying. Some reviewers have remarked on the deus ex machina (the Priestess appearing with the cradle), but I don’t think that’s the only reason. 

“CREUSA: Now I will make my confession! Before, I blamed Apollo: now I bless him because, though for so long he did nothing, now he gives my son back to me. Before, I hated this holy temple: now its porch smiles upon me, I caress this dear doorway, and touch every stone with delight. 

ATHENE: You have changed your curses into blessings: you do well. The ways of gods are slow; but in the end their power is shown.” 

Apollo does save the child and intervene so that they can be reunited. But at the same time, he gets away with raping Creusa and making her suffer for years—and his intervention also forces Creusa and Ion to deceive Xuthus, to live the rest of their lives with a lie. 

2/ I’ve got the impression that, unlike the plays of the 16th and 17th centuries, the ancient Greek plays are not really about actions and events, but about the characters’ reactions to them. 

Ibsen, at least in the plays I have read, seems closer to the ancient Greek dramatists than to Shakespeare. 

Sophocles’s Theban plays: King Oedipus, Oedipus at Colonus, Antigone

1/ My first ancient Greek play is Oedipus Rex or Oedipus Tyrannus or King Oedipus, in E. F. Watling’s translation. Compared to the plays I’m used to, there’s hardly any action as such—the entire play is one scene about the search for, and discovery of, the truth—and yet, there’s great suspense, tension, conflict, and tragedy. 

New to ancient Greek drama, I don’t have a lot to say, so I’m just going to note this: 

“JOCASTA (white with terror): What does it matter

What man he means? It makes no difference now… 

Forget what he has told you… It makes no difference. 

OEDIPUS: Nonsense: I must pursue this trail to the end, 

Till I have unravelled the mystery of my birth.

JOCASTA: No! In God’s name—if you want to live, this quest

Must not go on. Have I not suffered enough?

OEDIPUS: There is nothing to fear. Though I be proved slave-born 

To the third generation, your honour is not impugned. 

JOCASTA: Yet do not do it. I implore you, do not do it. 

OEDIPUS: I must. I cannot leave the truth unknown.

[…] JOCASTA: Doomed man! O never live to learn the truth!” 

This passage makes me think about Ibsen’s exploration of the concept of truth: Ghosts for example is a play about the danger of living for years with a lie, The Wild Duck is about the danger of pursuing absolute truth. 

Another thing I’d note is the layers and layers of irony. Laius and his wife Jocasta hear the oracle that their son would kill his father and marry his mother. In sending away the baby, they make the oracle become true, the same way Oedipus makes it become true by avoiding it and running away from his (foster) parents. Oedipus, now King of Thebes, is determined to find the murderer of the previous king (Laius) and ready to impose the heaviest punishments, only to find himself the guilty man and discover more painful truths.

Magnificent play. The depiction of Oedipus’s mind and behaviour, as he slowly discovers the truth and realises what he has done, is wonderful. 

2/ I had a harder time with Oedipus at Colonus and have little to say, being so unfamiliar with ancient Greek culture and drama. 

I like this passage though: 

“OEDIPUS: Time, Time, my friend, 

Makes havoc everywhere; he is invincible. 

Only the gods have ageless and deathless life; 

All else must perish. The sap of earth dries up, 

Flesh dies, and while faith withers falsehood blooms. 

The spirit is not constant from friend to friend, 

From city to city; it changes, soon or late; 

Joy turns into sorrow, and turns again to joy…” 

This is also good: 

“CREON: […] I may be old, but anger does not cool 

Except with death—that ends all bitterness.” 

The play is full of anger—at least Oedipus is—it makes me think of King Lear and Timon of Athens. 

“OEDIPUS: They see us both, and judge, 

Knowing that I, who am so ill-used in act, 

Have no defence but cursing.” 

Oedipus here is very different from Oedipus in the previous play—much time has passed, the self-disgust has evaporated, he is now full of resentment—but can we blame him? Like Lear, he’s abandoned by his own children. Worse, he’s condemned by society for things he’s unwittingly done. I can’t help thinking though that Oedipus seems rather… entitled and patronising in the way he speaks to Theseus, the king of Athens, wanting this, demanding that. Maybe I don’t know what I’m talking about.  

This is the translation by E. F. Watling. At some point I’m going to look at other translations. 

3/ In terms of the story, King Oedipus is the beginning, followed by Oedipus at Colonus, then followed by Antigone, which is about Oedipus’s children.  

In terms of the order of writing, however, Antigone was the first play (ca 442–440 BC), followed by King Oedipus (ca 429–427 BC), and Oedipus at Colonus (ca 407 BC) was written shortly before Sophocles’s death ca 406 BC. 

The story is this: Oedipus’s sons Eteocles and Polynices fight each other for the throne; Polynices goes to Argos and comes back in invasion of his own land; after their deaths, Creon (Jocasta’s brother, Oedipus’s brother-in-law and uncle) is restored to the throne and rules that Eteocles, the defender of Thebes, would be buried with honour whereas Polynices would be left unburied, to be eaten by birds and dogs; Creon also rules that anyone who disrespects him and buries Polynices would be condemned to death. 

“ISMENE: […] Now we two left; and what will be the end of us, 

If we transgress the law and defy our king? 

O think, Antigone; we are women; it is not for us 

To fight against men; our rules are stronger than we, 

And we must obey in this, or in worse than this. 

May the dead forgive me, I can do no other 

But as I am commanded; to do more is madness.” 

Antigone is unafraid—she wants to do her duty for her brother, despite what he did. 

“CREON: And yet you dared to contravene it? 

ANTIGONE: Yes. 

That order did not come from God. Justice, 

That dwells with the gods below, knows no such law. 

I did not think your edicts strong enough

To overrule the unwritten unalterable laws

Of God and heaven, you being only a man. 

They are not of yesterday or to-day, but everlasting, 

Though where they came from, none of us can tell. 

Guilty of their transgression before God

I cannot be, for any man on earth. 

I knew that I should have to die, of course, 

With or without your order. If it be soon, 

So much the better. Living in daily torment 

As I do, who would not be glad to die?...” 

Such a strong, dignified response—in those last lines, Antigone especially reminds me of Hermione at her trial in The Winter’s Tale. 

Antigone has many great speeches. 

“HAEMON: […] Therefore I say, 

Let not your first thought be your only thought.

Think if there cannot be some other way. 

Surely, to think your own the only wisdom, 

And yours the only word, the only will, 

Betrays a shallow spirit, an empty heart. 

It is no weakness for the wisest man 

To learn when he is wrong, know when to yield. 

So, on the margin of a flooded river

Trees bending to the torrent live unbroken, 

While those that strain against it are snapped off. 

A sailor has to tack and slacken sheets

Before the gale, or find himself capsized…” 

This is translated by E. F. Watling—I think I’d want a more poetic translation—but this is still a great speech. 

I also like this: 

“MESSENGER: […] What is the life of man? A thing not fixed 

For good or evil, fashioned for praise or blame. 

Chance raises a man to the heights, chance casts him down, 

And none can foretell what will be from what is. 

Creon was once an enviable man; 

[…] Now all is lost; for life without life’s joys 

Is living death, and such a life is his. 

Riches and rank and show of majesty 

And state, where no joy is, are empty, vain 

And unsubstantial shadows, of no weight 

To be compared with happiness of heart.” 

This is another great play, a great depiction of tyranny. Apart from some Greek mythology I read as a kid, this is perhaps the first time I’ve read Western literature from before Christianity. I struggled with Oedipus at Colonus but loved King Oedipus and Antigone—human beings haven’t changed much after all.  

Brief comments on the 2005 Pride and Prejudice

 

As fans were celebrating the 20th anniversary of the film, I thought why not revisit it? So I did. And I didn’t like it, though visually it is beautiful. 

Let me explain why. 

First of all, at two hours, the film feels a bit rushed. This is a common complaint, I know—certain things get cut, certain characters are underdeveloped, the film cannot have the complexity of the novel—but I can’t help noticing that the 2005 Pride and Prejudice emphasises the attraction and romance and neglects the prejudice, and the development of the relationship between Elizabeth Bennet and Mr Darcy. Some of it is because the Mr Wickham plot is barely there—there is not much space between the introduction of Mr Wickham and the reveal of his character (Elizabeth doesn’t have much time to like Mr Wickham for the revelation to be a blow either). The film also reduces the ridiculousness of Mrs Bennet, and the wit and irresponsibility of Mr Bennet.

Another problem is that Matthew Macfadyen is not very good as Mr Darcy. Keira Knightley is good as Elizabeth Bennet (much better than her own performance as Anna Karenina) and I can see why her Lizzie is so beloved, but Matthew Macfadyen is more or less inexpressive for the entire film. Colin Firth is so popular as Mr Darcy not because he’s hot (though that helps), but because he conveys so well the pride, the awkwardness, the struggle between his own passion and his distaste for Elizabeth’s embarrassing family, and above all, because he depicts the change, the development of Mr Darcy. As a character, Mr Darcy unfolds rather than changes, but he does adjust his manners—because of Elizabeth’s “lectures”, he learns to open up, and learns to speak to strangers with more warmth and friendliness. I saw that in Colin Firth’s performance; I didn’t really see it in Matthew Macfadyen’s. 

There are other irritations. Certain lines seem wrong (Mr Darcy says “You have bewitched me, body and soul, and I love… I love… I love you”—really?). Certain actions seem out of character. Would Elizabeth join with others in eavesdropping on her parents, or on her sister? And then burst in on them? Would she remain in Pemberley, knowing that Georgina is there, then watch her behind the door only to suddenly find Mr Darcy and run away like a rude intruder? Would Elizabeth snatch a letter from her father’s hand? 

I would also add, though some of you may find it petty, that after the clearly-spoken BBC adaptations I recently saw, I couldn’t help noticing that a few times in the 2005 Pride and Prejudice, the dialogue was almost drowned out by music, or other noises (such as the sound of rain). 

The main strengths of the film are the cinematography, Keira Knightley’s performance (I did like her witty, amused look), and the bond of the sisters, especially between Elizabeth and Jane. 

But as a whole, the 1995 series handles much better the characters and their relationships.

Now did you know that there’re currently two Pride and Prejudice series in the works? One is a six-part series, made by Netflix, with Emma Corrin and Jack Lowden in the main roles. The other is a ten-part adaptation of The Other Bennet Sister, a spin-off focusing on Mary Bennet (the Bennet sister nobody likes). Not hard to tell that both would be travesties.

Note: This blog post was originally published on 16/6 but emails were not delivered. I'm republishing it on 20/6 (with content unchanged) to test the new mailing system.

Brief thoughts on the 1983 Mansfield Park

The chief strength of this series is the script—this is an adaptation made by people who understand the novel and take it seriously and get the tone right—I think anyone who, like me, loves Mansfield Park would think that it’s in many ways a better effort than some recent adaptations. I have often complained that Mansfield Park fares less well on the screen than other Jane Austen novels because people often want Fanny Price to be something other than she is, and modern filmmakers, clearly thinking they’re “improving” on the book, change her, modernise her, make her more “fun”. I have never understood it. Do we not have enough girlbosses? The 1999 film is a travesty and the 2007 film I don’t even bother to watch—just look at the casting of Billie Piper in the role. Here in the 1983 series, there’s no modernisation, no condescension. Fanny Price is quiet, unimposing, unassertive, but perceptive, self-reliant, firm, and she has a different kind of strength. 

There is also a strong cast, especially Bernard Hepton as Sir Thomas, Anna Massey as Mrs Norris, and Jonathan Stephens as Mr Rushworth. 

Unfortunately, I cannot praise it the way I have praised the 1972 War and Peace or the 1977 Anna Karenina, also done by the BBC. The production values are lower, some of the blocking and staging feel a bit awkward. I’m not sure how I feel about Sylvestra Le Touzel as Fanny—for the large part, she’s all right, but I don’t particularly like the way she sometimes moves her hands. I don’t really like Nicholas Farrell as Edmund either, who I think looks rather too old for the role, and the switch from Mary to Fanny at the end feels rather sudden. 

But the most unconvincing are Robert Burbage and Jackie Smith-Wood as the Crawfords—I don’t think there’s anything wrong with their acting as such, but the Crawfords are the most attractive and charming of Jane Austen’s villains—so charming that some readers even fall for them, prefer Mary Crawford to Fanny Price, and think that Fanny should have accepted Henry—the actors aren’t quite right for the roles.  

I also think that, spanning 6 episodes, the series has time to develop the characters and their relationships but handles the first half much better than the second half. The first half is very good, from the depiction of Fanny’s place at Mansfield Park, to the ha-ha sequence, to the play-acting sequence. I especially like the way the series depicts Henry Crawford flirting simultaneously with Maria Bertram (Samantha Bond) and Julia Bertram (Liz Crowther), sporting with their feelings—what a rake—which doesn’t escape Fanny’s eyes. The acting is good. Like the novel, the series makes me feel sorry for the vain Julia and the ridiculous Mr Rushworth. 

It is in the second half that the series does less well—I mean the way Henry starts with wanting to break Fanny’s heart but falls in love with her, and the way he, despite his feelings for Fanny, can’t resist the fun and flirtatious Maria. Perhaps part of it is because the actor isn’t convincing in the role, I don’t know.

In short, this is a more faithful, more serious adaptation of Mansfield Park than later versions, which I appreciate. But there are flaws. 

Thanks to Brian Green for telling me about this adaptation.