Jean Racine: Andromaque and Bérénice

I read both plays in the translations by Samuel Solomon, who used the Latin names (Andromache, Orestes, Cephisa, Berenice, Paulinus…) rather than the French versions (Andromaque, Oreste, Céphise, Bérénice, Paulin…), so I’m going to do the same. 

Andromaque, or Andromache 

For context: Andromache was first performed in 1667; Molière’s The Misanthrope was in 1666 and The Miser was in 1668. 

Remember that love monologue in Love and Death? 

“It’s a very complicated situation, cousin Sonja. I’m in love with Alexei. He loves Alicia. Alicia’s having an affair with Lev. Lev loves Tatiana. Tatiana loves Simkin. Simkin loves me. I love Simkin, but in a different way than Alexei. Alexei loves Tatiana like a sister. Tatiana’s sister loves Trigorian like a brother. Trigorian’s brother is having an affair with my sister, who he likes physically, but not spiritually.” 

Woody Allen is parodying Chekhov, but it also works for Racine’s play: Orestes loves Hermione (his cousin, by the way); Hermione loves Pyrrhus (son of Achilles/ Akhilleus); Pyrrhus is betrothed to Hermione, but loves his Trojan captive Andromache (Hector’s widow); etc. One can probably add, Andromache loves her dead husband. Not having read Euripides’s play or any other Greek text about the story, I have no basis for comparison and could just say that the conflict of the play is the, er, love square, and Andromache’s choice between marriage with Pyrrhus or dignity and the death of her son. 

There’s another similarity with Chekhov. Samuel Solomon notes in Act 2 scene 1: 

“Like a character in Chekhov, centuries later, Hermione ignores Cleone’s questions and continues with her own passionate thoughts.”

My impression is that Racine doesn’t seem to have much interest in the political aspects of the story; he’s only interested in love, in depicting and dissecting the love of the four characters. All the characters are well-written, especially Andromache and Hermione, but I think the most complex and fascinating in the play is Hermione: her love moves from love to delusion to heartbreak to hate to urge for revenge to regret and grief. The focus moves from Pyrrhus and Andromache, to Hermione, who becomes the central character in the final Act.  

I don’t have much to say about the play, suspecting that much of Racine’s greatness is in the alexandrine verse that gets lost in translation, but this passage is interesting: 

“HERMIONE […] Just think of it! without a single prayer, 

My mother’s cause made all Greece spring to arms! 

For her fair eyes alone, ten years of war 

Saw twenty kings, strangers to her, expire! 

And I, who only seek a recreant’s death, 

And charge a lover to avenge my insult, 

A lover who may win me at this price, 

I give myself and still am not avenged?...”

(Act 4 scene 2) 

A daughter envies her mother. 

This is also interesting: 

“ORESTES […] Am I indeed Orestes?

I strangled deep down my divinest conscience; 

I forced myself to kill a king I reverenced;

[…] And am become a murderer and blasphemer.

For whom?...” 

(Act 5 scene 4) 

That is very good, especially the line “Am I indeed Orestes?”.  

Bérénice

Racine’s Bérénice was premiered in 1670, in the same month as Corneille’s Tite et Bérénice, about the same subject. 

Similar to Racine’s other play, this play has a love triangle (Titus and Antiochus both love Berenice). The political conflict is more eminent—as the Emperor of Rome, Titus cannot marry a foreigner such as Berenice, the Queen of Palestine (Judea)—but I would say that Racine isn’t particularly interested in the politics. I don’t even think he’s interested in Titus’s dilemma between the empire and Berenice, between duty and love—Titus has made his decision—the focus of the play is how he’s going to carry out his decision and say it to her, how Berenice reacts to the news when she has been hoping for a wedding, and how Antiochus reacts to everything that’s going on, as a close friend of Titus and an admirer of Berenice. 

Racine doesn’t just follow the classical unities (unity of place, unity of time, unity of action)—he simplifies the story, cuts out everything unnecessary, and focuses on the feelings of the three main characters. But if Pyrrhus in Andromache behaves dishonourably towards both Andromache and Hermione, and the passionate love of various characters in that play is mixed with intense hate, the three main characters in Berenice are all noble and sympathetic. 

I’d note one thing: 

“BERENICE Ah, cruel man, why say such things so late? 

What have you done? I thought myself beloved. 

My soul used to the joy of seeing you 

Lives but for you. Did you not know your laws

When for the first time I confessed my heart?

Why did you lead me on to love so well?...”

(Act 4 scene 5)

Many women today are gonna find that relatable. 

But as we can see, Titus is a noble man, who has to make the difficult choice of giving up his love for his duty. The ending is moving. 

I just can’t help thinking that, even though I can see Racine’s psychological insight and power of characterisation, much of his greatness seems to be in the verse—I can hear the grandeur of his poetry—that gets lost in translation.