Mark Griffith - Greek Tragedies 3: Aeschylus: The Eumenides; Sophocles: Philoctetes, Oedipus at Colonus; Euripides: The Bacchae, Alcestis

MARK GRIFFITH is professor of classics and of theater, dance, and performance studies at the University of California, Berkeley.

GLENN W. MOST is professor of ancient Greek at the Scuola Normale Superiore at Pisa and a visiting member of the Committee on Social Thought at the University of Chicago.

DAVID GRENE (19132002) taught classics for many years at the University of Chicago.

RICHMOND LATTIMORE (19061984), professor of Greek at Bryn Mawr College, was a poet and translator best known for his translations of the Greek classics, especially his versions of the Iliad and the Odyssey.

The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637

The University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London

2013 by The University of Chicago

The Eumenides 1953, 2013 by the University of Chicago

Philoctetes 1957, 2013 by the University of Chicago

Oedipus at Colonus from Sophocles: The Oedipus Cycle, translated by Dudley Fitts and Robert Fitzgerald. 1941 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Copyright renewed 1969 by Robert Fitzgerald. Reprinted by permission of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company

The Bacchae 1959, 2013 by the University of Chicago

Alcestis 1955, 2013 by the University of Chicago

All rights reserved. Published 2013.
Printed in the United States of America

22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 1 2 3 4 5

ISBN-13: 978-0-226-03576-5 (cloth)

ISBN-13: 978-0-226-03593-2 (paper)

ISBN-13: 978-0-226-03609-0 (e-book)

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Greek tragedies / edited by David Grene and Richmond Lattimore. Third edition / edited by Mark Griffith and Glenn W. Most.

pages. cm.

ISBN 978-0-226-03514-7 (cloth : alk. paper) ISBN 978-0-226-03528-4 (pbk. : alk. paper) ISBN 978-0-226-03531-4 (e-book) ISBN 978-0-226-03545-1 (cloth : alk. paper) ISBN 978-0-226-03559-8 (pbk. : alk. paper) ISBN 978-0-226-03562-8 (e-book) ISBN 978-0-226-03576-5 (cloth : alk. paper) ISBN 978-0-226-03593-2 (pbk. : alk. paper) ISBN 978-0-226-03609-0 (e-book) 1. Greek drama (Tragedy) I. Grene, David. II. Lattimore, Richmond, 19061984. III. Wyckoff, Elizabeth, 1915 IV. Most, Glenn W. V. Griffith, Mark (Classicist) VI. Sophocles. Antigone. English. 2013. VII. Sophocles. Oedipus Rex. English. 2013. VIII. Aeschylus. Agamemnon. English. 2013. IX. Aeschylus. Prometheus bound. English. 2013. X. Euripides. Hippolytus. English. 2013.

PA3626.A2G57 2013

882.0108dc23

2012044399

This paper meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.481992 (Permanence of Paper).

Translated by Richmond Lattimore

Translated by David Grene

Translated by Robert Fitzgerald

Translated by William Arrowsmith

Translated by Richmond Lattimore

The Eumenides was presented in 458 BCE as the last tragedy in the trilogy called the Oresteia. The other plays in the trilogy are Agamemnon and The Libation Bearers. Each of the three can be studied and interpreted as an independent drama, in isolation from the other two.

When Orestes murdered his mother, he did so at the command of Apollo, but even Apollo could not by formal absolution drive away her Furies (ultimately canonized as the Eumenides), who pursued the murderer up and down the world. At last the case was brought to Athens and tried by law, before a jury of Athenian citizens, with Athena presiding as judge (and also participating in the voting), the Furies acting as prosecutors, and Apollo as counsel for the defense. Athena (who was born without a mother) voted in favor of the father, and Orestes was acquitted by the narrowest of margins. She then appeased the angry Furies (Eumenides) by establishing a cult for them near the Acropolis, as guardian spirits of Athens.

As a drama of atonement, absolution, and canonization, The Eumenides bears some resemblance to Sophocles Oedipus at Colonus. In both cases the hero, who feels himself to be morally blameless, is nevertheless contaminated by horrendous past actions and must be absolved. But Sophocles keeps his supernatural powers in the background. Aeschylus stages his; and his issues are public, not individual, as the story of the Argive House of Atreus in its rescue from recurrent bloodshed and revenge merges into the history of civilization at Athens.