A story of how the weak (a woman, a boy and an old man) with a just cause subdued the strong (a general). Andromache, Hector’s wife, was reduced to a slave and concubine of Achilles’ son Neoptolemus, after the death of her husband and the fall of Troy. Neoptolemus’ wife Hermione desired to murder Andromache and her baby boy because of jealousy, and she enlisted her father King Menelaus as […]
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“Hecuba” by Euripides
Quotes: “O Argives, who have sacked my city! of my free will I die; let none lay hand on me; for bravely will I yield my neck. Leave me free, I do beseech; so slay me, that death may find me free; for to be called a slave amongst the dead fills my royal heart with shame.” O Priam, rich in store of fairest wealth, most blest of sires, and […]
Read more“The Trojan Women” by Euripides
Quotes: “Lift thy head, unhappy lady, from the ground; thy neck upraise; this is Troy no more, no longer am I queen in Ilium. Though fortune change, endure thy lot; sail with the stream, and follow fortune’s tack, steer not thy barque of life against the tide, since chance must guide thy course. Ah me! ah me! What else but tears is now my hapless lot, whose country, children, husband, […]
Read more“Hippolytus” by Euripides
A tragic tale of the unrelenting and destructive power of lust. Phaedra, wife of King Theseus, lusted after Hippolytus her stepson. When Hippolytus rejected her outright, she committed suicide from shame and despair, leaving a note falsely accusing Hippolytus of violating her. Theseus, upon reading the note, prayed to Poseidon to slay Hippolytus, causing the latter to suffer a violent and horrendous death. Sympathies for the victim Hippolytus, whose chastity […]
Read more“Iphigenia at Aulis” by Euripides
The Meaning of Sacrifice In Fear and Trembling, Kierkegaard compared Abraham’s sacrifice of Issac to Agamemnon’s sacrifice of Iphigenia, the former as the Knight of Faith and the latter the Tragic Hero; In this play, Euripides presented Agamemnon in a rather different light, not so much a hero who sacrificed his most beloved daughter to perform the duty dictated by a sacred oath and defend the honor of the whole […]
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“Medea” by Euripides
Despair, Anger and Hatred “Anger arises from offences against oneself, enmity may arise …because of what we take to be their character. Anger is accompanied by pain, hatred is not;… for the one would have the offenders suffer for what they have done; the other would have them cease to exist.” –Aristotle in “Rhetoric“ Medea, princess of Colchis and granddaughter of Helios, was both angry and hateful toward her husband Jason, […]
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