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Specimens of Greek Tragedy

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SPECIMENS OF GREEK TRAGEDY

Translated By

GOLDWIN SMITH, D.C.L.



AESCHYLUS AND SOPHOCLES



1893



PREFACE.

Greek drama, forerunner of ours, had its origin in the festival of
Dionysus, god of wine, which was celebrated with dance, song, and
recitative. The recitative, being in character, was improved into the
Drama, the chief author of the improvement, tradition says, being
Thespis. But the dance and song were retained, and became the Chorus,
that peculiar feature of the Greek play. This seems to be the general
account of the matter, and especially of the combination of the lyric
with the dramatic element, so far as we can see through the mist of an
unrecorded age.

Thirlwall, still perhaps the soundest and most judicious, though not
the most vivid or enthusiastic, historian of Greece, traces the origin
of the Drama to "the great choral compositions uniting the attractions
of music and action to those of a lofty poetry, which formed the
favourite entertainment of the Dorian cities." This, he says, appears
to have been the germ out of which, by the introduction of a new
element, the recitation of a performer who assumed a character and
perhaps from the first shifted his mask, so as to exhibit the outlines
of a simple story in a few scenes parted by the intervening song of
the Chorus, Thespis and his successors unfolded the Attic Tragedy. Of
the further development of the Drama in the age of Pericles, Thirlwall
says:--

"The drama was the branch of literature which peculiarly signalised
the age of Pericles; and it belongs to the political, no less than to
the literary, history of these times, and deserves to be considered in
both points of view. The steps by which it was brought through a
series of innovations to the form which it presents in its earliest
extant remains, are still a subject of controversy among antiquarians;
and even the poetical character of the authors by whom these changes
were effected, and of their works, is involved in great uncertainty.
We have reason to believe that it was no want of merit, or of absolute
worth, which caused them to be neglected and forgotten, but only the
superior attraction of the form which the drama finally assumed. Of
Phrynichus in particular, the immediate predecessor of Aeschylus, we
are led to conceive a very favourable opinion, both by the manner in
which he is mentioned by the ancients who were acquainted with his
poems, and by the effect which it is recorded to have produced upon
his audience. It is clear that Aeschylus, who found him in undisputed
possession of the public favour, regarded him as a worthy rival, and
was in part stimulated by emulation to unfold the capacities of their
common art by a variety of new inventions. These, however, were so
important as to entitle their author to be considered as the father of
Attic tragedy. This title he would have deserved, if he had only
introduced the dialogue, which distinguished his drama from that of
the preceding poets, who had told the story of each piece in a series
of monologues. So long as this was the case, the lyrical part must
have created the chief interest; and the difference between the Attic
tragedy and the choral songs which were exhibited in a similar manner
in the Dorian cities was perhaps not so striking as their agreement.
The innovation made by Aeschylus altered the whole character of the
poem; raised the purely dramatic portion from a subordinate to the
principal rank, and expanded it into a richly varied and well
organised composition. With him, it would seem, and as a natural
consequence of this great change, arose the usage, which to us appears
so singular, of exhibiting what was sometimes called a trilogy, which
comprised three distinct tragedies at the same time."

Grote says:--

"The tragic drama belonged essentially to the festivals in honour of
the god Dionysus; being originally a chorus sung in his honour, to
which were successively superadded: First, an iambic monologue; next,
a dialogue with two actors; lastly, a regular plot with three actors,
and a chorus itself interwoven into the scene. Its subjects were from
the beginning, and always continued to be, persons either divine or
heroic above the level of historical life, and borrowed from what was
called the mythical past. 'The Persae' of Aeschylus, indeed, forms a
splendid exception; but the two analogous dramas of his contemporary,
Phrynichus, 'The Phoenissae,' and 'The Capture of Miletus,' were not
successful enough to invite subsequent tragedians to meddle with
contemporary events. To three serious dramas, or a trilogy--at first
connected together by a sequence of subject more or less loose, but
afterwards unconnected and on distinct subjects, through an innovation
introduced by Sophocles, if not before--the tragic poet added a fourth
or satyrical drama; the characters of which were satyrs, the
companions of the god Dionysus, and other historic or mythical persons
exhibited in farce. He thus made up a total of four dramas, or a
tetralogy, which he got up and brought forward to contend for the
prize at the festival. The expense of training the chorus and actors
was chiefly furnished by the choregi,--wealthy citizens, of whom one
was named for each of the ten tribes, and whose honour and vanity were
greatly interested in obtaining a prize. At first these exhibitions
took place on a temporary stage, with nothing but wooden supports and
scaffolding; but shortly after the year 500 B.C., on an occasion when
the poets Aeschylus and Pratinas were contending for the prize, this
stage gave way during the ceremony, and lamentable mischief was the
result. After that misfortune, a permanent theatre of stone was
provided. To what extent the project was realised before the
invasion of Xerxes we do not accurately know; but after his
destructive occupation of Athens, the theatre, if any existed
previously, would have to be rebuilt or renovated, along with
other injured portions of the city."

Curtius says:--

"Thespis was the founder of Attic tragedy. He had introduced a
preliminary system of order into the alternation of recitative and
song, into the business of the actor, and into the management of dress
and stage. Solon was said to have disliked the art of Thespis,
regarding as dangerous the violent excitement of feelings by means of
phantastic representation; the Tyrants, on the other hand, encouraged
this new popular diversion; it suited their policy that the poor
should be entertained at the expense of the rich; the competition of
rival tragic choirs was introduced; and the stage near the black
poplar on the market-place became a centre of the festive merry-
makings in Attica."

Curtius thinks that Pisistratus, as a popular usurper and opponent of
the aristocracy, encouraged the worship of the popular god Dionysus
with the Tragic Chorus, and he gives Pisistratus the credit of this
glorious innovation. A similar policy was ascribed to Cleisthenes of
Sicyon by Herodotus (v. 67).

The Chorus thus remaining wedded to the Drama, parts the action with
lyric pieces more or less connected with it, and expressive of the
feelings which it excites. In Aeschylus and Sophocles the connection
is generally close; less close in Euripides. The Chorus also
occasionally joins in the dialogue, moralising or sympathising,
and sometimes, it must be owned, in a rather commonplace and insipid
strain. In "The Eumenides" of Aeschylus, the chorus of Furies takes
part as a character in the drama; in "The Suppliants" it plays the
principal part.

The Drama came to perfection with Athenian art generally, and with
Athens herself in the period which followed the Persian war. The
performance of plays at the Dionysiac festival was an important event
in Athenian life. The whole city was gathered in the great open-air
theatre consecrated to Dionysus, whose priest occupied the seat of
honour. All the free men, at least, were gathered there; and when we
talk about the intellectual superiority of the Athenian people, we
must bear in mind that a condition of Athenian culture was the
delegation of industry to the slave. That audience was probably the
liveliest, most quick-witted, most appreciative, and most critical
that the world ever saw. Prizes were given to the authors of the best
pieces. Each tragedian exhibited three pieces, which at first formed a
connected series, though afterwards this rule was disregarded. After
the three tragic pieces was performed a satyric drama, to relieve the
mind from the strain of tragedy, and perhaps also as a conventional
tribute to the jollity of the god of wine. In the Elizabethan Drama
the tragic and comic are blended as they are in life.

The subjects were taken usually from mythology, especially from the
circle of legends relating to the siege of Troy, to the tragic history
of the house of Atreus, the equally tragic history of the house of
Laius, and the adventures of Hercules. The subject of "The Persae" of
Aeschylus is a contemporary event, but this, as Grote says, was an
exception. Heroic action and suffering, the awful force of destiny and
of the will of heaven, are the general themes of Aeschylus and
Sophocles; passion, especially feminine passion, is more frequently
the theme of Euripides. Romantic love, the staple of the modern drama
and novel, was hardly known to the Greeks, whose romantic affection
was friendship, such as that of Orestes and Pylades, or Achilles and
Patroclus. The only approach to romantic love in the extant drama is
the love of Haemon and Antigone in the "Antigone" of Sophocles; and
even here it is subordinate to the conflict between state law and law
divine, which is the key-note of the piece; while the lovers do not
meet upon the scene. The sterner and fiercer passions, on the whole,
predominate, though Euripides has given us touching pictures of
conjugal, fraternal, and sisterly love. In the "Oedipus Coloneus" of
Sophocles also, filial love and the gentler feelings play a part in
harmony with the closing scene of the old man's unhappy life. In the
"Philoctetes," Sophocles introduces, as an element of tragedy,
physical pain, though it is combined with moral suffering.

A popular entertainment was of course adapted to the tastes of the
people. Debate, both political and forensic, was almost the daily
bread of the people of Athens. The Athenian loved smart repartee and
display of the power of fencing with words. The thrust and parry of
wit in the single-line dialogues (_stichomythia_) pleased them
more than it pleases us. Rhetoric had a practical interest when not
only the victory of a man's opinions in the political assembly, but
his life and property before the popular tribunal, might depend on his
tongue. The Drama was also used in the absence of a press for
political or social teaching, and for the insinuation of political or
social opinions. In reading these passages we must throw ourselves
back twenty-three centuries, into an age when political and social
observation was new, like politics and civilised society themselves,
and ideas familiar to us now were fresh and struggling for expression.
The remark may be extended to the political philosophy which struggles
for expression in the speeches of Thucydides.

The trio of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides has been compared with
that of Marlowe, Shakespeare, and Beaumont and Fletcher, and with that
of Corneille, Racine, and Voltaire. The parallel will hardly hold good
except as an illustration of the course of youth, perfection, and
decay through which every art or product of imagination seems to run,
unlike science, which continually advances. The epoch of the Athenian
three, like that of the Elizabethan three, like that of the great
Spanish dramatists, was one of national achievement, and their drama
was thoroughly national; whereas the French drama was the highly
artificial entertainment of an exclusive Court.

Aeschylus (B.C. 525-456) was the heroic poet of Athens. He had fought
certainly at Marathon, and, we may be pretty sure, at Salamis, so that
the narrative of the battle of Salamis in "The Persae" is probably
that of an eye-witness; and that he had fought at Marathon, not that
he had won the prize in drama, was the inscription which he desired
for his tomb. He is of the old school of thought and sentiment, full
of reverence for religion and for eternal law. The growing scepticism
had not touched him. His morality is lofty and austere. In politics he
was a conservative, of the party of Cimon, opposed to the radically
democratic party of Pericles; and his drama, especially the Oresteian
trilogy, teems with conservative sentiment and allusion. His
characters are of heroic cast. He deals superbly with the moral forces
and destiny; though it may be that more philosophy has been found in
him, especially by his German commentators, than is there, and that
obscurity arising from his imperfect command of language has sometimes
been mistaken for depth. His "Agamemnon" is generally deemed the
masterpiece of Greek tragedy. His language is stately and swelling, in
keeping with the heroic part of his characters; sometimes it is too
swelling, and even bombastic. Though he is the greatest of all, art in
him had not arrived at technical perfection. He reminds us sometimes
of the Aeginetan marbles, rather than the frieze of the Parthenon.

In Sophocles (B.C. 495-405) the dramatic art has arrived at technical
perfection. His drama is regarded as the literary counterpart of the
Parthenon. Its calm and statuesque excellence exactly met the
requirements of the taste which we call classic, and seems to
correspond with the character of the dramatist, which was notably
gentle, and with his form, which was typically beautiful. His
characters are less heroic, and nearer to common humanity than those
of Aeschylus. He appeals more to pity. His art is more subtle,
especially in the treatment, for which he is famous, of the irony of
fate. In politics, social sentiment, and religion, while he is more of
the generation of Pericles than Aeschylus, he is still conservative
and orthodox. If he belongs to democracy, it is a democracy still kept
within moral bounds, and owning a master in its great chief, with whom
he seems to have been personally connected. Nor does he ever court
popularity by bringing the personages of the heroic age down to the
common level. He, as well as Aeschylus, is dear to Aristophanes, the
satiric poet of conservatism, while Euripides is hateful.

Euripides (B.C. 480-406) perhaps slightly resembles Voltaire in this,
that he belongs to a different historic zone from his two
predecessors, from Sophocles as well as from Aeschylus, in political
and social sentiment, though not in date. He belongs to a full-blown
democracy, and is evidently the dramatic poet of the people. To please
the people he lays dignity and stateliness aside, brings heroic
characters down to a common level, and introduces characters which are
unheroic. He gives the people plenty of passion, especially of
feminine passion, without being nice as to its sources, or rejecting
such stories as those of Phaedra and Medea, which would have been
alien to the taste, not only of Aeschylus, but of Sophocles. He gives
them plenty of politics, plenty of rhetoric, plenty of discussion,
political and moral, plenty of speculation, which in those days was
novel, now and then a little scepticism. His "Alcestis" is melodrama
verging on sentimental comedy, and heralding the sentimental comedy of
Menander known to us in the versions of Terence. The chord of pathos
he can touch well. His degradation, as the old school thought it, of
the drama of Aeschylus and Sophocles, and what they deemed his
pandering to vulgar taste, brought upon him the bitter satire of
Aristophanes. Yet he did not win many prizes. Perhaps the vast theatre
and the grand choric accompaniments harmonised ill with his unheroic
style. He is clearly connected with the Sophists, and with the
generation the morality of which had been unsettled by the violence of
faction and the fury of the Peloponnesian war. Still there is no
reason for saying that he preached moral scepticism or impiety.
Probably he did not intend to preach anything, but to please his
popular audience and to win the prize. The line quoted against him,
"My lips have sworn, but my mind is unsworn," read in its place, has
nothing in it immoral. Perhaps he had his moods: he was religious when
he wrote "The Bacchae." As little ground is there for dubbing him a
woman-hater. If he has his Phaedra and Medea, he has also his Alcestis
and Electra. He seems to have prided himself on his choric odes. Some
of them have beauty in themselves, but they are little relevant to the
play.

A full and critical account of the plays will not be expected in the
Preface to a series of extracts; it will be found in such literary
histories as that of Professor Mahaffy. Nor can it be necessary to
dilate on the merit of the pieces selected. The sublime agony of
Prometheus Bound, the majesty of wickedness in Clytaemnestra,
the martial grandeur of the siege of Thebes, or of the battle of
Salamis, in Aeschylus; the awful doom of Oedipus, his mysterious end,
the heroic despair of Ajax, the martyrdom of Antigone to duty, in
Sophocles; the passion of Phaedra and Medea, the conjugal
self-sacrifice of Alcestis, the narratives of the deaths of Polyxena
and the slaughter of Pentheus by the Bacchae, in Euripides, speak for
themselves, if the translation is at all faithful, and find their best
comment in the reader's natural appreciation.

The number of those who do not read the originals will be increased by
the dropping of Greek from the academical course. To give them
something like an equivalent for the original in English is the object
of a translation. As prose can never be an equivalent for poetry, and
as the thoughts and diction of poetry are alien to prose, it is
necessary to run the risks of a translation in verse. To translate as
far as possible line for line, is requisite in the case of the Greek
dramatists, if we would not lose the form and balance which are of the
essence of Greek art. It is necessary also to preserve as much as
possible the simplicity of diction, and to avoid words and phrases
suggestive of very modern ideas. After all, it is difficult, with a
material so motley and irregular as the English language, to produce
anything like the pure marble of the Greek. There are translations of
Greek tragedies or parts of them by writers of high poetic reputation,
which are no doubt poetry, but are not Greek art.

The lyric portions of the Greek Drama are admired and even
enthusiastically praised by literary judges whose verdict we shall not
presume to dispute. To translation, however, the choric odes hardly
lend themselves. Their dithyrambic character, their high-flown
language, strained metaphors, tortuous constructions, and frequent,
perhaps studied, obscurity, render it almost impossible to reproduce
them in the forms of our poetry. Nor perhaps when they are strictly
analysed will much be found, in many of them at least, of the material
whereof modern poetry is made. They are, in fact, the libretto of a
chant accompanied by dancing, and must have owed much to the melody
and movement. In attempting to render the grand choric odes of the
"Agamemnon," moreover, the translator is perplexed by corruptions of
the text and by the various interpretations of commentators, who,
though they all agree as to the moral pregnancy and sublimity of the
passage, frequently differ as to its precise meaning. A metrical
translation of these odes in English is apt to remind us of the
metrical versions of the Hebrew Psalms. A part of one chorus in
Aeschylus, which forms a distinct picture, has been given in
rhythmical prose; three choruses of Sophocles and two of Euripides
have, not without misgiving, been rendered in verse.

The spelling of proper names is in a state of somewhat chaotic
transition which makes it difficult to take a definite course. The
precisians themselves are not consistent: they still speak of Troy,
Athens, Plato, and Aristotle. In the versions themselves the Greek
forms have been preferred, though a pedantic extreme has been avoided.
In the Preface and Introduction the forms familiar to the English
reader have been used.

For Aeschylus and Euripides, the editions of Paley in the _Bibliotheca
Classica_ have been used; for Sophocles, that of Mr. Lewis Campbell.




CONTENTS


PREFACE


AESCHYLUS.

PROMETHEUS BOUND.

Introduction

Prometheus is brought in by the Spirits of Might and Force, Hephaestus
accompanying them. Lines 1-113

The Sin of Prometheus. Lines 444-533

Prometheus defies Zeus. Lines 928-1114


THE PERSIANS.

Introduction

Atossa's Dream. Lines 1478-216

The Battle of Salamis and the Destruction of the Persian Fleet. Lines
251-473


THE SEVEN AGAINST THEBES.

Introduction

The Champions. Lines 370-673


AGAMEMNON.

Introduction

The Fall of Troy announced at Mycenae. Lines 1-39

The Chorus recounts the Sacrifice of Iphigenia. Lines 177-240

The Meeting of Agamemnon and Clytaemnestra. Lines 828-947

Cassandra's Prophecy. Lines 1149-1391

Cassandra's Prophecy fulfilled. Lines 1343-1554


THE CHOËPHOROE.

Introduction

Orestes discovers himself to Electra. Lines 158-274

Clytaemnestra pleads to her Son Orestes for her Life in Vain. Lines
860-916


THE EUMENIDES (FURIES).

Introduction

Orestes is tried as a Matricide before the Court of the Areopagus at
Athens. Lines 536-747


SOPHOCLES.


OEDIPUS THE KING.

Introduction

The Plague-stricken Thebans supplicate Oedipus for Relief. Lines 1-77

Oedipus calls upon Tiresias to reveal the Murderer of Laius. Lines
300-462

The Death of Polybus announced. The Secret of Oedipus's Incest and
Murder revealed. Lines 924-1085

Jocasta hangs herself and Oedipus puts out his Eyes. The Scene
described. Lines 1223-1296

Oedipus bewails his Calamities. His Colloquy with Creon. Lines
1369-1514


OEDIPUS AT COLONUS.

Introduction

Oedipus and Antigone arrive at Colonus and enter the Consecrated
Ground. Lines 1-110

The Chorus chants the Praises of Colonus. Lines 668-719

Length of Days: Choric Hymn. Lines 1211-1238

The End of Oedipus. Lines 1579-1667


ANTIGONE.

Introduction

Antigone proposes to Ismene to take a Part in paying the Last Rites to
their Brother Polynices. Lines 1-99

Antigone is caught by the Guard paying Funeral Rites to the Corpse of
Polynices, and is brought before Creon. Lines 384-581

A Colloquy between Creon and his Son Haemon, to whom Antigone is
betrothed. Lines 631-780

The Power of Love: Choric Hymn. Lines 781-800

Antigone is sent to her Death by Creon. Lines 882-928

Creon, having been brought to Repentance by the Denunciations of the
Prophet Tiresias, sets out to bury the Corpse of Polynices and release
Antigone from the Cave of Death. The Issue is recounted by a Messenger
to the Queen, Eurydice. Lines 1155-1243


AJAX.

Introduction

Tecmessa, a Captive with whom Ajax lives as his Wife, tells the Chorus
of Salaminian Mariners what has befallen their Chieftain. Lines
284-330

Ajax bewails his own Fall. Tecmessa tries to comfort him and turn him
from Violent Courses. Lines 430-595

Ajax pretends to be softened, and to be going forth only for the
Harmless Purpose of Purification in a Running Stream, though he is
really going to his Death. Lines 646-692

The Last Speech of Ajax. Lines 815-865


ELECTRA.

Introduction

The Tutor of Orestes tells Clytaemnestra a Fictitious Story of her
Son's Death by a Fall in a Chariot Race. Electra is on the Scene.
Lines 660-822

Electra's Sister Chrysothemis, having found the offerings of Orestes
on his Father's Tomb, brings what she deems glad Tidings to Electra,
who meets her with the Announcement that the Pedagogos has just
brought Certain News of their Brother's Death. Electra, now reduced to
Despair, proposes to Chrysothemis that they should themselves attempt
to slay Aegisthus. Lines 871-1057

Orestes enters with the Urn which, it is pretended, contains his
Ashes. His Recognition ensues. Lines 1097-1231


THE TRACHINIAE

Introduction

Deianira imparts the Secret of her Device for regaining the Love of
her Husband, Hercules, and puts the Fatal Robe into the Hands of
Lichas, the Herald, that he may carry it to Hercules. Lines 531-632

Deianira recounts to the Chorus an Alarming and Portentous Incident.
Then Hyllus, the Son of Hercules, comes and announces the Catastrophe.
Lines 663-820


PHILOCTETES.

Introduction

Ulysses explains the Plan of Action to Neoptolemus, and labours to
bend him to his Purpose. Lines 1-134

Neoptolemus having filched the Bow of Philoctetes, Philoctetes prays
him to restore it. Lines 927-962





AESCHYLUS




PROMETHEUS BOUND.


Prometheus, the good Titan, has been raising mankind from the
condition of primeval brutes by teaching them the arts of
civilisation. At last he steals fire from heaven for their use.
By this he incurs the wrath of Zeus, who, having deposed his
father Chronos, has become king of the gods. As a punishment
Prometheus is condemned by Zeus to be chained to a rock in the
Caucasus, with an eagle always feeding on his breast. But Prometheus
knows the secret of a mysterious marriage which is destined in time to
take place, and by the offspring of which Zeus in his turn is to be
dethroned. Strong in his consciousness of this, he defies Zeus, who by
the agency of Hermes tries in vain to wrest the secret from him. The
persons of the drama, besides Prometheus, are Hephaestus, better known
by his Latin name of Vulcan, Might and Force personified, Hermes the
messenger of Heaven, and the wandering Io. The chorus consists of sea-
nymphs, who sympathise with the suffering Prometheus. This drama is a
sublime enigma. Aeschylus was conservative and deeply religious. How
could he write a play the hero of which is a benefactor of man
struggling against the tyranny of the king of the gods, and the sequel
of which found a fit and congenial composer in Shelley, whose
sentiment and manner the "Prometheus Bound" wonderfully anticipates
and perhaps helped to form? Again, how could the Athenians, in an age
when their piety had not yet given way to scepticism, have endured
such dramatic treatment of the chief of the gods? It is almost as if a
Mystery Play had been presented in the Middle Ages with Satan for the
hero and the First Person of the Trinity in the character of an
oppressor. Perhaps the position of Zeus in the drama as a usurper may,
in some degree, have softened the religious effect.

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