So, I didn't actually read this translation. I read Moses Hadas' translation, but I'm not reviewing the translation per se. I'm more interested in the plays themselves. They are fantastic. I can really see why Euripedes was so popular. I loved how he told so many stories about the same people but from different perspectives at different times. He's sunny and witty and has a sense of the historic. I mean as a group, and as a body of work, I really thought these were a lot of fun.

Firstly, the translation by Paul Roche is solid -no complaints there - and the short summaries before each play are useful and informative.
The plays themselves, however, don't grab you like those of Sophocles, nor do they have the gravitas or wisdom (in this idiot's view) of Aeschylus. The Trojan Women and Iphigenia in Aulis have value in fleshing out the Homeric/Trojan/Epic Cycle. Several of the others are forgettable though, or just a bit silly (like Medea), and the final satyric play is very, very silly (and not really in a good way).
Overall, I'd say Euripides is more interesting to read about (anti-gods, pro-women, anti-war, etc.) than to actually read.

I only read Hippolytus and the Bacchae in this collection.

Hippolytus, by Euripides is a very short but poignant play that centers around Phaedra, the new wife of Theseus, son of Aegeus, and her sudden infatuation and love of Hippolytus, Theseus’ bastard son.

I really enjoyed this play because I believe it really uses Aphrodite (less so Artemis) to great effect. The gods, in my eyes, are the concrete forms of human vice and virtue. Playing with such abstract concepts as real people allows the establishment of motives and nuance - why not talk about deeply human qualities by simply viewing these things as innately human themselves?

As such, Aphrodite is a very prideful god and does not like people disrespecting the infinite power of love, which is what Hippolytus dies from. Love is portrayed as one of the most powerful forces in this play, it affects animals, humans, docile and severe alike, and even the gods themselves. It can be thought that love interweaves all virtue and vice, and in some sense is more powerful than all of them.

Love is conveyed as a very sweet, yet bitter prospect, of which I have, no doubt, partaken of. Some of the happiest and most sorrowful moments in my life are predicated by the presence of some type of love, both directly and indirectly. There is the pain of love that exists when you feel it for someone, when a friend or acquaintance has unintentionally (or sometimes, intentionally) placed you under the spell of love, with a lack of reciprocation on the part of Phaedra. Unrequited love is very painful, as I’m sure the reader of this review has no doubt about. Love can be likened to death in some way, the death of who you might formerly be, the death of who you were while you were single. The death of the person you loved (or at least, the person you thought they were.)

It is important to note, however, that there is not just pain on the side of the unrequited, the unreceived. Hippolytus is also in pain too, and arguably suffers a worse fate than Phaedra did. Those who are the recipients of love, but are unable, or perhaps, do not desire to reciprocate such love suffer as well too. Being forced to hurt someone, to completely decimate a world that was created and lives vividly inside of their brain.

Having to potentially tear apart the other world, that of friendship, apart; Perhaps even risking never seeing the person again and being estranged from someone who otherwise might be of great amicable worth.

Needless to say, I do not like Hippolytus. Though lustful people are not my cup of tea, overly-pious and condescending individuals like Hippolytus are in themselves bad. Though he did do the right thing, Hippolytus embodies this vice to the utmost degree, and perhaps even represents the common attitudes towards sex at the time. Maybe he is a critique of the overly pious men who lie about enjoying sex. Maybe he isn’t really that nuanced, but still. His fate is unfortunate, yes, but the man was of vice too. To have 7 generations of virgins herald his death and wish him to elysium is a bit much.
Another tidbit I really enjoyed was the Nurse being a machiavellian devil. There was no way out of the fate, so she knew it was time to put something to action, for better or for worse.


The Bacchae

Another masterful play by Euripides. The Bacchae is a gory, disgusting tale in which Pentheus, King of Thebes, is no match for Dionysus. This tale depicts what it means for a man to revile a god, for a man to resist god, even, for a man to resist his nature.

The play is not super airtight, but there are a lot of themes and callbacks that exist across the play. Ideas like Cadmus’ advice at the beginning to obey tradition, the frenzied flame, or the inevitability of succumbing to Bacchus’ spell. This play also uses a ton of dithyrambic measures. They are incredibly erratic and wild sounding, with a lot of the verses sounding borderline manic whenever you say them out loud.

It is fitting that this sort of measure was invented by Arion, the man who road the backs of dolphins and generally was just a pretty crazy harp player. The measure is perfect in its place as the hymn style for Dionysus, but it is even more perfect in this set of plays too. The idea of a fire closing in on the city of Thebes in tandem with this choral type creates a very frantic and erratic atmosphere. Dionysus himself is like fire, burning bright and putting his looks and shenanigans on full display. Of course, the climax is insane too. If it’s going to be a book or play about Dionysus, it has to have these effects that engulf the reader in the flames.

I’m not really sure if Euripides believed in the gods or not. It seems to me that he was like an Iranian director trying to avoid censorship. I believe he elevates the idea of “godhood” to be something more human, more abstract in nature. Dionysus I believe embodies the idea of alcoholism, or you could even think more generally that he is the embodiment of vice. The main conflict being detailed in this story is Pentheus’ resistance to such a force.

Pentheus is very stubborn and refuses to allow Dionysus to practice his Bacchic orgiastic rituals, but more than that, he denounces the very idea of Dionysus being a god in the first place. If it’s one thing gods don’t like, it’s not being acknowledged that they are one. Pentheus is a metaphor for ourselves and our relationship to vice: the more we deny the fact that we do wrong, the more stigma we assign to wrongdoing, the more we alienate ourselves.

But there is also a darker side to this denial of vice. I think Euripides touches on something slightly controversial: people who work to alleviate the idea that they aren’t something might actually be that something. You can probably extrapolate this to some more specific cases.
Things take a turn for the worse with Pentheus when Dionysus finally has had enough of his stubbornness and he dresses him up as a woman and has him devoured by his own mother.
But in all actuality, it seems that Pentheus was wanting to be a part of the rites all along. Was his resistance due to shame? Was it because he felt inadequate when a member of his family was a god and he not? I’m not too sure, but if I had to pick one, it’s that he truly wanted to be a follower of Bacchus. The people who try to put their puritanism on display might be in fact that people who are the most depraved.

After this book, I will not construe the idea of Dionysus as a nice guy. There are several allusions to motifs of “the flame” infecting people who were under the spell of Dionysus: that of the frenzied flame. It plays on this idea of alcohol and lust being like a flame, it being a passion. Dionysus is more generally the god of passion, hence a lot of allusions to Dionysus being similar to Aphrodite in the play itself.

A general word of advice that comes with the play's the following (which I don’t really agree with, but is interesting nonetheless) - it is better to abide by tradition than to rebel against culture, to rebel against godhood. But I think Euripides alludes to this in order to show that this advice too can be foolish, because in the end even those who sit by and allow the status quo to propagate might in the end die too.

Euripides was, perhaps, the most progressive of the three major Greek playwrights, which shines through in his work. I’d say my favourites were Andromache and Iphigenia at Aulis—it’s nice to read about women with strength of spirit and mind in classical text. Would definitely go back and reread again after some time!

fuckin love euripides man

"Eros. Eros, clouding our eyes/With a mist of yearning when you sweeten the hearts/Of those against whom you plan your attack./Please never show yourself to wound me./Please never turn everything upside down...." (from Hippolytus)
"NURSE: I'll never let go. PHAEDRA: Then, poor woman, you'll have to share my doom. NURSE: What doom could be worse than losing you?" (from Hippolytus)
"CHORUS: ...Where can Decency show her face? Where has Virtue hidden?" (from Iphigenia at Aulis)

I read (so far) both plays with Iphigenia (Agamemnon & Clytemnestra's daughter). "Iphigenia at Aulis" was the standout play. Here, Euripedes pulls out some absolutely beautiful lines and writing. It is introspective and solemn and you can feel the weight of not only the looming war with the Trojans but of the sacrifice that Agamemnon must make. It weighs heavily on the family of Atreus and others, sagging them down and down throughout the play. Iphigenia especially who somehow manages to make the best of her condemned and short life. It was a wonderful and moving play.

Will be reading the others within soon.

"It comes to this: if a man is wise he will shun war"
Another read for school, but enjoyed the surprisingly nuanced takes on gender and war. My personal favorites of the collection were The Trojan Women and Medea.

The plays are very interesting, and also so intriguing to read that I just cannot put it down.

This was my first encounter with ancient Greek theater. Only about 30 plays survive from antiquity out of thousands lost. Theater in the ancient Greek world, especially in Athens, served as a form of civil religion - a means by which all members of the community witnessed to the stories and themes that bound them together as a community. This collection, translated by Paul Roche, is a great introduction to the genre. Roche helpfully adds stage directions and some commentary to help the reader more fully envision these as pieces to be performed.

The collection contains ten works: "Alcestis," "Hippolytus," "Ion," "Electra," "Iphigenia at Aulis," "Iphigenia among the Taurians," "Medea," "The Bacchae," "The Trojan Women," and "The Cyclops." My favorites in the collection were "Iphigenia at Aulis," "The Bacchae," and "The Trojan Women." All three have been influential on the development of Western theater. They are also really, really good! I found myself genuinely moved by the "The Trojan Women," horrified by "The Bacchae," and on the edge of my seat reading "Iphigenia at Aulis.

This is the edition I'd recommend to buy. Well, if you have a Kindle. (It's only like $6 for Kindle.) I hate Signet editions in paper - they're cheap - but the advantage to this one is it's one of the few collections of all the major plays in one volume, and Roche's translation is...it's okay.

The collection contains:
Hippolytos (five stars; no distinct review)
n  Medean (five stars)
n  Trojan Womenn (four)
n  Alcestisn (four)
n  The Bacchaen (four)
n  Iphigenia at Taurusn (four)
n  Cyclopsn (three)
Ion
Electra
n  Iphigenia at Aulisn (five)

Personal note: leave Hekabe for when Anne Carson's Grief Lessons get released for Kindle in August. Elektra or Orestes is next.

Other Euripides Plays
Heracleidae
Andromache
Hecuba
The Suppliants (Suppliant Women)
Herakles
Helen
Phoenician Women
Orestes
Rhesus

You may also be interested in: my opinions about the best of the ancient Greek plays from Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides and Aristophanes.

ALCESTIS
If you were married and you knew your spouse was going to die and you also knew you could put yourself in his or her stead, would you? If the answer is yes, are you a good spouse? Would people honor you and revere your decision? Should you be able to ask your spouse to not remarry after you are gone?

On the opposite side, if your spouse chose to, would you allow your spouse to die for you? If the answer is yes, are you a good spouse? Would people honor you and revere your decision? Would it be right for another to die in your stead when it is your appointed time to die? Could you expect your parents who are elderly to step up? Should they offer themselves because they are old and have already lived life?

This scenario is reality in this play. I would not categorize this play as a tragedy. Usually in a tragedy people are left to suffer situations they have no control over, but while one character in this play has the power to stop the tragedy and chooses not to, another in the end saves the day after all hope has been abandoned. This ‘tragedy’ has a happy ending that leaves ethical questions in the mind of the reader.

HIPPOLYTUS
“Virtue is pitted against virtue, and by a twist of fate virtue is betrayed by virtue.” (Euripides Ten Plays, by Paul Roche, pg. 47)

It is interesting to note that you should never cross a god. For when they are angry they destroy anything and everything for revenge. Aphrodite, the goddess of love, has been spurned by Hippolytus and means to destroy him. She will do this knowing it will also destroy Theseus and Phaedra who revere Aphrodite.

Aphrodite: “Phaedra, therefore, has to die,
Though she saves her good name.
Yes, she must die.
Her present agonies are not enough
To outweigh the penalty I must exact
From those who do me wrong.”

Phaedra, the step-mother of Hippolytus, is hopelessly in love with him, but is determined to die rather to “give it rein” or let it be known:

Phaedra: “The moment love smote me
I cast about for a way to handle it.
I determined to keep quiet and hide my sickness.
One cannot trust the tongue:
So glib at bringing others to heel,
So bad at coping with troubles of its own.
Next, I made up my mind to master this madness
Through sheer self-control.
Thirdly, when this attempt to quell love’s power failed,
I began to see that death was the only way out –
None can deny it.
I would rather have my virtue than my shame
Blazoned forth for all to see.
For the scandal, I knew, would be just as great
To own the passion as to give it rein.
Besides, I realized that as a woman
I was the ready butt for hate by all.”

Given she failed at not loving him and is determined not to cause any problems I find it reprehensible Aphrodite would use her to get to Hippolytus. I also find the Nurse detestable. She promises Phaedra she will not tell Hippolytus, but then goes and does just that. Hippolytus is shocked and disgusted by the news. His response tells us just how much he despises the idea of love:

Hippolytus: “Great Zeus,
Why ever did you give a place to women under the sun:
That pestilent tribe, that curse to man?
….
Woman is a plague, and here’s the evidence.
The father who begets her and brings her up
Then pays a gross dowry to get her out of the house
And be rid of the baggage.
The man who takes home this noxious package
Is then thrilled to bedeck his idol with every kind of frippery.
He dolls her up in expensive gowns.
He fritters away – poor fool! – his heritage...
The luckiest man is he who wins a nobody for a wife,
A brainless nincompoop who just sits at home.
A brainy woman I abhor,
And in my house, at least, I hope there’ll never be
A woman of above-average brains.
It’s the clever ones that go in for Aphrodite’s fun and games.
The dullards are kept in check by their own ineptitude...
As it is,
Worthless women hatch their plots in closets
And their maids broadcast them abroad.”

What he says is not beautiful, but he says it beautifully. Euripides says so much in so few words. I wonder how the ancient Greeks took this speech. Was it meant to be funny? Sadly, there is enough truth behind it to make it humorous. The rest of the play reads fast for as the reader I was anticipating how Aphrodite was to bring about her purpose.

ION
When a god bears a child from a mortal what happens to that child? What happens to the mother who bore the child? Ion is such a child. We see through the course of the play what is done by the God Apollo to steer the fate of his own son.

The chorus ends the play with the following:

Chorus: “Praised be Apollo, son of Zeus and Leto.
Those whom misfortune undermines
Should reverence the gods and take courage.
The virtuous in the end will win,
The wicked, by their nature, not:
Because of sin.”

This seems to me a departure from the average theme of most tragedies – that men suffer in this life and we just have to deal. This exit chorus is a little more positive.

ELECTRA
Find my review of Electra in my review of "Electra and other plays by Euripides".

IPHIGENIA AT AULIS
It was Euripides last play and was unfinished at his death. It is thought that his son finished the play and produced it in Athens a short time later. This whole play has major similarities to the story of Abraham and Isaac. I wonder how much, if any, influence the Jewish traditions had on the people of ancient Greece.

First, in the story of Abraham he is commanded to sacrifice his son, Isaac. Abraham doesn’t want to because he loves his son, but follows the commandment of the Lord. In Iphigenia at Aulis, Agamemnon is told a virgin needs to be sacrificed in order for the army to sail to Troy. He sends word to his wife to bring Iphigenia and waffles back and forth between stopping them or letting them come. In the end he is convinced by Menelaus his daughter must die.

Second, Isaac willingly allows his father to lie him on the stone having full knowledge he is about to die. Iphigenia learns what Agamemnon plans and also willingly goes to the sacrificial altar.

“‘Father, here I am,’ she said, ‘as you bid me.
Of my own free will I bequeath my body
for my state and for the whole of Hellas.
So lead me to the altar of sacrifice –
If that is the decision.
May it help you, if that is in my power.
May you be awarded victory
And return a winner to your native land.
Let no Argive lay his hand on me.
Silent, unflinching, I bare my throat.’”

Third, as Abraham is striking down with his weapon, an angel stops him. A ram is provided in a nearby bush as a substitute and Isaac is saved. In Iphigenia at Aulis, the priest took the final stroke, but Iphigenia had vanished and in her place was a deer.

“There is no doubt your child was wafted to the gods,
So cease from grief and resentment against your consort.
Mysterious to us mortals are the ways of the gods.
Those they love, they save:
This day has seen your child dead and alive.”

This play was interesting to read after reading all the Electra plays because Clytemnestra always used the sacrifice of their daughter as her reasoning for murdering Agamemnon. So after reading an account of what happened, is this enough justification for Clytemnestra to murder Agamemnon? There was no evidence of death, no body of Iphigenia, but her daughter was gone. Clytemnestra never saw her again. Did she believe the army lied to her? That the story of the deer was just that – a story? If she really believed Iphigenia was taken by Artemis would she have hated Agamemnon? Does it matter that Iphigenia willingly went to die? Should that take away the motive of Clytemnestra? Or, did she use this occurrence as an excuse to gain power and keep a lover?

A lot of commentary suggests Euripides was a type of feminist in his time because more than half of his plays are about women. I agree that his portrayal of the woes and trials of womankind are heartfelt and are probably accurate, but there are always the little sentences that undermine this theory. The following is from Iphigenia when she is telling her mother she will go with Agamemnon:

“It is unthinkable that this man [Achilles]
Should pit himself against the whole of Argos
For a woman’s sake.
A single man is worthier
To look upon the light than ten thousand women.”

IPHIGENIA AMONG THE TAURIANS
This play gives closure to both Iphigenia at Aulis and the story of Orestes. We find out Iphigenia was saved from sacrifice to serve in a foreign land in one of Artemis’ temples. Her main purpose is to prepare the victims for sacrifice. Iphigenia has an interesting perspective on her job:

“I am not impressed with Artemis’ subtleties.
She won’t let anyone come near her altar
Who has touched blood or a woman in childbirth or a corpse,
Because they are tainted,
Yet takes delight in human sacrifice.
No, I cannot bring myself to think
That Leto, Zeus’s wife, could generate such absurdity.
Not do I believe what is said of Tantalus,
That he gave a banquet to the gods,
Regaling them with children’s flesh.
No, I believe that the people of this land
Being murderers themselves
Have foisted their murderous instincts on the goddess.
I refuse to think that any god is evil.”

Orestes, in his mad travels, finds himself in the same foreign land and becomes at the mercy of the people who want to sacrifice him to the goddess. When Orestes is taken to the temple he meets his sister. The sentiment above is juxtaposed with the following from Orestes:

Iphigenia: Dreams, dreams, goodbye! You were all a lie.
Orestes: And so are the gods – no better than dreams on wings,
And yet they say so wise!
Confusion reigns among the deities
Just as it does among us mortals.
The only thing one should regret
Is being ruined not by one’s own folly
But by following some crackpot prophecy:
A ruin that exactly happened to someone
Whom those in the know know.”

Little does Orestes know that by the end of the day he will be on his way to being free from the Furies and saved by Pallas Athena.

MEDEA
“Revenge is sweet, sweeter than life itself – so say fools.” Seriously, this play is messed up. At most it portrays how one bent on revenge can ruin her own life; at the least it is a sadistic and shocking read.

Medea: “Of all creatures that can feel and think,
We women are the worst-treated things alive.
To begin with,
We bid the highest price in dowries
Just to buy some man
To be dictator of our bodies.
How that compounds the wrong!
Then there is the terrifying risk:
Shall we get a good man or a bad?
Divorce is a disgrace
(at least for women),
To repudiate a man, not possible.
So, plunged into habits new to her,
Conventions she has never known at home,
She has to guess like some clairvoyant
How to handle the one who shares her bed.
And if we learn our lesson well
In this exacting role,
And our husband does not kick against the marriage yoke,
Oh, ours is an enviable life!
Otherwise we are better dead.
When a man gets bored with wife and home,
He simply roams abroad to relieve the tedium of his spirit,
Turns to a friend or finds his cronies.
We women, on the other hand,
Turn only to a single man.
We live safe at home, they say.
They do battle with the spear.
How shallow!
I had rather stand my ground three times in battle
Than face a childbirth once….
Woman, on the whole, is a timid thing:
The din of war, the flash of steel, unnerves her;
But wronged in love, there is no heart more murderous.”

Medea is justified in thinking this because she learned her husband, Jason, has taken another wife. Not just any wife, the daughter of the King. This explains her motive, but after this rant Medea goes wrong. She plans and executes the murder of Jason’s new wife and also the murders of her two sons. The end is heartbreaking, but also genius. Euripides has shown himself to be a master in ‘agon’, where “violent emotion is channeled into formal argumentation: these interludes provide a sharper and sometimes chilling intellectual pleasure as callous acts are justified with alarming articulacy.” (Euripides: Electra and Other Plays by Penguin Classics, pg. xxxvii) The following argument between Medea and Jason is so believable and real:

MEDEA: “Zeus the Father knows
Exactly what you got from me and how you then behaved.
I refused to let you or your royal princess
Set our wedded life aside and make me cheap
So that you could live in bliss;
Or let that match-arranger, Creon,
Dismiss me from the land without a fight.
So call me lioness, if you like,
Or a Scylla haunting the Tyrrhenian shore,
I have done what I ought:
Wounded you to the very core.
JASON: [wheeling around to face her]
You are in agony too.
You share my broken life.
MEDEA: It is worth the suffering since you cannot sneer.
JASON: Poor children, what a monster fate gave you for a mother!
MEDEA: Poor sons, what a disaster your selfish father was!
JASON:tIt was not his right hand that struck them down.
MEDEA: No, it was his pride and lust for his new mate.
JASON: You think it right to murder just for a thwarted bed?
MEDEA: And do you think that a thwarted bed is trifling to a woman?
JASON: To a modest woman, yes, but you are sunk in vice.
MEDEA: [pointing to the two dead boys]
See, they are no more. I’ve stung you to the heart.”

THE BACCHAE
This play is advertized as Euripides finest work. This play is definitely the most violent, the most horrific, and the most tragic. In my opinion it is not my favorite, but when is being popular taken into account when deciding what constitutes a masterpiece? This play demonstrates the power of the Gods, particularly Dionysus.

“The Bacchae asks the question: is there an equation between faith and reason, religion and fact, freedom of spirit and law-and-order? Euripides’ conclusion seems to be that too much law-and-order leads to social tyranny… , too much freedom of spirit to chaos, too much religion to fanaticism. In the play, the young King Pentheus, who is the same age as Dionysus (Bacchus), believes that law-and-order is the sole end of the state. For him freedom of spirit is tantamount to anarchy. So he goes out to suppress the new cult coming from the Orient promoting Dionysus. In the process he becomes a fanatic, and as fanaticism does with life, so it does with him – tears him to pieces. Dionysus tries to save him: make him see that there are many levels to life and that law-and-order is only one of them – Dionysus himself being both a constructive and destructive force, like a law of nature, against which it is perilous to hurl oneself.” (Euripides Ten Plays A New Translation by Paul Roche pg. 393-394)

I really liked this chorus verse:
“The braggart’s unbridled tongue,
The anarchical folly of fools
Leads to untimely demise,
But unshaken abides
The life of the quietly wise,
Holding the home together.
For the gods in the faraway skies
Still look upon men.
Mere cleverness is not wise.
Given immortal airs
Life quickens and dies. A man in pursuit
Of mere grand desires misses his time.
Oh that is the way of fanatically
Willful men, I surmise.”

THE TROJAN WOMEN
Find my review of The Trojan Women in my review of "Electra and other plays by Euripides".

THE CYCLOPS
This is a satyr play and is purported to be a comedy. It definitely is more crude, but funny? Maybe you have to be an ancient Greek to get the jokes.

Impressive for someone from 500 BC.