read 5/10 plays (supposed to read 7 but oh well)

Medea
Iphigenia at Aulis
Iphigenia in Tauris
The Trojan Women
Hippolytus

The book is cheap and well translated; although at some points it's quite clear that it's supposed to be used as a theater script rather than a homely reading. The introductions are brief and nothing much to be mentioned in the book description.

More good translations of ten greek tragedies. I enjoyed these very much.

As Chico said, "Euripides jean, Eumenides jeans."

Euripides is my favorite of the surviving Greek tragedians.

Classic

Just google the man. He is one of the three greats of Greek tragedy. If you don't already love Greek mythology, you will after reading his work. Euripides' gods are as powerful as ever, but can be just a hideous as any mortal.

I'm on my fifth copy and I also have a copy on my nook. :)

Some of the plays featured in this collection are the best Euripides ever wrote, namely Medea and Hippolytus which are just as emotionally devastating today as they were 2500 years ago. Some other plays are strong ones as well, like the wonderfully morbid The Bacchants. Unfortunately a large number of these plays are rather unremarkable. Euripides' play Electra is substantially inferior to Aeschylus' interpretation of the same events presented in The Libation Bearers, and Iphigenia at Aulis has an ending that undercuts one of the most poignant moments of The Iliad (though note, the authenticity of the final line giving this play a happy ending is highly disputed).

It's probably better to read a few of these plays at a time, instead of reading all ten straight through, since the style and progression of the plays is so uniform that the works might begin to blend together for you as they did for me. It's this experience that makes me rate the collection as I do, but I would also urge you to read Medea and Hippolytus, as they are among the best works that survive from the ancient Athenian dramatists.

Euripides' plays are amazing, no doubt about that. However, Roche's translation is so gruesome, it reads like the script of a soap opera.

The guy could write.

Didn't need stage directions, either, 'cuz the characters usually said what they were doing as they did it. "Oh, my anguished daughter, I press a cool cloth to your feverish brow, and cry out to the gods, when will your agony cease! Ai!" Better yet, he's got quick, believable dialogues, which (according to the editor) he practically invented: recognizable characters full of human failings and foibles, motivated by complex desires and hemmed in by familiar fears.

Not so much 'the gods will have their way' as 'what they hell are we going to do?'

how would a theorist say it? "Euripides systematically deconstructed the classical dramatic form, employing its tropes in unconventional formations to both critique the precedents and offer a promise of new hope to succeeding generations through his use of irony and pastiche..." oh i can't take it anymore.

take instead the last play, the one he wrote when he was old and in exile, which starts with an old man complaining about his aches and pains (bantering with his boss, who he respects but doesn't really like), rather than with a god giving a long monologue to preface the action and bring everybody in the audience up to speed. euripides' speed seems to be more along the lines of "you all know what i'm saying, right? well good, let's get busy, then."

and i don't know i believe so much the editor's claim that his use of deux ex machina was always a cynical comment. interesting to think that, but doesn't always seem to be true. maybe if the translator didn't fill the plays with so many current cliches (like "crime doesn't pay"), i would have an easier time believing that.

guess i'll have to read anne carson's translations of 'em...

I thoroughly enjoyed this translation of Euripedes and felt it captured a very modern perspective and aspect of his writing. My favorite part of the translation has to be this though: [FROM THIS POINT ON THE GREEK BECOMES MORE AND MORE SUSPECT.] pp 398.

Alcestis: ****
Hippolytus: ****
Ion: ***
Electra: **
Iphigenia at Aulis: ****
Iphigenia Among the Taurians: ***
Medea: *****
The Bacchae: **
The Trojan Women: *****
The Cyclops:***