**3.5

greek plays are really praised when they’re literally

chorus: here comes meneleaus, to unleash his wrath on the wretched hermione

meneleaus: *gives two page soliloquy about how angry he is over his daughter just existing*

I believe in female rage and justified murder

Cassandra, on being dragged away to Agamemnon: (Do not cry for me, mother.) "I shall come among the dead as a victor. I shall have laid waste the house of the sons of Atreus, the men who destroyed us."

Of the three plays, I'd say Andromache was my favorite. Very good plays- fulfills the reader's/audience's craving for tragedy, but also introduces the power and manipulation of women.

Very interesting reading! I might have benefited from reading Euripides before reading modern retellings of what happened to the Trojan women, but it was still very exciting to read their stories. This collection of plays includes: Hecuba, The Trojan Women, and Andromache and it tells the dark story of what happens to women after war. We see the women fall into slavery and be given as prized slaves to the men who slaughtered their families. We see the atrocities the women had to live through. But at the same time, the plays are about the victory of the female spirit. They are about the community of women, women's resilience and survival. I highly recommend reading these plays if you're a fan of Greek mythology and/or the Trojan war! I'm definitely reading more of Euripides soon, I have Alexandros, Electra, and Iphigenia in Aulis high on my list.

Full disclosure: I had to skim a good portion of the dialogue in each of these plays in order to not give up out of boredom. I think that a focus on monologues and having very little action was the style back in ancient Greece, but it does not translate well to modern America (my attention span is nil! entertain me!). The strongest feelings I had when reading these plays was when I stepped back and considered on my own what the characters were going through; I did not find the dialogue to be all that moving.

Trojan Women, the most famous of this volume, is wonderful— but not my favorite. Andromache was the big winner— a genuinely moving AND funny tragedy.

Like much of the Euripides I’ve read, his blend of tones and psychological complexity is what keeps me coming back.

Rhesos is a weird one but moves quickly!

Amazingly good.

I had the pleasure of seeing a performance of The Trojan Women at the ancient Odeon (built in the second century AD) in July 2017. The play was slightly modernised, but still very much Euripides. Trojan Women is a very powerful play about the aftermath of the Trojan War, or - to put it more precisely - what happened to Hecuba (formerly queen of Tory), Cassandra (her daughter), Andromache (daughter-in-law of Hecuba) and Helena (wife of Menelaos). It is a timeless play. You might even call it an anti-war play, yet insisting on the victory of the female spirit amid the horrors visited on them by the gods and men during war.

Three of Euripides' timeless masterpieces are presented in this short and thematically linked collection from James Morwood and Edith Hall. Through Hecuba, The Trojan Women, and Andromache, Euripides considers the tragic aftermath of the Trojan War on the women of that city.

The translation is fluid and (for Classics) modern, while the commentary is comprehensive enough that a complete novice in Greek mythology would easily understand what is going on. I particularly enjoyed the introduction which provides some contextual insights that made me completely re-imagine the contemporary staging of these plays.

While the plays themselves are weaker than some of Euripides' others, this book would be a fantastic starting point for newcomers to Greek tragedy and even contains revelations for those long familiar with the genre.

Off the top of my head I know I have read at least "The Trojan Women" which was different from other tragedies, partially because it was mostly about women and not men. It also offers news of what happened (fictionally) after the war. Cassandra's role made me laugh, though she was mad. Most importantly, DO NOT WATCH THE MOVIE. I watched it for class after reading the story and the movie was just annoying. Actually having to listen to women go through "woe is me" instead of just reading it is awful.

honestly, i wasn't expecting to enjoy this and was just reading it to feed my superiority complex, but it was honestly so good?

hecuba and andromache were phenomonal, trojan women was slightly less good (but still great), but cassandra's speech is just *chef's kiss*.

i cannot for the life of me work out if euripedes was a feminist (for his time) or misogynist, because honestly there are such contradictory messages??

it was actually really entertaining. hermione and andromache's dialogue was really funny, i thought (probably wasn't meant to be, oh well), and the stories are really good, centring on the impact of war and obviously some bad ass morally grey women (my favourite kind).

anyway, i would read again, and i'm probably going to try some more euripedes soon. this was my first attempt at an ancient greek text, but this translation wasn't difficult to understand. a solid 4 star read, maybe 4.5