Prometheus Bound is

Classic Greek tragedy. Aeschylus is difficult, and a guide to Ancient Greek theatre always helps. I returned to this collection over a period of thirty years.

“misfortune wanders everywhere, and settles now upon one and now upon another.”

Review to come... First two: Suppliants - boring; Persians - good. Last two: Seven Against - very good; Prometheus - incredible/shattering/vital.

Read Prometheus Bound on 30 Jan 15.

4 Stars for Smyth's translation of Seven Against Thebes.

I’ve just read Aeschylus’ Seven Against Thebes. This sounds like an action movie, but in fact it is nothing of the sort. None of the fighting occurs on stage. It is a character study.
Eteocles is the perfect prince. He organises the defence of Thebes with courage and efficiency, and goes to his death Nelson-like, with his duty done and victory achieved.

See four plays are all really fragments as they portions of larger cycles dealing the same characters or themes. Imagine sitting down to read Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings and having only Volume 3 available. Or only being able to watch Attack of the Clones but knowing five other Star Wars films once existed. Frustrating. Like the lost plays of William Shakespeare, the plays contained in this slim volume only tease us with what the completed stories might have authored. These are good examples of dissecting the human condition, but they only hint at what the author may have truly had in mind in telling them.

Two of the four stood out for me.
Prometheus Unbound is an interesting fraction (?) of a larger play, the rest of the pieces have been sadly lost, but it still works well on its own. Prometheus is the prototype rebel against authority, but he is also the prototype of the teacher. This makes him a very fascinating character study. In this play we see the results of his struggles against Zeus's authority and the consequences of his delivery of fire into the hands of mankind. It's a pity the other two (?) plays detailing the Prometheus chronicle by Aeschylus have been lost.

The Persians was also very interesting. A tagedy written by a Greek but from the point of view of a Persian who wanted to enslave the Greeks. Not what I expected.one would think that a historical tragedy would portray the Persians as monsters, villains and the stereotypical political enemy. Instead the Persians are humanely noble; which, of course, make sthe tragedy work. It was also interesting that this was a historical tragedy, most (all?) Greek plays I am familiar with deal with mythological stories and characters. This is in many ways a very unique example of Greek theater.

Aeschylus was the first Greek tragedian. Only 10% of his 70 plays remain, and the only complete ancient Greek trilogy in the Oresteia (Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, The Eumenides). Of the remaining plays, this collection includes Prometheus Bound, The Suppliants, Seven Against Thebes, The Persians.

As I had previously read Prometheus Bound I did not reread it here. However, the introduction had good coverage of how the Prometheia would have continued if the second and third plays of the trilogy remained. The Oresteia demonstrates the pattern of violence, counter-violence, and the subjugation of violence to reason and justice. Thus, Prometheus Bound is believed to be followed by Prometheus Unbound and ending with Prometheus the Fire-Bringer. How regrettable not to have the entire trilogy.

Next up, and thematically linked to Prometheus Bound is the first play of the Danaid trilogy (The Suppliants, The Egytians, The Daniads). This series focuses on the progeny of Io, an Argive Queen sent to wander the ancient world as a cow, a disguise bestowed by Zeus with a torment accursed by Hera. The story of 50 daughters of Danius pursued by 50 male cousins of Aegyptius to the seat of Argos, is a beautiful setup of the violence against the fleeing women and protection by Argos. We can imagine what will come in the second and third from some remaining fragments, but alas, these are really only conjecture.

The Seven Against Thebes is structurally a marvelous idea; it would have been the final play of the trilogy begun with Laius and Oedipus, thus is a play rebalancing violations of the world. The seven gates attacked and defended by the great warriors of each army. However the slow progression of conversation away from any action recalls the beginning of The Iliad and the parade of heroes. The end is as was fated by Apollo’s curse on Laius to the destruction of his family line. Oepidus could not escape his fate, nor can his warring sons, Eteocles and Polyneices. With their mutual deaths at the end, we hear their two sisters arrive, Antigone and Ismene. Enter Antigone, I cannot wait to begin the plays of Sophocles, whose plays concerning the Theban Cycle purportedly outshine Aeschylus’. Apparently the ending was rewritten to add Antigone and Ismene to the end of The Seven Against Thebes, in which Antigone declares her decision to bury the brother who threatened the city, against the cities wishes. I think, however, the sequence of Laius, Oedipus, Seven Against Thebes would be rather compelling. The doubling of sibling brothers and sisters at the end, makes for a trilogy finale whereby justice becomes ambiguous.

Aeschylus’ first play, The Persians was written in 472 BC, which is what makes these works so profound, and that they remain a miracle. Also remarkable, is it is the only play that covers a recent history to whom the audience would actually know the facts surrounding the Battle of Salamis. This play is set in Susu, the capital of the Persians. Most of the play constitutes a messenger relaying the defeat of the Persian navy and the total loses but that Xerxes has survived. At court, his mother, Atossa, hears and leads an investigation into the war’s outcome, whereby she visits her late husband’s tomb and his ghost, that of Darius, enters the play. Ending with Xerxes and a mourning chorus, this is such a brilliant way to have an enemy relays the “facts” of such a politically significant event.

CHORUS: Sad favour, sad request.
XERXES: Join my mournful hymn.
CHORUS: Ototototoi!
O grievous hand of Fate!
O king, we weep for you.
XERXES: Beat your breast,
Groan aloud for me.
CHORUS: O king, behold my tears.
XERXES: Cry aloud, beat your breast for me.
CHORUS: With good will, my master.
XERXES: Cry aloud and groan.
CHORUS: Ototototoi!
Bruising blows mingle with wails of grief.
XERXES: Come, beat your breast, intone a Mysian dirge.
CHORUS: O pain, O pain!
XERXES: Pluck for my sake the white hair from your beard.
CHORUS: With fingers clenched, and bitter cries,
We pluck the white hair from our beards.
XERXES: Weep and howl.
CHORUS: We weep and howl.
XERXES: Tear your gowns, tear them through.
CHORUS: O pain, O pain!
XERXES: And tear your hair in grief for all our army dead.
CHORUS: With fingers clenched, with bitter cries, We tear the white hair from our heads.
XERXES: Fill your eyes with tears.
CHORUS: Our eyes are filled with tears.
XERXES: Beat your breast, groan aloud for me.
CHORUS: Alas, alas!

This play would have been the second play in a trilogy, begun with Phineus about Jason and the Argonauts, and ended with one called Glaucus, concerning either the son of Sisyphus or a Boetian farmer who eats a magical herb. In either case, what a great loss.

i do enjoy the story of prometheus and i was very glad that we are discussing this in class, however prometheus is a pick me man who should learn to shut up because he is annoying!!!

book 1 for my drama and transgression: from prometheus to faust module

recensione sul blog: http://thereadingpal.blogspot.it/2018...



Sto cercando di recuperare la lettura di classici greci e latini, per piacere personale. Purtroppo mi manca la conoscenza sia del greco antico che del latino, entrambe lingue che dovrei imparare. Questa volta è toccato ad alcune opere di Eschilo.
La mia è una copia vecchissima, tanto che ha il prezzo in lire, ma sia l'introduzione che la traduzione sono state scritte dalle stesse persone della nuova versione.
Consiglio di non saltare la parte introduttiva: io, presonalmente, l'ho trovata molto interessante. Purtroppo nel corso di Letteratura Greca quest'anno si ci è concentrato su altri autori, quindi per me è stato un approfondimento molto gradito.
Per quanto riguarda la traduzione, senza sapere la lingua non posso dire molto, ecco. Guardando l'originale riconoscevo qualche parola, ma non tanto da poter controllare la traduzione. Nel complesso si leggeva bene, anche se alcuni punti mi sono piaciuti più di altri. È un peccato che ci manchino alcuni versi. Mi chiedo come sarebbe leggerlo, e anche vederlo, in originale. Eschilo ha portato parecchie innovazioni al teatro greco, e le tragedie da lui scritte sono davvero interessanti.
Tra queste quattro opere, quella che ho preferito è sicuramente il Prometeo Incatenato, seguito da I persiani. Per quanto riguarda il Prometeo, racconta il mito del titano Prometeo e della sua punizione, inflittagli da Zeus per aver donato il fuoco agli umani. È quella che mi è piaciuta di più perché adoro la mitologia greca, e perché, leggendo opere che parlano di loro, mi sento più vicina agli dèi. Per quanto riguarda I Persiani, invece, viene portata a Susa la notizia della sconfitta di Salamina. L'ultima parte, dove appare Serse, è uno dei punti che più ho amato. Anche I sette contro Tebe e Le supplici sono bellissime opere, sopratutto la seconda per quanto mi riguarda.
In tutte queste opere possiamo individuare dettagli della cultura greca del tempo, altro dettaglio che mi interessa molto, e le note a volte aiutano ad individuare dettagli che potrebbero sfuggire.
Non ho molto da dire, a essere sincera. Le opere mi sono piaciute, le trame erano interessanti e la traduzione facile da seguire. Il tutto si legge piuttosto velocemente ed io, personalmente, non mi sono affatto annoiata nella lettura.

Having recently read Caroline Alexander’s The War That Killed Achilles: The True Story of Homer's Iliad and the Trojan War, a wild hare came into my head to read Aeschylus’ Persians, which was mentioned in some connection with the book. My exposure to Greek playwrights is limited. In my infamous graduate-school days, my exposure to Greek authors comprised the historians and relatively obscure Byzantine chroniclers; I had done little reading – much less serious reading – of the literature.

As my ancient Greek has rusted almost beyond use, I am fortunate in this case for having an excellent translation by Carl Mueller, who quotes Dryden in illustrating his approach to the plays – “The translator that would write with any force or spirit of an original must never dwell on the words of the author.” (p. 117)

This volume contains four of the seven complete plays from Aeschylus’ work (somewhere between 70 and 90 plays, of which only fragments have survived the ages): Persians, Seven Against Thebes, Suppliants, and Prometheus Bound.

n  Persians:n None of these plays are “plays” in what most people expect from that word. There’s little action or plot, and much recitation between chorus and actor. Persians is unique in a couple of ways. It’s the only first-hand account of the battle of Salamis (the playwright was there) that has survived, and for a play presented to an audience of Athenians it presents the enemy in a surprisingly sympathetic light (remarkably so, considering that Salamis was only about a decade in the past when first performed and many in the audience would have been veterans of the war). It is – above all – a cautionary tale about the perils of hubris. In attempting to invade Hellas, Xerxes has overstepped the bounds of what is permitted to humans and he and all of Persia must pay the price – defeat, humiliation, ruin.

Even at this early period in the evolution of theater, Aeschylus shows a mastery of dramatic technique (pp. 26ff), and a genius for vivid imagery. Compare the images of the flower of Persia’s youth marching to war and the lament when they are slaughtered by the Athenians:

From Susa they went, / from Agbatana, / from Kissia’s ancient, towering ramparts, / by horse, by ship, by foot, / in close-ranked columns of war. / Men like Amistres and Artaphrenes, / Megabates and Astaspes, / each of them kings, / Persian commanders, / but each of them also the Great King’s servants, / marshals of Persia’s massive forces, / surging, surging, / seething for battle, / archers, horsemen, / a sight to see, / fearful in the fight, / stern in the harsh resolve of their spirit.

Artembares, high in his chariot, / and Masistres, / and noble Imaios, / strong of arm with his archer’s bow, / unyielding Imaios, / and Pharandakes, / and Sosthenes, driver of stallions. / And others, still others / great Nile sent forth, / teeming Nile’s fertile flow: / Sousiskanes, / and Egypt-born, sun-dark Pegastagon, / and towering Arsames, / lord of temple-rich Memphis, and / Ariomardos, governor of age-old Thebes, / and marsh-dwelling oarsmen terrible in number… (pp. 122-23)

And from the Persian Chorus:

King! / My King! / I lament for your army, / your noble army, / for the greatness of Persia, / and her glorious men, / cut down now, / cut down, whom / god has destroyed!

The land, / the land cries, / cries aloud, / cries, / for her youth whom / Xerxes has / slain, / whom Xerxes had crammed into dismal / Hades, / Persia’s / youth from Agbatana, / great Persia’s flower, / many, many, / thousands, / ten thousands, / archers, / masters of the bow, / a forest of men, / gone, / destroyed, / no more!

Weep for them, / weep, / our noble defense! / All Asia brought to her / knees in / shame! (pp. 167-68)

n  Seven Against Thebes:n Before I learned the actual story behind the title, this play always brought to my mind a Greek version of “The Seven Samurai” (or at least “The Magnificent Seven”). The reality, for me, wasn’t quite as inspiring.

Eteokles and Polyneikes are the brother-sons of Oedipus. The original plan was for the brothers to alternate in the kingship of Thebes but after Eteokles’ first year, he refused to give up the throne and exiled his brother. Polyneikes goes to Argos, where he convinces King Adrastos to help him take the city. Adrastos recruits five other champions and they lead an army against Thebes. Everyone but Adrastos is fated to die in this war, the brothers as part of a curse on Oedipus’ house, as well as a fulfillment of the father-brother’s curse on them for mistreatment.

In its “raw” form, there’s really no side to prefer but in Aeschylus’ hands, you’re urged to root for Eteokles, who is presented here as the epitome of (martial) arête and good kingship – not only does he fulfill the demands of honor but he truly cares for the fate of Thebes and dies knowing that his defense of the city will save it from the horrors of a sack.

As with Persians, there’s some memorable poetry:

O god-hated house of Oedipus, / house cursed by the gods, / house maddened by the gods, / house of tears, / now the curse of Oedipus is fulfilled!

But no time for tears or wailing now, / giving birth to even worse suffering!

As for him, / Polyneikes, / so well-named, / strife-bringer, we will / see if his sign is fulfilled; whether golden / letters on a shield will do what they say; / or are they the babble of a demented mind?

If Justice, virgin daughter of / Zeus, had ever been with him in / thought or deed, his boasting might have come true.

But never, never once, never – not when he / fled the dark cavern of his mother’s / womb, not in childhood or adolescence, not when the hair of manhood grew on his chin, / did Justice ever, even once, / turn her eye on him or ever acknowledge him! / Nor does she now, / now as he rapes his city, his parent / land, in this violent, criminal assault! / For is she did, / if Justice looked / kindly on him, she would be justly misnamed / for championing one who brings death on his city! pp. (215-16)

n  Suppliants:n This play is the least satisfying from a self-contained-story point of view. It sets up a confrontation between the fifty daughters of Danaos, who do not want to marry against their will, and the demands of Greek culture, which says a girl must wed.

It must be remembered that all of these plays were part of dramatic trilogies and a satyr play (a comedy). Suppliants is the first in an arc that explored the myth of the Danaids. It’s as if we only had a copy of “The Empire Strikes Back” and maybe a frame or two of the other movies. We could comment favorably on the movies’ technical mastery and script but we wouldn’t know much about the characters or why Vader’s admission of paternity is so pivotal.

n  Prometheus Bound:n Prometheus Bound is the most play-like of these plays. The characters are strongly delineated (Hephaistos, Prometheus, Oceanus, the First Daughter, Io and Hermes) and, while no action takes place on stage, the monologues are harrowing enough in the tales they recount, and the finale when the Titan is hurled down into Tartarus is as violent as any an action-film lover could wish.

The story should be familiar to most readers: There is a war in heaven between Zeus’ faction and that of his father, Kronos. Prometheus & his mother Themis, though Titans and initially Kronos’ allies, defect to Zeus and allow his side to prevail. But Zeus, in this play, is a tyrant who can brook no competition. When Prometheus gives to Man not alone fire but all the arts of civilization, Zeus condemns him to perpetual torment, chained to a cliff in the Caucasus.

The play is a deconstruction of tyranny and the proper response of a free man. Hephaistos and Oceanus are the men who go along to get along (courtiers and sycophants), Io is a living victim of tyranny (raped by Zeus and driven mad by Hera’s jealousy), and Hermes is Zeus’ Gestapo (spying on the sky god’s subjects so that no rival can arise).