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Oresteia #1-3

The Oresteia: Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, The Eumenides

aeschylus robert fagles w.b. stanford

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Alternate covers of this ISBN here, here, here, here. Most recent cover is here.

In the Oresteia—the only trilogy in Greek drama which survives from antiquity—Aeschylus took as his subject the bloody chain of murder and revenge within the royal family of Argos.

Moving from darkness to light, from rage to self-governance, from primitive ritual to civilized institution, their spirit of struggle and regeneration becomes an everlasting song of celebration.

336 pages, Paperback

First published January 1,-0458
Series
Oresteia
Literary awards
national book award finalist, 
Places
greece, argos, 

This edition

Format
336 pages, Paperback
Published
February 7, 1984 by Penguin Classics
ISBN
ASIN
B0DLSYHQT8
Language
English
Characters More characters
  • Orestes

    Orestes

    In Greek mythology, Orestes (Greek: Ὀρέστης) was the son of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra. When his father returned from the Trojan War, he was murdered by Clytemnestra and her lover, Aegisthus. Orestes went into exile and swore to get revenge. After he reac...

  • Electra

    Electra

    In Greek mythology, Electra (Greek: Ἠλέκτρα, Ēlektra) was an Argive princess and daughter of King Agamemnon and Queen Clytemnestra. She and her brother Orestes plotted revenge against their mother Clytemnestra and step father Aegisthus for the murder of t...

  • Clytemnestra (wife Of Agamemnon)

    ...

  • Cassandra

    Cassandra

    In Greek mythology, Cassandra (Greek Κασσάνδρα, also Κασάνδρα) was the daughter of King Priam and Queen Hecuba of Troy. Her beauty caused Apollo to grant her the gift of prophecy. When Cassandra refused Apollos attempted seduction, he placed a curse...

  • Agamemnon

    Agamemnon

    In Greek mythology, Agamemnon (Ancient Greek: Ἀγαμέμνων; modern Greek: Αγαμέμνονας, "very resolute") is the son of King Atreus of Mycenae and Queen Aerope; the brother of Menelaus and the husband of Clytemnestra; different mythological versions make him t...

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About the author

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aeschylus

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Greek Αισχύλος, Esquilo in Spanish, Eschyle in French, Eschilo in Italian, Эсхил in Russian.

Aeschylus (c. 525/524 BC – c. 456 BC) was an ancient Greek tragedian often described as the father of tragedy. Academic knowledge of the genre begins with his work, and understanding of earlier Greek tragedy is largely based on inferences made from reading his surviving plays. According to Aristotle, he expanded the number of characters in the theatre and allowed conflict among them. Formerly, characters interacted only with the chorus.
Only seven of Aeschylus's estimated 70 to 90 plays have survived. There is a long-standing debate regarding the authorship of one of them, Prometheus Bound, with some scholars arguing that it may be the work of his son Euphorion. Fragments from other plays have survived in quotations, and more continue to be discovered on Egyptian papyri. These fragments often give further insights into Aeschylus' work. He was likely the first dramatist to present plays as a trilogy. His Oresteia is the only extant ancient example. At least one of his plays was influenced by the Persians' second invasion of Greece (480–479 BC). This work, The Persians, is one of very few classical Greek tragedies concerned with contemporary events, and the only one extant. The significance of the war with Persia was so great to Aeschylus and the Greeks that his epitaph commemorates his participation in the Greek victory at Marathon while making no mention of his success as a playwright.

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Rating(4 / 5.0, 99 votes)
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99 reviews All reviews
Profile Image for Kimberly .
GHhost
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 25,2025
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Foreword
Acknowledgements
A Reading of 'The Oresteia': The Serpent and the Eagle

--Agamemnon
--The Libation Bearers
--The Eumenides

The Genealogy of Orestes
Select Bibliography
Notes
Glossary
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drugmugger
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 25,2025
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Overall, The Oresteia was a brutal work, savage and eloquent. I highly recommend you listen to Norwegian black metal while reading this, as it really adds to the experience. Then again, I find that listening to Norwegian black metal adds to the experience of such activities as driving to the grocery store, so I may be a tad bit biased there.

Some of my favorite excerpts:

“…we must suffer, suffer into truth.
We cannot sleep, and drop by drop at the heart
the pain of pain remembered comes again,
and we resist, but ripeness comes as well.
From the gods enthroned on the awesome rowing-bench
there comes a violent love.”

“But Justice turns the balance scales,
sees that we suffer
and we suffer and we learn.”

“Hope’s hand, hovering over the urn of mercy, left it empty.”

“…the house that hates god,
an echoing womb of guilt, kinsmen
torturing kinsmen, severed heads,
slaughterhouse of heroes, soil streaming blood…”

“Raging mother of death, storming deathless war against the ones she loves!”

“Rushed from the house we come
escorting cups for the dead,
in step with the hands’ hard beat, our cheeks glistening,
flushed where the nails have raked new furrows running blood;
and life beats on, and
we nurse our lives with tears,
to the sound of ripping linen beat our robes in sorrow,
close to the breast the beats throb
and laughter’s gone and fortune throbs and throbs.”
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Warfoki
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 25,2025
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The Oresteian Trilogy contains three works by Aeschylus: Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, and Eumenides. My audio version, which is read by a full cast, also includes an excerpt from Proteus in The Odyssey that refers to Agamemnon’s brother Menelaus. It was performed in 458 BCE and is the only Greek drama that survives in its entirety. It is a story of vengeance and justice. In the first part, when Agamemnon returns from Troy, his wife Clytemnestra takes revenge on him for his role in the sacrifice of their daughter Iphegenia. In The Libation Bearers, Orestes and Electra take revenge on their mother Clytemnestra. In Eumenides, Orestes goes on trial for killing Clytemnestra, with Athena as judge, the Furies as prosecutors, and Apollo speaking for the defense. It reflects the changes in Greek society at the time, told as a clash between the old gods and the new order. This Greek tragedy is written in an eloquent manner. It is surprisingly modern in its translation by Ian Johnston and adaptation by Yuri Rasovsky. I highly recommend it to anyone interested in the classics. I think audio is a wonderful way to gain an appreciation for how it may have been performed.
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EndlessSky
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 25,2025
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For people who didn't notice Marina Hyde's column in today's Guardian:
Having been instrumental in forcing the last two prime ministers out of office, Boris Johnson is on a hat-trick. Can he do it? Can Big Dog play his cards in such a way that a third prime ministerial scalp will be his – his in more ways than one? The answer feels like a hard yes, but this never-ending Greek tragedy is certainly taking its time. How’s your stamina? Like me, you maybe feel the Boristeia is dragging on a bit. Seemingly three plays in, Shagamemnon is still with us.
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AtheaOfAltea
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 25,2025
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Agamemnon is such an impressive piece of theatre. Even to this day, it has a kind of tension so rarely achieved in any piece of theatre since. It set in stone many of the conventions of horror literature. The great unknowable evil lurking underneath the plot is an omnipresence, hanging over all of the dialogue, and flavouring all of the characters' interactions.

The following two plays are more cerebral, and taken together they complete the thematic journey of the trilogy: from chaos to order, and from evil to virtue. They provide a necessary counterbalance to the chaos of the first play, and finally (in Eumenides) serve as a reckoning of the events of the first and second plays.

I first read these plays in the Peter Burian and Alan Shapiro translation. My second reading was in Fagles' translation. Both are very good, and I struggle to choose between them. Fagles appears to be more literal, and Burian/Shapiro appears to be more lyrical.

My slightly weird and rambling years-old review is below.

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I'm quite conflicted about rating this. Beyond any doubt at all, Agamemnon, the first of the trilogy, is a masterpiece of the highest order. It's a superbly tense story with an awesome (and very emotionally affecting) climax. The two plays that follow, although great in their own ways, are not so tense as the first. Libation Bearers continues the story of Agamemnon and is centered around the late general's tomb. And then there's Eumenides which is mostly a courtroom trial (although rather an unusual one, in that Apollo appears as a witness and Athena contributes frequently).

The third play reminded me a lot of Murder in the Cathedral by T.S. Eliot. No doubt he was influenced in no small part by Aeschylus. Regardless, I found the courtroom sequences of Murder in the Cathedral to be quite surreal. And I found that same surrealism as present in Eumenides - perhaps even more so than it was in Eliot's play. In Eliot's play there were no gods present at the trial.

None of this is intended as a negative criticism of course. It's just what struck me foremost. Perhaps I should re-read Murder in the Cathedral. So much of modern literature takes on a different appearance when you go back to the sources - and there's no earlier source of drama than Aeschylus.
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Hysvear
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 25,2025
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Net zoals de meeste mensen - vermoed ik - ben ik van de drie Atheense tragici het minst vertrouwd met het werk van Aischylos. Dus las ik nu zijn Oresteia, de trilogie rond de moord op Agalemnon door Klytaimnestra en later die op Klytaimnestra door Orestes en de nasleep hiervan.

Ik heb het huis van de Atriden (waartoe ook Tantalos, Pelops, Thyestes, etc behoren) altijd al de meest interessante stof van de klassieke tragedie gevonden - ja zelfs meer dan de Oedipous-stof - en nu ik Aischylos versie las nog meer!

Het is absurd te denken dat deze drie stukken meer dan 2500 jaar oud zijn, ze blijven ons - mij toch - nog steeds raken. Tegelijk zijn ze dus in zekere zin nog steeds actueel (thematieken van de wraak, oorlog, familiemoord, vrije wil etc), maar ook erg gegrond in de eigen context. Zo wist ik bijvoorbeeld niet dat het laatste stuk van de trilogie - Goede geesten - toch vrij expliciet verwijst naar de politieke situatie van het Athene van Aischylos’ tijd. Dat maakt deze stukken zo aantrekkelijk: de lezing ervan is gelaagd en er vallen vele interpretaties te vormen.

Straf werk.
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Half-MagePrince
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 25,2025
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Highly recommend it if you enjoy Ancient Greek Literature. The trilogy presents the development of early democratic elements in the Greek city-states within the larger narrative of a chain of murders. The character of Clytemnestra, Aeschylus' giving a voice to minor characters in society, and the debate surrounding Zeus' Will, Fate, and Justice are interesting aspects in the plays. Looking forward to studying it for class and writing about it.
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ronin_aizen
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 25,2025
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This is perhaps ancient Greece's most famous tragic trilogy that has survived antiquity. "Agamemnon" deals with the treacherous murder of King Agamemnon, just returned from the Trojan war, at the hands of his wife, Clytemnestra, and his brother (who had an affair with his wife and coveted the throne). "The Libation Bearers" brings karmic and bloody retribution upon Clytemnestra at the hands of her only son, Orestes, avenging the death of his father. "The Eumenides" deals with Orestes flight from 'the furies,' demon-like creatures who are hellbent on exacting justice for the unforgivable sin of matricide, with a climax of Orestes appealing for mercy and clemency from the gods of Olympus for his "crime." A fascinating read with such descriptions that one cannot help but imagine the scenes that take place. Highly recommended!
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