Short Stories, Irish literature, Classics, Modern Fiction, Contemporary Literary Fiction, The Japanese Novel, Post Colonial Asian Fiction, The Legacy of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and quality Historical Novels are Among my Interests








Wednesday, January 4, 2023

Trojan Women by Euripides - first produced 415 B. C. E. - Translated by Emily Wilson 2016-This play is included in The Greek Plays: Sixteen Plays by Sophocles, Aeschylus and Euripides-Preface, general introduction, play introductions, and compilation copyright © 2016 by Mary Lefkowitz and James Romm


 Trojan Women by Euripides - first produced 415 B. C. E. - Translated by Emily Wilson -This play is included in The Greek Plays: Sixteen Plays by Sophocles, Aeschylus and Euripides-Preface, general introduction, play introductions, and compilation copyright © 2016 by Mary Lefkowitz and James Romm


Ancient Reads

The Trojan Women-A 1971 movie with Katherine Hepburn as Hecuba and Vanessa Redgrave as Andromache 




Translations of Euripides by Emily Wilson I have so far read 

Electra -420 B. C. E.

Trojan Women -415 B. C. E.


Trojan Women is the second translation of Euripides by Emily Wilson I have so far read

CAST OF CHARACTERS (IN ORDER OF APPEARANCE) POSEIDON, ATHENA, HECUBA, widow of Priam; queen of Troy, CHORUS of captured Trojan women, TALTHYBIUS, herald of the Greek army, CASSANDRA, Trojan prophetess; daughter of Hecuba and Priam, the late king of Troy ANDROMACHE, Trojan noblewoman; widow of the Trojan hero Hector, ASTYANAX, young son of Andromache by Hector MENELAUS, king of Sparta and co-leader of the Greek army HELEN, wife of Menelaus, whom she left for the Trojan prince Paris (the cause of the Trojan War)

"Homer’s Iliad was already some three hundred years old during the golden age of Athenian tragedy, but it remained the central literary text for the Greeks and colored all their thinking about war and loss. The downfall of the Trojans, made inevitable by the death" from the introduction by James Romm 

The coda of the Iliad consists of a long dirge for the fallen Hector, as his corpse is lamented by his sister, Cassandra, his widow, Andromache, his mother, Hecuba, and even his sister-in-law, Helen— widely considered the cause of the war. The center of the play is in the laments of these four women.

Trojan Women focuses on the horrible impact of the war on aristocratic Trojan women. An extreme denunciation of Helen is prominent. The capricious of the Gods is paramount.

There are translations of two more Plays of Euripides by Emily Wison, Bacchae and Helen, that I hope to read soon.

Mel Ulm 


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