Bücher der Reihe Greek Tragedy in New Translations

Euripides' "Bakkhai" is the staple of the canon of Greek tragedy, as its structure and thematics offer exemplary models of the classic tragic elements. The plot centres around the actions of Pentheus, King of Thebes, who refused to recognize the god Dionysus or permit Thebans to worship him.

Based on the conviction that only translators who write poetry themselves can properly re-create the celebrated and timeless tragedies of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, the Greek Tragedy in New Translations series offers new translations that go beyond the literal meaning of the Greek in order to evoke the poetry of the originals. Under the general editorship of Peter Burian and Alan Shapiro, each volume includes a critical introduction, commentary on the text, full stage directions, and a glossary of the mythical and geographical references in the play. En route to fight the Trojan War, the Greek army has abandoned Philoctetes, after the smell of his festering wound, mysteriously received from a snakebite at a shrine on a small island off Lemnos, makes it unbearable to keep him on ship. Ten years later, an oracle makes it clear that the war cannot be won without the assistance of Philoctetes and his famous bow, inherited from Hercules himself. Philoctetes focuses on the attempt of Neoptolemus and the hero Odysseus to persuade the bowman to sail with them to Troy. First, though, they must assuage his bitterness over having been abandoned, and then win his trust. But how should they do this--through trickery, or with the truth? To what extent do the ends justify the means? To what degree should personal integrity be compromised for the sake of public duty? These are among the questions that Sophocles puts forward in this, one of his most morally complex and penetrating plays.

The Greek Tragedy in New Translations series is based on the conviction that only translators who write poetry themselves, or who work in collaboration with poets, can properly re-create the celebrated and timeless tragedies of the great Greek writers. These new translations are more than faithful to the original text, going beyond the literal meaning in order to evoke the poetic intensity and rich metaphorical texture of the Greek language. Euripides was one of the most popular and controversial of all the Greek tragedians, and his plays are marked by an independence of thought, ingenious dramatic devices, and a subtle variety of register and mood. Medea, is a story of betrayal and vengeance. Medea, incensed that her husband Jason would leave her for another after the many sacrifices she has made for him, murders both his new bride and their own children in revenge. It is an excellent example of the prominence and complexity that Euripides gave to female characters. This new translation does full justice to the lyricism of Euripides original work, while a new introduction provides a guide to the play, complete with interesting details about the traditions and social issues that influenced Euripides's world.

This volume collects for the first time four plays of Euripides in the acclaimed Greek Tragedy in New Translations series, each previously published individually: Alcestis, Medea, Helen, and Cyclops.

This volume collects Aeschylus' Prometheus Bound, a haunting depiction of the most famous of Olympian punishments; The Suppliants, an extraordinary drama of flight and rescue arising from women's resistance to marriage; Persians, a masterful telling of the Persian Wars from the view of the defeated; and Seven Against Thebes, a richly symbolic play about the feuding sons of Oedipus. The volume retains the informative introductions andexplanatory notes of the original editions and adds a single combined glossary and Greek line numbers.

A new translation of a long-neglected Greek drama that has become increasingly popular in classrooms and on the stage. The two editors, Alan Shapiro and Peter Burian, a poet and classicist, collaborated previously on The Oresteia. This is the final volume of the Greek Tragedy in New Translations series.

The Persians, Aeschylus' earliest surviving tragedy, holds a fascination both for readers of Greek drama and Greek history. Not only is it the earliest existing play in the Western tradition, it is drawn directly from the playwright's own experiences at the battle of Salamis, making it the only account of the Persian Wars composed by an eyewitness. And as pure tragedy, it is a masterpiece. Aeschylus tells the story of the war from the Persian point of view, and his pride in the great victory of Greeks is tempered with a real compassion for Xerxes and his vanquished nation. Lembke and Harrington have rendered this stunning work in a modern translation that loses none of the original's dramatic juxtaposition of serenity and violence, hope and despair.

Based on the conviction that only translators who write poetry themselves can properly re-create the celebrated and timeless tragedies of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, the Greek Tragedy in New Translations series offers new translations that go beyond the literal meaning of the Greek in order to evoke the poetry of the originals. This volume collects Euripides'' Andromache (translated by Susan Stewart and Wesley D. Smith), a play that challenges the concept of tragic character and transforms expectations of tragic structure; Hecuba (Janet Lembke and Kenneth J. Reckford), a powerful story of the unjustifiable sacrifice of Hecuba''s daughter and the consequent destruction of Hecuba''s character; Trojan Women (Peter Burian and Alan Shapiro), a particularly intense account of human suffering and uncertainty; andRhesos (Richard Emil Braun), the story of a futile quest for knowledge. This volume retains the informative introductions and explanatory notes of the original editions and adds a single combined glossary and Greek line numbers.

Includes a critical introduction, commentary on the text, full stage directions, and a glossary of the mythical and geographical references in the plays.

The latest title to join the acclaimed Greek Tragedy in New Translations series, Sophocles' Oedipus at Colonus tells the story of the last day in the life of Oedipus.

Echoing through Western culture for more than two millenia, Sophocles' Antigone has been a touchstone of thinking about human conflict, and the degree to which men and women are the creators of their own destinies.

This is a new translation in verse of Medea by a well-regarded poet with an introduction and notes by a scholar of Euripides. The result is a distinguished new edition of a canonical play, one of the most widely read and performed of all the Greek dramas.

In "Andromache", Euripides depicts the aftermath of the Trojan war, when Andromache, the widow of Hector, has a fruitful, but illicit affair with the son of Achilles. The ensuing power-struggle with Hermione, the wronged wife, is re-told in this collaboration between a poet and a classicist.

Peter Burian and Brian Swann re-create Euripides' controversial play in a new translation accompanied by critical introductions, stage directions, a glossary of mythical Greek terms, and a commentary on difficult passages.

In this new translation, Sophocles early masterpiece comes boldly to life. In Greek tradition, Aias is the outmoded warrior whom time passes by. In Sophocles play, he becomes the man who moves resolutely beyond time. Most previous versions and interpretations have equivocated over Sophocles bold vision. This version attempts to translate precisely that transformation of the hero from the bygone figure to the man who stops time. In Homer, Aias is the immovable bulwarkof the Achaians, second only to Achilles in battle prowess and size. But when Achilles dies, his armor is given to the wily Odysseus, not Aias. Shamed, and driven to madness, Aias dies a dishonorable death by suicide. He becomes, in death, the symbol of greatness lost; his death signals the end of aheroic age; in the visual arts, draped hideously over his huge sword, he becomes a momento mori. Sophocles plays upon his audiences expectation of all this. In the first scene Aias appears as the Homeric warrior turned mad butcher. It is harder to imagine a more degraded image of the hero. But with each scene, Aias moves from darkness into greater and greater light, and speaks, contrary to the audiences expectations, more like a Heraclitean philosopher of the worlds flux than the laconic figureknown from Homer. In fact, Sophocles Aias clearly sees his madness and the betrayal by the Greeks as merely symptomatic of a world in which nothing remains constant, not loyalties, not oaths, not friendship, not love. Not content to live in a world where nothing lasts, he resolves to live andtherefore to die in accord with the more absolute law of his own inner nature. He thereby transforms his death into destiny, dying with his grip on the absolute rather than living on in a world of uncertainties. In death, he thus becomes the paradigm of permanence, of the human possibility of snatching the eternal from the desperately fleeting. This version embodies, and the introduction and notes hope to elucidate, how Sophocles brings this tragic vision of human greatness powerfully tolife.

In "Herakles", Euripides reveals with subtlety and complexity the often brutal underpinnings of our social arrangements. The play depicts Herakles being driven mad by Hera, the wife of Zeus. Hera hates Herakles because he is one of Zeus' children born of adultery.

Peter Burian and Alan Shapiro's masterful translation of The Oresteia, originally published in 2003, is being repackaged for the collected volumes in the Greek Tragedy in New Translations series. Burian will add Greek line numbers and update the introduction and bibliography.

This volume collects for the first time three of Sophocles most moving tragedies, all set in mythical Thebes: Oedipus the King, perhaps the most powerful of all Greek tragedies; Oedipus at Colonus, a story that reveals the reversals and paradoxes that define moral life; and Antigone, a touchstone of thinking about human conflict and human tragedy, the role of the divine in human life, and the degree to which men and women are the creatorsof their own destiny.

Based on the conviction that only translators who write poetry themselves can properly re-create the celebrated and timeless tragedies of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, the Greek Tragedy in New Translations offers new translations that go beyond the literal meaning of the Greek in order to evoke the poetry of the originals. Collected here for the first time in the series are four major works by Euripides all set in Athens: Hippoltos, translated by Robert Bagg, a dramatic interpretation of the tragedy of Phaidra; Suppliant Women, translated by Rosanna Warren and Steven Scully, a powerful examination of the human psyche; Ion, translated by W. S. Di Piero and Peter Burian, a complex enactment of the changing relations between the human and divine orders; and The Children ofHerakles, translated by Henry Taylor and Robert A. Brooks, a descriptive tale of the descendants of Herakles and their journey home. These four tragedies were originally avialble as single volumes. This volume retains the informative introductions and explanatory notes of the original editions and adds a single combines glossary and Greekline numbers.

Based on the conviction that only translators who write poetry themselves can properly re-create the celebrated and timeless tragedies of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, the Greek Tragedy in New Translations offers new translations that go beyond the literal meaning of the Greek in order to evoke the poetry of the originals. The volume brings together four major works by one of the greatest classical dramatists: Electra, translated by Anne Carson and Michael Shaw, a gripping story of revenge, manipulation, and the often tense conflict of the human spirit; Aias, translated by Herbert Golder and Richard Pevear, an account of the heroic suicide of the Trojan war hero better known as Ajax; Philoctetes, translated by Carl Phillips and Diskin Clay, a morally complex and penetrating play aboutthe conflict between personal integrity and public duty; and The Women of Trachis, translated by C.K. Williams and Gregory W. Dickerson, an urgent tale of mutability in a universe of precipitous change. These four tragedies were originally available as single volumes. This new volume retains the informative introductions andexplanatory notes of the original editions and adds a single combined glossary and Greek line numbers.

Merwin and Dimock have provided a new translation for this celebrated tragedy, with a comprehensive introduction, notes on the text, and a glossary of mythical and geographical terms.

A translation of Euripides's Orestes by Peck, a poet, and Nisetich, a classicist, with introduction, glossary, and full stage directions.

One of Euripides' late plays, Ion is a complex enactment of mortals' attempts to understand the actions of the gods and their own conflicted natures. The play's beauty and violence, its lyrical delicacy and nearly tragic action, offer a compelling view of the human condition.

"The Oresteia" by Aeschylus, a trilogy among the Greek tragedies, is considered to be one of the great foundational texts of Western culture. This title is a translation of this work.