: The Trojan women of Euripides by Euripides BCE BCE Murray Gilbert Translator - Trojan War Drama; Andromache (Legendary character) Drama; Hecuba Queen of Troy Drama; Cassandra (Legendary character) Drama; Helen of Troy Queen of Sparta Drama Classical Antiqu

@FreeBooks

Posted in: #FreeBooks #FreeBooksIndia #FreeBooksApp #gg

Vote Up Vote Down   0 Reactions

Login to give Reaction!

THE TROJAN WOMEN OF EURIPIDES

TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH RHYMING VERSE WITH EXPLANATORY NOTES BY

GILBERT MURRAY, LL.D., D.LITT.

REGIUS PROFESSOR OF GREEK IN THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD

THE TROJAN WOMEN

"How are ye blind, Ye treaders down of cities, ye that cast Temples to desolation, and lay waste Tombs, the untrodden sanctuaries where lie The ancient dead; yourselves so soon to die!"

To the cities of this present day might the prophetess Cassandra speak her message:

"Would ye be wise, ye Cities, fly from war! Yet if war come, there is a crown in death For her that striveth well and perisheth Unstained: to die in evil were the stain!"

A throb of human sympathy as if with one of our sisters of to-day comes to us at the end, when the city is destroyed and its queen would throw herself, living, into its flames. To be of the action of this play the imagination needs not to travel back over three thousand years of history. It can simply leap a thousand leagues of ocean.

If ever wars are to be ended, the imagination of man must end them. To the common mind, in spite of all its horrors, there is still something glorious in war. Preachers have preached against it in vain; economists have argued against its wastefulness in vain. The imagination of a great poet alone can finally show to the imagination of the world that even the glories of war are an empty delusion. Euripides shows us, as the centre of his drama, women battered and broken by inconceivable torture--the widowed Hecuba, Andromache with her child dashed to death, Cassandra ravished and made mad--yet does he show that theirs are the unconquered and unconquerable spirits. The victorious men, flushed with pride, have remorse and mockery dealt out to them by those they fought for, and go forth to unpitied death. Never surely can a great tragedy seem more real to us, or purge our souls more truly of the unreality of our thoughts and feelings concerning vital issues, than can The Trojan Women at this moment of the history of the world.

FRANCIS HOVEY STODDARD.

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

Free books android app tbrJar TBR JAR Read Free books online gutenberg

(0)

Login to post a comment!