Alcestis
1900
Euripides rewrote the rules of tragedy with this strange, shattering play about a woman who volunteers to die for her husband. Alcestis, queen of Thessaly, agrees to take her husband Admetus's place in death when the Fates grant him a reprieve - on the condition that someone else die in his stead. What follows is an excavation of love, duty, and the terrible mathematics of sacrifice. We watch Alcestis say goodbye to her children, descending into darkness while her husband lives. But Euripides, that radical psychologist of the ancient world, refuses to let us look away from the cost: the Chorus murmurs about his cowardice, and even the gods seem to regard Admetus's survival with something like contempt. This is Greek tragedy at its most humane and its most uncomfortable - a play that celebrates Alcestis's courage while quietly interrogating the world that demanded such courage from women. It ends with a resurrection, but nothing is simple, and nothing should be.
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“The fiercest anger of all, the most incurable,Is that which rages in the place of dearest love.””
— Euripides
“Let no one think of me that I am humble or weak or passive; let them understand I am of a different kind: dangerous to my enemies, loyal to my friends. To such a life glory belongs.””
— Euripides
“Arm yourself, my heart: the thing that you must do is fearful, yet inevitable.””
— Euripides
“Surely, of all creatures that have life and will, we women are the most wretched. When, for an extravagant sum, we have bought a husband, we must then accept him as possessor of our body.””
— Euripides
“O Zeus, why is it you have given men clear ways of testing whether gold is counterfeit but, when it comes to men, the body carries no stamp of nature for distinguishing bad from good.””
— Euripides
“Ruthless is the temper of royalty; How much better to live among the equals.Let me decline in a safe old age. The very name of the "middle way".””
— Euripides
“To me, a wicked man who is also eloquent seems the most guilty of them all. He´ll cut your throat as bold as brass, because he knows he can dress up murder in handsome words.””
— Euripides
“If women didn't exist, human life would be rid of all its miseries.””
— Euripides
“Give me your hand; I'll hold you....Then wipe off on me all your uncleanness, all; I do not shrink from it.””
— Euripides
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Euripides. Alcestis. Lex, lex-books.com/book/alcestis-6462c235-e827-458b-9c63-b6d609fa9382.Euripides (1900). Alcestis. Lex. https://lex-books.com/book/alcestis-6462c235-e827-458b-9c63-b6d609fa9382Euripides. Alcestis. Lex. https://lex-books.com/book/alcestis-6462c235-e827-458b-9c63-b6d609fa9382.
