--Not a
thousand
prayers can gain
A man's bare bread, save an he work amain.
A man's bare bread, save an he work amain.
Euripides - Electra
poetry.
THE
ELECTRA
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
FORTY-SECOND THOUSAND
LONDON: GEORGE ALLEN & UNWIN LTD
RUSKIN HOUSE, 40 MUSEUM STREET, W. C. 1
_First Edition, November_ 1905
_Reprinted, November_ 1906
" _February_ 1908
" _March_ 1910
" _December_ 1910
" _February_ 1913
" _April_ 1914
" _June_ 1916
" _November_ 1919
" _April_ 1921
" _January_ 1923
" _May_ 1925
" _August_ 1927
" _January_ 1929
_(All rights reserved)_
PERFORMED AT
THE COURT THEATRE, LONDON
IN 1907
_Printed in Great Britain by
Unwin Brothers Ltd. , Woking_
Introduction[1]
The _Electra_ of Euripides has the distinction of being, perhaps, the best
abused, and, one might add, not the best understood, of ancient tragedies.
"A singular monument of poetical, or rather unpoetical perversity;" "the
very worst of all his pieces;" are, for instance, the phrases applied to
it by Schlegel. Considering that he judged it by the standards of
conventional classicism, he could scarcely have arrived at any different
conclusion. For it is essentially, and perhaps consciously, a protest
against those standards. So, indeed, is the tragedy of _The Trojan Women_;
but on very different lines. The _Electra_ has none of the imaginative
splendour, the vastness, the intense poetry, of that wonderful work. It is
a close-knit, powerful, well-constructed play, as realistic as the tragic
conventions will allow, intellectual and rebellious. Its _psychology_
reminds one of Browning, or even of Ibsen.
To a fifth-century Greek all history came in the form of legend; and no
less than three extant tragedies, Aeschylus' _Libation-Bearers_ (456
B. C. ), Euripides' _Electra_ (413 B. C. ), and Sophocles' _Electra_ (date
unknown: but perhaps the latest of the three) are based on the particular
piece of legend or history now before us. It narrates how the son and
daughter of the murdered king, Agamemnon, slew, in due course of revenge,
and by Apollo's express command, their guilty mother and her paramour.
Homer had long since told the story, as he tells so many, simply and
grandly, without moral questioning and without intensity. The atmosphere
is heroic. It is all a blood-feud between chieftains, in which Orestes,
after seven years, succeeds in slaying his foe Aegisthus, who had killed
his father. He probably killed his mother also; but we are not directly
told so. His sister may have helped him, and he may possibly have gone mad
afterwards; but these painful issues are kept determinedly in the shade.
Somewhat surprisingly, Sophocles, although by his time Electra and
Clytemnestra had become leading figures in the story and the mother-murder
its essential climax, preserves a very similar atmosphere. His tragedy is
enthusiastically praised by Schlegel for "the celestial purity, the fresh
breath of life and youth, that is diffused over so dreadful a subject. "
"Everything dark and ominous is avoided. Orestes enjoys the fulness of
health and strength. He is beset neither with doubts nor stings of
conscience. " Especially laudable is the "austerity" with which Aegisthus
is driven into the house to receive, according to Schlegel, a specially
ignominious death!
This combination of matricide and good spirits, however satisfactory to
the determined classicist, will probably strike most intelligent readers
as a little curious, and even, if one may use the word at all in
connection with so powerful a play, undramatic. It becomes intelligible as
soon as we observe that Sophocles was deliberately seeking what he
regarded as an archaic or "Homeric" style (cf. Jebb, Introd. p. xli. ); and
this archaism, in its turn, seems to me best explained as a conscious
reaction against Euripides' searching and unconventional treatment of the
same subject (cf. Wilamowitz in _Hermes_, xviii. pp. 214 ff. ). In the
result Sophocles is not only more "classical" than Euripides; he is more
primitive by far than Aeschylus.
For Aeschylus, though steeped in the glory of the world of legend, would
not lightly accept its judgment upon religious and moral questions, and
above all would not, in that region, play at make-believe. He would not
elude the horror of this story by simply not mentioning it, like Homer, or
by pretending that an evil act was a good one, like Sophocles. He faces
the horror; realises it; and tries to surmount it on the sweep of a great
wave of religious emotion. The mother-murder, even if done by a god's
command, is a sin; a sin to be expiated by unfathomable suffering. Yet,
since the god cannot have commanded evil, it is a duty also. It is a sin
that _must_ be committed.
Euripides, here as often, represents intellectually the thought of
Aeschylus carried a step further. He faced the problem just as Aeschylus
did, and as Sophocles did not. But the solution offered by Aeschylus did
not satisfy him. It cannot, in its actual details, satisfy any one. To him
the mother-murder--like most acts of revenge, but more than most--was a
sin and a horror. Therefore it should not have been committed; and the god
who enjoined it _did_ command evil, as he had done in a hundred other
cases! He is no god of light; he is only a demon of old superstition,
acting, among other influences, upon a sore-beset man, and driving him
towards a miscalled duty, the horror of which, when done, will unseat his
reason.
But another problem interests Euripides even more than this. What kind of
man was it--above all, what kind of woman can it have been, who would do
this deed of mother-murder, not in sudden fury but deliberately, as an act
of "justice," after many years? A "sympathetic" hero and heroine are out
of the question; and Euripides does not deal in stage villains. He seeks
real people. And few attentive readers of this play can doubt that he has
found them.
The son is an exile, bred in the desperate hopes and wild schemes of
exile; he is a prince without a kingdom, always dreaming of his wrongs and
his restoration; and driven by the old savage doctrine, which an oracle
has confirmed, of the duty and manliness of revenge. He is, as was shown
by his later history, a man subject to overpowering impulses and to fits
of will-less brooding. Lastly, he is very young, and is swept away by his
sister's intenser nature.
That sister is the central figure of the tragedy. A woman shattered in
childhood by the shock of an experience too terrible for a girl to bear; a
poisoned and a haunted woman, eating her heart in ceaseless broodings of
hate and love, alike unsatisfied--hate against her mother and stepfather,
love for her dead father and her brother in exile; a woman who has known
luxury and state, and cares much for them; who is intolerant of poverty,
and who feels her youth passing away. And meantime there is her name, on
which all legend, if I am not mistaken, insists; she is _A-lektra_, "the
Unmated. "
There is, perhaps, no woman's character in the range of Greek tragedy so
profoundly studied. Not Aeschylus' Clytemnestra, not Phaedra nor Medea.
One's thoughts can only wander towards two great heroines of "lost" plays,
Althaea in the _Meleager_, and Stheneboea in the _Bellerophon_.
G. M.
[Footnote 1: Most of this introduction is reprinted, by the kind
permission of the Editors, from an article in the _Independent Review_
vol. i. No. 4. ]
ELECTRA
CHARACTERS IN THE PLAY
CLYTEMNESTRA, _Queen of Argos and Mycenae; widow of Agamemnon_.
ELECTRA, _daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra_.
ORESTES, _son of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra, now in banishment_.
A PEASANT, _husband of Electra_.
AN OLD MAN, _formerly servant to Agamemnon_.
PYLADES, _son of Strophios, King of Phocis; friend to Orestes_.
AEGISTHUS, _usurping King of Argos and Mycenae, now husband of
Clytemnestra_.
The Heroes CASTOR and POLYDEUCES.
CHORUS of Argive Women, with their LEADER.
FOLLOWERS of ORESTES; HANDMAIDS of CLYTEMNESTRA.
_The Scene is laid in the mountains of Argos. The play was first produced
between the years_ 414 _and_ 412 B. C.
ELECTRA
_The scene represents a hut on a desolate mountain side; the river Inachus
is visible in the distance. The time is the dusk of early dawn, before
sunrise. The_ PEASANT _is discovered in front of the hut_.
PEASANT.
Old gleam on the face of the world, I give thee hail,
River of Argos land, where sail on sail
The long ships met, a thousand, near and far,
When Agamemnon walked the seas in war;
Who smote King Priam in the dust, and burned
The storied streets of Ilion, and returned
Above all conquerors, heaping tower and fane
Of Argos high with spoils of Eastern slain.
So in far lands he prospered; and at home
His own wife trapped and slew him. 'Twas the doom
Aegisthus wrought, son of his father's foe.
Gone is that King, and the old spear laid low
That Tantalus wielded when the world was young.
Aegisthus hath his queen, and reigns among
His people. And the children here alone,
Orestes and Electra, buds unblown
Of man and womanhood, when forth to Troy
He shook his sail and left them--lo, the boy
Orestes, ere Aegisthus' hand could fall,
Was stolen from Argos--borne by one old thrall,
Who served his father's boyhood, over seas
Far off, and laid upon King Strophios' knees
In Phocis, for the old king's sake. But here
The maid Electra waited, year by year,
Alone, till the warm days of womanhood
Drew nigh and suitors came of gentle blood
In Hellas. Then Aegisthus was in fear
Lest she be wed in some great house, and bear
A son to avenge her father. Close he wrought
Her prison in his house, and gave her not
To any wooer. Then, since even this
Was full of peril, and the secret kiss
Of some bold prince might find her yet, and rend
Her prison walls, Aegisthus at the end
Would slay her. Then her mother, she so wild
Aforetime, pled with him and saved her child.
Her heart had still an answer for her lord
Murdered, but if the child's blood spoke, what word
Could meet the hate thereof? After that day
Aegisthus thus decreed: whoso should slay
The old king's wandering son, should win rich meed
Of gold; and for Electra, she must wed
With me, not base of blood--in that I stand
True Mycenaean--but in gold and land
Most poor, which maketh highest birth as naught.
So from a powerless husband shall be wrought
A powerless peril. Had some man of might
Possessed her, he had called perchance to light
Her father's blood, and unknown vengeances
Risen on Aegisthus yet.
Aye, mine she is:
But never yet these arms--the Cyprian knows
My truth! --have clasped her body, and she goes
A virgin still. Myself would hold it shame
To abase this daughter of a royal name.
I am too lowly to love violence. Yea,
Orestes too doth move me, far away,
Mine unknown brother! Will he ever now
Come back and see his sister bowed so low?
Doth any deem me fool, to hold a fair
Maid in my room and seek no joy, but spare
Her maidenhood? If any such there be,
Let him but look within. The fool is he
In gentle things, weighing the more and less
Of love by his own heart's untenderness.
[_As he ceases_ ELECTRA _comes out of the hut. She is in mourning garb,
and carries a large pitcher on her head. She speaks without observing the_
PEASANT'S _presence_.
ELECTRA.
Dark shepherdess of many a golden star,
Dost see me, Mother Night? And how this jar
Hath worn my earth-bowed head, as forth and fro
For water to the hillward springs I go?
Not for mere stress of need, but purpose set,
That never day nor night God may forget
Aegisthus' sin: aye, and perchance a cry
Cast forth to the waste shining of the sky
May find my father's ear. . . . The woman bred
Of Tyndareus, my mother--on her head
Be curses! --from my house hath outcast me;
She hath borne children to our enemy;
She hath made me naught, she hath made Orestes naught. . . .
[_As the bitterness of her tone increases, the_ PEASANT _comes forward. _
PEASANT.
What wouldst thou now, my sad one, ever fraught
With toil to lighten my toil? And so soft
Thy nurture was! Have I not chid thee oft,
And thou wilt cease not, serving without end?
ELECTRA (_turning to him with impulsive affection_).
O friend, my friend, as God might be my friend,
Thou only hast not trampled on my tears.
Life scarce can be so hard, 'mid many fears
And many shames, when mortal heart can find
Somewhere one healing touch, as my sick mind
Finds thee. . . . And should I wait thy word, to endure
A little for thine easing, yea, or pour
My strength out in thy toiling fellowship?
Thou hast enough with fields and kine to keep;
'Tis mine to make all bright within the door.
'Tis joy to him that toils, when toil is o'er,
To find home waiting, full of happy things.
PEASANT.
If so it please thee, go thy way. The springs
Are not far off. And I before the morn
Must drive my team afield, and sow the corn
In the hollows. --Not a thousand prayers can gain
A man's bare bread, save an he work amain.
[ELECTRA _and the_ PEASANT _depart on their several ways. After a few
moments there enter stealthily two armed men,_ ORESTES _and_ PYLADES.
ORESTES.
Thou art the first that I have known in deed
True and my friend, and shelterer of my need.
Thou only, Pylades, of all that knew,
Hast held Orestes of some worth, all through
These years of helplessness, wherein I lie
Downtrodden by the murderer--yea, and by
The murderess, my mother! . . . I am come,
Fresh from the cleansing of Apollo, home
To Argos--and my coming no man yet
Knoweth--to pay the bloody twain their debt
Of blood. This very night I crept alone
To my dead father's grave, and poured thereon
My heart's first tears and tresses of my head
New-shorn, and o'er the barrow of the dead
Slew a black lamb, unknown of them that reign
In this unhappy land. . . . I am not fain
To pass the city gates, but hold me here
Hard on the borders. So my road is clear
To fly if men look close and watch my way;
If not, to seek my sister. For men say
She dwelleth in these hills, no more a maid
But wedded. I must find her house, for aid
To guide our work, and learn what hath betid
Of late in Argos. --Ha, the radiant lid
Of Dawn's eye lifteth! Come, friend; leave we now
This trodden path. Some worker of the plough,
Or serving damsel at her early task
Will presently come by, whom we may ask
If here my sister dwells. But soft! Even now
I see some bondmaid there, her death-shorn brow
Bending beneath its freight of well-water.
Lie close until she pass; then question her.
A slave might help us well, or speak some sign
Of import to this work of mine and thine.
[_The two men retire into ambush. _ ELECTRA _enters, returning from the
well. _
ELECTRA.
Onward, O labouring tread,
As on move the years;
Onward amid thy tears,
O happier dead!
Let me remember. I am she, [_Strophe_ 1.
Agamemnon's child, and the mother of me
Clytemnestra, the evil Queen,
Helen's sister. And folk, I ween,
That pass in the streets call yet my name
Electra. . . . God protect my shame!
For toil, toil is a weary thing,
And life is heavy about my head;
And thou far off, O Father and King,
In the lost lands of the dead.
A bloody twain made these things be;
One was thy bitterest enemy,
And one the wife that lay by thee.
Brother, brother, on some far shore [_Antistrophe_ 1.
Hast thou a city, is there a door
That knows thy footfall, Wandering One?
Who left me, left me, when all our pain
Was bitter about us, a father slain,
And a girl that wept in her room alone.
Thou couldst break me this bondage sore,
Only thou, who art far away,
Loose our father, and wake once more. . . .
Zeus, Zeus, dost hear me pray? . .
--Not a thousand prayers can gain
A man's bare bread, save an he work amain.
[ELECTRA _and the_ PEASANT _depart on their several ways. After a few
moments there enter stealthily two armed men,_ ORESTES _and_ PYLADES.
ORESTES.
Thou art the first that I have known in deed
True and my friend, and shelterer of my need.
Thou only, Pylades, of all that knew,
Hast held Orestes of some worth, all through
These years of helplessness, wherein I lie
Downtrodden by the murderer--yea, and by
The murderess, my mother! . . . I am come,
Fresh from the cleansing of Apollo, home
To Argos--and my coming no man yet
Knoweth--to pay the bloody twain their debt
Of blood. This very night I crept alone
To my dead father's grave, and poured thereon
My heart's first tears and tresses of my head
New-shorn, and o'er the barrow of the dead
Slew a black lamb, unknown of them that reign
In this unhappy land. . . . I am not fain
To pass the city gates, but hold me here
Hard on the borders. So my road is clear
To fly if men look close and watch my way;
If not, to seek my sister. For men say
She dwelleth in these hills, no more a maid
But wedded. I must find her house, for aid
To guide our work, and learn what hath betid
Of late in Argos. --Ha, the radiant lid
Of Dawn's eye lifteth! Come, friend; leave we now
This trodden path. Some worker of the plough,
Or serving damsel at her early task
Will presently come by, whom we may ask
If here my sister dwells. But soft! Even now
I see some bondmaid there, her death-shorn brow
Bending beneath its freight of well-water.
Lie close until she pass; then question her.
A slave might help us well, or speak some sign
Of import to this work of mine and thine.
[_The two men retire into ambush. _ ELECTRA _enters, returning from the
well. _
ELECTRA.
Onward, O labouring tread,
As on move the years;
Onward amid thy tears,
O happier dead!
Let me remember. I am she, [_Strophe_ 1.
Agamemnon's child, and the mother of me
Clytemnestra, the evil Queen,
Helen's sister. And folk, I ween,
That pass in the streets call yet my name
Electra. . . . God protect my shame!
For toil, toil is a weary thing,
And life is heavy about my head;
And thou far off, O Father and King,
In the lost lands of the dead.
A bloody twain made these things be;
One was thy bitterest enemy,
And one the wife that lay by thee.
Brother, brother, on some far shore [_Antistrophe_ 1.
Hast thou a city, is there a door
That knows thy footfall, Wandering One?
Who left me, left me, when all our pain
Was bitter about us, a father slain,
And a girl that wept in her room alone.
Thou couldst break me this bondage sore,
Only thou, who art far away,
Loose our father, and wake once more. . . .
Zeus, Zeus, dost hear me pray? . . .
The sleeping blood and the shame and the doom!
O feet that rest not, over the foam
Of distant seas, come home, come home!
What boots this cruse that I carry? [_Strophe_ 2.
O, set free my brow!
For the gathered tears that tarry
Through the day and the dark till now,
Now in the dawn are free,
Father, and flow beneath
The floor of the world, to be
As a song in she house of Death:
From the rising up of the day
They guide my heart alway,
The silent tears unshed,
And my body mourns for the dead;
My cheeks bleed silently,
And these bruised temples keep
Their pain, remembering thee
And thy bloody sleep.
Be rent, O hair of mine head!
As a swan crying alone
Where the river windeth cold,
For a loved, for a silent one,
Whom the toils of the fowler hold,
I cry, Father, to thee,
O slain in misery!
The water, the wan water, [_Antistrophe_ 2.
Lapped him, and his head
Drooped in the bed of slaughter
Low, as one wearied;
Woe for the edged axe,
And woe for the heart of hate,
Houndlike about thy tracks,
O conqueror desolate,
From Troy over land and sea,
Till a wife stood waiting thee;
Not with crowns did she stand,
Nor flowers of peace in her hand;
With Aegisthus' dagger drawn
For her hire she strove,
Through shame and through blood alone;
And won her a traitor's love.
[_As she ceases there enter from right and left the_ CHORUS, _consisting
of women of Argos, young and old, in festal dress_.
CHORUS.
_Some Women. _
Child of the mighty dead, [_Strophe_.
Electra, lo, my way
To thee in the dawn hath sped,
And the cot on the mountain grey,
For the Watcher hath cried this day:
He of the ancient folk,
The walker of waste and hill,
Who drinketh the milk of the flock;
And he told of Hera's will;
For the morrow's morrow now
They cry her festival,
And before her throne shall bow
Our damsels all.
ELECTRA.
Not unto joy, nor sweet
Music, nor shining of gold,
The wings of my spirit beat.
Let the brides of Argos hold
Their dance in the night, as of old;
I lead no dance; I mark
No beat as the dancers sway;
With tears I dwell in the dark,
And my thought is of tears alway,
To the going down of the day.
Look on my wasted hair
And raiment. . . . This that I bear,
Is it meet for the King my sire,
And her whom the King begot?
For Troy, that was burned with fire
And forgetteth not?
CHORUS.
_Other Women. _
Hera is great! --Ah, come, [_Antistrophe_.
Be kind; and my hand shall bring
Fair raiment, work of the loom,
And many a golden thing,
For joyous robe-wearing.
Deemest thou this thy woe
Shall rise unto God as prayer,
Or bend thine haters low?
Doth God for thy pain have care?
Not tears for the dead nor sighs,
But worship and joy divine
Shall win thee peace in thy skies,
O daughter mine!
ELECTRA.
No care cometh to God
For the voice of the helpless; none
For the crying of ancient blood.
Alas for him that is gone,
And for thee, O wandering one:
That now, methinks, in a land
Of the stranger must toil for hire,
And stand where the poor men stand,
A-cold by another's fire,
O son of the mighty sire:
While I in a beggar's cot
On the wrecked hills, changing not,
Starve in my soul for food;
But our mother lieth wed
In another's arms, and blood
Is about her bed.
LEADER.
On all of Greece she wrought great jeopardy,
Thy mother's sister, Helen,--and on thee.
[ORESTES _and_ PYLADES _move out from their concealment_; ORESTES _comes
forward_: PYLADES _beckons to two_ ARMED SERVANTS _and stays with them in
the background_.
ELECTRA.
Woe's me! No more of wailing! Women, flee!
Strange armed men beside the dwelling there
Lie ambushed! They are rising from their lair.
Back by the road, all you. I will essay
The house; and may our good feet save us!
ORESTES (_between_ ELECTRA _and the hut_).
Stay,
Unhappy woman! Never fear my steel.
ELECTRA (_in utter panic_).
O bright Apollo! Mercy! See, I kneel;
Slay me not.
ORESTES.
Others I have yet to slay
Less dear than thou.
ELECTRA.
Go from me! Wouldst thou lay
Hand on a body that is not for thee?
ORESTES.
None is there I would touch more righteously.
ELECTRA.
Why lurk'st thou by my house? And why a sword?
ORESTES.
Stay. Listen! Thou wilt not gainsay my word.
ELECTRA.
There--I am still. Do what thou wilt with me.
Thou art too strong.
ORESTES.
A word I bear to thee. . .
Word of thy brother.
ELECTRA.
Oh, friend! More than friend!
Living or dead?
ORESTES.
He lives; so let me send
My comfort foremost, ere the rest be heard.
ELECTRA.
God love thee for the sweetness of thy word!
ORESTES.
God love the twain of us, both thee and me.
ELECTRA.
He lives! Poor brother! In what land weareth he
His exile?
ORESTES.
Not one region nor one lot
His wasted life hath trod.
ELECTRA.
He lacketh not
For bread?
ORESTES.
Bread hath he; but a man is weak
In exile.
ELECTRA.
What charge laid he on thee? Speak.
ORESTES.
To learn if thou still live, and how the storm,
Living, hath struck thee.
ELECTRA.
That thou seest; this form
Wasted. . .
ORESTES.
Yea, riven with the fire of woe.
I sigh to look on thee.
ELECTRA.
My face; and, lo,
My temples of their ancient glory shorn.
ORESTES.
Methinks thy brother haunts thee, being forlorn;
Aye, and perchance thy father, whom they slew. . .
ELECTRA.
What should be nearer to me than those two?
ORESTES.
And what to him, thy brother, half so dear
As thou?
ELECTRA.
His is a distant love, not near
At need.
ORESTES.
But why this dwelling place, this life
Of loneliness?
ELECTRA (_with sudden bitterness_).
Stranger, I am a wife. . . .
O better dead!
ORESTES.
That seals thy brother's doom!
What Prince of Argos. . . ?
ELECTRA.
Not the man to whom
My father thought to give me.
ORESTES.
Speak; that I
May tell thy brother all.
ELECTRA.
'Tis there, hard by,
His dwelling, where I live, far from men's eyes.
ORESTES.
Some ditcher's cot, or cowherd's, by its guise!
ELECTRA (_struck with shame for her ingratitude_).
A poor man; but true-hearted, and to me
God-fearing.
ORESTES.
How? What fear of God hath he?
ELECTRA.
He hath never held my body to his own.
ORESTES.
Hath he some vow to keep?
THE
ELECTRA
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
FORTY-SECOND THOUSAND
LONDON: GEORGE ALLEN & UNWIN LTD
RUSKIN HOUSE, 40 MUSEUM STREET, W. C. 1
_First Edition, November_ 1905
_Reprinted, November_ 1906
" _February_ 1908
" _March_ 1910
" _December_ 1910
" _February_ 1913
" _April_ 1914
" _June_ 1916
" _November_ 1919
" _April_ 1921
" _January_ 1923
" _May_ 1925
" _August_ 1927
" _January_ 1929
_(All rights reserved)_
PERFORMED AT
THE COURT THEATRE, LONDON
IN 1907
_Printed in Great Britain by
Unwin Brothers Ltd. , Woking_
Introduction[1]
The _Electra_ of Euripides has the distinction of being, perhaps, the best
abused, and, one might add, not the best understood, of ancient tragedies.
"A singular monument of poetical, or rather unpoetical perversity;" "the
very worst of all his pieces;" are, for instance, the phrases applied to
it by Schlegel. Considering that he judged it by the standards of
conventional classicism, he could scarcely have arrived at any different
conclusion. For it is essentially, and perhaps consciously, a protest
against those standards. So, indeed, is the tragedy of _The Trojan Women_;
but on very different lines. The _Electra_ has none of the imaginative
splendour, the vastness, the intense poetry, of that wonderful work. It is
a close-knit, powerful, well-constructed play, as realistic as the tragic
conventions will allow, intellectual and rebellious. Its _psychology_
reminds one of Browning, or even of Ibsen.
To a fifth-century Greek all history came in the form of legend; and no
less than three extant tragedies, Aeschylus' _Libation-Bearers_ (456
B. C. ), Euripides' _Electra_ (413 B. C. ), and Sophocles' _Electra_ (date
unknown: but perhaps the latest of the three) are based on the particular
piece of legend or history now before us. It narrates how the son and
daughter of the murdered king, Agamemnon, slew, in due course of revenge,
and by Apollo's express command, their guilty mother and her paramour.
Homer had long since told the story, as he tells so many, simply and
grandly, without moral questioning and without intensity. The atmosphere
is heroic. It is all a blood-feud between chieftains, in which Orestes,
after seven years, succeeds in slaying his foe Aegisthus, who had killed
his father. He probably killed his mother also; but we are not directly
told so. His sister may have helped him, and he may possibly have gone mad
afterwards; but these painful issues are kept determinedly in the shade.
Somewhat surprisingly, Sophocles, although by his time Electra and
Clytemnestra had become leading figures in the story and the mother-murder
its essential climax, preserves a very similar atmosphere. His tragedy is
enthusiastically praised by Schlegel for "the celestial purity, the fresh
breath of life and youth, that is diffused over so dreadful a subject. "
"Everything dark and ominous is avoided. Orestes enjoys the fulness of
health and strength. He is beset neither with doubts nor stings of
conscience. " Especially laudable is the "austerity" with which Aegisthus
is driven into the house to receive, according to Schlegel, a specially
ignominious death!
This combination of matricide and good spirits, however satisfactory to
the determined classicist, will probably strike most intelligent readers
as a little curious, and even, if one may use the word at all in
connection with so powerful a play, undramatic. It becomes intelligible as
soon as we observe that Sophocles was deliberately seeking what he
regarded as an archaic or "Homeric" style (cf. Jebb, Introd. p. xli. ); and
this archaism, in its turn, seems to me best explained as a conscious
reaction against Euripides' searching and unconventional treatment of the
same subject (cf. Wilamowitz in _Hermes_, xviii. pp. 214 ff. ). In the
result Sophocles is not only more "classical" than Euripides; he is more
primitive by far than Aeschylus.
For Aeschylus, though steeped in the glory of the world of legend, would
not lightly accept its judgment upon religious and moral questions, and
above all would not, in that region, play at make-believe. He would not
elude the horror of this story by simply not mentioning it, like Homer, or
by pretending that an evil act was a good one, like Sophocles. He faces
the horror; realises it; and tries to surmount it on the sweep of a great
wave of religious emotion. The mother-murder, even if done by a god's
command, is a sin; a sin to be expiated by unfathomable suffering. Yet,
since the god cannot have commanded evil, it is a duty also. It is a sin
that _must_ be committed.
Euripides, here as often, represents intellectually the thought of
Aeschylus carried a step further. He faced the problem just as Aeschylus
did, and as Sophocles did not. But the solution offered by Aeschylus did
not satisfy him. It cannot, in its actual details, satisfy any one. To him
the mother-murder--like most acts of revenge, but more than most--was a
sin and a horror. Therefore it should not have been committed; and the god
who enjoined it _did_ command evil, as he had done in a hundred other
cases! He is no god of light; he is only a demon of old superstition,
acting, among other influences, upon a sore-beset man, and driving him
towards a miscalled duty, the horror of which, when done, will unseat his
reason.
But another problem interests Euripides even more than this. What kind of
man was it--above all, what kind of woman can it have been, who would do
this deed of mother-murder, not in sudden fury but deliberately, as an act
of "justice," after many years? A "sympathetic" hero and heroine are out
of the question; and Euripides does not deal in stage villains. He seeks
real people. And few attentive readers of this play can doubt that he has
found them.
The son is an exile, bred in the desperate hopes and wild schemes of
exile; he is a prince without a kingdom, always dreaming of his wrongs and
his restoration; and driven by the old savage doctrine, which an oracle
has confirmed, of the duty and manliness of revenge. He is, as was shown
by his later history, a man subject to overpowering impulses and to fits
of will-less brooding. Lastly, he is very young, and is swept away by his
sister's intenser nature.
That sister is the central figure of the tragedy. A woman shattered in
childhood by the shock of an experience too terrible for a girl to bear; a
poisoned and a haunted woman, eating her heart in ceaseless broodings of
hate and love, alike unsatisfied--hate against her mother and stepfather,
love for her dead father and her brother in exile; a woman who has known
luxury and state, and cares much for them; who is intolerant of poverty,
and who feels her youth passing away. And meantime there is her name, on
which all legend, if I am not mistaken, insists; she is _A-lektra_, "the
Unmated. "
There is, perhaps, no woman's character in the range of Greek tragedy so
profoundly studied. Not Aeschylus' Clytemnestra, not Phaedra nor Medea.
One's thoughts can only wander towards two great heroines of "lost" plays,
Althaea in the _Meleager_, and Stheneboea in the _Bellerophon_.
G. M.
[Footnote 1: Most of this introduction is reprinted, by the kind
permission of the Editors, from an article in the _Independent Review_
vol. i. No. 4. ]
ELECTRA
CHARACTERS IN THE PLAY
CLYTEMNESTRA, _Queen of Argos and Mycenae; widow of Agamemnon_.
ELECTRA, _daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra_.
ORESTES, _son of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra, now in banishment_.
A PEASANT, _husband of Electra_.
AN OLD MAN, _formerly servant to Agamemnon_.
PYLADES, _son of Strophios, King of Phocis; friend to Orestes_.
AEGISTHUS, _usurping King of Argos and Mycenae, now husband of
Clytemnestra_.
The Heroes CASTOR and POLYDEUCES.
CHORUS of Argive Women, with their LEADER.
FOLLOWERS of ORESTES; HANDMAIDS of CLYTEMNESTRA.
_The Scene is laid in the mountains of Argos. The play was first produced
between the years_ 414 _and_ 412 B. C.
ELECTRA
_The scene represents a hut on a desolate mountain side; the river Inachus
is visible in the distance. The time is the dusk of early dawn, before
sunrise. The_ PEASANT _is discovered in front of the hut_.
PEASANT.
Old gleam on the face of the world, I give thee hail,
River of Argos land, where sail on sail
The long ships met, a thousand, near and far,
When Agamemnon walked the seas in war;
Who smote King Priam in the dust, and burned
The storied streets of Ilion, and returned
Above all conquerors, heaping tower and fane
Of Argos high with spoils of Eastern slain.
So in far lands he prospered; and at home
His own wife trapped and slew him. 'Twas the doom
Aegisthus wrought, son of his father's foe.
Gone is that King, and the old spear laid low
That Tantalus wielded when the world was young.
Aegisthus hath his queen, and reigns among
His people. And the children here alone,
Orestes and Electra, buds unblown
Of man and womanhood, when forth to Troy
He shook his sail and left them--lo, the boy
Orestes, ere Aegisthus' hand could fall,
Was stolen from Argos--borne by one old thrall,
Who served his father's boyhood, over seas
Far off, and laid upon King Strophios' knees
In Phocis, for the old king's sake. But here
The maid Electra waited, year by year,
Alone, till the warm days of womanhood
Drew nigh and suitors came of gentle blood
In Hellas. Then Aegisthus was in fear
Lest she be wed in some great house, and bear
A son to avenge her father. Close he wrought
Her prison in his house, and gave her not
To any wooer. Then, since even this
Was full of peril, and the secret kiss
Of some bold prince might find her yet, and rend
Her prison walls, Aegisthus at the end
Would slay her. Then her mother, she so wild
Aforetime, pled with him and saved her child.
Her heart had still an answer for her lord
Murdered, but if the child's blood spoke, what word
Could meet the hate thereof? After that day
Aegisthus thus decreed: whoso should slay
The old king's wandering son, should win rich meed
Of gold; and for Electra, she must wed
With me, not base of blood--in that I stand
True Mycenaean--but in gold and land
Most poor, which maketh highest birth as naught.
So from a powerless husband shall be wrought
A powerless peril. Had some man of might
Possessed her, he had called perchance to light
Her father's blood, and unknown vengeances
Risen on Aegisthus yet.
Aye, mine she is:
But never yet these arms--the Cyprian knows
My truth! --have clasped her body, and she goes
A virgin still. Myself would hold it shame
To abase this daughter of a royal name.
I am too lowly to love violence. Yea,
Orestes too doth move me, far away,
Mine unknown brother! Will he ever now
Come back and see his sister bowed so low?
Doth any deem me fool, to hold a fair
Maid in my room and seek no joy, but spare
Her maidenhood? If any such there be,
Let him but look within. The fool is he
In gentle things, weighing the more and less
Of love by his own heart's untenderness.
[_As he ceases_ ELECTRA _comes out of the hut. She is in mourning garb,
and carries a large pitcher on her head. She speaks without observing the_
PEASANT'S _presence_.
ELECTRA.
Dark shepherdess of many a golden star,
Dost see me, Mother Night? And how this jar
Hath worn my earth-bowed head, as forth and fro
For water to the hillward springs I go?
Not for mere stress of need, but purpose set,
That never day nor night God may forget
Aegisthus' sin: aye, and perchance a cry
Cast forth to the waste shining of the sky
May find my father's ear. . . . The woman bred
Of Tyndareus, my mother--on her head
Be curses! --from my house hath outcast me;
She hath borne children to our enemy;
She hath made me naught, she hath made Orestes naught. . . .
[_As the bitterness of her tone increases, the_ PEASANT _comes forward. _
PEASANT.
What wouldst thou now, my sad one, ever fraught
With toil to lighten my toil? And so soft
Thy nurture was! Have I not chid thee oft,
And thou wilt cease not, serving without end?
ELECTRA (_turning to him with impulsive affection_).
O friend, my friend, as God might be my friend,
Thou only hast not trampled on my tears.
Life scarce can be so hard, 'mid many fears
And many shames, when mortal heart can find
Somewhere one healing touch, as my sick mind
Finds thee. . . . And should I wait thy word, to endure
A little for thine easing, yea, or pour
My strength out in thy toiling fellowship?
Thou hast enough with fields and kine to keep;
'Tis mine to make all bright within the door.
'Tis joy to him that toils, when toil is o'er,
To find home waiting, full of happy things.
PEASANT.
If so it please thee, go thy way. The springs
Are not far off. And I before the morn
Must drive my team afield, and sow the corn
In the hollows. --Not a thousand prayers can gain
A man's bare bread, save an he work amain.
[ELECTRA _and the_ PEASANT _depart on their several ways. After a few
moments there enter stealthily two armed men,_ ORESTES _and_ PYLADES.
ORESTES.
Thou art the first that I have known in deed
True and my friend, and shelterer of my need.
Thou only, Pylades, of all that knew,
Hast held Orestes of some worth, all through
These years of helplessness, wherein I lie
Downtrodden by the murderer--yea, and by
The murderess, my mother! . . . I am come,
Fresh from the cleansing of Apollo, home
To Argos--and my coming no man yet
Knoweth--to pay the bloody twain their debt
Of blood. This very night I crept alone
To my dead father's grave, and poured thereon
My heart's first tears and tresses of my head
New-shorn, and o'er the barrow of the dead
Slew a black lamb, unknown of them that reign
In this unhappy land. . . . I am not fain
To pass the city gates, but hold me here
Hard on the borders. So my road is clear
To fly if men look close and watch my way;
If not, to seek my sister. For men say
She dwelleth in these hills, no more a maid
But wedded. I must find her house, for aid
To guide our work, and learn what hath betid
Of late in Argos. --Ha, the radiant lid
Of Dawn's eye lifteth! Come, friend; leave we now
This trodden path. Some worker of the plough,
Or serving damsel at her early task
Will presently come by, whom we may ask
If here my sister dwells. But soft! Even now
I see some bondmaid there, her death-shorn brow
Bending beneath its freight of well-water.
Lie close until she pass; then question her.
A slave might help us well, or speak some sign
Of import to this work of mine and thine.
[_The two men retire into ambush. _ ELECTRA _enters, returning from the
well. _
ELECTRA.
Onward, O labouring tread,
As on move the years;
Onward amid thy tears,
O happier dead!
Let me remember. I am she, [_Strophe_ 1.
Agamemnon's child, and the mother of me
Clytemnestra, the evil Queen,
Helen's sister. And folk, I ween,
That pass in the streets call yet my name
Electra. . . . God protect my shame!
For toil, toil is a weary thing,
And life is heavy about my head;
And thou far off, O Father and King,
In the lost lands of the dead.
A bloody twain made these things be;
One was thy bitterest enemy,
And one the wife that lay by thee.
Brother, brother, on some far shore [_Antistrophe_ 1.
Hast thou a city, is there a door
That knows thy footfall, Wandering One?
Who left me, left me, when all our pain
Was bitter about us, a father slain,
And a girl that wept in her room alone.
Thou couldst break me this bondage sore,
Only thou, who art far away,
Loose our father, and wake once more. . . .
Zeus, Zeus, dost hear me pray? . .
--Not a thousand prayers can gain
A man's bare bread, save an he work amain.
[ELECTRA _and the_ PEASANT _depart on their several ways. After a few
moments there enter stealthily two armed men,_ ORESTES _and_ PYLADES.
ORESTES.
Thou art the first that I have known in deed
True and my friend, and shelterer of my need.
Thou only, Pylades, of all that knew,
Hast held Orestes of some worth, all through
These years of helplessness, wherein I lie
Downtrodden by the murderer--yea, and by
The murderess, my mother! . . . I am come,
Fresh from the cleansing of Apollo, home
To Argos--and my coming no man yet
Knoweth--to pay the bloody twain their debt
Of blood. This very night I crept alone
To my dead father's grave, and poured thereon
My heart's first tears and tresses of my head
New-shorn, and o'er the barrow of the dead
Slew a black lamb, unknown of them that reign
In this unhappy land. . . . I am not fain
To pass the city gates, but hold me here
Hard on the borders. So my road is clear
To fly if men look close and watch my way;
If not, to seek my sister. For men say
She dwelleth in these hills, no more a maid
But wedded. I must find her house, for aid
To guide our work, and learn what hath betid
Of late in Argos. --Ha, the radiant lid
Of Dawn's eye lifteth! Come, friend; leave we now
This trodden path. Some worker of the plough,
Or serving damsel at her early task
Will presently come by, whom we may ask
If here my sister dwells. But soft! Even now
I see some bondmaid there, her death-shorn brow
Bending beneath its freight of well-water.
Lie close until she pass; then question her.
A slave might help us well, or speak some sign
Of import to this work of mine and thine.
[_The two men retire into ambush. _ ELECTRA _enters, returning from the
well. _
ELECTRA.
Onward, O labouring tread,
As on move the years;
Onward amid thy tears,
O happier dead!
Let me remember. I am she, [_Strophe_ 1.
Agamemnon's child, and the mother of me
Clytemnestra, the evil Queen,
Helen's sister. And folk, I ween,
That pass in the streets call yet my name
Electra. . . . God protect my shame!
For toil, toil is a weary thing,
And life is heavy about my head;
And thou far off, O Father and King,
In the lost lands of the dead.
A bloody twain made these things be;
One was thy bitterest enemy,
And one the wife that lay by thee.
Brother, brother, on some far shore [_Antistrophe_ 1.
Hast thou a city, is there a door
That knows thy footfall, Wandering One?
Who left me, left me, when all our pain
Was bitter about us, a father slain,
And a girl that wept in her room alone.
Thou couldst break me this bondage sore,
Only thou, who art far away,
Loose our father, and wake once more. . . .
Zeus, Zeus, dost hear me pray? . . .
The sleeping blood and the shame and the doom!
O feet that rest not, over the foam
Of distant seas, come home, come home!
What boots this cruse that I carry? [_Strophe_ 2.
O, set free my brow!
For the gathered tears that tarry
Through the day and the dark till now,
Now in the dawn are free,
Father, and flow beneath
The floor of the world, to be
As a song in she house of Death:
From the rising up of the day
They guide my heart alway,
The silent tears unshed,
And my body mourns for the dead;
My cheeks bleed silently,
And these bruised temples keep
Their pain, remembering thee
And thy bloody sleep.
Be rent, O hair of mine head!
As a swan crying alone
Where the river windeth cold,
For a loved, for a silent one,
Whom the toils of the fowler hold,
I cry, Father, to thee,
O slain in misery!
The water, the wan water, [_Antistrophe_ 2.
Lapped him, and his head
Drooped in the bed of slaughter
Low, as one wearied;
Woe for the edged axe,
And woe for the heart of hate,
Houndlike about thy tracks,
O conqueror desolate,
From Troy over land and sea,
Till a wife stood waiting thee;
Not with crowns did she stand,
Nor flowers of peace in her hand;
With Aegisthus' dagger drawn
For her hire she strove,
Through shame and through blood alone;
And won her a traitor's love.
[_As she ceases there enter from right and left the_ CHORUS, _consisting
of women of Argos, young and old, in festal dress_.
CHORUS.
_Some Women. _
Child of the mighty dead, [_Strophe_.
Electra, lo, my way
To thee in the dawn hath sped,
And the cot on the mountain grey,
For the Watcher hath cried this day:
He of the ancient folk,
The walker of waste and hill,
Who drinketh the milk of the flock;
And he told of Hera's will;
For the morrow's morrow now
They cry her festival,
And before her throne shall bow
Our damsels all.
ELECTRA.
Not unto joy, nor sweet
Music, nor shining of gold,
The wings of my spirit beat.
Let the brides of Argos hold
Their dance in the night, as of old;
I lead no dance; I mark
No beat as the dancers sway;
With tears I dwell in the dark,
And my thought is of tears alway,
To the going down of the day.
Look on my wasted hair
And raiment. . . . This that I bear,
Is it meet for the King my sire,
And her whom the King begot?
For Troy, that was burned with fire
And forgetteth not?
CHORUS.
_Other Women. _
Hera is great! --Ah, come, [_Antistrophe_.
Be kind; and my hand shall bring
Fair raiment, work of the loom,
And many a golden thing,
For joyous robe-wearing.
Deemest thou this thy woe
Shall rise unto God as prayer,
Or bend thine haters low?
Doth God for thy pain have care?
Not tears for the dead nor sighs,
But worship and joy divine
Shall win thee peace in thy skies,
O daughter mine!
ELECTRA.
No care cometh to God
For the voice of the helpless; none
For the crying of ancient blood.
Alas for him that is gone,
And for thee, O wandering one:
That now, methinks, in a land
Of the stranger must toil for hire,
And stand where the poor men stand,
A-cold by another's fire,
O son of the mighty sire:
While I in a beggar's cot
On the wrecked hills, changing not,
Starve in my soul for food;
But our mother lieth wed
In another's arms, and blood
Is about her bed.
LEADER.
On all of Greece she wrought great jeopardy,
Thy mother's sister, Helen,--and on thee.
[ORESTES _and_ PYLADES _move out from their concealment_; ORESTES _comes
forward_: PYLADES _beckons to two_ ARMED SERVANTS _and stays with them in
the background_.
ELECTRA.
Woe's me! No more of wailing! Women, flee!
Strange armed men beside the dwelling there
Lie ambushed! They are rising from their lair.
Back by the road, all you. I will essay
The house; and may our good feet save us!
ORESTES (_between_ ELECTRA _and the hut_).
Stay,
Unhappy woman! Never fear my steel.
ELECTRA (_in utter panic_).
O bright Apollo! Mercy! See, I kneel;
Slay me not.
ORESTES.
Others I have yet to slay
Less dear than thou.
ELECTRA.
Go from me! Wouldst thou lay
Hand on a body that is not for thee?
ORESTES.
None is there I would touch more righteously.
ELECTRA.
Why lurk'st thou by my house? And why a sword?
ORESTES.
Stay. Listen! Thou wilt not gainsay my word.
ELECTRA.
There--I am still. Do what thou wilt with me.
Thou art too strong.
ORESTES.
A word I bear to thee. . .
Word of thy brother.
ELECTRA.
Oh, friend! More than friend!
Living or dead?
ORESTES.
He lives; so let me send
My comfort foremost, ere the rest be heard.
ELECTRA.
God love thee for the sweetness of thy word!
ORESTES.
God love the twain of us, both thee and me.
ELECTRA.
He lives! Poor brother! In what land weareth he
His exile?
ORESTES.
Not one region nor one lot
His wasted life hath trod.
ELECTRA.
He lacketh not
For bread?
ORESTES.
Bread hath he; but a man is weak
In exile.
ELECTRA.
What charge laid he on thee? Speak.
ORESTES.
To learn if thou still live, and how the storm,
Living, hath struck thee.
ELECTRA.
That thou seest; this form
Wasted. . .
ORESTES.
Yea, riven with the fire of woe.
I sigh to look on thee.
ELECTRA.
My face; and, lo,
My temples of their ancient glory shorn.
ORESTES.
Methinks thy brother haunts thee, being forlorn;
Aye, and perchance thy father, whom they slew. . .
ELECTRA.
What should be nearer to me than those two?
ORESTES.
And what to him, thy brother, half so dear
As thou?
ELECTRA.
His is a distant love, not near
At need.
ORESTES.
But why this dwelling place, this life
Of loneliness?
ELECTRA (_with sudden bitterness_).
Stranger, I am a wife. . . .
O better dead!
ORESTES.
That seals thy brother's doom!
What Prince of Argos. . . ?
ELECTRA.
Not the man to whom
My father thought to give me.
ORESTES.
Speak; that I
May tell thy brother all.
ELECTRA.
'Tis there, hard by,
His dwelling, where I live, far from men's eyes.
ORESTES.
Some ditcher's cot, or cowherd's, by its guise!
ELECTRA (_struck with shame for her ingratitude_).
A poor man; but true-hearted, and to me
God-fearing.
ORESTES.
How? What fear of God hath he?
ELECTRA.
He hath never held my body to his own.
ORESTES.
Hath he some vow to keep?
