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anarcho_zymurgist's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
More difficult writing than Sophocles, for example, but there's nothing quite like Greek tragedy to reignite my passion for reading.
sabrinaslivingliterature's review against another edition
4.0
This book looks at the events that happen after The Trojan War when Agamemnon returns home to his wife Clytemnestra.
This is my first experience reading a play not for school and I really enjoyed it. The translation is rhymed which makes it flow and the speeches made by characters are emotional and beautiful! As this is the only Greek Tragedy where the entire trilogy survives i highly recommend it and would love to see it performed!
This is my first experience reading a play not for school and I really enjoyed it. The translation is rhymed which makes it flow and the speeches made by characters are emotional and beautiful! As this is the only Greek Tragedy where the entire trilogy survives i highly recommend it and would love to see it performed!
goosemixtapes's review against another edition
4.0
“an unholy act
gives birth to more in their turn,
and they have the look of their lineage.”
—agamemnon, sarah ruden translation
i don’t think greek theater is ever going to do it for me like shakespearean theater. i (somewhat) understand the choral odes, but i get tangled in them anyway, and while i know theater is mostly speech, a lot of greek plays feel to my uncultured heart like a lot of people standing around talking and then sometimes there is a dead body. that said, i’ve been intending to read the oresteia for years and i’m so glad i finally got around to it, because whatever my feelings about the constraints of greek theater, these plays FUCK. they have it all. family dynamics toxic enough to kill. the law of revenge and the ancestral curses of hubris. axe murder. milves, even.
AGAMEMNON (5 stars)
—> this is definitely my favorite play of the cycle; the imagery in it is impeccable. it’s a greek tragedy, but it's also a horror story, and having read christa wolf’s cassandra first made me hypersensitive to the themes of the sun & cassandra’s role & the way she serves as a foil of sorts to clytemnestra. whom i love so much. cassandra is my dearest but clytemnestra… sexy. anyway this play is an absolute banger all the way through; every character is compelling in their own way (even agamemnon, whose actions i can't commend, is a horribly tragic and often-sympathetic character) and this play is iconic. the fucking red carpet? you WISH you had what the oresteia has
notable lines:
“some godsend burning through the dark—“ (Robert Fagles translation, line 24)
“the generations wrestle, knees grinding the dust… the spear snaps in the first blood rites that marry Greece and Troy” (Fagles, lines 69-72)
“he tore Troy from the root with Zeus’s harrow of justice” (Ruden, lines 525-6)
“Hope’s hand, hovering over the urn of mercy, left it empty” (Fagles, lines 801-2)
CASSANDRA: “no cure for the doom that took the city after all, and I, her last ember, I go down with her” (Fagles, lines 1172-4)
“Helen the grief that never heals” (Fagles, line 1495)
and perhaps the summation of the trilogy:
“You can’t dislodge these Furies, who are family” (Ruden, line 1190)
gives birth to more in their turn,
and they have the look of their lineage.”
—agamemnon, sarah ruden translation
i don’t think greek theater is ever going to do it for me like shakespearean theater. i (somewhat) understand the choral odes, but i get tangled in them anyway, and while i know theater is mostly speech, a lot of greek plays feel to my uncultured heart like a lot of people standing around talking and then sometimes there is a dead body. that said, i’ve been intending to read the oresteia for years and i’m so glad i finally got around to it, because whatever my feelings about the constraints of greek theater, these plays FUCK. they have it all. family dynamics toxic enough to kill. the law of revenge and the ancestral curses of hubris. axe murder. milves, even.
AGAMEMNON (5 stars)
—> this is definitely my favorite play of the cycle; the imagery in it is impeccable. it’s a greek tragedy, but it's also a horror story, and having read christa wolf’s cassandra first made me hypersensitive to the themes of the sun & cassandra’s role & the way she serves as a foil of sorts to clytemnestra. whom i love so much. cassandra is my dearest but clytemnestra… sexy. anyway this play is an absolute banger all the way through; every character is compelling in their own way (even agamemnon, whose actions i can't commend, is a horribly tragic and often-sympathetic character) and this play is iconic. the fucking red carpet? you WISH you had what the oresteia has
notable lines:
“some godsend burning through the dark—“ (Robert Fagles translation, line 24)
“the generations wrestle, knees grinding the dust… the spear snaps in the first blood rites that marry Greece and Troy” (Fagles, lines 69-72)
“he tore Troy from the root with Zeus’s harrow of justice” (Ruden, lines 525-6)
“Hope’s hand, hovering over the urn of mercy, left it empty” (Fagles, lines 801-2)
CASSANDRA: “no cure for the doom that took the city after all, and I, her last ember, I go down with her” (Fagles, lines 1172-4)
“Helen the grief that never heals” (Fagles, line 1495)
and perhaps the summation of the trilogy:
“You can’t dislodge these Furies, who are family” (Ruden, line 1190)
goosemixtapes's review against another edition
5.0
The war came home. This is what he did: this is the war that put food on our table. This is how it looks. What did you think was inside that word? You know this is what happens, what it looks like, this is the human animal panicking as the cord is cut--and you can look away but he did this thing, in your name, to our enemies, and he did it to our daughter, did this to her, set the thing in motion, and now just is the balance of our act.
the way this contains and expands on every single motif from the original oresteia while also being even more strikingly antiwar. the way this is such a vivid blotchy confusing feverish depiction of mental illness and trauma and grief. the fact that this is the source text of "This was always going to happen. She's been dead since the beginning." the ENDING. if you are an oresteia fan and you haven't read this i'm fucking begging you to read this right the fuck now. if you aren't an oresteia fan get well soon
the way this contains and expands on every single motif from the original oresteia while also being even more strikingly antiwar. the way this is such a vivid blotchy confusing feverish depiction of mental illness and trauma and grief. the fact that this is the source text of "This was always going to happen. She's been dead since the beginning." the ENDING. if you are an oresteia fan and you haven't read this i'm fucking begging you to read this right the fuck now. if you aren't an oresteia fan get well soon
olulelule's review against another edition
challenging
dark
tense
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Murder, Child death, Injury/Injury detail, and Death of parent
irisloehr's review against another edition
4.0
just not an aeschylus fan, and “eumenides” in particular was simply not hitting for me. “libation bearers,” though? that’s secretly a comedy, and frankly i’m obsessed
v_larr's review against another edition
4.0
Clytemnestra is a girlboss and did absolutely nothing wrong. Apollo is a shithead but I love him for it. The chorus makes no sense to me. I read these for a mythology course and maybe I sped through the readings maybe I didn't. Again Clytemnestra girlboss she makes me think of Lady Macbeth. Good thing modern writers are mostly past demonizing powerful women.