Take a photo of a barcode or cover
paigeweb's reviews
98 reviews
Grief Lessons: Four Plays by Euripides by Euripides
dark
emotional
funny
reflective
sad
5.0
Euripides situates his plays in a terrifyingly bleak universe where gods are petty and humans are playthings; one lopsidedly characterized by an absence of divine reward, shortage of divine favor, and excess of divine punishment. Sorrow and suffering are the only constants. You can do everything right, play by the gods’ rulebook, and still be struck down.
The only agency afforded his human characters — the sole means of defiance allowed — is verbal. When the damage is done and the dust has settled on ravaged lives, they cry their protest to deaf ears in the sky. His wife and children dead, Herakles declares “Gods are stubborn. So am I.” And when cautioned by Theseus against this sacrilege, responds wryly, “I am stuffed with evils - nowhere to put more.” Sensing the approach of death after being dealt a fatal injury, Hippolytus protests in two tenses at the injustice of his undeserving end: “I am a good man. I was a good man.” He grows increasingly bold as he breathes his last (what more can be taken from him now?): “If only mortal men could lay a curse on divine beings!” In his own story Admetos notes the same cruel irony, saying “They look, they see us suffering. We did no harm to gods and yet you die.”
But throughout these tales of human misfortune and divine indifference run touching threads of friendship and shared grief. Slaves to the same unfeeling twists of fate, we must rely on each other for empathy and grace. Examples from the text are numerous and often follow the same formulas: “I’ll share your bad luck.” … “I came to share his grief.” … “Give me your hand. I am your friend.” … “No I will not give up on you.” … “I, as friend for friend, will bear this grief with you.” … “Your suffering I see… Your pain I understand.” If there is any salvation to be found in Euripides’ world, here is where it lies.
“The way gods care for us, when I think of it, lifts my pain, gives me secret hope, but then I look at the swings and swerves of mortal fate and I falter.”
“We humans seem disastrously in love with this thing (whatever it is) that glitters on the earth — we call it life.”
The only agency afforded his human characters — the sole means of defiance allowed — is verbal. When the damage is done and the dust has settled on ravaged lives, they cry their protest to deaf ears in the sky. His wife and children dead, Herakles declares “Gods are stubborn. So am I.” And when cautioned by Theseus against this sacrilege, responds wryly, “I am stuffed with evils - nowhere to put more.” Sensing the approach of death after being dealt a fatal injury, Hippolytus protests in two tenses at the injustice of his undeserving end: “I am a good man. I was a good man.” He grows increasingly bold as he breathes his last (what more can be taken from him now?): “If only mortal men could lay a curse on divine beings!” In his own story Admetos notes the same cruel irony, saying “They look, they see us suffering. We did no harm to gods and yet you die.”
But throughout these tales of human misfortune and divine indifference run touching threads of friendship and shared grief. Slaves to the same unfeeling twists of fate, we must rely on each other for empathy and grace. Examples from the text are numerous and often follow the same formulas: “I’ll share your bad luck.” … “I came to share his grief.” … “Give me your hand. I am your friend.” … “No I will not give up on you.” … “I, as friend for friend, will bear this grief with you.” … “Your suffering I see… Your pain I understand.” If there is any salvation to be found in Euripides’ world, here is where it lies.
“The way gods care for us, when I think of it, lifts my pain, gives me secret hope, but then I look at the swings and swerves of mortal fate and I falter.”
“We humans seem disastrously in love with this thing (whatever it is) that glitters on the earth — we call it life.”
Eleanor and Hick: The Love Affair That Shaped a First Lady by Susan Quinn
4.5
Open up the schools and put this on the curriculum!!
The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
The original "would you still love me if I was a bug" thought experiment.... And the answer is a resounding NO.
Lapvona by Ottessa Moshfegh
3.5
What can morality mean, what can god mean, in a place where no good deed goes unpunished and suffering is mistaken for salvation?
Gross, weird, and morbid, Lapvona is a scathing critique of the hypocrisy of religion and a humorous depiction of the general stupidity of humanity. Just my type of book.
Gross, weird, and morbid, Lapvona is a scathing critique of the hypocrisy of religion and a humorous depiction of the general stupidity of humanity. Just my type of book.
An Oresteia by Sophocles, Aeschylus, Euripides
5.0
Was it casual when my best friend asked me "do you think I would choose to live without you?" ??
The way Anne Carson manipulates language and writes about the way language CAN be manipulated is pure sorcery. The story is timeless, ouroboric, a family that captures and consumes itself in maddening nets of violence and vengeance, doomed to the same tragic ending repeated to infinite variation. Sickness that seeps up through the cracks. Grief upon grief.
Only void is between us.
Time stood like a deathmaster over me, letting the minutes drop.
Why are you so in love with things unbearable?
The way Anne Carson manipulates language and writes about the way language CAN be manipulated is pure sorcery. The story is timeless, ouroboric, a family that captures and consumes itself in maddening nets of violence and vengeance, doomed to the same tragic ending repeated to infinite variation. Sickness that seeps up through the cracks. Grief upon grief.
Only void is between us.
Time stood like a deathmaster over me, letting the minutes drop.
Why are you so in love with things unbearable?
The Passion by Jeanette Winterson
4.0
Can't believe I avoided this book for so long because the synopsis made it sound uncharacteristically heterosexual of Winterson.... I'll never not trust her again. Gorgeously weird and imaginative.
"The mystics and the churchmen talk about throwing off this body and its desires, being no longer a slave to the flesh. They don't say that through the flesh we are set free. That our desire for another will lift us out of ourselves more cleanly than anything divine."
"The mystics and the churchmen talk about throwing off this body and its desires, being no longer a slave to the flesh. They don't say that through the flesh we are set free. That our desire for another will lift us out of ourselves more cleanly than anything divine."
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
4.5
I'm not religious, but if there is a god I imagine him like Victor Frankenstein... stumbling backwards in shocked horror from his act of creation, fleeing in repulsion from the spurned beings he gave life to.
Side note: If I had a nickel for every classic novel I've read recently which includes a loving (homoerotic?) male friendship with one tenderly nursing the other back to health...
Side note: If I had a nickel for every classic novel I've read recently which includes a loving (homoerotic?) male friendship with one tenderly nursing the other back to health...
The Secret History by Donna Tartt
4.5
An atmospheric read with consistently fantastic characterization (Bunny has always felt particularly corporeal to me). Personally formative.
Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky
5.0
Thinking about the gendered notions of suffering in this novel; how it is frequently hedonistic for the male characters (sought and self-inflicted as a form of penitence, a sign of distinction, a way to join the ranks of 'great' men), while mainly altruistic for the women (suffering is synonymous with self-sacrifice and service)
“I need to be crucified, not pitied! Crucified! Crucify, O Judge, crucify, and when you have crucified, then take pity! If you do that, I will come and ask for crucifixion, for it is not merriment I crave, but tears and sorrow!”
“I need to be crucified, not pitied! Crucified! Crucify, O Judge, crucify, and when you have crucified, then take pity! If you do that, I will come and ask for crucifixion, for it is not merriment I crave, but tears and sorrow!”