Libation Bearers: Unabridged Edition
By Aeschylus
()
About this ebook
Aeschylus
Aeschylus (c.525-455 B.C) was an ancient Greek playwright and solider. Scholars’ knowledge of the tragedy genre begins with Aeschylus’ work, and because of this, he is dubbed the “father of tragedy”. Aeschylus claimed his inspiration to become a writer stemmed from a dream he had in which the god Dionysus encouraged him to write a play. While it is estimated that he wrote just under one hundred plays, only seven of Aeschylus’ work was able to be recovered.
Read more from Aeschylus
The Oresteia: Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, and The Eumenides (Translated by E. D. A. Morshead with an introduction by Theodore Alois Buckley) Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Yale Required Reading - Collected Works (Vol. 1) Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Aeschylus II: The Oresteia Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Harvard Classics: All 71 Volumes Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPrometheus Bound Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Agamemnon Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Greek Plays: Sixteen Plays by Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides (Modern Library Classics) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Suppliant Maidens: With linked Table of Contents Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Eumenides Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Yale Classics (Vol. 1) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPrometheus Bound: Unabridged Edition Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Libation Bearers Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Five Great Greek Tragedies Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Greek Plays: 33 Plays by Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides (Modern Library Classics) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Agamemnon of Aeschylus Translated into English Rhyming Verse with Explanatory Notes Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Oresteia Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Persians Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Agamemnon Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to Libation Bearers
Related ebooks
The Libation Bearers Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Libation Bearers Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsChoephori Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Choephori Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Liberation-Bearers Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Libation Bearers: With linked Table of Contents Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Libation Bearers: from The Oresteia Trilogy. "Of all the gods only death does not desire gifts" Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsElectra Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Seven Against Thebes Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Suppliants Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Eumenides: Unabridged Edition Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMy Lattice, and Other Poems Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Complete Aeschylus Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Electra: With linked Table of Contents Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Eumenides Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Agamemnon Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Suppliants Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Tempers Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsOresteia Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Selections From 'The Flowers Of Evil' (Le Fleurs Du Mal) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLucifer -- A Theological Tragedy: A Play Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsElectra Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSophocles: The Seven Plays in English Verse: The Seven Plays in English Verse Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Hecuba Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Iphigenia Among the Taurians Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Flowers of Evil Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Eumenidies Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe House of Atreus Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Poetry Of Charlotte Bronte Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Performing Arts For You
For colored girls who have considered suicide/When the rainbow is enuf Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Becoming Free Indeed: My Story of Disentangling Faith from Fear Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Robin Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Yes Please Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Macbeth (new classics) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5As You Wish: Inconceivable Tales from the Making of The Princess Bride Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Importance of Being Earnest: A Play Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Sisters Brothers Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Science of Storytelling: Why Stories Make Us Human and How to Tell Them Better Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Quite Nice and Fairly Accurate Good Omens Script Book: The Script Book Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Wuthering Heights Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Romeo and Juliet Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Unsheltered: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Agatha Christie Collection Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Diamond Eye: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Storyworthy: Engage, Teach, Persuade, and Change Your Life through the Power of Storytelling Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Hamlet Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Stories I Only Tell My Friends: An Autobiography Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes: Revised and Complete Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Count Of Monte Cristo (Unabridged) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Our Town: A Play in Three Acts Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Lucky Dog Lessons: Train Your Dog in 7 Days Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Star Wars: Book of Lists Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMash: A Novel About Three Army Doctors Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The History of Sketch Comedy: A Journey through the Art and Craft of Humor Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSlave Play Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Dolls House Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Trial Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Libation Bearers
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
Libation Bearers - Aeschylus
LIBATION BEARERS
Aeschylus
Tranlated by Edmund Doidge Anderson Morshead
© 2019 Synapse Publishing
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
ORESTES
CHORUS OF CAPTIVE WOMEN
ELECTRA
A NURSE
CLYTEMNESTRA
AEGISTHUS
AN ATTENDANT
PYLADES
The Scene is the Tomb of Agamemnon at Mycenae; afterwards, the Palace of Atreus, hard by the Tomb.
Orestes
L ord of the shades and patron of the realm
That erst my father swayed, list now my prayer,
Hermes, and save me with thine aiding arm,
Me who from banishment returning stand
On this my country; lo, my foot is set
On this grave-mound, and herald-like, as thou,
Once and again, I bid my father hear.
And these twin locks, from mine head shorn, I bring,
And one to Inachus the river-god,
My young life’s nurturer, I dedicate,
And one in sign of mourning unfulfilled
I lay, though late, on this my father’s grave.
For O my father, not beside thy corse
Stood I to wail thy death, nor was my hand
Stretched out to bear thee forth to burial.
What sight is yonder? what this woman-throng
Hitherward coming, by their sable garb
Made manifest as mourners? What hath chanced?
Doth some new sorrow hap within the home?
Or rightly may I deem that they draw near
Bearing libations, such as soothe the ire
Of dead men angered, to my father’s grave?
Nay, such they are indeed; for I descry
Electra mine own sister pacing hither,
In moody grief conspicuous. Grant, O Zeus,
Grant me my father’s murder to avenge—
Be thou my willing champion!
Pylades,
Pass we aside, till rightly I discern
Wherefore these women throng in suppliance.
[Exeunt Pylades and Orestes; enter the Chorus bearing vessels for libation; Electra follows them; they pace slowly towards the tomb of Agamemnon.
CHORUS
Forth from the royal halls by high command
I bear libations for the dead.
Rings on my smitten breast my smiting hand,
And all my cheek is rent and red,
Fresh-furrowed by my nails, and all my soul
This many a day doth feed on cries of dole.
And trailing tatters of my vest,
In looped and windowed raggedness forlorn,
Hang rent around my breast,
Even as I, by blows of Fate most stern
Saddened and torn.
Oracular thro’ visions, ghastly clear,
Bearing a blast of wrath from realms below,
And stiffening each rising hair with dread,
Came out of dream-land Fear,
And, loud and awful, bade
The shriek ring out at midnight’s witching hour,
And brooded, stern with woe,
Above the inner house, the woman’s bower.
And seers inspired did read the dream on oath,
Chanting aloud In realms below
The dead are wroth;
Against their slayers yet their ire doth glow.
Therefore to bear this gift of graceless worth—
O Earth, my nursing mother!—
The woman god-accurs’d doth send me forth
Lest one crime bring another.
Ill is the very word to speak, for