>> Dr. Lanham:
Good evening. I am Alan Lanham, Dean of Library Services, and we welcome you to our Grecian Ampitheater, which if you look around you might be able to think in your mind that that is where you are. 

We are standing in front of the temple of Athena, althouth I think the play will take us two different places in Greece. 

I want to call you attention to the printed brochure that gives you several activies coming up next week and through November the 5th that concentrate on various aspects and many disciplines related to Ancient Greece.  

And we hope that that will trigger interest in your studies and whether it revolves around your courses, or not, it might lead you to study abroad, it might lead you to an avenue of Archeology or performance that you are not thinking of right now, so feel free to explore the various activities that are there.  

I hear there are some budding actors in the room, and so, place yourself on the stage, as the magic takes place, and thank you for coming. 
[music plays]

>> Leeann:
He arrived here in the land of Thebes
Dionysus, son of Zeus, born to him
from Semele, Cadmus' daughter, delivered
by a fiery midwife—Zeus' lightning flash.        

>> Meghan:
He changed his form from god to human,  
appearing here at these streams of Dirce,
the waters of Ismarus. 
He sees his mother's tomb— 
for she was wiped out by that lightning bolt.      

>> Amina:
It's there, by the palace, with that rubble,
the remnants of her house, still smoldering  from Zeus' lightning flash
Hera's undying outrage
against his mother. 
But praise be to Cadmus. 
He's made his daughter's shrine a sacred place.        
And Dionysus has completely covered it        
with leafy shoots of grape-bearing vines.
         

>> Stormie:
We’ve left the fabulously wealthy East,
          
lands of Lydians and Phrygians,
          
Persia's sun-drenched plains, walled towns in Bactria.
          
We've left the bleak lands of the Medes, 
          
through rich Arabia, all Asian lands,                                     
across the salt-sea coast, through those towns
          
of barbarians and Greeks all intermingled.
          

>> Shelbie:
Now we've come to Thebes, city of Greeks,                                    
making known to men the divinity of Dionysus.
                    
We women who've left Tmolus,
          
backbone of Lydia, his band of worshippers.          
He has led us here from barbarian lands, and when we rest,
          
we take up our drums, first invented
          
by mother Rhea and himself.  

>> All:
Let us go to the clefts of Mount Cithaeron,
          
to the  Bacchae, to join the dancing.

>> Leeann:
We are the Daughters of Dionysus.
And we bring to you tales, but not of the exploits of men.

>> Meghan:
We bring you tales of women.

>> Stormie:
Women of strength.
Women of power.

>> All:
Tales of the Daughters of Dionysus.

>> Amina:
Medea won third prize for Euripides at its first performance in the annual drama festival in Athens.  

Since 431 BC, the universality of this Greek tragedy has impelled twenty playwrights and uncounted translators to indite repeatedly this protest against woman’s status in a patriarchal society.  

Prior to the play’s opening, Jason has returned from his Argosy to Colchis where, with the aid of Medea’s sorcery, he stole the Golden Fleece from the serpent-guarded cave. 

The princess of Colchis saved his life once again when she slew her own brother who pursued them in their flight to Jason’s Argo anchored on the Black Sea shore. 

Jason returned victorious to Corinth and married Medea, who bore him two sons. 

As the play opens, Jason, driven by ambition, has renounced Medea in order to wed Creusa, the young daughter of King Creon, who exiles Medea from Corinth.  

But as Jason and Creon will soon learn, Medea’s sense of justice is fused with a furious vengeance. 

The play opens to the lamenting of Medea’s Nurse – her faithful servant for many years, and the concerns of the women of Corinth, who are dismayed at her treatment at the hands of Jason.

>> Leeann:
I wish the long ship Argo had never passed that perilous channel between the Symplegades, I wish the pines that made her mast and her oars still waved in the wind on Mount Pelion, 
	and the gray fishhawk
Still nested in them, the great adventurers had never voyaged
Into the Asian sunrise to the shores of morning for the Golden Fleece
For then my mistress Medea
Would never have seen Jason, nor loved and saved him, or cut herself off from this country to 
	go with him
Into this country of the smiling chattering Greeks and the roofs of Corinth; 
over which I see evil
Hang like a cloud. For she is not meek, but fierce, and the daughter of a king.
Yet at first all went well.
The folk of Corinth were kind to her, they were proud of her beauty, and Jason loved her. 
	Happy is the house
Where the man and the woman love and are faithful.
Now all is changed; all is black hatred.  For Jason has turned from Medea; he has married
the yellow-haired child of Creon, the ruler here. He wants worldly advantage, 
	fine friends,
And a high place in Corinth. For these he is willing to cast Medea like a harlot, and betray 
	the children 
That she has borne him.  He is not wise, I think.

>> Stormie:
Death.

>> Leeann:
Listen!  I hear her voice.

>> Stormie:
Death. Death is my wish. For myself, my enemies, my children.  Destruction.
That’s the word. Grind, crush, burn. Destruction. Ai ---  Ai ---

>> Leeann:
This is my terror:
To hear her always harking back to the children, like a fierce hound at fault. O unhappy one,
They’re not to blame.

>> Stormie:
If any god hears me: let me die. Ah, rotten, rotten, rotten: death is the only
Water to wash this dirt.

>> Leeann:
Oh, it’s a bad thing
To be born of high race, and brought up willful and powerful in a house, unruled.
And ruling many: for then if misfortune comes it is unendurable, it will drive you mad.  I say 
	that poor people 
Are happier: the little commoners and humble people, the poor in spirit: for they can lie low
Under the wind and live……
(Noticing the women)  What do you want?

>> Shelbie:
I hear her crying again; it is dreadful.

>> Meghan:
Her lamentation. 
She is deep in grief: we couldn’t help coming.

>> Shelbie:
We are friends of this house and its trouble hurts us.

>> Leeann:
You are right, friends; it is not a home. It is broken.
A house of grief and of weeping.

>> Stormie:
Hear me, gods, let me die. What I need: all dead, all dead, all dead
Under the great cold stones. For a year and a thousand years and another thousand: 
cold as the stones, cold,
Crimson-cloaked
In the blood of our wounds.

>> Shelbie:
O shining sky, divine earth,
Harken not to the song that this woman sings.
It is not her mind’s music; her mind is not here.
She does not know what she prays for.
Pain and wrath are the singers.

>> Meghan:
Unhappy one,
Never pray for death, never pray for death,
He is here all too soon.
He strikes from the clear sky like a hawk,
He hides behind green leaves, or he waits
Around the corner of the wall.
O never pray for death, never pray for death – 
Because that prayer will be answered.

>> Shelbie:
I think you ought to convince Medea to come from the dark dwelling, and speak with us, 
	before her heart breaks,
Or she does harm to herself.  We has lived among her, we’ve learned to love her, we’d gladly 
	tell her so.
It might comfort her spirit.

>> Leeann:
Do you think so?  She wouldn’t listen….She is coming!
Speak carefully to her: make your words a soft music.

>> Stormie:
I will look at the light of the sun, this last time. I wish from that blue sky the white wolf of 
	lightening
Would leap down, and burst my skull and my brain, and like a burning babe, cling to these breasts 
	– Ai! - 	Ai!
I did not know I had visitors.  Women of Corinth:
If anything has been spoken too loudly here, consider
That I believed I was alone; and I have some provocation. You’ve come – let me suppose
With love and sympathy – to peer at my sorrows……
I will show you my naked heart.  You know that my lord Jason
Has left me and made a second marriage, with the bright-haired child
Of wealth and power.  I too was a child of wealth andpower, but not in this country; and I spent my 
	power
For the love of Jason. I poured it out before him like water, I made him drink it like wine. 
	I gave him
Success and fame; I saved him his precious life; not once, many times. You may have heard
	what I did for him:
I betrayed my father for him, I killed my brother to save him; I made my own land to hate 
	me forever;
And I fled west with Jason under the thunder of the sail, weeping and 
	laughing,
And home to Greek water: his home, my exile.
My endless exile.  And here I have loved him and borne him sons; and this – man –
Has left me and taken Creon's daughter, to enjoy her fortune, and put aside her soft yellow 
	hair
And kiss her young mouth.
I do not know what other women – I do not know how much a Greek woman
Will endure.  The people of my race are somewhat rash and intemperate.  As for me, I wish 
	simply to die.
But Jason is not to smile at his bride over my grave, nor that great man Creon
Hang wreaths and make a feast-day in Corinth. Or let the wreaths be bright blinding fire, 
	and the songs a high wailing
And the wine, blood.

>> Shelbie:
Daughter of sorrow, beware.
It is dangerous to dream of wine; it is worse
To speak of wailing and blood:
For the images that the mind makes
Find a way out, they work into life.

>> Stormie:
Let them work into life!

>> Shelbie:
There are evils that cannot be cured by evil.
Patience remains, and the gods watch all.

>> Stormie:
Let them watch my enemies go down in blood.

>> Amina:
Medea makes good on her promises. When Creon comes to confront her and cast her into exile, she appeals to him and asks for a day to put her house in order. He begrudgingly grants her request, and that seals his doom. Invoking her witchcraft, Medea sends her own sons to deliver to Creon’s daughter, Creusa, gifts of a golden robe and crown, which when donned, fulfill Medea’s prophecy of a fiery vengeance.  As the scene opens, Medea awaits the return of the Nurse, so that she might hear the extent of her destructive power.

>> Stormie:
Old friend:
Catch your breath; take your time.  I want the whole tale, every gesture and cry. I have 
	labored for this.

>> Leeann:
Death is turned loose!  I’ve hobbled and run, and fallen…..

>> Stormie:
Please, Nurse.  go slowly.
Tell me these things in order from the beginning,
As when you used to dress me, when I was little, in my father’s house: you used to say
“One thing at a time; one thing and then the next.”

>> Leeann:
My eyes are blistered,
My throat’s like a dry straw- There was a long mirror on the wall, and when 
her eyes saw it –
When she put her hands in the case and took those gold 
	things – and I
Watched, for I feared something might happen to her, but I never thought
So horribly – she placed that golden wreath on her tiny head and wrapped those
	long gold robe 
Around her white shoulders,
And slender flanks, -
And she gazed at the girl in the metal mirror, going back and forth
On tiptoe almost;
But then horror began.  I – Oh, oh –

>> Stormie:
You are not suffering.
You saw it, you did not feel it.  Speak plainly.

>> Leeann:
Her face went white;
She staggered , bending over, and fell
Into the great throne-chair; then a serving woman
called for water thinking she had fainted, but saw the foam
Start on her lips, and the eyes rolling, and screamed instead.  Then some of them
Ran to fetch Jason, others ran after Creon and that doomed girl
Frightfully crying started up from the chair; sshe was like a torch, and 
that gold crown
Like a comet streamed fire; she tore at it but it clung to her head; the golden robes
Was white-hot, flaying the flesh from the living bones; blood mixed with fire ran down, she 
	fell, she burned
On the floor, writhing.  Then Creon came and flung himself on her, hoping to choke
That rage of flame, but it burned through him, his own agony
Made him forget his daughter’s.  The fire stuck to the flesh, it glued him to her; he tried to 
	stand up,
He tore her body and his own.  The burnt flesh broke
In lumps from the bones.
	I have finished.  They lie there.
Eyeless, disfaced, untouchable; middens of smoking flesh – 
	I have no more.

>> Stormie:
I want all.
Had they died when you came away?

>> Leeann:

No, the breath
Still whistled in the black mouths. No one could touch them.
Jason stood in their smoke, tearing His unhelmeted hair.

>> Stormie
You have told good news well: I’ll reward you.
As for those people, they will soon die.  Their woes are over too soon.
Jason’s are not. 

>> Amina:
The deaths of Creon and Creusa have given Medea a certain sense of justice, but her vengeance is not yet complete. 

The Nurse and the Women urge her to take her children and flee, telling her that “fire and death have done your bidding. Is it not enough?”  Medea responds:

>> Stormie:
No, Loathing is endless. 
Hate is a bottomless cup,
I will pour and pour…..

>> Amina:
Her focus now turns to her children. She asks,

 >> Stormie:
Would you say this child has Jason’s eyes?
They are his cubs. They have his blood.
As long as they live I shall be mixed with him.  Children,
It is evening. See, evening has come.  And Evening brings all things home.  It brings the bird to the bough and the 
	lamb to the fold – 
And the child to the mother.
We must not think too much:  people go mad
If they think too much.

>> Amina:
The women plead with Medea to spare the children, but it is in vain. 

Unaware of what has transpired in his own home, Jason rushes in, determined to confront – and kill – Medea for what she has done to Creon and Creusa. 

Instead, Medea confronts him, her gown stained with the blood of the precious sacrifice she has made…..

>> >> Stormie:
What feeble night-bird overcome by misfortune beats at my door?  
Can this be that great adventurer,
The famous lord of the seas and delight of women, the heir to rich Corinth – 
this crying drunkard
On the dark doorstep? – You’ve not had enough.  
	You have come to drink the last bitter drops.
I’ll pour them for you.  The wine I was pouring for you spilled on my hand –
Dear were the little grapes that were crushed to make it; dear were the vineyards.
Hush, your sons are sleeping. Perhaps I will let you look at them:
	you cannot have them.
But the hour grows late, you ought to go home to that high-born bride; the night has fallen, 
	surely she longs for you.
Surely her flesh is not crusted black, nor her forehead burned bald, nor her mouth a horror.
She is very young.  But surely she loves and desires you – 
Surely she will be fruitful…..
I’ll let you 
Look at your sons.  Open the doors that he may see them.
I have done it: because I loathed you more 
Than I loved them.  I tore my own heart and laughed; because I was tearing yours.
I would still laugh.  I’d still be joyful
To know that every bone of your body is broken: 
You are left friendless, mateless, childless. Now 
	Go down to your ship Argo and weep beside it, that rotting hulk on the harbor-beach
Drawn dry astrand, never to be launched again – even the barnacles on the 
	warped keel
Are dead and stink: - that’s your last companion – 
And only hope: for some time one of the rotting timbers
Will fall on your head and kill you – meanwhile sit there and mourn, 
remembering the infinite evil,
and the good
That you made evil.

ANTIGONE


>> Amina:
Antigone was written by Sophocles in the fifth century B.C.  

The story continues the plight of the House of Oedipus. 

When Antigone’s brothers kill each other in brutal civil war, her ruling uncle Creon honors one with a decent burial, but insists, on penalty of death, that the other be left to rot in disgrace on the field.  

What follows is a daring collision of personal liberty and tyranny, religious conviction and legal oppression, and a sister’s heroism against her uncle’s stubborn resolve.

>> Meghan:
Ismene,  quick, come here!
What’s to become of us?
Why are we always the ones?

There’s nothing, sister, nothing
Zeus hasn’t put us through
Just because we are who we are –
The daughters of Oedipus.
And because we are his daughters
We took what came, Ismene, 
In public and in private, 
Hurt and humiliation – 
But this I cannot take.
The ones we love
Are enemies of the state.
To be considered traitors –

>> Shelbie::
What do you mean?

>> Meghan:
I mean – have you not heard?

>> Shelbie::
What I heard was enough.
Our two brothers are dead,
The Argos troops withdrawn
And the two of us left to cope. 
But what’s next, I don’t know.

>> Meghan:
That’s why I came outside.
The walls in there have ears.
This is for your ears only.

>> Shelbie::
What is it? You have me scared.

>> Meghan:
And right you are to be scared.
Creon has made a law.
Eteocles has been buried
As a soldier, with full honours,
So he’s gone home to the dead.
But not Polyneices.
Polyneices is denied
Any burial at all.

Word has come down from Creon
There’s to be no laying to rest, 
No mourning, and the corpse 
Is to be publicly dishonoured.
His body’s to be dumped, 
Disposed of like a carcass,
Left out for the birds to feed on.
If you so much as throw him
The common handful of clay
You’ll have committed a crime.

I say, he has put it to us.
I say, it’s a test you’re facing,
Whether you are who you are,
True to your seed and breed
And generation, or whether – 

>> Shelbie::
Antigone…Antigone,
What do you mean, a test?
If things have gone this far
What is there I can do?

>> Meghan:
You can help me do one thing.

>> Shelbie::
And what thing is that?

>> Meghan:
His body…Help me to lift
And lay your brother’s body.

>> Shelbie::
And bury him, no matter…?
But what about Creon's order?

>> Meghan:
What are Creon's rights
When it comes to me and mine?

>> Shelbie::
Easy now, my sister.
Think this through for a minute.
Think of the line we come from:
We’re children of Oedipus –
Daughters of the man
Who fathered us on his own mother – 
The king they drove from their city.

And now this last thing happens.
The doom in our blood comes back 
And brother slaughters brother –
The two of them, dead in a day.

Are you and I to be next?
How do you think they see us?
How do you think we’d fare 
Two women on our own
Faced with a death decree –
Women, defying Creon?
It’s not a woman’s place.

In the land of the living, sister,
The laws of the land obtain:
And the dead know that as well.
The dead will have to forgive me.

>> Meghan:
You and the laws of the land!
Sister, let me tell you:
From now on, and no matter 
How your mind may change,
I’ll never accept your help.
I will bury him my self.
And if death comes, so be it.
There’ll be a glory in it.
I’ll go down to the underworld
Hand in hand with a brother.
And I’ll go with my head held high.
The gods will be proud of me.
But how are you going to face them, 
Ismene, if you dishonour their laws?

>> Shelbie::
Dishonour them I do not.
But nor am I strong enough 
To defy the laws of the land.

>> Meghan:
Live, then; and live with your choice.
I am going to bury his body.

>> Shelbie::
Antigone, I fear for you.

>> Meghan:
Better fear for yourself.

>> Shelbie::
You are mad. You don’t stand a chance.

>> Meghan:
Here and now, Ismene,
I hate you for this talk.
And the dead are going to hate you.
Call me mad if you like
But leave me alone to do it.
If Creone has me killed,
Where’s the disgrace in that?
The disgrace would be to avoid it.
(exit Antigone)

>> Shelbie::
Nothing’s going to stop you, sister.
But nothing’s going to stop 
The ones that love you,
From keeping on loving you.
(exit Ismene)

>> Stormie: (as Narrator):
Defying Creon’s edict, Antigone attempts 
to bury her brother.  When she is caught 
after her second attempt, she is brought 
to face Creon’s wrath.

>> Stormie::
Now what has happened?  Is this
The work of the gods?
Antigone, child of doom,
Have you gone and broken the law?

>> Amina:
This is the one.  We caught her at it,
Attending to the corpse.  Where’s Creon gone?

>> Stormie::
Creon knows when he’s needed.  He’s coming now.

>> Leeann::
Needed?  Why am I needed?

>> Amina:
King Creon Sir.
We found her attending to the corpse.
I was on to her in a flash; my prisoner
And mine alone.  And now, sir, she is yours
to judge her and convict her –

>> Leeann::
How did you find her?

>> Amina:
I saw her attending to the corpse you said
Nobody was to bury.  Will that do?

>> Leeann::
How was she observed and caught?  Describe it.


>> Amina:
Oh, I’ll describe it.  Gladly.
I went back to the watch. We did what we could do.
We cleaned the body down that we could 
And peeled away the clothes. It was starting to go off
So we stationed ourselves around the hill – 
 you know, because of the smell.
And then what happens?  
Leaves whipped off trees.  Flying sand and dust, like the sky was
Vomiting black air.  
We braced ourselves for whatever plague it was
The gods were sending.  But then it clears
 And this one’s standing, crying her eyes out.
She sees the bare corpse and lets out a screech
And starts to curse whoever did the deed.
She lifted the dust from her hands and let it fall.
She poured the water from her urn three times,
Taking care to do the whole thing right,
And showed no signs of panic when we came upon her,
Denied no thing she was accused of doing
Then or earlier.

>> Leeann::
You there, studying the ground: hold up your head
And tell us: is this true?

>> Meghan:
True.  I admit it.

>> Leeann::
(to guard)  All right.  You’re in the clear – so now clear off.
(guard exits)  Tell us.
Did you or did you not
Know that the proclamation forbade all this?

>> Meghan:
I did know.  How could I not?  

>> Leeann::
And still you dared to disobey the law?

>> Meghan:
I disobeyed because the law was not
The law of Zeus not the law ordained 
By Justice, Justice dwelling deep
Among the gods of the dead.
Was I to humour you, or honour gods?
Sooner or later I’ll die anyhow
And sooner may be better in my case:
This death penalty is almost a relief.

>> Stormie::
This wildness in her comes from Oedipus.
She gets it from her father.  She won’t relent.

>> Leeann::
We’ll wait and see.  The bigger the resistance
The bigger the collapse.  Get Ismene out here.
She was inside, in the house, a while ago, 
Raving, out of her mind.  That’s how guilt
Affects some people. They simply break 
And everything comes out.  But the barefaced ones,
The ones who defy you even more when they’re found out,
They’re worse again.

>> Meghan:
Will it be enough for you to see me executed?

>> Leeann::
More than enough.

>> Meghan:
Then why don’t you do it quickly?
Anything I have to say to you
Or you to me only deepens the wound.
I never did a nobler thing than bury
My brother Polyneices.

>> Stormie::
Ismene, look in tears!
For her sister.  For herself.

>> Leeann:: 
Tell us, you, now.  You helped her, didn’t you?
Or are you going to claim you’re innocent?

>> Shelbie::
I helped her, yes, if I’m allowed to say so
And now I stand with her to take what comes.

>> Meghan:
I don’t allow this.  Justice won’t allow it.
You wouldn’t help.
We cut all ties.
It’s over.

>> Shelbie::
But now I’m with you.  I want to throw myself
Like a lifeline to you in your sea of troubles.

>> Meghan:
Too late, my sister.  You chose a safe line first.
The dead and Hades know who did this deed.

>> Shelbie::
Antigone, don’t rob me of all honour.
Let me die with you and act right by the dead.

>> Meghan:
You can’t just pluck your honour off a bush
You didn’t plant.  You forfeited your right.

>> Shelbie::
If Antigone dies, how will I keep on living?

>> Meghan:
You can save yourself.  That is my honest wish.

>> Shelbie::
And be forever shamed in my own eyes?

>> Meghan:
Take heart, Ismene, you are still alive
But I have long gone over to the dead. 

>> Leeann::
This is incredible:  one of them 
Had the father’s madness in her from the start
But I never thought to see it in Ismene.

>> Shelbie::
My sister is the mainstay of my life.

>> Leeann::
Your sister was…there’s no “is” anymore.

>> Shelbie::
You mean you’d kill your own son’s bride to be?

>> Leeann::
I would and will.  He has other fields to plow.

>> Shelbie::
He loves her utterly.  For him, there’s no one else.

>> Leeann::
No son of mine will take a condemned wife.

>> Shelbie::
Oh, poor, poor Haemon!  To have you for a father!

>> Leeann::
You and your marriage talk.  Too late for that.

>> Stormie::
Do you mean, sir, you’ll rob Haemon of this woman?

>> Leeann::
Hades will rob him first.

>> Stormie::
The sentence, though, has been decided on?

>> Leeann::
It has, by me, 
And I, may I remind you, have your acclamation.
Women were never meant for this assembly.
Get her away from here.  And the other one.
From now on they’ll be kept in place again
And better be…Yes, keep an eye on them.
Once the end’s in sight they all get desperate.
Even the bravest will make a run for it.

>> Stormie::
Creon, so adamant in his condemnation of Antigone, 
is soon to discover the ill-effects of ignoring wise counsel….

Is this more bad news for the royal house?

>> Amina::
Dead.  They are dead.  And the living bear the guilt.

>> Stormie::
Who was killed?  Who did the killing?  Quick!

>> Amina::
Haemon was killed –

>> Stormie::
But by himself or Creon?

>> Amina::
By himself.  For the blood on his father’s hands. 
I can tell you the whole thing.
Right from the start I was at Creon's side,
Marching up that hill.  And sure enough
It was still there, Polneices’ corpse,
Or what the dogs had left of it.  So we prayed 
To the goddess of the crossroads and to Pluto
To ignore
The pitilessness of that desecration.
Then we washed the remains in purifying water,
We Gathered enough sticks and made a fire
To burn him as was proper.  

Then on we went, right up to the cave mouth,
And deep in that unholy vault we hear
Such terrible howling we have to send for Creon.
And when Creon comes, he howls himself and he knows.
“Oh, hide me, hide me from myself,” he cries,

I hear my son’s voice in there.  Come on,”
He shouts.  “Tumble the stones, break through
And look and tell me.  Tell me if it’s Haemon.”

So we tumbled the stones and peered into the gallery.  Antigone was there,
Hanging by her neck form a linen noose,
And Haemon on the ground beside her
With his arms around the girl's waist, imploring
The underworld, lamenting his dead bride
And shouting execrations against Creon.
But Creon can’t help himself and runs to the boy
With open arms 
 But Haemon spat in his face
And made a  lunge with his two-edged sword
And would have got him if Creon hadn’t dodged.
Then before we know it, he had turned 
The sword on himself and plunged it
In his own side.  And as the darkness fell over his eyes
blood came spurting…
Out of his mouth all over her white cheek…
That was the kiss he gave his bride to be.
A wedding witnessed in the halls of death.
And one to teach us living witnesses
The mortal cost of ill-judged words and deeds.

>> Stormie::
Stand back.  It’s the king
Coming to bury his own.

How did the likes of us
Foresee this and not him?

>> Leeann::
Behold your king of wrong,
Wrong-headed on the throne,
Wrong-headed in the home,
Wrong-footed by the heavens.

>> Stormie::
Too late, alas, you’ve learned.

>> Amina::
My lord, you come bowed down with grief enough, 
But you must brace yourself to suffer more.

>> Leeann::
What can be worse than worst?
What has happened now?

>> Amina::
The one who brought your son into the world 
Has taken leave of it.  Your queen’s life-blood
Is on the palace floor.

>> Leeann::
Why am I clamped like prey
In the hungry jaws of death?
Mother and child both.
I have wived and fathered death.

>> Amina::
No, my lord.  She dealt the stroke herself.
The sword was two-edged, and so was her grief.
But then as the darkness stole down over her eyes,
She called you death-dealer and cursed your name.

>> Leeann::
Why doesn’t somebody take
A two-edged sword to me?

>> Amina::
Death-dealer, she said, because you and your doings
Felled her children

>> Leeann::
And then she raised her hand to do the deed?

>> Amina::
When she’d heard how Haemon killed herself
She went and took your own sword from its scabbard
And punched it in her heart.

>> Leeann::
Let all verdicts be pronounced
Against me.  She was guiltless.
It was my hand on the hilt,
My hand that drove the blade.

>> Stormie::
This is right, if ever right can come 
From wrongs like yours.  This is good.
When the worst has to be faced, the best thing is
To face it quickly.

>> Leeann::
The quicker it comes, the better.
I want to hurry death.
I want to be free of the dread
Of wakening in the morning.
Everything I’ve touched
I have destroyed.  I’ve nobody to turn to
Nowhere I can go.  My recklessness and pride
I paid for in the end.  The blow came quick.

>> Stormie::
Wise conduct is the key to happiness.
Always rule by the gods and reverence them.
Those who overbear will be brought to grief.
Fate will flail them on its winnowing floor
And in due season teach them to be wise.

THE TROJAN WOMEN

SHELBIE (as Narrator):
Aristotle referred to Euripides in passing as the most “tragic” of the poets.  

If what Aristotle meant was that Euripides possessed the greatest capacity in general for provoking pity and fear, then The Trojan Women, one of the greatest pieces of anti-war literature ever written, must also rank as one of the the greatest Euripidean tragedies, with it’s tale of the destructive nature of war.  

First performed on the Athenian stage in 416 b.c., its denunciation of the terror and futility of war makes this play from a faraway age amazingly – and sadly – contemporary.  

The play has no plot, and almost no action, but it frames the impact of war on all levels of society with a pathos worthy of the “poet of the world’s grief,” as Euripides was called.

AMINA (as Narrator):
Before the ruined walls of ancient Troy, a few days after the battle in which King Menelaus of Sparta, and Agamemnon, general of the Greeks, had taken the city, there appears dimly in the early dawn the mourning figure of the god, Poseidon. 

Bodies of dead warriors lie before the huts of the captive women who await disposition among the Greek leaders, and a white-haired woman is sleeping on the ground--it is Hecuba, Queen of Troy, the wife of Priam and mother of Hector and Paris.

STORMIE (as Narrator):
Poseidon laments the destruction of the Trojan wall which he and Apollo had built, and cries that Priam lies unburied by his own hearth while the captive women wail and the victors await the winds that will take them to their homes. 

He reflects that Helen, the wife of Menelaus whom Paris had brought to Troy, also awaits in a hut, a prize of war; that Hecuba's child, Polyxena, has been secretly slain and Priam and his sons are gone, while her daughter Cassandra, the virgin seeress beloved of Apollo, has been marked as the prize of Agamemnon.

LEEANN (as Narrator):
The goddess, Pallas Athena, appears, and with Poseidon conspires to destroy the home-going Greek ships in revenge. 

Poseidon cries to the conquerors: "How are ye blind, ye treaders down of cities, ye that cast temples to desolation, and lay waste tombs, the untrodden sanctuaries where lie the ancient dead; yourselves so soon to die!" 

The dawn comes, and Hecuba awakens to mourn her tragic fate and curse Helen as the cause. 

The other captive women rise to echo her cries.

>> Shelbie:
Up from the ground – O weary head, O breaking neck.
This is no longer Troy.  And we are not the lords of Troy
Endure. for the ways of fate are the ways of the wind.
Drift with the stream – drift with fate.
No use to turn the prow to breast the waves.
Let the boat ho as it chances.
Sorrow, my sorrow.
What sorrow is there that is not mine,
Grief to weep for.
Country lost and children and husband.
Glory of all my house brought low.
All was nothing – nothing always.

What did you come for?  A woman?
A thing of loathing, of shame,
To husband, to brother, to home.
She slew Priam,
Father of fifty sons,
She wrecked me upon the reef of destruction.
Who am I that I wait here at a Greek king’s door?
A slave that men drive on,
Old, homeless, and without children.
Shaven head brought low in dishonor.
O wives of the bronze-armored men who fought,
And maidens, sorrowing maidens, plighted to shame,
See – only smoke left where was Troy.

>> Amina:
O Hecuba – your cry –We heard you call so piteously,
 And through our hearts flashed fear.
In the tent we were weeping, too, for we are slaves.

>> Shelbie:
Look, child, there where the Greek ships wait – 

>> Leann:
They are moving. The men hold oars.

>> Stormie:
O God, what will they do? Carry me off on a ship far from home?

>> Shelbie:
You ask, and I know nothing.
But I think ruin is here.
>> Meghan:
Oh, we are wretched.  We shall hear the summons.  
Women of Troy, go forth from your home, for the Greeks set sail.

>> Shelbie:
But not Cassandra, oh, not her.
She is mad – she has been driven mad.  Leave her within,
Not shamed before the Greeks – not that grief too.
I have enough.

>> Amina:
Out of the Greek king’s tent trembling I come, O Queen, to hear my fate from you.  
Not death – They would not think of death for a poor woman.

>> Stormie:
The sailors – they are standing on the prow.
Already they are running out the oars.

>> Leeann:
It is so early – but a terror woke me.
My heart beats so.

>> Meghan:
Has a herald come from the Greek camp?
Whose slave shall I be?  I – bear that?

>> Shelbie:
Wait for the lot drawing. It is near.

>> Amina:
My sons. I would look at them once more. 
Never again.

>> Stormie:
Worse to come.
A Greek’s bed – and I – 

>> Leeann:
A night like that? 
Oh, no – not that for me.

>> Meghan:
I see myself a water carrier, dipping my pitcher in the great Pierian spring.

>> Amina:
The land of Theseus, Athens, it is known to be a happy place.  I wish I could go there.

>> Stormie:
But not to the Eurotas, hateful river, where once Helen lived.
Not there, to be a slave to Menelaus who sacked Troy.

>> Shelbie:
And I whose slave am I, creeping along with my crutch?

>> Leeann (as Narrator):
The crushing news of Hecuba’s fate is unwillingly brought by the Greek herald, Talthybius. 

He informs Hecuba that Cassandra is to be the bride of Agamemnon, hints that Polyxena is dead, and reveals that Andromache, the wife of Hector, is to be the prize of Pyrrhus, Achilles' son; Hecuba herself is fated to be the slave of the despised Odysseus, King of Ithaca.

>> Shelbie:
Beat, beat my shorn head!  Tear, tear my cheek!
His slave – vile lying man. I have come to this – 
There is nothing good he does not hurt – a lawless beast.
Pity me, women of Troy, for
 I have gone.  I am lost – 
An evil fate fell on me, a lot the hardest of all.

>> Amina:
My husband,
you wander unburied, uncared for, 
While ,
Swift-winged ships shall carry me 
On to the land the riders love,

>> Stormie:
Children, our children.
At the gate they are crying, crying, 
Calling to us
Mother, I am all alone.
They are carrying me off to a black ship, and I cannot see you.

>> Leeann:
Where, oh where?  To holy Salamis, with swift oars dipping?
Or to the crest of Corinth, the city of two seas,
Where the gates King Pelops built for his dwelling stand?

>> Meghan:
Oh, if only, far out to sea,
The crashing thunder of God would fall down, 
Down on Menelaus’ ship, 
He it was drove me from Troy.
He is driving me in tears over to Greece to slavery.

>> Amina (narration):
Cassandra appears, bearing a torch and walking as in a dream in her bridal garments. 

She chants dire prophecies of the Greeks' empty victory, with death for Agamemnon and "the dark wanderings" of mother-murder that shall destroy the house of Atreus. 

She becomes conscious of the awed Talthybius, and, tearing off her garlands, goes to "the house of Death to lie beside my bridegroom," with a final word of comfort for her city and for Hecuba, who collapses to the ground, broken in grief.

>> Meghan (Narration):
A chariot approaches from the town, laden with spoils and bearing a mourning woman who holds a child in her arms--Andromache, the widow of Hector, and her baby. 

Andromache, crying her grief to Hecuba, calls down God's wrath on Paris "who sold for his evil love Troy and the towers thereof." 

She confirms to the agonized Hecuba that Polyxena has been slain at Achilles' tomb.

>> Stormie (Narration):
Andromache asks how she can become the wife of Achilles' son without shame to herself and her beloved Hector, but Hecuba counsels that she honor her new lord and thus, perhaps, be permitted to rear her son as a future saviour of Ilion. 

But the gentle Talthybius returns with news that Odysseus has prevailed in council, and ordered that the child is to be dashed to death from the wall; if Andromache casts a curse upon the Greek ships, the baby is to have no burial. 

The stricken mother, calling a curse upon Helen, addresses her baby:

>> Amina (as Andromache):
"Go, die, my best-beloved, my cherished one,
In fierce men's hands, leaving me here alone.... Weepest thou?
Nay, Thou canst not know.
And father will not come; he will not come....
How shall it be? One spring ... deep, deep
Down. And thy neck ... Ah, God, so cometh sleep!...
And none to pity thee!... Thou little thing
That curlest in my arms, what sweet scents cling
All around thy neck; now, kiss me, lips to lips....
Quick! Take him: drag him: cast him from the wall....
To the bridal ... I have lost my child, my own!"

>> Stormie (Narration):
Andromache, half swooning, is driven to the ships, and a soldier bears the child to his death.

>> Shelbie:
When Hector fought and thousands at his side, we fell beneath you.
Now, with country captured and the Trojans dead,
A little child like this has made you afraid.
The fear that comes when reason goes –
Myself, I do not wish to share it.

Poor little one. How savagely our ancient walls, 
Apollo’s towers, have torn away the curls your mother’s fingers wound and where she pressed her soft kisses – here where the bone grins white – 
Dear hands, the same dear shape your father’s had, how loosely now you fall. 
And dear proud lips forever closed.  False words you would speak to me when you would jump into my bed, call me 
Grandmother, when you are dead, I’ll cut off a great lock of hair and lead my men to ride out past your tomb.
Not you, but I, old homeless,  
Must lbury you, so young,
So miserably dead.

They have taken all that was your father’s, but one thing, for your burying, you shall have, the bronze-barred shield.
It kept safe Hector’s mighty arm, but now it has lost its master.
Come, Bring such covering for the pitiful dead body as we still have.
God has not left us much to a make a show with.  
Everything I have I give you, child.
Go: lay our dead in hisgrave, with these last gifts of death given to him. 
I think those that are dead care little how they are buried.  It is we, the living, our vanity.

>> Stormie:
Oh, terrible!
The fire lights the whole town up. 
The inside rooms are burning.
The citadel – it is all flame now.

>> Leeann:
Troy is vanishing.
War first ruined her.
And now the rest if going up in smoke, the glorious houses fallen.
First the spear and then the fire.

>> Shelbie:
My knees are stiff, but I must kneel.
Now, I strike the ground with both my hands – 

>> Amina:
I too, I kneel upon the ground.
I call to mine down there.
Husband, my poor husband.

>> Shelbie:
They are herding us like cattle – driving us out.

>> Stormie:
Pain, all pain.

>> Leeann:
To a slave’s house, from my country.

>> Shelbie:
Priam, Priam, you are dead,
And not a friend to bury you. 
The evil that has found me – 
Do you know?

>> Meghan:
No.  Death has darkened his eyes.
He was good and the wicked killed him.

>> Shelbie:
O dwellings of the gods and O dear city,
The spear came first and now only the red flame lives there.

>> Amina:
Fall and be forgotten.  Earth is kind.

>> Stormie:
The dust is rising, spreading out like a great wing of smoke.
I cannot see my house.

>> Leeann:
The name has vanished from the land, and we are gone,
One here, one there.  And Troy is gone forever.

>> Meghan (Narration): 
With a great crash, the city wall is lost in smoke and darkness, signaling the fall of Troy.

>> Amina: 
Earthquake and flood and the city’s end…

>> Shelbie:
My limbs are weak,
You must carry me on to the new day of slavery.

>> Stormie:
Farewell, dear city.
Farewell, my country, where once my children lived.

>> Leeann:
On to the ships…..

ALL:
There below, the Greek ships wait.

[applause]