Hi,
which editions do you suggest for The Tragedies? In the cae of Sophocles I use Jebb’s. I read these days Page’s edition of Medea. for othe best editions of the tragedians, which editions should I use? what is your suggestions? I am a pre-advanced greek reader.
p.s.: As I live in Iran, I am far away to stay familar with the coming or recommended editions:expressionless_face:
For Sophocles Jebb is the gold standard. For the Agamemnon, there is Raeburn’s excellent modern commentary and of course the magisterial edition of Fraenkel, PDFs of which are floating around and available.
If you just want to read through the texts and need a hand understanding certain aspects, you can content yourself with the Aris and Phillips Classical Texts editions. Every Euripidean play has been treated in that series, there are then a few Sophoclean plays, and likewise a few Aeschyleans. Alternatively, if you just want to practise your Greek, perseus is mostly fine for Euripides or you can make good use of the Loeb editions (also available online for a price).
If you want to engage with the text at a much deeper level, then you can consult larger commentaries.
Fraenkel for Agamemnon, for example, has already been mentioned. For Sophocles Jebb is the go to, however be wary in your reading since the work, though magisterial, is still dated.
For Euripides (incomplete list, plays and names of editor off the top of my head):
Alcestis: Dale (1950s), Parker (2000s).
Medea: Mastronarde is more accessible: in three volumes there is the edition of Martina.
Herclidae: Wilkins
Hippolytus: Barrett is your one-stop shop.
Hecuba: in English there’s Battezzato, very accessible; a much larger German edition is Mathiesson’s
Hercules: other than the Aris & Phillips, there’s the old but outstanding edition of Wilamowitz.
Troades: KH Lee, but very recently Kovacs.
Iph. Tauris: Kyriakou, Parker
Ion: most recently that of Gunter Martin, excellent and comprehensive.
Helen: Allan
Phoenissae: Mastronarde hands down.
[Rhesus]: Fries, Liapis
The older Oxford Reds (you mentioned Page’s edition of Medea) are still reliable in many respects.
For critical editions without commentary: Oxford Classical Text editions for all three, then West’s Teubner edition of Aeschylus.
You have a lot to choose from here. I liked Mastronarde’s Medea commentary as well as Parker’s Alcestis. From a philological point of view Finglass’s Ajax is exemplary but he isn’t interested in modern ideas of interpretation which some will see as an advantage. I thought he missed the point of the play and was quite disappointed. I learned a lot from it though. Trachiniae is worth reading in “Easterling, P. E. 1982. Sophocles. Trachiniae. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press”. Jebb is good but his interpretations necessarily are situated in a different time.
More generally Simon Goldhill’s “Reading Greek Tragedy”, Cambridge 1986 is worth reading. As is the “Cambridge Companion to Greek tragedy” edited by P. E. Easterling, 1997. I am sure there are probably more up to date introductions but they are still worth consulting.
Despite what others say learning how to read a commentary ( and preferably more than one) is a vital part of studying classical literature. What seems so alien and is yet perhaps not and what seems so familiar and is in fact wholly unlike our own experience form part of the joy of reading Tragedy. Commentaries help you on your way to forming your own opinions.
In the first instance just stick to one play and I would start with Medea. It’s less difficult than other plays and Mastronarde gives lots of help. It goes without saying that it is a hugely enjoyable play and a magnificent achievement.
The Medea is about a jilted woman who kills her own children out of sexual jealousy. You might wonder why seneca2008 calls it hugely enjoyable.
Glad to see you haven’t lost your touch. 
I hope we get some good replies!
I came to say that Seneca is right. Medea is hugely enjoyable. Alcestis too. I’ve been going through the Fabulae 1 volume of Euripides, and am in the middle of it now.
But then I noticed Seneca’s aside about “others”, which he uses to refer to me, as I sometimes – not always – read without commentaries, and have been doing it more lately. There are some advantages, and some disadvantages, depending on your tastes and goals.
Not having much personal concern about how exactly strangers read things, I have felt it very awkward to receive all of the attention from the reading habit police. (I didn’t even ask my wife if she used a commentary for Middlemarch last year.)
Oh dear. I didn’t say seneca was wrong, in fact if you pressed me I’d say he was right. As seneca recognized, I was raising the question, which seems to me an interesting one, of why anyone should find such a play hugely enjoyable. Merely asserting that it is, on your own authority and in absolute terms, is unenlightening and doesn’t contribute to discussion of the question.
Your own reading habits are beside the point. Not everything is about you, Joel, and I for one wish you wouldn’t act as if it were. I’m sorry to strike such a sour note, but this is all becoming a bit much.
I read the English translation a few months ago. I thought it was quite a play, but I did not enjoy it. I would say it was more scary than anything. Jason was a complete jerk, and I have never seen anyone so wrathful as Medea.
No, I didn’t misunderstand you, mwh – no one here is about to believe that you’ve suddenly turned against Greek tragedy. Yes, the returns to the topic of the – perhaps nameless – people who don’t recommend commentaries are becoming a bit much.
Lukas I was very heartened to read about your response. The passions on display are frightening. This chimes with part at least of Aristotle’s ideas about pity, fear and Catharisis.
So the question posed by mwh is very multi layered. How can watching something so horrible as a mother murdering her children be part of an experience which is “hugely enjoyable”. I have to say that when I used that phrase I was thinking of the experience of reading the play, the language the themes and structure. The productions I have seen have left me feeling that much was missing and I haven’t been particularly moved. Pasolini’s film with Callas captures something of the “otherness” of Medea and the grandeur of her character. I fell under its spell straightaway.
Medea has been a recurrent figure in classical literature as well as in more modern times. There have been several operas on the myth, most recently (2010) by Aribert Reimann after Franz Grillparzer’s play. The many strands of the myth obviously have a lot to say to us today just as it did in ancient times. I dont think this would be true if our response was primarily intellectual.
Opera and funfairs provide good exemplars of how we can safely enjoy horrifying experiences. I have just watched Tosca from the Met. It was a sumptuous production with beautiful music playing out a horrible mixture of sexual jealousy, sadism and power politics (much like Medea?). How can this mixture of beauty and horror where the three main characters die - two murders and one suicide - be so appealing. I guess some people distance themselves from the reality of what is happening and concentrate on the beauty. Those who who open themselves to what is actually being shown may find it overwhelming. I rarely go to see Madama Butterfly anymore because I find the the tension between the beauty of the utterance and the vileness of the action too much to handle. Somehow this opera doesn’t seem safe for me even in the opera house.
I wish I could have answered this question by direct reference to performances of Medea but the English adaptations I have seen seem very thin gruel compared to Euripides.
Lukas,
I’d like to add a few thoughts to those of Seneca. They’re not necessarily original thoughts, but I’d like to mention them because I believe they’re relevant to the discussion. I recently watched a 3 part series on Greek theatre, written and presented by Dr. Michael Scott of the University of Warwick. One of the key elements of Greek theatre is the invitation to audience to participate in thinking about the issues. In many Greek tragedies and later Roman tragedies, we are presented with an horrific act and unlike many modern dramas where the line between good and evil is more clearly drawn, we are asked what we would do in a similar situation, where the lines are not so clearly drawn. How much hurt can a person endure before they finally “snap” and lash out in an act of vengeance? Can there ever be a justification for revenge? Is the act solely the fault of the offender or do external influences come into play (fate, the gods)? These are all questions the poets ask us to think about. Remember these myths and stories had been around a long time. The poets show how the myths present issues that sooner or later have to be faced in our daily lives and by using the various characters and the chorus of the play, they’re able to present different viewpoints on the questions and force us as participants to make choices.
Εὐχαριστῶ!
I figured Seneca enjoyed it as how it was put together. That is interesting that some attempts at reproducing the stories fall short.
Aetos: That is very interesting that the Greek playwrights would put the questions in front of the audiences to think about.
Hi Lukas,
I think I could have worded that better. When I say the poets are inviting the audience to participate, I mean that the plays themselves force the audience to think about the issues. I don’t believe the poets actually stood in front of the audience and posed the questions. Quite often the questions are embedded in the dialogue or the situations presented in the play invite analysis and discussion.
I meant what you wrote; not that the playwrights asked questions.
Excellent! I’m glad I didn’t leave you with the wrong impression. By the bye, the name of the series is “Greece: The Greatest Show on Earth”. I thought it gave a nice overview of ancient theatre. I found it on a Greek documentary channel 'Cosmote History HD". I’m sure it’s available on one of the US or European documentary channels. I’m pretty sure the BBC archives has it, but I don’t have access to it from this side of the pond.
Εὐχαριστῶ!
I am beginning to watch it on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAkLTWQUbG8
This thread makes me want to re-read Medea. I’m going to see if I can find my notes from reading Mastronarde’s commentary.
I watched the first part of Part II this evening and notice that the narrator mentioned another Euripides play: Βάκχαι.
I just did a quick scan of a Wikpedia article about it. It sounds like another depressing play with revenge by Dionysus, but do posters think it is worth reading? The Wikipedia article said it is a very famous play.
The Bacchae was the first Greek play I ever saw in the theatre of Epidauros. I remember many things about that evening. The coach trip from Nafplio, the warmth of the summer night, the stars. The sculpture in the centre of the orchestra of what I now understand to be the lightening that destroyed Dionysos’ mother Semele some years before the play begins. The sheer physicality of the chorus of maenads. Much puzzled me about the play and from what I recall of snatches of overheard conversations on that coach I was not alone. It was performed in modern Greek, I suppose, which I didnt understand at all. Yet it left a long lasting impression on me.
Aetos mentions the plurality of voices in Tragedy and so one should not perhaps judge tragedies solely by the usually horrific events by which they are well known. One should not lose sight of the doubt which plagues Medea, with the attempts at empathy shown by the chorus. One can also revel in Medea’s command of rhetoric as she manipulates Creon and be aware that she is using her power over words for her own ends. The play is not defined by its outcome (is that even a possibility? ) but more by the discussion and different points of view which are expressed along the way.
The Bacchae invites us to think (amongst other things) about the consequences of trying to assert ones rationality at all costs. The chaotic madness of Dionysos has its own logic and it is different from Pentheus’. Its a multi layered play of course and questions of gender, performance, theatricality all emerge. Dont forget that Dionysos was the God to whom the performances of tragedy were dedicated in Athens.
Above I recommended The Cambridge Companion to greek tragedy. This should give you an introduction to the many ways in which Tragedy can be interpreted. Greek tragedy is very different from say Shakespeare and you need to think about it in a different way. Once you start your exploration you will discover a hugely rewarding and rich experience. I should also add that even if you dont study Latin, Seneca’s tragedies will repay reading. In the past these have been seen as pale imitations of Greek tragedy. Happily they now stand on their own two feet as they did in the Renaissance when they were so influential on the development of western drama.