The Bacchae and Other PlaysPreface to the Second Edition
Introduction
Ion
The Women Of Troy
Helen
The Bacchae
Notes to Ion
Notes to Helen
Notes to The Bacchae
Euripides is thought to have lived between 485 and 406 BC. He is
considered to be one of the three great dramatists of Ancient
Greece, alongside Aeschylus and Sophocles. He is particularly
admired by modern audiences and readers for his characterization
and astute and balanced depiction of human behaviour. Medea is his
most famous work.
Date- 2013-08-06
Euripides is thought to have lived between 485 and 406 BC. He is
considered to be one of the three great dramatists of Ancient
Greece, alongside Aeschylus and Sophocles. He is particularly
admired by modern audiences and readers for his characterization
and astute and balanced depiction of human behaviour. Medea is his
most famous work.
Robin Robertson is from the north-east coast of Scotland. He is the
author of three collections of poetry- A Painted Field (1997),
winner of the 1997 Forward Poetry Prize (Best First Collection),
the Aldeburgh Poetry Festival Prize and the Saltire Society
Scottish First Book of the Year Award; Slow Air (2002); and
Swithering (2006). He is also the editor of Mortification- Writers'
Stories of their Public Shame (2003). In 2004, he was named by the
Poetry Book Society as one of the 'Next Generation' poets, and
received the E. M. Forster Award from the American Academy of Arts
and Letters. Robin Robertson's third poetry collection, Swithering
(2006), was shortlisted for the 2005 T. S. Eliot Prize and won the
2006 Forward Poetry Prize (Best Poetry Collection of the Year). In
2013 Robin Robertson was awarded the Petrarca-Preis. He lives and
works in London.
Euripides, the youngest of the three great Athenian playwrights,
was born around 485 BC of a family of good standing. He first
competed in the dramatic festivals in 455 BC, coming only third;
his record of success in the tragic competitions is lower than that
of either Aeschylus or Sophocles. There is a tradition that he was
unpopular, even a recluse; we are told that he composed poetry in a
cave by the sea, near Salamis. What is clear from contemporary
evidence, however, is that audiences were fascinated by his
innovative and often disturbing dramas. His work was controversial
already in his lifetime, and he himself was regarded as a 'clever'
poet, associated with philosophers and other intellectuals.
Towards the end of his life he went to live at the court of
Archelaus, king of Macedon. It was during his time there that he
wrote what many consider his greates work, the Bacchae. When news
of his death reached Athens in early 406 BC, Sophocles appeared
publicly in mourning for him. Euripides is thought to have written
about ninety-two plays, of which seventeen tragedies and one
satyr-play known to be his survive; the other play which is
attributed to him, the Rhesus, may in fact be by a later hand.
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