with the story of this misfortune, sent by god.
(The Messenger exits the stage in the direction he came from.)
CHORUS: (singing in dochmiacs)
Cypris, you lead the unbending minds
of gods and men, and in your company
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the one with shimmering wings
encircles them in swift flight.
Eros flies over the earth,
over the sounding salt sea,
and he enraptures whomever,
heart-crazed, he swoops on, golden in flight:
the mountains’ and the seas’ spawn,
all that the earth feeds
and the bright sun sees,
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and humankind. All these you rule,
Cypris, in solitary majesty.
(The goddess Artemis appears and is lowered by the mēchanē onto the roof of the house. She addresses Theseus, first chanting and then speaking.)
ARTEMIS: I command you, noble son of Aegeus:
Listen.
I, daughter of Leto, Artemis, speak to you.
Why do you feel joy in misery, Theseus?
You’ve killed your son against heaven’s law
because you trusted your wife’s false words,
believed what you hadn’t seen.
But your ruinous blindness is evident to all.
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How do you not cower deep below the earth
in your shame?
or remove yourself from pain,*82
take wing and fly away?
No part of a life among good men
can be yours.
Hear, Theseus, the account of your wrongdoing.
My words will improve nothing, but they’ll give you pain.
I’ve come for this: to show that your son’s mind
is just, so he may die with a good name,
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and to show your wife’s obsession or, in a way,
her nobility. She was in love with your son,
goaded and stung by the goddess most hateful
to those of us who find pleasure in chastity.
She tried to conquer Cypris with strength of mind—
her nurse’s unwanted scheme destroyed her.
Her nurse told your son under oath of silence
of her disease. As was right, he didn’t give in
to her request; nor did reverence allow him
to abandon his oath, even when you abused him.
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Phaedra, fearing exposure, wrote a false
account. With this deceitful ruse she
persuaded you and destroyed your son.
THESEUS: oimoi!
ARTEMIS: This story hurts you, Theseus? Yet be still.
Listen to what follows; you’ll weep more.
You know that you have from your father
three certain curses: one you used, evil man,
against your son, though you had
enemies to curse. Your father wished you well
but gave what his promise required of him.
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You, however, wronged your son and me.
You waited for neither proof nor prophesy.
You made no inquiry, gave no time for thought.
More quickly than you should, you hurled
curses at your son, and killed him.
THESEUS: Lady, let me die!
ARTEMIS: You’ve done a terrible thing, yes,
but even so you may find forgiveness yet.
Cypris wanted all this to happen
to sate her anger. We gods have this rule:
No one wants to oppose the will
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of another god. We always stand aside.
Be sure, if I didn’t fear Zeus, I’d never
sink so far in disgrace as to allow
the one mortal I love most of all
to die. As for you, in the first place,
your ignorance frees your error
from evil intent. And then the death of your wife
prevented any questions about her story
that might have persuaded you. This disaster
has hit you hardest. But it pains me, too.
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Gods don’t enjoy the death of reverent men;
evil men we destroy: house, children, all.
(Hippolytus, supported by two slaves, enters, barely able to walk. Both the Chorus and Hippolytus are chanting.)
CHORUS: Here he comes now, wretched man,
his blond head, his young flesh
mangled. What grief,
what twin troubles take hold of this house,
the gods’ doing.
HIPPOLYTUS: aiai, aiai
This desolation! My unjust father
has blighted me with an unjust curse.
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I’m wretched, ruined, oimoi moi.
Pain shoots through my skull,
my brain convulses.
Wait! I must rest my failing body.
(After a pause, Hippolytus starts to move again and cries out from the pain.)
ē, ē
You, my horses, fed by my hand,
hateful now,
you destroyed me, you killed me.
pheu, pheu. I beg you, slaves,
lay gentle hands on my tattered flesh.
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Who stands here, on my right?
Hold me up with care, with sure strength
drag me forward, ill-fated and wrongfully cursed
by my father. Zeus, Zeus, do you see this?
I, reverent and god-fearing,
I, superior to all in self-control,
I go to Death; he’s here before my eyes,
I’ve lost my life; all the effort
of decency, all in vain.
(As the pain increases, Hippolytus shifts from chanting to singing.)
aiai, aiai
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Now the pain, the pain engulfs me,
let me go.
Let death come to heal my misery.
Kill me, give me an end.
I want a sharp sword
to slice me apart,
to put my life to rest.
Oh, father’s wretched curse!
Bloody wrong done by ancestors
long ago is here now,*83
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it waits no more,
it comes at me—why?
I am guiltless.
iō moi moi
What can I say? How
can I free myself from life,
free myself from suffering?
May the night-dark necessity
of Death come and take me,
wretched, to rest.
ARTEMIS: Poor man, what suffering has you under its yoke!
1390
Your nobility of mind has destroyed you.
(Hippolytus hears but cannot see her.)
HIPPOLYTUS: eā!
Divinely scented breath!*84 Even in suffering
I sense your presence and grow lighter.
Artemis, divine being, is here in this place.
ARTEMIS: Poor man, I’m here, your dearest goddess.
HIPPOLYTUS: Do you see my body, my wretched state?
ARTEMIS: I see, but the law of the gods forbids me tears.
HIPPOLYTUS: Your hunter and your servant is no more.
ARTEMIS: No, but even in death you’re dear to me.
HIPPOLYTUS: Gone the keeper of your horses, your statue’s guard.
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ARTEMIS: Cypris in her villainy contrived it so.
HIPPOLYTUS: oimoi, I understand! That goddess destroyed me!
ARTEMIS: She faulted your scorn and hated your chastity.
HIPPOLYTUS: On her own she destroyed three of us.
ARTEMIS: Yes: you, your father and his wife.
HIPPOLYTUS: I weep, then, for my father’s misfortune.
ARTEMIS: The goddess plotted to deceive him.
> HIPPOLYTUS: (to Theseus) Father, you’ve suffered great unhappiness.
THESEUS: I’m ruined, son. I have no joy in life.
HIPPOLYTUS: For your sake more than mine your error grieves me.
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THESEUS: I wish I were the one dying, not you.
HIPPOLYTUS: Bitter gift of your father Poseidon!
THESEUS: I wish the curse had never crossed my lips.
HIPPOLYTUS: You would’ve killed me anyway in your anger.
THESEUS: The gods deluded me; my judgment failed.
HIPPOLYTUS: pheu. Would that men could curse gods!
ARTEMIS: Leave it be. The rage Cypris visited
on your body won’t go unavenged
even when you’re in darkness below.
There will be recompense for your reverence and good heart.
1420
I will exact payment with my own hand
and these unerring arrows: some favorite of hers,
the one she loves most, will pay the penalty.
And you, poor man, will be honored above all
in Troezen, my gift in return for your suffering.
Unwed girls before they marry will cut
their hair to honor you; you will reap
their tears of mourning through the ages.*85
Maidens’ songs will tell your story
for all time; Phaedra’s passion for you
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won’t slip wordlessly into silence.
And you, child of aged Aegeus, take
your son in your arms, draw him close.
In ignorance you killed him: men naturally
make mistakes when gods direct them to.
I counsel you, Hippolytus, not to hate
your father. This destruction is your lot.
And so farewell. I may not stay to watch
you die, be tainted by your dying breath.*86
I see that you are near that end now.
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HIPPOLYTUS: Farewell to you, blessed maiden! Go now.
You leave our long acquaintance easily.
I fight my father no longer, as you ask.
Before this, too, I obeyed your command.
(Artemis exits.)
aiai, now darkness covers my eyes.
Father, take hold of me; raise me up.
THESEUS: oimoi, child, what are you doing to me?
HIPPOLYTUS: I’m dying. I see the gates of death before me.
THESEUS: You leave me with my hands tainted?
HIPPOLYTUS: No, no. I absolve you of my murder.
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THESEUS: You mean, you release me from bloodguilt?
HIPPOLYTUS: As Artemis of the deadly arrows is my witness.*87
THESEUS: Dearest son, how good you are to your father!
HIPPOLYTUS: Pray you’re treated so by sons born in wedlock.*88
THESEUS: oimoi, your good and reverent heart! Farewell!
HIPPOLYTUS: Farewell, Father, again farewell.
THESEUS: Don’t desert me, child. Be strong.
HIPPOLYTUS: My strength is gone; my death is here.
Father, cover my face quickly now.
THESEUS: Glorious Athens, land of Troezen,
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such a man you’ve lost! In misery
I’ll recall the pain you’ve caused, Cypris.
CHORUS: (chanting) All citizens feel this new grief together.*89
It wasn’t foreseen.
There will be a torrent of tears.
Great men’s stories, when they’re told,
spread greater sorrow.
* * *
*1 Gods traditionally appear on the roof of the skēnē in Greek tragedy.
*2 The name Cypris probably originates from Aphrodite’s cult site on the island of Cyprus, in myth her place of birth. She is thus called “the Cyprian,” but in this play the epithet is used as if it were her name, equivalent to Aphrodite.
*3 In the mythic tradition, Theseus’ first wife, named Hippolyta or (in some versions) Antiope, had been an Amazon queen.
*4 Theseus’ grandfather.
*5 Attica is here called the land of Pandion after one of its legendary kings. The Mysteries were celebrated at Eleusis, near Athens, to honor the goddess Demeter.
*6 The rock of Pallas is the Acropolis in Athens; there was, in Euripides’ day, on the slope of the Acropolis, a cult site to Hippolytus with a temple to Aphrodite.
*7 The Greek here translated “for Hippolytus” can be understood in two ways: either Hippolytus was the cause of the founding of the shrine, or the shrine is located “in the precinct of Hippolytus.” See Barrett, p. 160.
*8 Cecrops is the name of another legendary king of Athens, so the land of Cecrops is Athens. The Pallantids, sons of Pallas, were Theseus’ cousins, who had challenged Theseus’ right to rule Athens. Theseus and his forces killed them, and Theseus thus incurred the pollution of kin-murder, which forced him into exile.
*9 In myth, both Aegeus and Poseidon are fathers of Theseus, both having slept with his mother, Aethra, on the same night.
*10 It is impossible to say whether Aphrodite leaves the roof by a staircase or is carried off by the mēchanē, a cranelike device that was often used for the appearance and departure of divinities.
*11 Line divisions in songs vary from editor to editor, so the numbering of lines in the lyric sections, which is conventional, does not always correspond to the number of lines in this translation.
*12 A line (“of maidens, Artemis”) has been omitted, largely for metrical reasons.
*13 The concept of aidōs is central to the play. No English equivalent exists, so I will leave the Greek term untranslated where it is personified. Aidōs is a gauge of a person’s moral strength. It can take the form of respect for society’s conventions; a sense of shame about how others will see you if you act inappropriately or immorally; or modesty and restraint in one’s interactions with others. It can be viewed as either a positive or an inhibiting force.
*14 Ocean’s water is fresh, not salty, so the stream fed by it is suitable for washing clothes.
*15 “The lady” is Phaedra.
*16 The Chorus speculate about the source of Phaedra’s illness. In the strophe they mention various gods who are often thought to cause mysterious illnesses; in the antistrophe they consider human causes, such as infidelity or bad news from her family in Crete. The text is uncertain in the first and fifth lines of the strophe.
*17 Another name for Artemis.
*18 Athenians. Erechtheus was, in myth, the first king of Athens.
*19 Phaedra comes from Crete, where her family still lives.
*20 The rhythm from here until line 266 is anapestic.
*21 Line 172 has been transposed to the Nurse’s speech, between lines 180 and 181. The line, which refers to Phaedra’s changing moods, is more appropriately spoken by the Nurse.
*22 Many editors of the play consider the last seven lines of the Nurse’s speech a later interpolation because of their sententiousness and seeming irrelevance. I would argue that they belong in Euripides’ text as an elaboration of the Nurse’s deeply pragmatic and pessimistic nature, which is important for understanding her later actions.
*23 Given the limitations on aristocratic women’s movement outside the house and Phaedra’s usual concern for her reputation, this desire of hers to run free in the wild, and to hunt and race horses, as Hippolytus does, is shocking to the nurse.
*24 The Thessalian javelin was a light spear that hunters threw at a boar or deer when they had encircled it.
*25 The Greeks imported horses from a people called the Enetoi (Venetoi) who lived on the north coast of the Adriatic and after whom Venice is named.
*26 The verb here has aidōs as its root.
*27 This phrase was inscribed on the entranceway to the temple of Apollo at Delphi, the site of his temple and oracle.
*28 The text is uncertain here and at line 277, where it has been emended.
*29 The nurse seems to suggest that Phaedra’s illness may have to do with pregnancy or another gynecological problem, for which she would seek help from a midwife or experienced older woman rather than a male doctor.
*30 According to Apollodorus, Phaedra’s sons by Theseus are named Acamas and Demophon (3.16.18). The nurse’s point here is that without Phaedra’s support, her sons may be displaced in Theseus’ favor by Hippolytus, who is his first child, though illegitimate because his mother is a foreigner. In the mythic tradition, Demophon does eventually become king of Athens, although the tradition is not consistent in making Phaedra his mother.
*31 Hippolytus is the child of Theseus and an Amazon, either Hippolyta or Antiope.
*32 In the act of supplication, the suppliant kneels and takes hold of the knees and hand, or chin, of the person who has the power to grant him or her what he or she needs. The person thus supplicated is bound by the ritual act of supplication to respond to the request.
*33 Phaedra points to the illicit love of her mother, Pasiphae, for the Minotaur and (two lines farther on) that of her sister, Ariadne, for Dionysus, as a way of approaching the subject of her illicit love for Hippolytus, her stepson.
*34 The dochmiac rhythm was created to express the intense emotions of tragedy.
*35 Phaedra calls aidōs (see note to line 78) a pleasure because it is the quality that allows a person to have a reputation for goodness.
*36 The “good” aidōs allows a person to restrain herself when to act would hurt her reputation. The “bad” aidōs makes a person unable to act to preserve her honor, out of fear of putting herself forward, or of condemnation, or of misplaced respect. As Phaedra says, it is never entirely clear whether restraint or action is the right thing in any given situation. If it were clear, she argues, there would be a different word for the two different reactions. Aidōs can be a bad pleasure because it can preserve a good reputation while stopping someone from doing what is right, since reputation is not necessarily based on what is actually good.
*37 Phaedra several times uses the Greek word erōs to describe the passion she feels for Hippolytus. The word can represent the feeling of lust itself or that feeling personified as the god Eros, whose bow and arrows instill desire in those they strike. The verb “wound” here seems suited to the personification.
*38 A citizen’s persuasiveness in the law courts or assembly of Athens depended on the strength and quality of his reputation. This reference to contemporary Athenian politics is anachronistic.
*39 The Nurse gives two examples of gods who fell in love with mortals. Their passion for an inappropriate object did not, the Nurse argues, cause them to feel shame before other gods and hide themselves away.
The Greek Plays Page 69
