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Informationen zum Autor Little is known of the life of Euripides. He was born about 485 B.C. on the island of Salamis and may have begun a career as a painter before writing in the drama competitions in 455 B.C. During his lifetime his plays were often produced, but he won the Athenian drama prize only four times. He died in 406 B.C. Euripides was a prolific writer, the author of some eighty-eight or more plays, of which nineteen have survived under his name. He was criticized by the conservatives of his time for introducing shabby heroes and immoral women into his plays, a practice that they considered degrading to the noble form of tragedy. However, audiences to whom his predecessors were cold and remote found Euripides direct and appealing. Euripides became immensely popular after he died and his influence altered drama forever. Considered by George Bernard Shaw to be the greatest of the Greek dramatists, Euripides is now regarded by many as the originator of the dramatic sensibility that developed into what we call "modern" European drama. Klappentext The first playwright of democracy, Euripides wrote with enduring insight and biting satire about social and political problems of Athenian life. In contrast to his contemporaries, he brought an exciting--and, to the Greeks, a stunning--realism to the "pure and noble form" of tragedy. For the first time in history, heroes and heroines on the stage were not idealized: as Sophocles himself said, Euripides shows people not as they ought to be, but as they actually are. Leseprobe ALCESTIS CHARACTERS Apollo Death Chorus, elders of Pherae Handmaid Alcestis, wife of Admetus Admetus, King of Pherae Eumelus, son of Admetus and Alcestis Heracles Pheres, father of Admetus Butler Guards, attendants, mourners The scene represents the palace of Admetus at Pherae. Alcestis was acted in 438 b.c. [Enter Apollo, gorgeously dressed, with bow and quiver.] APOLLO. House of Admetus, in which I condescended to put up with a slave's table, I a god! Zeus was the cause: he killed my son Asclepius by hurling the lightning into his breast, and I in my anger slew the Cyclopes who fashion Zeus' fire; for this has the father constrained me to do bond service to a mortal man. I came to this land and tended cattle for my host, and I preserved his house to this day. In the son of Pheres I found a pious man, as I myself am pious, and I rescued him from death by tricking the Fates. These deities agreed that Admetus could escape Hades for the present by offering in exchange another body to the spirits below. He canvassed and solicited all his friends, his aged father and the mother who bore him, but he found no one except his wife willing for his sake to die and to forgo the light of day. His wife is now moving about the house supported in his arms and is gasping her last, for upon this day it is fated for her to die and quit this life. I am leaving the friendly shelter of these halls lest the pollution of death come upon me within doors. Already I perceive Death hard by, the priest of the dead who is ready to lead her down to the house of Hades. Punctually does he arrive; he has been watching for this day upon which she must die. [Enter Death, in a fearful and gloomy dress, with a bare sword.] DEATH. Ha! Ha! What are you up to outside the palace, why are you prowling about here, Phoebus? Are you at your tricks again? Appropriating the dues of the powers below and ending our perquisites? Was it not enough for you to prevent the death of Admetus by beguiling the Fates with a sly trick? Now you have armed your hand with a bow to keep guard also over this woman, this daughter of Pelias, who saved her husband by undertaking to die for him herself. APOLLO. Never fear. Justice and fair arguments are on my side. DEATH. What need of a bow if justice is on you...
