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Agamemnon
The war is over and the hero returns. But what good is a hero without a war? What else does he know but warfare? And his city has managed without him. The gap left by his departure has closed. Yet the problems he left behind have remained. They have lain dormant. But his return revives them.
172 pages, Paperback
First published March 2, 2014
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November 9, 2016
Interesting, though lacks the clarity of character to urge one to feel.
Unlike in Aeschylus' Agamemnon, Seneca's Clytemnestra is insecure and neurotic. She relies on Aegisthus for clarity and purpose. However, her lust for him is sometimes overshadowed by her devotion to Agamemnon.
The most interesting part of the story is something which Seneca added, not found in any other renditions of this story. During the return to Argos, the herald Eurybates announces Agamemnon's return, describing that much of the Greek fleet was destroyed:
"The fleet itself helps on its own destruction, prow crashing on prow and side on side. One ship the yawning deep sucks into the abyss, engulfs and spews forth again, restored to the sea above; one sinks of its own weight, another turns its wrecked side to the waves, and one the tenth wave o’erwhelms. Here, battered and stripped of all its ornament, one floats, with neither sails nor oars nor straight mast bearing the high sailyards, a broken hulk, drifting wide on the Icarian sea. Reason, experience, are of no avail; skill yields to dire calamity. Horror holds their limbs; the sailors all stand stupefied, their tasks abandoned; oars drop from hands"
Unlike in Aeschylus' Agamemnon, Seneca's Clytemnestra is insecure and neurotic. She relies on Aegisthus for clarity and purpose. However, her lust for him is sometimes overshadowed by her devotion to Agamemnon.
The most interesting part of the story is something which Seneca added, not found in any other renditions of this story. During the return to Argos, the herald Eurybates announces Agamemnon's return, describing that much of the Greek fleet was destroyed:
"The fleet itself helps on its own destruction, prow crashing on prow and side on side. One ship the yawning deep sucks into the abyss, engulfs and spews forth again, restored to the sea above; one sinks of its own weight, another turns its wrecked side to the waves, and one the tenth wave o’erwhelms. Here, battered and stripped of all its ornament, one floats, with neither sails nor oars nor straight mast bearing the high sailyards, a broken hulk, drifting wide on the Icarian sea. Reason, experience, are of no avail; skill yields to dire calamity. Horror holds their limbs; the sailors all stand stupefied, their tasks abandoned; oars drop from hands"
Displaying 1 of 1 review