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Fedra
FEDRA je remek-djelo klasicizma. Višeslojna priča ispripovijedana je na jednostavan način.
Radnja se odvija u Trezeni, u jednom danu, u samom trenutku krize - kada Fedrina ljubav i sramota izlaze na vidjelo - od trenutka kada Fedra, mučena strašnom tajnom prvi put odlučuje oduzeti sebi život, do trenutka kada to čini, a sve je ispjevano uzvišenim stilom u uzornim aleksandrincima.
Radnja se odvija u Trezeni, u jednom danu, u samom trenutku krize - kada Fedrina ljubav i sramota izlaze na vidjelo - od trenutka kada Fedra, mučena strašnom tajnom prvi put odlučuje oduzeti sebi život, do trenutka kada to čini, a sve je ispjevano uzvišenim stilom u uzornim aleksandrincima.
103 pages, Paperback
First published March 1, 1677
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About the author
Jean Racine
2,047 books360 followersClassical Greek and Roman themes base noted tragedies, such as
Britannicus
(1669) and
Phèdre
(1677), of French playwright Jean Baptiste Racine.
Adherents of movement of Cornelis Jansen included Jean Baptiste Racine.
This dramatist ranks alongside Molière (Jean Baptiste Poquelin) and Pierre Corneille of the "big three" of 17th century and of the most important literary figures in the western tradition. Psychological insight, the prevailing passion of characters, and the nakedness of both plot and stage mark dramaturgy of Racine. Although primarily a tragedian, Racine wrote one comedy.
Orphaned by the age of four years when his mother died in 1641 and his father died in 1643, he came into the care of his grandparents. At the death of his grandfather in 1649, his grandmother, Marie des Moulins, went to live in the convent of Port-Royal and took her grandson Jean-Baptiste. He received a classical education at the Petites écoles de Port-Royal, a religious institution that greatly influenced other contemporary figures, including Blaise Pascal.
The French bishops and the pope condemned Jansenism, a heretical theology, but its followers ran Port-Royal. Interactions of Racine with the Jansenists in his years at this academy great influenced the rest of his life. At Port-Royal, he excelled in his studies of the classics, and the themes of Greek and Roman mythology played large roles in his works.
Jean Racine died from cancer of the liver. He requested burial in Port-Royal, but after Louis XIV razed this site in 1710, people moved his body to the church of Saint-Étienne-du-Mont in Paris.
*source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Ra...
Adherents of movement of Cornelis Jansen included Jean Baptiste Racine.
This dramatist ranks alongside Molière (Jean Baptiste Poquelin) and Pierre Corneille of the "big three" of 17th century and of the most important literary figures in the western tradition. Psychological insight, the prevailing passion of characters, and the nakedness of both plot and stage mark dramaturgy of Racine. Although primarily a tragedian, Racine wrote one comedy.
Orphaned by the age of four years when his mother died in 1641 and his father died in 1643, he came into the care of his grandparents. At the death of his grandfather in 1649, his grandmother, Marie des Moulins, went to live in the convent of Port-Royal and took her grandson Jean-Baptiste. He received a classical education at the Petites écoles de Port-Royal, a religious institution that greatly influenced other contemporary figures, including Blaise Pascal.
The French bishops and the pope condemned Jansenism, a heretical theology, but its followers ran Port-Royal. Interactions of Racine with the Jansenists in his years at this academy great influenced the rest of his life. At Port-Royal, he excelled in his studies of the classics, and the themes of Greek and Roman mythology played large roles in his works.
Jean Racine died from cancer of the liver. He requested burial in Port-Royal, but after Louis XIV razed this site in 1710, people moved his body to the church of Saint-Étienne-du-Mont in Paris.
*source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Ra...
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January 11, 2016
Phèdre is hydrogen.
Phèdre is helium.
Phèdre is a star.
I say this not only because she's the main character in this glorious play, and even less because she's been played by some of the greatest actresses in the world (Sarah Bernhardt, Helen Mirren, Fernanda Montenegro - yes, even Brazil adapted this famous play!), but because she's constantly in a thermonuclear fusion between reason and emotion that ultimately leads to self-destruction in such a powerful blast that affects all the other bodies that gravitate around her.
In general terms (hey, I'm not a scientist!, just an enthusiast, so bear with my simplifications here), a star, during the course of its life, suffers from a combat of gigantic proportions between internal pressure - caused by the fusion of hydrogen into helium in high temperature and high pressure reactions - and gravity. Once the fusion has been through enough for millions of years and exhausted its elements, the radiation pressure becomes too much, winning the battle against gravity, and the star explodes.
Phèdre, Jean Racine's protagonist, suffers from an inner turmoil while trying to control her forbidden desires through her conscience - the gravity that holds everything together within her -, wishing to transform love into hate (to be able to keep Hippolyte away). Exhausted by her constant struggle, she collapses when she can't take the heat no more through an explosion of unparalleled precedents, gushing to unimaginable distances her true feelings, like lava from a dormant volcano that's been inactive for centuries and that once active won't stop showing its true power, its true magnitude, and creating drastic consequences which, in Phèdre's case, is the awaited confession of her incestuous feelings that have been suppressed for so long towards her stepson.
Leaving the stars in the sky and volcano activity, for own on safety, extinct, this is a very intense, fascinating tragedy (so much that I couldn't help but to read every line more than a couple of times, as if I was producing a stage adaptation of my own where I would play all characters and needed to memorize everything.) You will find here no filler scenes, no unnecessary characters, no gimmicks. Instead of that, Racine brought all big feelings into play: there is guilt, there is jealousy, there is self-loathing and, of course, there is love. This is not a good vs evil confrontation, which I find modern and down-to-earth as, let's agree, we all have good and bad inside of us, so Racine excels in not creating determined heroes and villains, but by writing of the conflicts between confused feelings which, in their turn, drive the actions between what has been decided, pre-established against desire in its purest form - pure as in free from all boundaries and conventions: Hippolyte loves Aricie, even though she has to remain chaste and is prohibited territory by his father; and Phèdre falls in love with her stepson, the main arch of this fascinating play.
This is such a heavy psychological story that Racine had no need to resort to showing violence on stage: feelings and words were enough. An interesting parallel to be made here is how these characters were - obviously - fruits of the playwright’s wishes and commands, from his dialogues to his stage directions, just like we, in our real lives, can be controlled by such feelings as love and jealousy - as if they were ruthless playwrights on their own - writing and changing our lines and actions the way they see fit, ignoring previous established thoughts and behaviors, changing everything on the go, leaving their 'actors' (us) to work without any rehearsal, waiting for the spectacle to begin to then change everything, leaving all that was planned behind. Phèdre, the woman, had to improvise many times as well for she wasn't able to go on with what her reason had imposed on her, losing control on stage. This gave me a sense of realism - although, of course, there were mythological elements involved.
Still on the fact that there are no villains or heroes here, even though Phèdre's (or Oenone's) actions were to be condemned, still they are somehow understandable - even if not agreeable - once you consider the situation they're in. Racine's own words of Phèdre is that she "is neither entirely guilty nor altogether innocent. She is involved by her destiny, and by the anger of the gods, in an unlawful passion at which she is the very first to be horrified. She prefers to let herself die rather than declare it to anyone. And, when she is forced to disclose it, she speaks with such embarrassment that it is clear that her crime is a punishment of the gods rather than an urge flowing from her own will.”
It may seem Phèdre's ordeal would be enough material to make this play so enchanting, but no. As I mentioned before, there's another forbidden love blooming simultaneously: that of Aricie and Hippolyte. I have once more to applaud Racine for his writing as I always found a fascinating topic that love's disguise is normally hatred, instead of indifference. Hippolyte, in order to camouflage - not hide - his feelings for Aricie (and the same applies, in the beginning, to how his stepmother acted towards him), made use of hate. It seems the desire of receiving something in return, of awakening in the other any sentiment - even hate - is better than to go on unnoticed (for receiving indifference back would be too harsh), as if it would be easier to transform that sentiment into love than to generate a brand new feeling from scratch.
I’m beyond happy to have read this gorgeous play. I find it delightful that in literature, just as in life, things are all interconnected. Artists, in their works, generously offer us new material, new books, new writings to pursue, as if to not abandon us - knowing that ending a book leaves us with a sense of being lost -, so they show us the way to new knowledge, to new books, to new writers, to whom we will devote ourselves until the time has come for us to jump on the next train, which will in its turn connect us to others and unexplored roads. That's how I came to know Racine and Phèdre at this time, from reading another Frenchman work, which came to me from another book and so on infinitely, both onwards and backwards, to an endless and very satisfactory journey.
Rating: for a play that is, to my knowledge, psychologically accurate - written in 17th century - in depicting its characters' actions in a believable way and for Racine, masterful writer and, I must say, the true protagonist here: 5 stars that will keep on shining for a very long, long time.
Phèdre is helium.
Phèdre is a star.
I say this not only because she's the main character in this glorious play, and even less because she's been played by some of the greatest actresses in the world (Sarah Bernhardt, Helen Mirren, Fernanda Montenegro - yes, even Brazil adapted this famous play!), but because she's constantly in a thermonuclear fusion between reason and emotion that ultimately leads to self-destruction in such a powerful blast that affects all the other bodies that gravitate around her.
In general terms (hey, I'm not a scientist!, just an enthusiast, so bear with my simplifications here), a star, during the course of its life, suffers from a combat of gigantic proportions between internal pressure - caused by the fusion of hydrogen into helium in high temperature and high pressure reactions - and gravity. Once the fusion has been through enough for millions of years and exhausted its elements, the radiation pressure becomes too much, winning the battle against gravity, and the star explodes.
Phèdre, Jean Racine's protagonist, suffers from an inner turmoil while trying to control her forbidden desires through her conscience - the gravity that holds everything together within her -, wishing to transform love into hate (to be able to keep Hippolyte away). Exhausted by her constant struggle, she collapses when she can't take the heat no more through an explosion of unparalleled precedents, gushing to unimaginable distances her true feelings, like lava from a dormant volcano that's been inactive for centuries and that once active won't stop showing its true power, its true magnitude, and creating drastic consequences which, in Phèdre's case, is the awaited confession of her incestuous feelings that have been suppressed for so long towards her stepson.
Leaving the stars in the sky and volcano activity, for own on safety, extinct, this is a very intense, fascinating tragedy (so much that I couldn't help but to read every line more than a couple of times, as if I was producing a stage adaptation of my own where I would play all characters and needed to memorize everything.) You will find here no filler scenes, no unnecessary characters, no gimmicks. Instead of that, Racine brought all big feelings into play: there is guilt, there is jealousy, there is self-loathing and, of course, there is love. This is not a good vs evil confrontation, which I find modern and down-to-earth as, let's agree, we all have good and bad inside of us, so Racine excels in not creating determined heroes and villains, but by writing of the conflicts between confused feelings which, in their turn, drive the actions between what has been decided, pre-established against desire in its purest form - pure as in free from all boundaries and conventions: Hippolyte loves Aricie, even though she has to remain chaste and is prohibited territory by his father; and Phèdre falls in love with her stepson, the main arch of this fascinating play.
This is such a heavy psychological story that Racine had no need to resort to showing violence on stage: feelings and words were enough. An interesting parallel to be made here is how these characters were - obviously - fruits of the playwright’s wishes and commands, from his dialogues to his stage directions, just like we, in our real lives, can be controlled by such feelings as love and jealousy - as if they were ruthless playwrights on their own - writing and changing our lines and actions the way they see fit, ignoring previous established thoughts and behaviors, changing everything on the go, leaving their 'actors' (us) to work without any rehearsal, waiting for the spectacle to begin to then change everything, leaving all that was planned behind. Phèdre, the woman, had to improvise many times as well for she wasn't able to go on with what her reason had imposed on her, losing control on stage. This gave me a sense of realism - although, of course, there were mythological elements involved.
Still on the fact that there are no villains or heroes here, even though Phèdre's (or Oenone's) actions were to be condemned, still they are somehow understandable - even if not agreeable - once you consider the situation they're in. Racine's own words of Phèdre is that she "is neither entirely guilty nor altogether innocent. She is involved by her destiny, and by the anger of the gods, in an unlawful passion at which she is the very first to be horrified. She prefers to let herself die rather than declare it to anyone. And, when she is forced to disclose it, she speaks with such embarrassment that it is clear that her crime is a punishment of the gods rather than an urge flowing from her own will.”
It may seem Phèdre's ordeal would be enough material to make this play so enchanting, but no. As I mentioned before, there's another forbidden love blooming simultaneously: that of Aricie and Hippolyte. I have once more to applaud Racine for his writing as I always found a fascinating topic that love's disguise is normally hatred, instead of indifference. Hippolyte, in order to camouflage - not hide - his feelings for Aricie (and the same applies, in the beginning, to how his stepmother acted towards him), made use of hate. It seems the desire of receiving something in return, of awakening in the other any sentiment - even hate - is better than to go on unnoticed (for receiving indifference back would be too harsh), as if it would be easier to transform that sentiment into love than to generate a brand new feeling from scratch.
I’m beyond happy to have read this gorgeous play. I find it delightful that in literature, just as in life, things are all interconnected. Artists, in their works, generously offer us new material, new books, new writings to pursue, as if to not abandon us - knowing that ending a book leaves us with a sense of being lost -, so they show us the way to new knowledge, to new books, to new writers, to whom we will devote ourselves until the time has come for us to jump on the next train, which will in its turn connect us to others and unexplored roads. That's how I came to know Racine and Phèdre at this time, from reading another Frenchman work, which came to me from another book and so on infinitely, both onwards and backwards, to an endless and very satisfactory journey.
Rating: for a play that is, to my knowledge, psychologically accurate - written in 17th century - in depicting its characters' actions in a believable way and for Racine, masterful writer and, I must say, the true protagonist here: 5 stars that will keep on shining for a very long, long time.
June 16, 2014
When is one guilty of something, when one commits the reprehensible deed, and only one knows it, or when it is made known to others?
Phèdre thinks that the latter case is a great deal worse, worse even than death:
je meurs pour ne point faire un aveu si funeste
je n’en mourrai plus, j’en mourrai plus coupable
And so probably did Racine, because in his Phèdre, the action is activated by Phèdre’s avowal of her guilt which she makes three times. These three long soliloquies are amongst the most famous parts of the play. She is guilty of loving her stepson and she acknowledges this to her “confidente” (Oenone), to her stepson (Hyppolite), and to her husband (Thésée). These three confessions trigger the drama that unfolds irremediably fast, bringing the tragic downfall of both guilty and non guilty.
But the interest of this play is not in the plot, but in the themes that Racine so lyrically develops. Love coupled with jealousy as a fatal damnation. Treachery as the worst ignominy that can be suffered and inflicted. Choices that remain captive and render Destiny unavoidable. And expectedly in Racine, the power of the word as the vehicle for the human soul.
Racine’s tragedies are distilled drama. They are tragedies at their purest in which there is the very minimum of extraneous material. Respecting the three Aristotelian units of one place, one theme and one unit of time (one day), Racine also added the typically 17th century French concept of “bienséance” or “propriety”. He approached the three units by emptying them as much as possible. The place is no place, but just an enclosing undefined lieu that traps the tragic heroes and heroines in their own disarrays. The action takes place elsewhere and the messengers just inform the enclosed heroes about them. The resulting single action we see acted is no action at all, but the soul’s suffering them (in a way similarly to Baroque opera in which the recitatives tell the story and the arias sing the feelings). With so much material stripped out, then everything can happen quickly. We end up not been aware of whether it all happened in one day, or in an accelerated, condensed and immeasurable eternity. On the stage are left the abstract concepts that do not resolve.
For Phèdre has remained guilty.
I have reread this play as a complement to reading Marcel Proust’s La recherche du temps perdu as part of the 2013: The Year of Reading Proust Group. And since it is a play I have sought to watch it acted out. I found this DVD http://www.amazon.co.uk/Ph%C3%A8dre-D..., and therefore my review will comment on this production as well.
I should add that, sadly, this is the only filmed production of a Racine play that I have been able to find. Are they commercially so unattractive? When I lived in Paris I was on a budget but was willing to stand and queue, for sometimes close to two hours, to be able to get the cheapest tickets (FF12.-) for the Comédie Française performances (Corneille, Marivaux, but mostly Molière and Racine). In one year I did not miss one single production.
I am lucky that I have seen some wonderful productions of Racine at the CF then. The stage settings were bare. The accoutrements for emphasizing the Drama were almost only the costumes that the characters wore, with their flowing tunics and floating capes and veils. They were simple but made out of absolutely exquisite materials. Contrasting hues in the clothing paralleled opposite personalities while subtle gradations in color tones marked allegiances. Only tenuously would they distract from the declaimed verses. The acting was selective. Racine’s characters do not move abruptly nor do they gesticulate while they converse. They do not need to touch since they reach each other with their words. Racine’s heroes and heroines are walking and speaking souls.
When in this DVD Phèdre first appears on the stage as a crouching and limping neurotic woman I was shocked that this could be a Racine Queen. I had been expecting a dignified dame whose august and majestic body carried the full weight of suffering in a stately manner. Phèdre is most famous for her remarkable and very long monologues, known to be so difficult to deliver well that they can make or unmake an actress. It seems that theatre critics count their career in France by the number of Phèdres they have attended. The legendary Sarah Bernhardt was unforgettably photographed in this role.
But this unappealing first entrance of a broken and bent Phèdre in my DVD is, furthermore, followed by somewhat hysterical characters who shout at each other their love and longings. Their incensed and broken sentences and undue emphasis at invented syncopations ruins Racine’s verses and rhyme.
For Racine was a master of the Alexandrines, the twelve syllable verses with a clear caesura in its exact middle. His iambic hexameters establish a cadential rhythm which measures an even pace. True, at selected times he breaks and joins the verses with a skillful “enjambement” (the continuation of a thought in the following verse) that has an effect of an accelerated train of thought, but this enjambement ought not to interfere with a mellifluous enunciation of the lines. His verses should have the lulling effect of a hypnotic lullaby.
In the DVD production, with its broken chants and histrionic acting, a worthy exception is Théramène’s account of Hyppolite’s death. Were a film director of Steven Spielberg’s kind get hold of Théramène’s speech, it would be inflated it into a fantastic rendering of monsters, seas opening into abysms, and a hair-raising run of frenzied and desperate horses with a fatal consequence. Instead, true to Racine, a sad man, barely moving, declaims this succession of horrors, without blinking, depicting with only words the dreadful scene that gradually sinks the listening father into an unavoidable sorrow. What a wonderful speech.
It is not surprising that Racine’s selected use of words and exquisite ability with the Alexandrines would fascinate someone as careful and sensitive to the power of language as Marcel Proust. We have Proust’s explicit admiration for the way Racine could twist the very formal structure of his verses and with a broken syntax add ambiguity and richness to his meaning. These examples he gave are from Andromaque:
Pourquoi l’assassiner, Qu’a-t-il fait? A quel titre ?
Qui te l’a dit ?
But it was the poignant portrayal of guilty love in Phèdre that obsessed Proust. And it is this play, which he knew in its entirety by heart, that he has associated to his fictional actress La Berma and which figures in La recherche repeatedly.
--------------------------
After this wonderful reading I will proceed with the rereading of more plays by Racine and with the listening of Rameau’s Opera, Hippolyte et Aricie.
November 4, 2023
Phaedra, princess of Crete, became queen of Athens when she married the legendary hero Theseus. But her story did not end there: she famously (or notoriously) fell in love with her stepson Hippolytus, and Phaedra’s fateful decision to tell Hippolytus of her illicit and incestuous passion set in motion a cycle of retribution and tragedy that was chronicled by classical writers like Euripides, Ovid, and Seneca. And centuries after the end of the classical period, one of France’s greatest dramatists, Jean Racine, brought to the same material a decided Gallic sensibility, a series of profound and searching meditations on the human heart, and an acute gift for psychological insight.
Jean-Baptiste Racine stands with Molière among the foremost of France’s 17th-century dramatists. Where Molière, as a dramatist, tended to work within the conventions of the comedy of manners, Racine inclined toward more of a tragic sensibility; and the classical education that he received at the abbey of Port-Royal may have nourished his interest in tragic stories from ancient Greece. Phèdre was first staged in 1677; and like Racine’s earlier plays about Andromache and Iphigenia, Phèdre demonstrates how Racine’s fascination with the ancient world combined with his interest in the situation of women, in ancient times and in his own.
As Phèdre begins, Athens is in a state of uncertainty. The Athenian king, Theseus, is said to be dead, and the question of the royal succession is in doubt. Hippolytus is Theseus’ son by an Amazon noblewoman. Since that time, however, Theseus married Phaedra (in Racine’s French formulation, Phèdre) of Crete, and Theseus and Phèdre have had a son of their own.
And Phèdre is desperate, driven to the brink of suicide, by her obsessive passion for her stepson Hippolytus. Knowing that such feelings are unworthy of a queen, a woman of royal blood, Phèdre confides her guilty secret to her servant Oenone, planning afterwards to take her own life.
But Oenone urges Phèdre to live on: “The King is dead, my lady, and you must take his place./His death leaves you a son to whom you owe everything./If you die, he will be a slave; if you live, he will be a king.” She even invites Phèdre to hope that the queen’s incestuous desires might find fulfillment: “Your love has become an ordinary love./In his death, Theseus has dissolved the complications/Which made of your passion a fearful crime./Hippolytus is less to be feared by you now./You can see him without feeling guilty.” Oenone, an enabler who feels that it is her place to tell a royal patron what said royal patron wants to hear, thus does much to set in motion a tragic cycle of events.
The theme of people loving against their will pervades Racine’s Phèdre. Aricia, an Athenian princess whose family once mounted a coup attempt against Theseus, and who since then has been confined by Theseus as a sort of state prisoner, tells her servant Ismène that she loves Hippolytus, even though she does not want to. She says to Ismène, “You know my long opposition to love”, but adds that when she sees Hippolytus, “I love and esteem in him/The virtues of his father, and not the weaknesses./Let me confess it, I love the noble pride/Which has never bent under the yoke of passion.” Ismène, for her part, suggests that Hippolytus feels the same sort of against-one’s-own will love pangs toward Aricia: “As soon as you looked at him, he seemed upset./His eyes, trying in vain to avoid looking,/Full of yearning, could not leave you./The name of ‘lover’ offends his pride, perhaps,/But he has the eyes of a lover”. The possibility that these two young nobles might find love together is thus set forth.
But Phèdre still loves Hippolytus, and has been encouraged by Oenone to reveal her love to the Prince of Athens. Phèdre does offer herself to Hippolytus, and he reacts with shock to Phèdre’s proposition: “What are these words? Have you forgotten/That Theseus is my father and your husband?” When Phèdre backs off a bit, Hippolytus tries to give her a face-saving way out: “Forgive me, my lady. I blush when I confess/That I wrongfully accused an innocent speech./My shame will not allow me to stay here,/And I am leaving…” Fatefully, however, Hippolytus leaves his sword with Phèdre when he quits her presence.
Some of the most moving passages in Phèdre emphasize the torment that Phèdre feels because of her love for Hippolytus:
Relentless Venus, who knows the shame
Of my ancestors, am I sufficiently humiliated?
You could not increase your cruelty.
Your triumph is complete: every arrow has reached its mark.
If you now seek a new glory,
Turn to an enemy more rebellious than I.
Hippolytus avoids you, and, defying your wrath,
He has never knelt before your altars.
Your name seems to offend his proud ears.
Goddess, avenge yourself! My cause is yours!
Phèdre’s feelings of guilt, of humiliation, of anger, are set forth in a psychologically astute manner – and the reader or viewer, regardless of their level of familiarity with the original Greek myth, senses that Hippolytus’ story is not likely to end well.
In a surprising turn of events, it turns out that Theseus is alive; rumours of his death were most definitely premature. At Oenone’s suggestion, Phèdre agrees to accuse Hippolytus of rape, using Hippolytus’ sword as evidence.
This scenario creates a great deal of dramatic irony. Hippolytus tells Theseus of his plans “forever to disappear from the city your wife inhabits”, adding that “Phèdre alone can explain the mystery.” Clearly, he feels that Phèdre, in accordance with her noble birth and upbringing, will speak the truth about her attempts to seduce Hippolytus. Phèdre, meanwhile, speaks in ambiguous half-truths, telling Theseus that “I do not deserve your tender affections” and stating further that “You have been offended. Jealous fortune/Has not spared your wife in your absence” – all of which is true, after a fashion, though the reality of what happened between Phèdre and Hippolytus is the opposite of what Phèdre will imply.
Theseus is understandably upset by this less-than-royal welcome – “What is this? What horror in this house/Causes everyone to flee from my presence?” – but his disquiet of mind at this point is nothing, compared with what is to come.
Oenone accuses Hippolytus of raping Phèdre, and Theseus, believing Oenone, curses his son, expelling Hippolytus from Athens and calling upon the sea-god Neptune to take a terrible supernatural vengeance against him.
Phèdre, still jealous of Hippolytus’ love, at first wants to have Aricia killed, but then remembers herself better: “What am I doing? Have I lost control of my mind?.../My crimes have become monstrous./They include incest and imposture.” With this moment of what Aristotle called anagnorisis (recognition), Phèdre abandons her designs on Hippolytus and her plans for bloodshed.
Instead, Phèdre turns against Oenone, the servant who sought to pander to her lady’s wrongful desires, when Oenone could instead have spoken hard truths and served as her lady’s conscience: “Are you bent on poisoning me to the very end,/Wretched Oenone? This is how you ruined me.” She expresses anger that Oenone encouraged her to unjustly accuse Hippolytus of rape, and thus perhaps to bring about Hippolytus’ death:
I will heed you no longer, for you are a monster.
Leave my presence.
I wish now to be alone with my tortured fate.
May the justice of heaven reward you,
And may your punishment forever terrify
All those who, like you, with loathsome means,
Feed the weakness of unhappy rulers,
Urge them to submit to the desires of their heart,
And open up the way to unhappy crime!
Oenone is left alone, to meditate despairingly upon where her misplaced sense of personal loyalty has brought her: “I gave up everything and did everything in order to serve her./I deserve the reward she has now given me.”
Aricia and Hippolytus, who have fled the city together, reflect upon the unjust situation that Hippolytus faces. Aricia urges Hippolytus to tell Theseus the truth about Phèdre’s crimes: “Defend your honour from a shameful reproach….Why, through what caprice,/Are you leaving the way open to your accuser?” Hippolytus in turn states his rationale for protecting Phèdre from exposure: “Should I have revealed the wrong of his wife?/In telling him the full details,/Should I have covered his face with unworthy shame?” The two express their hopes for marriage, for a happy life together, in a manner that might remind the reader of Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare’s “star-crossed lovers” who often dream together of a future that can never be.
From that point, the play moves swiftly toward a tragic resolution. Difficult truths are told, a cycle is set forth in which one death leads inexorably to another, and one surviving major character is left to lament that “I will banish myself from the entire universe./Everything rises up against my injustice./The glory of my name increases my suffering.”
What struck me most about Racine’s Phèdre was the creative way in which the great French dramatist reworked characterization from the classical Greek myth. In Euripides’ original play, Hippolytus is an arrogant, self-righteous prig, whose rejection of women and sexual love is a marker of his hubris and self-importance; Aphrodite, angered by his refusal to worship her and respect her divine powers, vengefully causes Phaedra to fall in love with Hippolytus. Poor Phaedra, for all the compassion and pathos with which Euripides dramatizes her situation, is little more than a pawn in the love goddess’s schemes for revenge against the Athenian prince.
In Racine’s play, by contrast, Hippolytus is a likeable enough young man – a rationalist who has hitherto rejected love not in order to insult a goddess, but because he is concerned about the power that the emotions hold to mislead one’s judgement. Horrified by Phèdre’s attempt at seduction, he generously tries to offer Phèdre a way out of her humiliating dilemma, and he chooses to leave Theseus’ court rather than tell Theseus the awful truth about Theseus’ wife. His chief flaw seems to be a sort of philosophical and class-based naivete: Phèdre is a noblewoman, and therefore (Hippolytus believes) she will of course do the honourable thing and tell the truth. Hippolytus, tragically, is mistaken in that assumption.
As for Phèdre herself, Racine makes her not a mythic archetype, but rather a very human character – a flesh-and-blood woman tormented by the strength of her emotions. One feels her anguish at being plagued by feelings she cannot control. Giving in at first to the temptation of trying to realize her illicit desires, she eventually realizes the wrong that she has done, and tries (albeit too late) to confess what she has done and prevent bloodshed.
That cycle of a fatal decision leading to tragedy, and to the tragic hero’s recognition of their place in the universe, is something that one can see in the great tragedies of William Shakespeare’s artistic maturity -- Hamlet, King Lear, Macbeth, and Othello, all of them written between 1600 and 1609. Later in the same century, on the other side of the English Channel, Jean Racine achieved comparably sublime tragic effects with his Phèdre.
Jean-Baptiste Racine stands with Molière among the foremost of France’s 17th-century dramatists. Where Molière, as a dramatist, tended to work within the conventions of the comedy of manners, Racine inclined toward more of a tragic sensibility; and the classical education that he received at the abbey of Port-Royal may have nourished his interest in tragic stories from ancient Greece. Phèdre was first staged in 1677; and like Racine’s earlier plays about Andromache and Iphigenia, Phèdre demonstrates how Racine’s fascination with the ancient world combined with his interest in the situation of women, in ancient times and in his own.
As Phèdre begins, Athens is in a state of uncertainty. The Athenian king, Theseus, is said to be dead, and the question of the royal succession is in doubt. Hippolytus is Theseus’ son by an Amazon noblewoman. Since that time, however, Theseus married Phaedra (in Racine’s French formulation, Phèdre) of Crete, and Theseus and Phèdre have had a son of their own.
And Phèdre is desperate, driven to the brink of suicide, by her obsessive passion for her stepson Hippolytus. Knowing that such feelings are unworthy of a queen, a woman of royal blood, Phèdre confides her guilty secret to her servant Oenone, planning afterwards to take her own life.
But Oenone urges Phèdre to live on: “The King is dead, my lady, and you must take his place./His death leaves you a son to whom you owe everything./If you die, he will be a slave; if you live, he will be a king.” She even invites Phèdre to hope that the queen’s incestuous desires might find fulfillment: “Your love has become an ordinary love./In his death, Theseus has dissolved the complications/Which made of your passion a fearful crime./Hippolytus is less to be feared by you now./You can see him without feeling guilty.” Oenone, an enabler who feels that it is her place to tell a royal patron what said royal patron wants to hear, thus does much to set in motion a tragic cycle of events.
The theme of people loving against their will pervades Racine’s Phèdre. Aricia, an Athenian princess whose family once mounted a coup attempt against Theseus, and who since then has been confined by Theseus as a sort of state prisoner, tells her servant Ismène that she loves Hippolytus, even though she does not want to. She says to Ismène, “You know my long opposition to love”, but adds that when she sees Hippolytus, “I love and esteem in him/The virtues of his father, and not the weaknesses./Let me confess it, I love the noble pride/Which has never bent under the yoke of passion.” Ismène, for her part, suggests that Hippolytus feels the same sort of against-one’s-own will love pangs toward Aricia: “As soon as you looked at him, he seemed upset./His eyes, trying in vain to avoid looking,/Full of yearning, could not leave you./The name of ‘lover’ offends his pride, perhaps,/But he has the eyes of a lover”. The possibility that these two young nobles might find love together is thus set forth.
But Phèdre still loves Hippolytus, and has been encouraged by Oenone to reveal her love to the Prince of Athens. Phèdre does offer herself to Hippolytus, and he reacts with shock to Phèdre’s proposition: “What are these words? Have you forgotten/That Theseus is my father and your husband?” When Phèdre backs off a bit, Hippolytus tries to give her a face-saving way out: “Forgive me, my lady. I blush when I confess/That I wrongfully accused an innocent speech./My shame will not allow me to stay here,/And I am leaving…” Fatefully, however, Hippolytus leaves his sword with Phèdre when he quits her presence.
Some of the most moving passages in Phèdre emphasize the torment that Phèdre feels because of her love for Hippolytus:
Relentless Venus, who knows the shame
Of my ancestors, am I sufficiently humiliated?
You could not increase your cruelty.
Your triumph is complete: every arrow has reached its mark.
If you now seek a new glory,
Turn to an enemy more rebellious than I.
Hippolytus avoids you, and, defying your wrath,
He has never knelt before your altars.
Your name seems to offend his proud ears.
Goddess, avenge yourself! My cause is yours!
Phèdre’s feelings of guilt, of humiliation, of anger, are set forth in a psychologically astute manner – and the reader or viewer, regardless of their level of familiarity with the original Greek myth, senses that Hippolytus’ story is not likely to end well.
In a surprising turn of events, it turns out that Theseus is alive; rumours of his death were most definitely premature. At Oenone’s suggestion, Phèdre agrees to accuse Hippolytus of rape, using Hippolytus’ sword as evidence.
This scenario creates a great deal of dramatic irony. Hippolytus tells Theseus of his plans “forever to disappear from the city your wife inhabits”, adding that “Phèdre alone can explain the mystery.” Clearly, he feels that Phèdre, in accordance with her noble birth and upbringing, will speak the truth about her attempts to seduce Hippolytus. Phèdre, meanwhile, speaks in ambiguous half-truths, telling Theseus that “I do not deserve your tender affections” and stating further that “You have been offended. Jealous fortune/Has not spared your wife in your absence” – all of which is true, after a fashion, though the reality of what happened between Phèdre and Hippolytus is the opposite of what Phèdre will imply.
Theseus is understandably upset by this less-than-royal welcome – “What is this? What horror in this house/Causes everyone to flee from my presence?” – but his disquiet of mind at this point is nothing, compared with what is to come.
Oenone accuses Hippolytus of raping Phèdre, and Theseus, believing Oenone, curses his son, expelling Hippolytus from Athens and calling upon the sea-god Neptune to take a terrible supernatural vengeance against him.
Phèdre, still jealous of Hippolytus’ love, at first wants to have Aricia killed, but then remembers herself better: “What am I doing? Have I lost control of my mind?.../My crimes have become monstrous./They include incest and imposture.” With this moment of what Aristotle called anagnorisis (recognition), Phèdre abandons her designs on Hippolytus and her plans for bloodshed.
Instead, Phèdre turns against Oenone, the servant who sought to pander to her lady’s wrongful desires, when Oenone could instead have spoken hard truths and served as her lady’s conscience: “Are you bent on poisoning me to the very end,/Wretched Oenone? This is how you ruined me.” She expresses anger that Oenone encouraged her to unjustly accuse Hippolytus of rape, and thus perhaps to bring about Hippolytus’ death:
I will heed you no longer, for you are a monster.
Leave my presence.
I wish now to be alone with my tortured fate.
May the justice of heaven reward you,
And may your punishment forever terrify
All those who, like you, with loathsome means,
Feed the weakness of unhappy rulers,
Urge them to submit to the desires of their heart,
And open up the way to unhappy crime!
Oenone is left alone, to meditate despairingly upon where her misplaced sense of personal loyalty has brought her: “I gave up everything and did everything in order to serve her./I deserve the reward she has now given me.”
Aricia and Hippolytus, who have fled the city together, reflect upon the unjust situation that Hippolytus faces. Aricia urges Hippolytus to tell Theseus the truth about Phèdre’s crimes: “Defend your honour from a shameful reproach….Why, through what caprice,/Are you leaving the way open to your accuser?” Hippolytus in turn states his rationale for protecting Phèdre from exposure: “Should I have revealed the wrong of his wife?/In telling him the full details,/Should I have covered his face with unworthy shame?” The two express their hopes for marriage, for a happy life together, in a manner that might remind the reader of Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare’s “star-crossed lovers” who often dream together of a future that can never be.
From that point, the play moves swiftly toward a tragic resolution. Difficult truths are told, a cycle is set forth in which one death leads inexorably to another, and one surviving major character is left to lament that “I will banish myself from the entire universe./Everything rises up against my injustice./The glory of my name increases my suffering.”
What struck me most about Racine’s Phèdre was the creative way in which the great French dramatist reworked characterization from the classical Greek myth. In Euripides’ original play, Hippolytus is an arrogant, self-righteous prig, whose rejection of women and sexual love is a marker of his hubris and self-importance; Aphrodite, angered by his refusal to worship her and respect her divine powers, vengefully causes Phaedra to fall in love with Hippolytus. Poor Phaedra, for all the compassion and pathos with which Euripides dramatizes her situation, is little more than a pawn in the love goddess’s schemes for revenge against the Athenian prince.
In Racine’s play, by contrast, Hippolytus is a likeable enough young man – a rationalist who has hitherto rejected love not in order to insult a goddess, but because he is concerned about the power that the emotions hold to mislead one’s judgement. Horrified by Phèdre’s attempt at seduction, he generously tries to offer Phèdre a way out of her humiliating dilemma, and he chooses to leave Theseus’ court rather than tell Theseus the awful truth about Theseus’ wife. His chief flaw seems to be a sort of philosophical and class-based naivete: Phèdre is a noblewoman, and therefore (Hippolytus believes) she will of course do the honourable thing and tell the truth. Hippolytus, tragically, is mistaken in that assumption.
As for Phèdre herself, Racine makes her not a mythic archetype, but rather a very human character – a flesh-and-blood woman tormented by the strength of her emotions. One feels her anguish at being plagued by feelings she cannot control. Giving in at first to the temptation of trying to realize her illicit desires, she eventually realizes the wrong that she has done, and tries (albeit too late) to confess what she has done and prevent bloodshed.
That cycle of a fatal decision leading to tragedy, and to the tragic hero’s recognition of their place in the universe, is something that one can see in the great tragedies of William Shakespeare’s artistic maturity -- Hamlet, King Lear, Macbeth, and Othello, all of them written between 1600 and 1609. Later in the same century, on the other side of the English Channel, Jean Racine achieved comparably sublime tragic effects with his Phèdre.
November 22, 2018
I missed these French classics.
July 12, 2024
Une très belle pièce de Racine cela faisait longtemps que je n’avais pas lu du théâtre. Phèdre est amoureuse d’Hypolite son beau-fils, amour scandaleux et incestueux.
Comme je l’ai déjà dit c’est une e lente pièce, cependant même si je trouve que certains vers sont vraiment magnifiques vers 675 : les dieux m’en sont témoins ces dieux qui dans mon flanc ont allumé le feu fatal à tout mon sang oui encore pour mieux de résister j’ai cherché ta haine.
L’auteur nous décrit les méandres de la passion toutefois même si la pièce est de bonne qualité pour moi elle ne vaut pas les grandes pièces tragiques de Shakespeare. Et j’aimerais bien lire la version de Sénèque,
Comme je l’ai déjà dit c’est une e lente pièce, cependant même si je trouve que certains vers sont vraiment magnifiques vers 675 : les dieux m’en sont témoins ces dieux qui dans mon flanc ont allumé le feu fatal à tout mon sang oui encore pour mieux de résister j’ai cherché ta haine.
L’auteur nous décrit les méandres de la passion toutefois même si la pièce est de bonne qualité pour moi elle ne vaut pas les grandes pièces tragiques de Shakespeare. Et j’aimerais bien lire la version de Sénèque,
October 20, 2022
في ذهن كل منا خطأ لن يرتكبه و لو"على جثته"و خطأ فيدرا التراجيدي بالتأكيد ينتمي لهذا الطراز..فمن الحمقاء التي تتمنى الوقوع في حب ابن زوجها؟
ثيسيوس قاتل المينوتور🐃 و منقذ شباب اثينا ..الذي فاز بعرش اتيكا و رزق بهيبوليتس من ملكة الامازونيات و بعد موتها يتزوج من فيدرا ابنة ماينوس..و ينجب منها طفلين
و ما ان يصير هيبوليتس شابا حتى تقع فيدرا في حبه!!!؟
افروديت أرسلت لها سهم الحب الحرام.. فهي أرادت الانتقام من ارتيميس ربة العفاف بهذه الطريقة اللعينة الملتفة. .و ردت ارتيمس بان القت سهم العفاف في قلب هيبوليتس
المسرحية كلها مبنية على جو الأساطير الاغريقية الخرافي المعتاد ..بهؤلاء الجالسين في الاوليمب لينكدوا على البشر بصراعاتهم 👿الأبدية
فيدرا هي البطل التراجيدي الكلاسيكي. ..عندنا يقع في صراع بين رغبته الوضيعة التي تتنافى مع جوهر شخصيته النبيلة .
و يعقد النقاد مقارنة بين فيدرا و امرأة العزيز و لكن قرار فيدرا الاخير جعلها تختلف كثيرا ..
فقد رفضت طريق الزيف للنهاية ..
هذه المأساة استفزت كبار الشعراء و الأدباء. .فيرجيل و اوفيد و سينكا و كان حظي مع رؤية راسين التي ترجمها أدونيس قراتها في احدي تلك المكتبات المليئة بالكتب القديمة النادرة المتربة . .فهي قصيرة
و استوحاها باكثير وعزيز أباظة و الحكيم؛ فهي فالنهاية ماساة عن طراز نادر من الأبطال
ثيسيوس قاتل المينوتور🐃 و منقذ شباب اثينا ..الذي فاز بعرش اتيكا و رزق بهيبوليتس من ملكة الامازونيات و بعد موتها يتزوج من فيدرا ابنة ماينوس..و ينجب منها طفلين
و ما ان يصير هيبوليتس شابا حتى تقع فيدرا في حبه!!!؟
افروديت أرسلت لها سهم الحب الحرام.. فهي أرادت الانتقام من ارتيميس ربة العفاف بهذه الطريقة اللعينة الملتفة. .و ردت ارتيمس بان القت سهم العفاف في قلب هيبوليتس
المسرحية كلها مبنية على جو الأساطير الاغريقية الخرافي المعتاد ..بهؤلاء الجالسين في الاوليمب لينكدوا على البشر بصراعاتهم 👿الأبدية
فيدرا هي البطل التراجيدي الكلاسيكي. ..عندنا يقع في صراع بين رغبته الوضيعة التي تتنافى مع جوهر شخصيته النبيلة .
و يعقد النقاد مقارنة بين فيدرا و امرأة العزيز و لكن قرار فيدرا الاخير جعلها تختلف كثيرا ..
فقد رفضت طريق الزيف للنهاية ..
هذه المأساة استفزت كبار الشعراء و الأدباء. .فيرجيل و اوفيد و سينكا و كان حظي مع رؤية راسين التي ترجمها أدونيس قراتها في احدي تلك المكتبات المليئة بالكتب القديمة النادرة المتربة . .فهي قصيرة
و استوحاها باكثير وعزيز أباظة و الحكيم؛ فهي فالنهاية ماساة عن طراز نادر من الأبطال
February 12, 2025
I really liked how accessible it was to read this play. Often, classics are daunting due to how verbose and lengthy they can be. I'd like to say easier than Shakespeare but more plot driven and no comedy.
November 17, 2013
Let's see: thwarted love, betrayal, implied incest, heinous lies, father-son love triangle with wife/stepmother, and a whole lot of death at the end. Um, yeah, that's the recipe for a pretty awesome story. Phaedra, married to Theseus, has always nurtured a secret love for his son, Hippolytus. When she receives news that Theseus is dead, she finally confesses her love to Hippolytus, who is in love with Aricia and is disgusted by his step-mother's advances. But, hey, guess what? Theseus isn't dead and returns just in time for all Hades to break loose . . .
Soap operas have nothing on ancient Greek drama. Plus, on All My Children, you never get a half bull/half dragon sea beastie sent by Neptune to torch our hero into a crispy critter before his horses go mad, crash the chariot, and then drag him to death. And I have to believe that's worth something.
Cross posted at This Insignificant Cinder
Soap operas have nothing on ancient Greek drama. Plus, on All My Children, you never get a half bull/half dragon sea beastie sent by Neptune to torch our hero into a crispy critter before his horses go mad, crash the chariot, and then drag him to death. And I have to believe that's worth something.
Cross posted at This Insignificant Cinder
May 25, 2012
a tragic play , Explores the Depths of the Human Soul ...
fascinating in its complexity.....
Phèdre the young and second wife of the king Theseus, fall in love with his son Hippolytus,her obsession disrupts her,she was losing her mind, sees Hippolytus everywhere. her offerings and prayers to change destination was in vain.....
she had Hippolytus exiled,and dismissed him from her presence.... However, she soon discovered that she could not remove his love from her heart. It remained. So she wished for death as the only way to end her Destined Love and, to punish herself for her betrayal and forbidden and cursed love......
but the sudden announcement of Theseus' death changed everything,she gives up her suicide plan and decided to enjoy life again .......
She lost control over herself and confess to Hippolytus her secret and passionate love, her confession has had an unexpected result,he has no pity on her and was in disgrace because of her shameful confession......
Theseus' return. And stopped the false rumors of his death,At first, Phèdre panic,again threatens suicide,but knowing Hippolytus's crush on the princess Aricia. her hysterical rage ,fear and jealousy make her leave Oenone(her nurse) accuses Hippolytus of attempting to seduce
her, Theseus is completely deceived. Theseus believed her and cursed Hippolytus with one of the three curses he had received from Poseidon. As a result, Hippolytus' horses were frightened by a sea monster and dragged him to his death.....
Phaedra feels guilty , she felt a total horror of herself, Recognizing the atrociousness of her crime, and the excruciating pain and feeling of disgust ,she declared the innocence of Hippolytus,and then committed suicide.......
May 18, 2024
i love reading tragedies as it puts my life into perspective and i realize that after all, nothing really is that bad. i mean i sure was brought up in a highly abusive household but at least, i didn't have a step-mother who accused me of raping her and let my father call upon a god to kill me <3
April 15, 2024
"¡La viuda de Teseo se atreve a amar a Hipólito! Créeme, este horrible monstruo no debe huir; he aquí mi corazón. Aquí debe herir tu mano. Impaciente ya por expiar su culpa, siento que se adelanta al encuentro de su brazo."
Racine es, junto a Moliere y Corneille uno de los mayores representantes del teatro clasicistad en la Francia de Luis XIV. Las obras de estos genios se presentaban en los mejores teatros que iban del Louvre al Versalles.
Estas obras expresaban el alto refinamiento y una completa rendición a la tragedia griega. Los personajes en su mayoría se ubicaban temporalmente en esa época y estas tragedias francesas tenían el mismo tenor y drama que la de sus antecesores helénicos.
En el caso de "Fedra", nos encontramos aquí con una clásica conjunción de amor, celos y traición bajo un halo de muerte latente que envuelve tanto a Fedra, quien es el personaje principal, esposa de Teseo, como al hijo de este, Hipólito y sumando a Aricia, princesa que reclama el poder ante la supuesta muerte de Teseo como de los Enona, Ismena y Pánope, todas cohortes del séquito de Fedra.
El clásico error no advertido del personaje principal y que desencadena un destino funesto que es el de Fedra al enamorarse de Hipólito, desencadena una serie de acontecimientos que arrastrará a todo el mundo a un desaste inminente.
"Fedra" es una excelente tragedia de Racine de quien volveré a leer en un futuro cercano.
Hoy, 15 de abril lo he leído nuevamente y me ha gustado de la misma manera que esa primera vez.
Racine es, junto a Moliere y Corneille uno de los mayores representantes del teatro clasicistad en la Francia de Luis XIV. Las obras de estos genios se presentaban en los mejores teatros que iban del Louvre al Versalles.
Estas obras expresaban el alto refinamiento y una completa rendición a la tragedia griega. Los personajes en su mayoría se ubicaban temporalmente en esa época y estas tragedias francesas tenían el mismo tenor y drama que la de sus antecesores helénicos.
En el caso de "Fedra", nos encontramos aquí con una clásica conjunción de amor, celos y traición bajo un halo de muerte latente que envuelve tanto a Fedra, quien es el personaje principal, esposa de Teseo, como al hijo de este, Hipólito y sumando a Aricia, princesa que reclama el poder ante la supuesta muerte de Teseo como de los Enona, Ismena y Pánope, todas cohortes del séquito de Fedra.
El clásico error no advertido del personaje principal y que desencadena un destino funesto que es el de Fedra al enamorarse de Hipólito, desencadena una serie de acontecimientos que arrastrará a todo el mundo a un desaste inminente.
"Fedra" es una excelente tragedia de Racine de quien volveré a leer en un futuro cercano.
Hoy, 15 de abril lo he leído nuevamente y me ha gustado de la misma manera que esa primera vez.
February 10, 2023
This is the first i have read from racine. Completely loved this from start to finish. He has an amazing way of telling a story and keeping you gripped to find out what will happen next. I am looking forward to reading more from this talented man
This story takes us on the journey of how one womans secret love can twist and turn to alter this family with disastrous consequences.
scandalous and intriguing. I very much enjoyed 😊
This story takes us on the journey of how one womans secret love can twist and turn to alter this family with disastrous consequences.
scandalous and intriguing. I very much enjoyed 😊
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November 8, 2024هفتمین نمایشنامهی ترم چهارم/ «"فدر" نمایشنامهای که راسین خود آن را نپسندید.»
برای خوندن این اثر بهتره اول "هیپولیت" اوریپید رو بخونید چون اقتباسی از اونه. کم پیش میاد به کتابی امتیاز ندم ولی از اونجایی که نگاهی کلاسی و درسی به این اثر دارم نمیدونم باید با امتیازم چه چیز رو نشون بدم. از لحاظ نثر و خلاقیت ۴-۵ امتیازه اما از نظر لذت بردنِ خودم ۲-۳ امتیازه چون خب شاید خودم هیچوقت نمیرفتم سمتش و برام همون هیپولیتِ اصلی خود اوریپید بسه چرا که هیچی به قشنگی نگاه اسطورهای اون نمیرسه؛ اما خب تجربهی جالبی بود به خصوص تفاوتها و مقایسههایی که بین دو اثر انجام دادیم. میمونه فدر سنکا که اونم باید بخونم که ببینم اون از چه زاویهی دیگهای نوشته اما در کل برام جالبه که این داستان تا به امروز ۳ تا اقتباس داشته. مگه چه پتانسیلی داشته که این همه نمایشنامهی دیگه نداشتن. باید اینو از استادمون بپرسم.
برای خوندن این اثر بهتره اول "هیپولیت" اوریپید رو بخونید چون اقتباسی از اونه. کم پیش میاد به کتابی امتیاز ندم ولی از اونجایی که نگاهی کلاسی و درسی به این اثر دارم نمیدونم باید با امتیازم چه چیز رو نشون بدم. از لحاظ نثر و خلاقیت ۴-۵ امتیازه اما از نظر لذت بردنِ خودم ۲-۳ امتیازه چون خب شاید خودم هیچوقت نمیرفتم سمتش و برام همون هیپولیتِ اصلی خود اوریپید بسه چرا که هیچی به قشنگی نگاه اسطورهای اون نمیرسه؛ اما خب تجربهی جالبی بود به خصوص تفاوتها و مقایسههایی که بین دو اثر انجام دادیم. میمونه فدر سنکا که اونم باید بخونم که ببینم اون از چه زاویهی دیگهای نوشته اما در کل برام جالبه که این داستان تا به امروز ۳ تا اقتباس داشته. مگه چه پتانسیلی داشته که این همه نمایشنامهی دیگه نداشتن. باید اینو از استادمون بپرسم.
November 26, 2017
Tous les adolescents tombent d'abord amoureux d'Antigone, parce que c'est la révolte adolescente. C'est quand tu tombes amoureux de Phèdre que tu sais que tu as grandi. J'avais quatorze ans, et je connaissais par cœur la tirade "J'aime. Ne crois pas qu'au moment que je t'aime, Innocente à mes yeux..."
C'était le tout début d'un vrai amour de théâtre.
C'était le tout début d'un vrai amour de théâtre.
March 25, 2009
There's an old Communist-era joke, quoted in the movie The Lives of Others, about the Party Leader's conversation with the Sun. (The punchline is "Fuck off, I'm in the West now"). In Racine's play, Phèdre also has a conversation with the Sun. When I looked at the footnote, I discovered that they were in fact close relatives.
Well... as everyone knows these days, being born into a rich, powerful family isn't exactly a guarantee that you're going to have a happy life. Generally, you marry someone you don't much like, get involved in an affair with a nasty but attractive person, and then it all goes from bad to worse. That's pretty much what happens to Phèdre. But at least Racine makes it into a great story, which is more than you can say for your average royal gossip columnist.
Well... as everyone knows these days, being born into a rich, powerful family isn't exactly a guarantee that you're going to have a happy life. Generally, you marry someone you don't much like, get involved in an affair with a nasty but attractive person, and then it all goes from bad to worse. That's pretty much what happens to Phèdre. But at least Racine makes it into a great story, which is more than you can say for your average royal gossip columnist.
July 28, 2020
Present, I flee you: absent, I find you again.
Where would we be without our foundation, our Hellenic mythos? I appreciated Racine effort's to tantalize by interrogating these tropes. The master certainly dazzles with his poetic images. I was expecting more of the interior lives of the characters and that didn't materialize. Each appeared rigid in determination and almost moored by the mechanisms of Fate. The idea of the Taboo proved a monolith and all association lead to tragedy, including the unlikely appearance of a sea beast.
3.4 stars -- rounded up.
Where would we be without our foundation, our Hellenic mythos? I appreciated Racine effort's to tantalize by interrogating these tropes. The master certainly dazzles with his poetic images. I was expecting more of the interior lives of the characters and that didn't materialize. Each appeared rigid in determination and almost moored by the mechanisms of Fate. The idea of the Taboo proved a monolith and all association lead to tragedy, including the unlikely appearance of a sea beast.
3.4 stars -- rounded up.
February 15, 2023
phedre just like me fr (minus the incestuous behavior)
November 14, 2024
اولین اقتباسی که از این اسطوره هستش برمیگرده به هیپولیت اثر اوریپید . که اونجا تمرکز بر شخصیت هیپولیت هستش ولی در این نمایشنامه تمرکز بر روی فدر هستش.
نمایشنامه راجع به عشق یک مادر به پسر ناتنی خودش هستش ، البته که ریشه این قضیه برمیگرده به خشم دو خدای یونانی به همدیگه . که چون خدایان نمیتونند به هم دیگه خشم بورزند ، مجبورن به بنده های همدیگه خشم بورزند.
این نمایشنامه یه تفاوت هایی هم با هیپولیت داره :
• عنوان نمایشنامه تغییر کرده
• حذف همسرایان
• پر رنگ شدن نقش دایه
• باورپذیر تر شدن انگیزه های شخصیت
• کمرنگ شدن نقش خدایان یونانی
و...
نمایشنامه راجع به عشق یک مادر به پسر ناتنی خودش هستش ، البته که ریشه این قضیه برمیگرده به خشم دو خدای یونانی به همدیگه . که چون خدایان نمیتونند به هم دیگه خشم بورزند ، مجبورن به بنده های همدیگه خشم بورزند.
این نمایشنامه یه تفاوت هایی هم با هیپولیت داره :
• عنوان نمایشنامه تغییر کرده
• حذف همسرایان
• پر رنگ شدن نقش دایه
• باورپذیر تر شدن انگیزه های شخصیت
• کمرنگ شدن نقش خدایان یونانی
و...
August 3, 2025
Phaedra, a tragedy by Racine
Racine (1639 – 1699)
This play by Racine is based on Phedre by Euripides, not modified in its content, but provided with brilliant dialogues in the French language, to bring this classic tragedy alive on the stage of a theatre.
It had its first presentation on January 1, 1677, in Paris, at the Hotel de Bourgogne.
And what an accumulation of tragically and dramatically human emotions is to be seen and heard.
Love and hate, faithfulness and betrayal, hope and despair, friendship and jealousy, arrogance and submission, suicide and death.
In the absence and with rumours of the death of Thesée, Phedre, his wife, is ready to betray him, for love of her stepson, Hippolyte.
To hide this incestuous love, she has long been pretending to hate Hippolyte.
Just when she reveals her love, news of Thesée's return arrives at the court.
Phèdre is devastated and prepares to commit suicide, but Oenone, Phèdre’s maid, turns the story around and informs Thesée that Hippolyte, his son, had abused Phèdre in his absence.
Now Thesée, in a rage of revenge, appeals to Neptune to punish his son.
And so it happened that Hippolyta, racing along the seashore in his horse-chariot, was carried away among the rocks and was killed most atrociously.
Soon Thesée learns the true side of the story, of the betrayal of Phedre, to himself and his son. Phedre takes a poison brought to Athens by Medea and dies.
Such is the fame of this play that no actress of any fame in the world was not favoured with the interpretation of Phedre.
The first one was ‘la Champmeslé’ to create the role. It is said that Racine himself taught her every verse and reply.
I am going to read Euripides again in comparison.
Racine (1639 – 1699)
This play by Racine is based on Phedre by Euripides, not modified in its content, but provided with brilliant dialogues in the French language, to bring this classic tragedy alive on the stage of a theatre.
It had its first presentation on January 1, 1677, in Paris, at the Hotel de Bourgogne.
And what an accumulation of tragically and dramatically human emotions is to be seen and heard.
Love and hate, faithfulness and betrayal, hope and despair, friendship and jealousy, arrogance and submission, suicide and death.
In the absence and with rumours of the death of Thesée, Phedre, his wife, is ready to betray him, for love of her stepson, Hippolyte.
To hide this incestuous love, she has long been pretending to hate Hippolyte.
Just when she reveals her love, news of Thesée's return arrives at the court.
Phèdre is devastated and prepares to commit suicide, but Oenone, Phèdre’s maid, turns the story around and informs Thesée that Hippolyte, his son, had abused Phèdre in his absence.
Now Thesée, in a rage of revenge, appeals to Neptune to punish his son.
And so it happened that Hippolyta, racing along the seashore in his horse-chariot, was carried away among the rocks and was killed most atrociously.
Soon Thesée learns the true side of the story, of the betrayal of Phedre, to himself and his son. Phedre takes a poison brought to Athens by Medea and dies.
Such is the fame of this play that no actress of any fame in the world was not favoured with the interpretation of Phedre.
The first one was ‘la Champmeslé’ to create the role. It is said that Racine himself taught her every verse and reply.
I am going to read Euripides again in comparison.
April 29, 2015
A pretty brutal love triangle
12 August 2013
This is apparently Racine's last play before he gave up the theatre scene to return to a religious life within the Jansenist sect. For those who don't know what a Jansenist is (and that would probably include most of us) then picture a god who is mean, nasty, and smacks you over the head with a baseball bat when you step out of line, and you have the god that the Jansenists worship. Why would anybody worship a god like that I don't know, but it probably has something to do with the fact that they are a monotheistic cult, and when you only have one god, and that god is a mean and nasty brute that smacks you over the head with a baseball bat when you step out of line, then you don't have much of a choice. Fortunately for us, we don't have to believe that God is actually like that, but that is another story for another time.
Anyway, Phaedre is based on an Ancient Greek myth that has been the subject of a number of other plays, including Phaedra by Seneca and Hippolytus by Euripides. Racine also used Plutarch's biography of Theseus as a source for this work.
The play, which probably suits Racine's style because he tended to write tragedies (unlike Shakespeare, who was a well rounded individual), and this is quite a violent tragedy with a pretty nasty love triangle. Basically the story involves the son of Theseus (Hippolytus) and the second wife of Theseus (Phaedre) didn't happen to be Hippolytus' mother. As the story goes, Phaedre was in love with Hippolytus but that was a forbidden love because she was his step mother, and such a relationship would be incestuous.
However, before I go further, I assume you all know who Theseus is, and if you don't well he was the guy that travelled to Crete and killed this dude:
and then married this woman:
that is Ariadne, who is not to be confused with this woman:
but after sailing away from Crete, he dumped on on the island of Naxos to leave her like this:
(There are some other photos that came up when I typed Ariadne into Google Images, but I think I will leave it at that).
Anyway, Theseus was what some would call a stud, and what others would call a sleaze, but hey, when you are king of Athens, and a hero to boot, particularly in the world of the Ancient Greeks, it is not surprising that you end up having your way with women. However, to cut a long story short, Theseus killed the king of Athens (because he was a prick, that is the King of Athens, but then you could say that Theseus was a prick as well, because he did dump Ariadne on a island and hey, I think the name Ariadne pretty cool) and then banned the former king's daughter from marrying so that he would not have a contender to the throne. However the problem turned out that Hippolytus was actually in love with her, so you have this really bizarre love triangle which pretty much doesn't resolve itself because Hippolytus ends up dying in a tragic chariot accident, or to use a modern example, something like this:
You can probably picture it, Theseus discovers that there is an affair going on between his wife and his son and bursts into a rage. However his son knows that this is rubbish because, well, it's incest and Hippolytus will have nothing to do with it, and anyway he's in love with this woman that he's not allowed to marry, so father and son have a massive fight and the son jumps into his chariot and rushes out of the city in a rage and ends up getting himself killed. It then turns out that Theseus discovers that Hippolytus is innocent and the whole thing was set up by Phaedra (and her nurse) because she is pissed that Hippolytus isn't returning her advances (because it is incest, and he will have none of it).
Anyway, I could probably write more, but I don't really want to, but may do so in the future if I feel like it, but I don't really feel like it now, even though this play is a masterpiece and Racine is a master tragedian, but then again, I think I have said enough, so here is a picture by Pablo Picasso.
12 August 2013
This is apparently Racine's last play before he gave up the theatre scene to return to a religious life within the Jansenist sect. For those who don't know what a Jansenist is (and that would probably include most of us) then picture a god who is mean, nasty, and smacks you over the head with a baseball bat when you step out of line, and you have the god that the Jansenists worship. Why would anybody worship a god like that I don't know, but it probably has something to do with the fact that they are a monotheistic cult, and when you only have one god, and that god is a mean and nasty brute that smacks you over the head with a baseball bat when you step out of line, then you don't have much of a choice. Fortunately for us, we don't have to believe that God is actually like that, but that is another story for another time.
Anyway, Phaedre is based on an Ancient Greek myth that has been the subject of a number of other plays, including Phaedra by Seneca and Hippolytus by Euripides. Racine also used Plutarch's biography of Theseus as a source for this work.
The play, which probably suits Racine's style because he tended to write tragedies (unlike Shakespeare, who was a well rounded individual), and this is quite a violent tragedy with a pretty nasty love triangle. Basically the story involves the son of Theseus (Hippolytus) and the second wife of Theseus (Phaedre) didn't happen to be Hippolytus' mother. As the story goes, Phaedre was in love with Hippolytus but that was a forbidden love because she was his step mother, and such a relationship would be incestuous.
However, before I go further, I assume you all know who Theseus is, and if you don't well he was the guy that travelled to Crete and killed this dude:
and then married this woman:
that is Ariadne, who is not to be confused with this woman:
but after sailing away from Crete, he dumped on on the island of Naxos to leave her like this:
(There are some other photos that came up when I typed Ariadne into Google Images, but I think I will leave it at that).
Anyway, Theseus was what some would call a stud, and what others would call a sleaze, but hey, when you are king of Athens, and a hero to boot, particularly in the world of the Ancient Greeks, it is not surprising that you end up having your way with women. However, to cut a long story short, Theseus killed the king of Athens (because he was a prick, that is the King of Athens, but then you could say that Theseus was a prick as well, because he did dump Ariadne on a island and hey, I think the name Ariadne pretty cool) and then banned the former king's daughter from marrying so that he would not have a contender to the throne. However the problem turned out that Hippolytus was actually in love with her, so you have this really bizarre love triangle which pretty much doesn't resolve itself because Hippolytus ends up dying in a tragic chariot accident, or to use a modern example, something like this:
You can probably picture it, Theseus discovers that there is an affair going on between his wife and his son and bursts into a rage. However his son knows that this is rubbish because, well, it's incest and Hippolytus will have nothing to do with it, and anyway he's in love with this woman that he's not allowed to marry, so father and son have a massive fight and the son jumps into his chariot and rushes out of the city in a rage and ends up getting himself killed. It then turns out that Theseus discovers that Hippolytus is innocent and the whole thing was set up by Phaedra (and her nurse) because she is pissed that Hippolytus isn't returning her advances (because it is incest, and he will have none of it).
Anyway, I could probably write more, but I don't really want to, but may do so in the future if I feel like it, but I don't really feel like it now, even though this play is a masterpiece and Racine is a master tragedian, but then again, I think I have said enough, so here is a picture by Pablo Picasso.
October 17, 2013
Greek families! Histrionics, rash reaction instead of considered response, inability to control emotion. Tragedy.
THIS REVIEW HAS BEEN CURTAILED IN PROTEST AT GOODREADS' CENSORSHIP POLICY
See the complete review here:
http://arbieroo.booklikes.com/post/33...
Bonus GR only bit: So if Goodreads was ever a family, it's now clear that it was one that escaped from a Greek Tragedy. It's fairly obvious that all the things in the first sentence of this review can be applied to the GR family - the only questions now is how many corpses are going to pile up as the Tragedy unfolds and whether we can summon a Diety to resolve the conflict for the future...no sign of Athena yet, more's the pity.
THIS REVIEW HAS BEEN CURTAILED IN PROTEST AT GOODREADS' CENSORSHIP POLICY
See the complete review here:
http://arbieroo.booklikes.com/post/33...
Bonus GR only bit: So if Goodreads was ever a family, it's now clear that it was one that escaped from a Greek Tragedy. It's fairly obvious that all the things in the first sentence of this review can be applied to the GR family - the only questions now is how many corpses are going to pile up as the Tragedy unfolds and whether we can summon a Diety to resolve the conflict for the future...no sign of Athena yet, more's the pity.
December 11, 2020
An enhanced version of Euripides' Hippolytus, expanded for a modern audience.
Racine fluffs up Euripides spare and rushed story of Hippolytus and Phaedra, giving Phaedra center stage speeches that Sarah Bernhardt would later deliver to much acclaim at the Comédie Française.
This play comes up several times in Proust, so I'll be looking for echoes of Racine as I read ISOLT.
A still of Bernhardt as Phèdre
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi....
Racine fluffs up Euripides spare and rushed story of Hippolytus and Phaedra, giving Phaedra center stage speeches that Sarah Bernhardt would later deliver to much acclaim at the Comédie Française.
This play comes up several times in Proust, so I'll be looking for echoes of Racine as I read ISOLT.
A still of Bernhardt as Phèdre
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi....
July 13, 2016
4.5*
Uma das várias versões desta obra inspirada na mitologia. Apesar de algumas discrepâncias entre os diversos autores no andamento do drama, todos eles comungam no fundamental: um amor incestuoso, uma mulher rejeitada, vingança e morte. Dramático e intenso. Gostaria de ver isto no teatro.
Uma das várias versões desta obra inspirada na mitologia. Apesar de algumas discrepâncias entre os diversos autores no andamento do drama, todos eles comungam no fundamental: um amor incestuoso, uma mulher rejeitada, vingança e morte. Dramático e intenso. Gostaria de ver isto no teatro.
September 29, 2017
I was pleasantly surprised by this play, even though I think it lacks originality (which I know is one of caracteristics of this genre at this time).
January 1, 2016
4/5 - Probably my favourite book from my university reading list so far!
Thoughts:
1. 17th century French theatre has always interested me and this didn't disappoint. Despite being written in the 1600s, to this day it is still an enjoyable, gripping story that's relatively easy to follow.
2. Phèdre was such an intriguing, multifaceted character; I never knew what was going to happen with her and what she was going to do next. She originates from Greek mythology and although I don’t know loads about that, I want to research it further when I start studying the text for lectures and seminars. I might read some similar texts by Seneca and Euripides if I have time, just so I can compare the presentation of Phèdre as a character.
3. Beautifully written in alexandrine verse; very poetic.
4. The themes of forbidden love, lust and desire were particularly poignant that ran throughout the entire play, introducing the play and ultimately concluding it.
Thoughts:
1. 17th century French theatre has always interested me and this didn't disappoint. Despite being written in the 1600s, to this day it is still an enjoyable, gripping story that's relatively easy to follow.
2. Phèdre was such an intriguing, multifaceted character; I never knew what was going to happen with her and what she was going to do next. She originates from Greek mythology and although I don’t know loads about that, I want to research it further when I start studying the text for lectures and seminars. I might read some similar texts by Seneca and Euripides if I have time, just so I can compare the presentation of Phèdre as a character.
3. Beautifully written in alexandrine verse; very poetic.
4. The themes of forbidden love, lust and desire were particularly poignant that ran throughout the entire play, introducing the play and ultimately concluding it.
March 9, 2021
This most famous of neoclassical European tragedies is currently out of its age - its formal mode of organization is more alien to our contemporary sense of drama than the Sanskrit plays of Kalidasa. Action is reduced to a set of highly-stylized operations and speeches, and the whole thing is governed by an iron-clad set of dramatic rules that make a caricature Aristotle's Poetics in their over-application, as if his analysis of tragedy had been intended to form a kind of strict recipe for their composition.
I do not know how such plays were performed or received in the 17th century when Racine wrote, but based on my glimpse back to the 19th century, I suspect that they were produced in an equally-stylized way, an almost-operatic reduction of action to elementary lines by which the particular is transmuted into the universal at the expense of the actual. Consider this recording of a monolog of the Phèdre by the famed actress Sarah Bernhardt - there is nothing naturalistic about it. It reminds me in truth of nothing so much as the style of poetry recitation favored by her contemporary William Butler Yeats (listen here for comparison), who was said to have regarded recitation as a kind of ritual act.
With respect to the formal technique, the last living heirs of Racine who have reached me are Schiller, who produced a fine translation of this play, and Goethe, whose enthusiasm for Racine is evident on every page of his Iphigenie auf Tauris. But the most significant psychological heir of Racine for our age may be Proust, who refers to this play several times in his Remembrance. In my view, Proust's use of Phèdre in that opus is exactly analogous to Joyce's use of Hamlet in Ulysses - for both authors, these previous masterworks provide a model for the character of the tragic aspect of life with which they are absorbed.
What does this play have to say to Proust, and to us? We need not guess, for Racine lays out its primary sense for us in his own short introduction - he wishes to more fully humanize the character of Phèdre by highlighting the degree to which her semi-incestuous love for her stepson Hippolytus was an affliction, and a curse sent from the gods. Thinking again of Proust, this perhaps gives us a clue as to why that author seems to believe that it is a kind of tragedy that his protagonist is obsessively jealous and acts in the most disgusting ways because of it - that it is a cause for pity and horror, in Racine's Aristotelian sense, rather than a reason for contempt.
There is a kind of narcissism in both Racine and Proust that I find completely repugnant. That people are in some large degree not responsible for feelings of love and jealousy that consume them, I might grant, but that they are in any sense not fully responsible for how they act because of those feelings ... that is a conclusion that is completely alien to me, and to my deepest beliefs about ethics and psychology.
So Racine's play is very distant from me. I can only speculate on how it was performed or what it meant in its original context, and what I discern of its core arguments is more foreign to my thought than the Analects of Confucius. It is based on a second-tier work by Euripides, and in my perspective, the many changes Racine makes not only worsen the play in every way, but make evident his own fundamentally weak grasp of what Greek tragedy is and how it functions. What is left to enjoy is its poetry, which is sometimes magnificent, and the insight it gives us into how the human animal was viewed in one particular corner of time and space.
I do not know how such plays were performed or received in the 17th century when Racine wrote, but based on my glimpse back to the 19th century, I suspect that they were produced in an equally-stylized way, an almost-operatic reduction of action to elementary lines by which the particular is transmuted into the universal at the expense of the actual. Consider this recording of a monolog of the Phèdre by the famed actress Sarah Bernhardt - there is nothing naturalistic about it. It reminds me in truth of nothing so much as the style of poetry recitation favored by her contemporary William Butler Yeats (listen here for comparison), who was said to have regarded recitation as a kind of ritual act.
With respect to the formal technique, the last living heirs of Racine who have reached me are Schiller, who produced a fine translation of this play, and Goethe, whose enthusiasm for Racine is evident on every page of his Iphigenie auf Tauris. But the most significant psychological heir of Racine for our age may be Proust, who refers to this play several times in his Remembrance. In my view, Proust's use of Phèdre in that opus is exactly analogous to Joyce's use of Hamlet in Ulysses - for both authors, these previous masterworks provide a model for the character of the tragic aspect of life with which they are absorbed.
What does this play have to say to Proust, and to us? We need not guess, for Racine lays out its primary sense for us in his own short introduction - he wishes to more fully humanize the character of Phèdre by highlighting the degree to which her semi-incestuous love for her stepson Hippolytus was an affliction, and a curse sent from the gods. Thinking again of Proust, this perhaps gives us a clue as to why that author seems to believe that it is a kind of tragedy that his protagonist is obsessively jealous and acts in the most disgusting ways because of it - that it is a cause for pity and horror, in Racine's Aristotelian sense, rather than a reason for contempt.
There is a kind of narcissism in both Racine and Proust that I find completely repugnant. That people are in some large degree not responsible for feelings of love and jealousy that consume them, I might grant, but that they are in any sense not fully responsible for how they act because of those feelings ... that is a conclusion that is completely alien to me, and to my deepest beliefs about ethics and psychology.
So Racine's play is very distant from me. I can only speculate on how it was performed or what it meant in its original context, and what I discern of its core arguments is more foreign to my thought than the Analects of Confucius. It is based on a second-tier work by Euripides, and in my perspective, the many changes Racine makes not only worsen the play in every way, but make evident his own fundamentally weak grasp of what Greek tragedy is and how it functions. What is left to enjoy is its poetry, which is sometimes magnificent, and the insight it gives us into how the human animal was viewed in one particular corner of time and space.
April 29, 2015
I loved this. Racine makes one big change from Euripides: he blames Phedre's false accusation mostly (though not wholly) on her nurse, instead of on her. Coincidentally, that's the one thing that really stuck out for me in the original: I found Phedre's final accusation jarring, unearned and unexplained. So...nice job, Racine!
He also throws a love interest for Hippolytus in, though, in order to make him a little less...y'know, above it all. This was less successful. I think he'd have achieved the effect more cleanly simply by having Hippolytus acknowledge some attraction to Phedre.
And I have now managed to second guess Euripides and Racine in two paragraphs. And screw Shakespeare, too! Yeah!
*ahem* Translation review: not so great. Rawlings delivers with the original French on preceding pages, which is terrific but also serves to make obvious her own shortcomings. Her translation is loose, and it ignores the rhyme of the original. Richard Wilbur manages the same rhyme scheme with ease in his Moliere translation. I'd heard that he failed hard when he attempted Racine, so I didn't read it. With hindsight, I'd give him a shot - or recent dead Laureate Ted Hughes, who also attempted it. Without anything to compare it to, Rawlings' interpretation is functional but not great.
He also throws a love interest for Hippolytus in, though, in order to make him a little less...y'know, above it all. This was less successful. I think he'd have achieved the effect more cleanly simply by having Hippolytus acknowledge some attraction to Phedre.
And I have now managed to second guess Euripides and Racine in two paragraphs. And screw Shakespeare, too! Yeah!
*ahem* Translation review: not so great. Rawlings delivers with the original French on preceding pages, which is terrific but also serves to make obvious her own shortcomings. Her translation is loose, and it ignores the rhyme of the original. Richard Wilbur manages the same rhyme scheme with ease in his Moliere translation. I'd heard that he failed hard when he attempted Racine, so I didn't read it. With hindsight, I'd give him a shot - or recent dead Laureate Ted Hughes, who also attempted it. Without anything to compare it to, Rawlings' interpretation is functional but not great.
July 20, 2015
في الأسطورة الإغريقية كانت الضحية الأساسية لهذه المأساة (هيبوليت) ابن الزوج ، إلا أن (جان راسين) أراد في مسرحيته التي أعدها من الأسطورة أن يجعل من (فيدرا) شريكة لهيبوليت في استدرار تعاطفنا .. فجعل منها ضحية ايضا .. ضحية الفضيلة .. او حب النفس و خشية السقوط ! ..، و قد نجح في ذلك الى حد ما
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فمع أنها سعت للموت أكثر من مرة خلال المسرحية (عصمة لشرفها) .. الى أن ماتت بالفعل .. الا أن ذلك لم يغفر لها تماما تآمرها على برئ .. لم يغفر لها أيضا ضعفها و حمقها و غيرتها كذلك !
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ركز ايضا راسين في مسرحيته على ظلم و حمق الآلهة ، و هي النزعة التي سادت في تلك العصور الوسطى بأوروبا ، و التي أسفرت عن نشوء النزعات الوجودية و الإنسانية فيما بعد
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فمع أنها سعت للموت أكثر من مرة خلال المسرحية (عصمة لشرفها) .. الى أن ماتت بالفعل .. الا أن ذلك لم يغفر لها تماما تآمرها على برئ .. لم يغفر لها أيضا ضعفها و حمقها و غيرتها كذلك !
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ركز ايضا راسين في مسرحيته على ظلم و حمق الآلهة ، و هي النزعة التي سادت في تلك العصور الوسطى بأوروبا ، و التي أسفرت عن نشوء النزعات الوجودية و الإنسانية فيما بعد
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October 30, 2014کاش در ترجمه دقت بیشتری میشد. سالاری از مترجمان خوب فرانسه بوده، تا جایی که من دنبال کردم البته این هم از کارهای اول اوست. الان کجاست خدا میداند. چه کار میکند؟ موخرهی ترجمه محمود نیکبخت از سن ژون پرس یک ترجمه ازش دیدم، خوب بود. گاهی چیزی در اینترنت، خوب بود. و این کتاب هم بد نیست، کاش در ترجمه دقت میکرد یا ناشران ما سنت بازخوانی و بازبینی و ویرایش کتاب را رعایت میکردند.
و اینکه راسین خیلی در فارسی نحیف است، حیف است به واقع. راسین هنوز جا برای ترجمه شدن دارد.
و اینکه راسین خیلی در فارسی نحیف است، حیف است به واقع. راسین هنوز جا برای ترجمه شدن دارد.
December 20, 2016
What a powerful tragedy about forbidden love! And what a difference reading this Richard Wilbur translation made in my enjoyment.
And Phaedra makes such a contrast to whiny Gwenevere in The Mists of Avalon (which I recently finished); like Gwenevere she knows her love to be impossible but she doesn't blame either the man (Hippolytes) or her husband (Theseus). And even in her jealous rage, she doesn't really blame Aricia either.
And Phaedra makes such a contrast to whiny Gwenevere in The Mists of Avalon (which I recently finished); like Gwenevere she knows her love to be impossible but she doesn't blame either the man (Hippolytes) or her husband (Theseus). And even in her jealous rage, she doesn't really blame Aricia either.
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