Rating: 
Summary: Plays to Die For
Review: "Early on the Sunday morning of May 22, 1949, after copying out half of Sophocles' desolate poem 'The Chorus from Ajax' as a valediction ("'Woe, woe!' will be the cry . . ."), James Forrestal tied one end of his bathrobe sash to the radiator of the diet kitchen across the hall from his sixteenth-floor room, tied the other end around his neck, removed the screen from the window above the radiator and jumped." This passage from Richard Rhodes' Dark Sun says less about Forrestal (U. S. Secretary of the Navy during the Second World War) than it does about Sophocles. It prompted me to read Sophocles' Ajax. I found Forrestal's valediction both powerful and terrifying: ". . . By painful stages came to his right mind.
And when he saw his dwelling full of Ruin,
He beat his head and bellowed. There he sat,
Wreckage himself among the wreck of corpses,
The sheep slaughtered; and in an anguished gripe
Of fist and fingernail he clutched his hair. . ." This in turn prompted me to reread the three Oedipus plays. I remembered reading them in college. I thought that I knew the story, but to my surprise I had missed some of the best parts. Either I'm getting wiser or I'm reading a better translation. I don't recall feeling the excitement or seeing the incredible beauty of construction when I read these plays for the first time. Sophocles is much, much better than I remembered him. Unlike Forrestal, I think that there is nothing better than a good Greek tragedy to cheer you up. David Green's superb translations reveal the Master's touch in readable, comprehensible, modern English.
Rating:
Summary: Three classics of Greek drama.
Review: "Oedipus the King" (or, "Oedipus Rex") is probably Sophocles' most famous work, first performed about 429 B. C. It should be required reading for every college Freshman. As had been prophesied, Oedipus unknowingly kills his father, Laius, and marries his own mother, Jocasta. The play has great use of irony. Jocasta (or, Iocasta) recognizes the truth before Oedipus and tries to prevent him from finding out. The play has unsrpassed use of dramatic irony. It has had a great influence on later authors. "Antigone" (probably first performed about 442 B. C.) is another tragedy centered on the flaw of stubborn pride. It also presents the conflict between secular law and divine law. A stubborn King Creon of Thebes refuses to allow the equally stubborn Antigone to bury the body of her brother Polynices despite the entreaties of Creon's wife and son. Creon orders her death but she commits suicide, as does Creon's wife and son. The play has excellent characterizations. The well-constructed "Oedipus at Colonus" (405 B. C.) was first produced after the death of Sophocles. It shared first prize in Athens along with some other plays. It is apparently a reflection of a quarrel between Sophocles and his own sons. An aged Oedipus, nearing death, curses his sons and prophesies their own deaths.
Rating:
Summary: not good
Review: I feel that the book could have been less elaborate. I say this because you are waisting your time by reading all the mumbo-jumbo within the actual basic context. A better, more understandable version is The Oedipus plays of Sophocles...a new translation by Paul Roche... By that one instead...
Rating: 
Summary: King Oedipus
Review: I just read this story a couple of days ago and I thought it was very interesting because Oedipis was unawhere that hi had married his own mother and that the chinldren that he had are his sons at the same time his brothers, but the thing is the this story has a lot of Irony cuz he doesen't know that he had killed his own father, the ex-king, he thought that his father was another person and when he didcover that there was a prophecy sab about him that said that he wold kill his own father he left his home so the phrofecy would not be completed, but the thing is the in the past his real father had order to leave him in the side of the mountain so he(oedipus) would die, he was only three days old, he was given to a shepart, but the shepert did not had the curage to leave him to die so hi gave the baby to another person and that person gave it to the other king as a present, buy the time Oedipus found out that he had killed his own father he punisht himself so that he would change part of the prophecy. He made himself blind because he said that he didnot deserver to see those who he had never seen and that the dead was not a punish ment for him that it would be the easy way and he deserved to suffer for the rest of his life.
Rating:
Summary: Unalterable Course
Review: I read the story of Oedipus in high school and several times since. While I find the twists of the story, especially the riddle of the Sphinx fascinating. (A very original puzzle.) I also found it a litte disturbing. I've never cared for the idea that a person's destiny is fixed and unavoidable.
The fact that the steps Oedipus took to foil the prophecy, actually placed him on the direct path to fulfilling it was scary. It makes one wonder: Do we really have control over our lives, or are we, as Shakespear put it, actors in someone's grand play?
It is a very sad and tragic story. Oedipus was hopelessly caught in a terrible snare. Definitely NOT upbeat. However,in my opinion, any story that can create positive thought and conversation on the inner workings of life is worth reading.
Rating:
Summary: Unalterable Course
Review: I read the story of Oedipus in high school and several times since. While I find the twists of the story, especially the riddle of the Sphinx fascinating. (A very original puzzle.) I also found it a litte disturbing. I've never cared for the idea that a person's destiny is fixed and unavoidable.
The fact that the steps Oedipus took to foil the prophecy, actually placed him on the direct path to fulfilling it was scary. It makes one wonder: Do we really have control over our lives, or are we, as Shakespear put it, actors in someone's grand play?
It is a very sad and tragic story. Oedipus was hopelessly caught in a terrible snare. Definitely NOT upbeat. However,in my opinion, any story that can create positive thought and conversation on the inner workings of life is worth reading.
Rating: 
Summary: Too Many Words! Taylor's Translation of Sophocles' Antigone
Review: In the movie, "Amadeus," the Austrian emperor avers that Mozart's new opera has "too many notes." The composer, on the contrary, thinks the number just right, as does even his envious rival, Salieri. The defect lay in the emperor's taste, not in the composer's art. In Don Taylor's translation of "Antigone," published in the book, Sophocles, The Theban Plays, there are indeed too many notes, i.e., words. The defect does not lie in the art of Sophocles, nor in the requirements of translation. Taylor wrote with a contract for television performance already in hand. He fashions lines that are easy for actors to play and for audiences to understand. Having translated a character's thought, he often expands, supplements or restates the material. Thus, the audience is given a second and third bite at the apple of understanding. But this is more like a college lecturer who fears that his students won't get the point, than like Sophocles, who is famous for a clear, solid, succinct style. Sophocles peppers his scenes, usually dialogues between two persons, with extended series of one-line "zingers," which the characters alternately thrust and counterthrust. The power and excitement of the exchanges lie in economy and pointedness of expression. To illustrate, here is a segment from the first scene between Creon and the soldier who tells him that Polynices' body has been partly buried. The first translation is by Dudley Fitts and Robert Fitzgerald, available in their book, The Oedipus Cycle, and also in Greek Plays in Modern Translation, both listed on Amazon.com. The second translation is Taylor's. SENTRY: King, may I speak?
CREON: Your very voice distresses me.
SENTRY: Are you sure that it is my voice and not your conscience?
CREON: By God, he wants to analyse me now!
SENTRY: It is not what I say, but what has been done, that hurts you.
CREON: You talk too much.
SENTRY: Maybe, but I've done nothing.
CREON: Sold your soul for some silver: that's all you've done.
SENTRY: How dreadful it is when the right judge judges wrong. SOLDIER: Am I allowed to speak, sir?
CREON: No!
Why should you speak? Every word you say
Is painful to me.
SOLDIER: Well, it can't be earache,
Can it sir, not what I said!
It must stick in your gullet. Or further down
Maybe, a sort of pain in your conscience.
CREON: Do you dare to answer me back: and make jokes
About my conscience?
SOLDIER: Me sir? No sir!
I might give you earache; I can see that.
I talk too much, always have done.
But the other pain, the heartburn as it were,
It's the criminal causing that sir, not me.
CREON: You're not short of a quick answer, either.
SOLDIER: Maybe not. But I didn't bury the body.
Not guilty to that sir.
CREON: But maybe guilty
Of selling your eyes for money, eh sentry,
Of looking the other way for cash?
SOLDIER: I think it's a shame sir, that an intelligent man
And as well educated as you are
Should miss the point so completely. The Fitts/Fitzgerald translation has 9 lines and 86 words; compared to Taylor's 24 and 160. Sophocles had used 9 lines and only 69 words. All the one-liner segments, occurring in almost every scene, undergo a similar transformation at Taylor's hand. But they are not alone. The same translating style appears in the major speeches of the play. Listen to part of the condemnation of Creon by the prophet, Teiresias, from Taylor first this time, then from Fitts/Fitzgerald. TEIRESIAS: Listen Creon. This is the truth!
Before many more days, before the sun has risen
- Well, shall we say a few more times -
You will have made your payment, corpse
For corpse, with a child of your own blood.
You have buried the one still living: the woman
Who moves and breathes, you have given to the grave:
And the dead man you have left, unwashed,
Unwept, and without the common courtesy
Of a decent covering of earth. So that both
Have been wronged, and the gods of the underworld,
To whom the body justly belongs,
Are denied it, and are insulted. Such matters
Are not for you to judge. You usurp
Ancient rights which even the gods
Themselves don't dare to question, powers
Which are not in the prerogative of kings.
Even now, implacable avengers
Are on their way, the Furies, who rise up
From Hell and swoop down from Heaven,
Fix their hooks into those who commit crimes,
And will not let go. The suffering
You inflicted upon others, will be inflicted
Upon you, you will suffer, as they did.
Have I been bribed, do you think? Am I speaking
For money now? Before very long,
Yes, it will be soon, there will be screaming
And bitter tears and hysterical crying
In this house. Men, as well as women. TEIRESIAS: Then take this, and take it to heart!
The time is not far off when you shall pay back
Corpse for corpse, flesh of your own flesh. You have thrust the child of this world into living night,
You have kept from the gods below the child that is theirs:
The one in a grave before her death, the other,
Dead, denied the grave. This is your crime:
And the Furies and the dark gods of Hell
Are swift with terrible punishment for you.
Do you want to buy me now, Creon? Not many days,
And your house will be full of men and women weeping. Box score, lines and words. Taylor 29:223. Fitts/Fitzgerald 11:106. Sophocles 16:94. Are all these words really necessary? Taylor claims that his approach helps to make the text not only more dramatic and intelligible, but also more poetic. I agree that his version is easier to grasp by first-time viewers or readers. But in the process much of the Sophoclean clarity, solidity and reality are lost.
Rating:
Summary: Too Many Words! Taylor's Translation of Sophocles' Antigone
Review: In the movie, "Amadeus," the Austrian emperor avers that Mozart's new opera has "too many notes." The composer, on the contrary, thinks the number just right, as does even his envious rival, Salieri. The defect lay in the emperor's taste, not in the composer's art. In Don Taylor's translation of "Antigone," published in the book, Sophocles, The Theban Plays, there are indeed too many notes, i.e., words. The defect does not lie in the art of Sophocles, nor in the requirements of translation. Taylor wrote with a contract for television performance already in hand. He fashions lines that are easy for actors to play and for audiences to understand. Having translated a character's thought, he often expands, supplements or restates the material. Thus, the audience is given a second and third bite at the apple of understanding. But this is more like a college lecturer who fears that his students won't get the point, than like Sophocles, who is famous for a clear, solid, succinct style. Sophocles peppers his scenes, usually dialogues between two persons, with extended series of one-line "zingers," which the characters alternately thrust and counterthrust. The power and excitement of the exchanges lie in economy and pointedness of expression. To illustrate, here is a segment from the first scene between Creon and the soldier who tells him that Polynices' body has been partly buried. The first translation is by Dudley Fitts and Robert Fitzgerald, available in their book, The Oedipus Cycle, and also in Greek Plays in Modern Translation, both listed on Amazon.com. The second translation is Taylor's. SENTRY: King, may I speak?
CREON: Your very voice distresses me.
SENTRY: Are you sure that it is my voice and not your conscience?
CREON: By God, he wants to analyse me now!
SENTRY: It is not what I say, but what has been done, that hurts you.
CREON: You talk too much.
SENTRY: Maybe, but I've done nothing.
CREON: Sold your soul for some silver: that's all you've done.
SENTRY: How dreadful it is when the right judge judges wrong. SOLDIER: Am I allowed to speak, sir?
CREON: No!
Why should you speak? Every word you say
Is painful to me.
SOLDIER: Well, it can't be earache,
Can it sir, not what I said!
It must stick in your gullet. Or further down
Maybe, a sort of pain in your conscience.
CREON: Do you dare to answer me back: and make jokes
About my conscience?
SOLDIER: Me sir? No sir!
I might give you earache; I can see that.
I talk too much, always have done.
But the other pain, the heartburn as it were,
It's the criminal causing that sir, not me.
CREON: You're not short of a quick answer, either.
SOLDIER: Maybe not. But I didn't bury the body.
Not guilty to that sir.
CREON: But maybe guilty
Of selling your eyes for money, eh sentry,
Of looking the other way for cash?
SOLDIER: I think it's a shame sir, that an intelligent man
And as well educated as you are
Should miss the point so completely. The Fitts/Fitzgerald translation has 9 lines and 86 words; compared to Taylor's 24 and 160. Sophocles had used 9 lines and only 69 words. All the one-liner segments, occurring in almost every scene, undergo a similar transformation at Taylor's hand. But they are not alone. The same translating style appears in the major speeches of the play. Listen to part of the condemnation of Creon by the prophet, Teiresias, from Taylor first this time, then from Fitts/Fitzgerald. TEIRESIAS: Listen Creon. This is the truth!
Before many more days, before the sun has risen
- Well, shall we say a few more times -
You will have made your payment, corpse
For corpse, with a child of your own blood.
You have buried the one still living: the woman
Who moves and breathes, you have given to the grave:
And the dead man you have left, unwashed,
Unwept, and without the common courtesy
Of a decent covering of earth. So that both
Have been wronged, and the gods of the underworld,
To whom the body justly belongs,
Are denied it, and are insulted. Such matters
Are not for you to judge. You usurp
Ancient rights which even the gods
Themselves don't dare to question, powers
Which are not in the prerogative of kings.
Even now, implacable avengers
Are on their way, the Furies, who rise up
From Hell and swoop down from Heaven,
Fix their hooks into those who commit crimes,
And will not let go. The suffering
You inflicted upon others, will be inflicted
Upon you, you will suffer, as they did.
Have I been bribed, do you think? Am I speaking
For money now? Before very long,
Yes, it will be soon, there will be screaming
And bitter tears and hysterical crying
In this house. Men, as well as women. TEIRESIAS: Then take this, and take it to heart!
The time is not far off when you shall pay back
Corpse for corpse, flesh of your own flesh. You have thrust the child of this world into living night,
You have kept from the gods below the child that is theirs:
The one in a grave before her death, the other,
Dead, denied the grave. This is your crime:
And the Furies and the dark gods of Hell
Are swift with terrible punishment for you.
Do you want to buy me now, Creon? Not many days,
And your house will be full of men and women weeping. Box score, lines and words. Taylor 29:223. Fitts/Fitzgerald 11:106. Sophocles 16:94. Are all these words really necessary? Taylor claims that his approach helps to make the text not only more dramatic and intelligible, but also more poetic. I agree that his version is easier to grasp by first-time viewers or readers. But in the process much of the Sophoclean clarity, solidity and reality are lost.
Rating:
Summary: The Plays of Sophocles
Review: Sophocles was a master of ancient Greek tragedy. Any criticism of these works is worse than ignorant. End of story. And yes, I'm aware that that was a sentence fragment, so there's no need to notify me of that via some nasty e-mail.
Rating:
Summary: The Plays of Sophocles
Review: Sophocles was a master of ancient Greek tragedy. Any criticism of these works is worse than ignorant. End of story. And yes, I'm aware that that was a sentence fragment, so there's no need to notify me of that via some nasty e-mail.
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