The Alcestis of Euripides

I read Carson's translation, then Hughes. In Carson, the man was unworthy of the woman, a little of a buffoon, spoiled and self-centered. In Hughes, he was pinioned by the gods exactly between intense love and inescapable duty, a tragic hero. Different translator choices, different tastes.

"Alcestis" is the oldest surviving play of Euripides, although he had been writing tragedies for almost twenty years when it was written. Apparently it ws the fourth play in a tetralogy, taking the place of the ribald satyr play which traditionally followed a series of three tragedies. Consequently, this play has more of a burlesque tone, best represented in the drunken speech of Heracles to the butler and his teasing of Admetus... Read Full Review

Ted Hughes'translation of Alcestis continues on a path he pursued for most of his later years: to resurrect "classic" poetry in a modern form. The translation flows eloquently, with the typical Hughes clipped verse. He seems desparate to make the text "speak" to modern readers, and (I think) especially to modern poets. Despite the obvious (and poignant) parallels of the storyline to Hughes' own life, I did not find... Read Full Review

At the end of the last book that Ted Hughes has given us, the king's wife returns from the dead, after she has sacrificed her life for his. It is a celebratory end to a journey through grief and hell, and one can only hope that Hughes, at the end of his life, putting together "Birthday Letters", was consoled by the fact that his illness would soon reunite him with the woman whose legacy and ghost he would never shake... Read Full Review

Alcestis was the first Greek tragedy I read, and it is still the one I love most, though Ajax and both Iphigenias are tough competitors. Heracles, a.k.a. Hercules, accepts hospitality at a home where, unknown to him, the housewife, Alcestis, is being mourned. He drinks and raises hell (the pun will be noticed by he who reads the play!). Informed of the tragedy, much embarrassed, he decides to add a new task to his tight... Read Full Review