Pitt Press Series

Produced more frequently on the ancient stage than any other tragedy, Orestes retells with striking innovations the story of the young man who kills his mother to avenge her murder of his father. Though eventually exonerated, Orestes becomes a fugitive from the Furies (avenging spirits) of his mother's blood. On the brink of destruction, he is saved in the end by Apollo, who had commanded the matricide. Powerful and gripping, Orestes sweeps us along with a momentum that, starting slowly, builds inevitably to one of the most spectacular climaxes in all Greek tragedy.

A novel of manners and conversation in the patrician social mielieu of England and London in the 1820's and 1803's. It begins as a novel of courtship, destined to end with the happy betrothal of its heroine, the orphaned Helen Stanley, but it soon turns into the story of Helen's friend Lady Cecilia Clarendon, and the crumbling of her marriage as her beguiling and harmless lies, not told in malice, becomes self-destructive to those whom she loves

This edition and commentary provides an introduction to one of Euripides' less well-known plays, and describes the enormous value of the text for our understanding of Athenian drama, religion, and society. Despite the excellent commentaries of Elmsley (1821) and Pearson (1907), and powerful articles by Wilamowitz, the play has not been given the notice it deserves. This edition interprets the play in a wide cultural setting, considering unorthodox aspects of the structure of the drama, but placing particular emphasis on the cults and myths of Heracles in Attica, on his apotheosis and marriage, on his association with the young, and most of all on the two most striking rituals in the play: the voluntary self-sacrifice of the daughter of Heracles, and the conversion of Eurystheus from an enemy of Athens to a hero whose dead body will protect the city-state. The text is James Diggle's (Oxford Classical Texts 1984).

Cliton. Ah ! Monsieur, c'est donc vous ? Dorante. Cliton, je te revoi ! Cliton. Je vous trouve, monsieur, dans la maison du roi ! Quel charme, quel desordre, ou quelle raillerie, des prisons de Lyon fait votre hotellerie ? Dorante. Tu le sauras tantot. Mais qui t'amene ici ? Cliton. Les soins de vous chercher. Dorante. Tu prends trop de souci ; et bien qu'apres deux ans ton devoir s'en avise, ta rencontre me plait, j'en aime la surprise : ce devoir, quoique tard, enfin s'est eveille. Cliton. Et qui savoit, monsieur, ou vous etiez alle ? Vous ne nous temoigniez qu'ardeur et qu'allegresse, qu'impatients desirs de posseder Lucrece ; l'argent etoit touche, les accords publies, le festin commande, les parents convies, les violons choisis, ainsi que la journee : rien ne sembloit plus sur qu'un si proche hymenee ; et parmi ces apprets, la nuit d'auparavant, vous sutes faire gille, et fendites le vent.