Elektra (NHB Classic Plays) E-Book

- Sophokles

• Herausgeber: Nick Hern Books
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 102

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025

Beschreibung

'There is something bad here, growing. Day and night I watch it. Growing.' Elektra, haunted by her father's assassination, is tormented by grief; a fierce instinct for survival; and a thirst for vengeance. When her long-lost brother Orestes at last returns, she urges him to take savage and terrifying action, but at what cost? This edition of Sophokles' electrifying and timeless play features the magisterial translation by award-winning poet, essayist and translator Anne Carson. It was published alongside Daniel Fish's production starring Brie Larson, Stockard Channing, Greg Hicks and Patrick Vaill, which opened at the Theatre Royal Brighton in 2025, before transferring at the Duke of York's Theatre in London's West End. 'Penetrating… lean, charged and fresh… translated by Canadian poet Anne Carson, with crystalline verse… this is a play about women, power and patriarchy… an oblique lesson for our times' - Guardian 'Stripped back… full of strangeness and insight… Anne Carson's poetic, prickly translation' - WhatsOnStage 'Anne Carson's vivid translation [is] rigorous but very actable, violently poetic but not above the occasional joke or injection of contemporary irony… riveting' - Globe and Mail

Leseprobe

Sophokles

ELEKTRA

Translated by Anne Carson

NICK HERN BOOKS

London

www.nickhernbooks.co.uk

Contents

Original Production Details

Elektra

Afterword: ‘Screaming in Translation: The Elektra of Sophokles’ by Anne Carson

Notes on the Text by Michael Shaw

Glossary

About the Authors

Copyright and Performing Rights Information

This edition of Elektra in the English translation by Anne Carson was published alongside a new production by Empire Street Productions. It opened at the Theatre Royal Brighton on 13 January 2025, before transferring to the Duke of York’s Theatre, London, on 5 February (previews from 24 January). The cast was as follows:

ELEKTRA

Brie Larson

CLYTEMNESTRA

Stockard Channing

CHRYSOTHEMIS

Marième Diouf

AEGISTHUS

Greg Hicks

ORESTES

Patrick Vaill

CHORUS

Hannah Bristow

CHORUS / UNDERSTUDY ELEKTRA

Wallis Currie-Wood

CHORUS

Jo Goldsmith-Eteson

CHORUS

Nardia Ruth

CHORUS / UNDERSTUDY CLYTEMNESTRA

Rebecca Thorn

CHORUS / UNDERSTUDY CHYSOTHEMIS

Adeola Yemitan

UNDERSTUDY ORESTES & AEGISTHUS

Arthur Boan

Director

Daniel Fish

Choreographer

Annie-B Parson

Set Designer

Jeremy Herbert

Costume Designer

Doey Lüthi

Lighting Designer

Adam Silverman

Sound Designer

Max & Ben Ringham

Composer

Ted Hearne

Characters

PAEDAGOGUS or OLD MAN, servant and former tutor of Orestes

ORESTES, son of Clytemnestra and Agamemnon, King of Argos

CHRYSOTHEMIS, daughter of Clytemnestra and Agamemnon

ELEKTRA, daughter of Clytemnestra and Agamemnon

CLYTEMNESTRA, Queen of Argos

AEGISTHUS, paramour of Clytemnestra

CHORUS of Mycenaen women

PYLADES, Orestes’ silent friend

Line numbers in the right-hand margin of the text refer to the English translation only, and the Notes on the text at p. XX are keyed to these lines.

Scene: at Mycenae before the palace of Agamemnon.

Enter the OLD MAN and ORESTES with PYLADES.

PAEDAGOGUS.

You are his son! Your father

marshalled the armies at Troy once –

child of Agamemnon: look around you now.

Here is the land you were longing to see all that time.

Ancient Argos. You dreamed of this place.

The grove of Io, where the gadfly drove her.

Look, Orestes. There is the marketplace

named for Apollo,

wolfkiller god.

And on the left, the famous temple of Hera.

10

But stop! There – do you know what that is?

Mycenae. Yes. Look at it. Walls of gold!

Walls of death. It is the house of Pelops.

I got you out of there

out of the midst of your father’s murder,

one day long ago.

From the hands of your sister

I carried you off. Saved your life. Reared you up –

to this: to manhood. To avenge your father’s death.

So, Orestes! And you, dear

20

Pylades –

Now is the time to decide what to do.

Already the sun is hot upon us.

Birds are shaking, the world is awake.

Black stars and night have died away.

So before anyone is up and about

let’s talk.

Now is no time to delay.

This is the edge of action.

ORESTES.

I love you, old man.

30

The signs of goodness shine from your face.

Like a thoroughbred horse – he gets old,

but he does not lose heart,

he pricks up his ears – so you

urge me forward

and stand on the front rank yourself.

Good. Now,

I will outline my plan. You

listen sharp.

If I’m off target anywhere,

40

set me straight.

You see, I went to Pytho

to ask the oracle how I could get justice

from the killers of my father.

Apollo answered:

Take no weapons.

No shield.

No army.

Go alone – a hand in the night.

Snare them.

50

Slaughter them.

You have the right.

That is the oracle.

Here is the plan:

you go into the house at the first chance.

Find out all that is happening there.

Find out and report to us. Be very clear.

You’re so old, they won’t know you.

And your garlands will fool them.

Now this is your story:

60

you’re a stranger from Phocis,

from the house of Phanoteus

(he’s the most powerful ally they have).

Tell them on oath that Orestes is dead.

An accident. Fatal:

rolled out of his chariot on the racetrack at Delphi.

Dragged to death under the wheels.

Let that be the story.

Meanwhile, we go to my father’s grave,

as Apollo commanded,

70

to pour libation and crown tomb

with locks of hair cut from my head.

Then we’ll be back

with that bronzeplated urn

(you know, the one I hid in the bushes).

Oh yes, we’ll fool them

with this tale of me dead,

burnt,

nothing left but ash.

What good news for them!

80

As for me –

what harm can it do

to die in words?

I save my life and win glory besides!

Can a mere story be evil? No, of course not –

so long as it pays in the end.

I know of shrewd men

who die a false death

so as to come home

all the more valued.

90

Yes, I am sure:

I will stand clear of this lie

and break on my enemies like a star.

O land of my fathers! O gods of this place!

Take me in. Give me luck on this road.

House of my father:

I come to cleanse you with justice.

I come sent by gods.

Do not exile me from honour!

Put me in full command

100

of the wealth and the house!

Enough talk.

Old man, look to your task.

We are off.

This is the point on which everything hinges.

This is the moment of proof.

ELEKTRA (a cry from inside the house).

IO MOI MOI DYSTENOS.

OLD MAN.

What was that? I heard

a cry – some servant in the house?

ORESTES.

Can it be poor Elektra?

Should we stay here and listen?

OLD MAN.

No. Nothing precedes the work of Apollo.

That is our first step: your father’s libations.

That is the way to win: action.

Exit OLD MAN and ORESTES with PYLADES.Enter ELEKTRA from the palace.

ELEKTRA.

O holy light!

And equal air shaped on the world –

you hear my songs,

you hear the blows fall.

You know the blood runs

when night sinks away.

120

All night I watch.

All night I mourn,

in this bed that I hate in this house I detest.

How many times can a heart break?

Oh Father,

it was not killer Ares

who opened his arms

in some foreign land

to welcome you.

But my own mother and her lover Aegisthus:

130

those two good woodsmen

took an axe and split you down like an oak.

No pity for these things,

there is no pity

but mine,

oh Father,

for the pity of your butchering rawblood death.

Never

will leave off lamenting,

never. No.

140

As long as the stars sweep through heaven.

As long as I look on this daylight.

No.

Like the nightingale who lost her child

I will stand in his doorway

and call on his name.

Make then all hear.

Make this house echo.

O Hades!

Persephone!

150

Hermes of hell!

Furies, I call you!

Who watch

when lives are murdered.

Who watch when loves betray.

Come! Help me! Strike back!

Strike back for my father murdered!

And send my brother to me.

Because

alone,

160

the whole poised force of my life is nothing

against this.

Enter CHORUS.

CHORUS.

Your mother is evil

strophe 1

but on my child why

melt your life away in mourning?

Why let grief eat you alive?

It was long ago

she took your father:

her hand came out of unholy dark

and cut him down.

170

I curse the one

who did the deed

(if this is right to say).

ELEKTRA.

You are women of noble instinct

and you come to console me

in my pain

I know.

I do understand.

But I will not let go this man or this mourning.

He is my father.

180

I cannot not grieve.

Oh my friends,

friendship is a tension. It makes delicate demands.

I ask this one thing:

let me go mad in my own way.

CHORUS.

antistrophe 1

Not from Hades’ black and universal lake can you lift him.

Not by groaning, not by prayers.

Yet you run yourself out

in grief with no cure,

no time limit, no measure.

190

It is a knot no one can untie.

Why are you so in love with

things unbearable?

ELEKTRA.

None but fool or an infant

could forget a father

gone so far and cold.

No.

Lament is a pattern cut and fitted around my mind –

like the bird who calls Itys! Itys! endlessly,

bird of grief,

200

angel of Zeus.

O heartdragging Niobe,

I count you a god:

buried in rock yet

always you weep.

CHORUS.

You are not the only one in the world

strophe 2

my child, who has stood in the glare of grief.

Compare yourself:

you go too far.

Look at your sister, Chrysothemis:

210

she goes on living. So does Iphianassa.

And the boy – his secret years are sorrowful too,

but he will be brilliant

one day when Mycenae welcomes him home

to his father’s place, to his own land

in the guidance of Zeus –

Orestes!

ELEKTRA.

Him yes!

I am past exhaustion

in waiting for him –

220

no children,

no marriage,

no light in my heart.

I live in a place of tears.

And he

simply forgets.

Forgets what he suffered,

forgets what he knew.

Messages reach me, each one belied.

He is passionate – as any lover.

230

But his passion does not bring him here.

CHORUS.

Have courage,

antistrophe 2

my child.

Zeus is still great in heaven,

he watches and governs all things.

Leave this anger to Zeus: it burns too high in you.

Don’t hate so much.

Nor let memory go.

For time is a god who can simplify all.

And as for Orestes

240

on the shore of Crisa

where oxen graze –

he does not forget you.

Nor is the king of death

on the banks of Acheron

unaware.

ELEKTRA.

But meanwhile most of my life has slid by

without hope.

I sink.

I melt.

250

Father has gone and there is no man left

who cares enough to stand up for me.

Like some beggar

wandered in off the street,

I serve as a slave

in the halls of my father.

Dressed in these rags,

I stand at the table

and feast on air.

CHORUS.

One rawblood cry

strophe 3  260

on the day he returned,

one rawblood cry went through the halls

just as the axeblade

rose

and fell.

He was caught by guile,

cut down by lust:

together they bred a thing shaped like a monster –

god or mortal

no one knows.

270

ELEKTRA.

That day tore out the nerves of my life.

That night:

far too silent the feasting,

much too sudden

the silence.

My father looked up and saw

death coming out of their hands.

Those hands took my life hostage.

Those hands murdered me.

I pray

280

the great god of Olympus

give them pain on pain to pay for this!

And smother the glow

of deeds like these.

CHORUS.

Think again, Elektra.

antistrophe 3

Don’t say any more.

Don’t you see what you’re doing?

You make your own pain.

Why keep wounding yourself?

With so much evil stored up

290

in that cold dark soul of yours

you breed enemies everywhere you touch.

But you must not

clash with the people in power.

ELEKTRA.

By dread things I am compelled. I know that.

I see the trap closing.

I know what I am.

But while life is in me

I will not stop this violence. No.

Oh my friends

300

who is there to comfort me?

Who understands?

Leave me be,

let me go,

do not soothe me.

This is a knot no one can untie.

There will be no rest,

there is no retrieval.

No number exists for

griefs like these.

310

CHORUS.

Yes but I speak from concern –

epode

as a mother would: trust me.

Do not breed violence out of violence.

ELEKTRA.

Alright then, you tell me one thing –

at what point does the evil level off in my life?

You say ignore the deed – is that right?

Who could approve this?

It defies human instinct!

Such ethics make no sense to me.

And how could I nestle myself in a life of ease

320

while my father lies out in the cold,

outside honour?

My cries are wings:

they pierce the cage.

For if a dead man is earth and nothing,

if a dead man is void and dead space lying,

if a dead man’s murderers

do not give

blood for blood