The Trojan Women

The play begins with the god Poseidon lamenting the fall of Troy. He is joined by the goddess Athena, who is incensed by the Greek’s exoneration of Ajax the Lesser’s actions...

Medea

Medea is centered on a wife’s calculated desire for revenge against her unfaithful husband. The play is set in Corinth some time after Jason's quest for the Golden Fleece, where...

Electra

The play begins with the introduction of Electra, the daughter of Clytemnestra and the late Agamemnon. Several years after Agamemnon’s death suitors began requesting Electra’s...

Ion

Outside the temple of Apollo at Delphi, Hermes recalls the time when Creusa, the daughter of Erectheus, was raped by Apollo in a cave at Long Rocks under the Acropolis. Creusa...

Andromache

Clinging to the altar of the sea-goddess Thetis for sanctuary, Andromache delivers the play's prologue, in which she mourns her misfortune (the destruction of Troy, the deaths of...

The Heracleidae

Iolaus, Heracles’ nephew and his companion during his Twelve Labours but now an old man, is in hiding with Heracles’ fatherless children at the altar of the temple of Zeus at...

Hecuba

In the play's unconventional opening, the ghost of Polydorus tells how when the war threatened Troy, he was sent to King Polymestor of Thrace for safekeeping, with gifts of gold...

The Cyclops

When Odysseus arrives he meets Silenus and offers to trade wine for food. Being a servant of Dionysus, Silenus cannot resist obtaining the wine despite the fact that the food is...

Rhesus

In the middle of the night Trojan guards on the lookout for suspicious enemy activity sight bright fires in the Greek camp. They promptly inform Hector, who almost issues a...

The Bacchae

The play begins in front of the palace of Thebes, with Dionysus telling the story of his origin and his reasons for visiting the city. Dionysus explains that he was born...