#aeschylus oresteia

[katerinaaqu]

Anaxibia sister to Agamemnon and Menelaus (some thoughts)

So...in terms of Oresteia we know that Pylades and Orestes are cousins technically. Pylades is also betrothed and later married to Orestes's sister Electra.

His father Strophius of Phocis was married according to that line to Agamemnon's and Menelaus's sister Anaxibia (Altrnatives of her name are Astyoche and Cydragora) that she has different parentage depending on the myths and the versions but I think I am in favor of the classic aka daughter of Atreus and the Cretan princess Aerope.

And now I wonder how was Anaxibia spared the family drama! Like how was she escaped from the whole coup of Aegisthus! Makes me wonder;

Did the brothers carry Anaxibia with them to Sparta for safety and THEN organize her betrothal to Strophius?

Did she live with them in exile for a little while and then catch the eye of Strophius somehow thus leading to the brothers see also the possibility of a possible ally and marry their sister to him?

Did, perhaps Agamemnon (or even Menelaus too) see the danger and betroth her to Strophius BEFORE the disaster? Thus Anaxibia being spared the exile?

Honestly all possibilities seem so great and honestly make one think! Of course judging how Orestes was born BEFORE Pylades one can expect that Anaxibia was married to Strophius AFTER Agamemnon and Menelaus settled down in their own kingdoms and potentially had their families which could mean how much greater responsibility the two brothers bore in their exile; not only had they take care of each other but also of their sister.

And to Agamemnon apologists such as myself or @likethexan seems even more admirable what responsibility Agamemnon possibly had. Quite possibly of course maybe Anaxibia was indeed sent to Phocis before the whole coup erupted it is just that the wedding potentially happened later after both brothers gained some of their political power back to negotiate a suitable marriage with the king of Phocis.

Of course that begs the question as to why didn't the brothers flee to Phocis instead of Sparta? Surely if their sister was there (married or not) she could potentially offer some help or influence. Well I should say one by looking at the map should say that the first difficulty was the distance:

If we assume that Anaxibia was taken out of harm's way on time but the brothers had literally to run for their lives, they probably ran towards the direction of the south where they would only need to use one mean of transport (cart, horse etc) instead of going to the other side of Peloponnese AND needing to get a ship as well to cross the sea to get to Phocis and they would probably need to get through the mountains again to get to their sister (because the road through Attica and Boetia would take them forever).

But is also a political move.

Agamemnon was not stupid. He probably knew the political power of Tyndareus as well as the riches and army of Sparta might have been superior to Phocis at that time. What is more Tyndareus just like the two of them, was once upon a time exiled with his brother Icarius and restored to the throne so Agamemnon was almost certain that Tyndareus would be more open to the idea to help them be restored in power. Not to mention that Sparta was closer related to Mycenae by geography alone.

So it seems that Agamemnon took the right decision to flee to the south and towards Sparta rather than to the north and towards Phocis

But of course the scenario in which the resided in Sparta with their sister for a little while before sending her to Phocis is always on the table or even that Anaxibia was left behind in Mycenae to be used as a hostage or something similar thus increasing the urge of Agamemnon to come and get her. Although I do not support the latter mainly that knowing the strong family bonds of the Atreides I find it difficult to imagine both brothers would leave their sister behind suffer the consequences of the coup. Especially given how the Atreides spent years to the care of the Spartan king so that doesn’t seem to be pointing towards the urgency of the two struggling to get their sister back and all which is another reason I do not support it but that is also on the table I suppose 🤔

Also we do not know how old Anaxibia was when the brothers had to flee. Maybe she was very young too. Maybe she had to be taken away so that the brothers wouldn't risk for her to be used against them or killed. Makes me imagine she would be barely enough of age to be married at that time (which is why I side more with the idea of her being sent away or carried with them to Sparta) but yeah these are some random thoughts from top of my head.

What do you guys think?

[mirefireflies]

“the ending is always the same”

war of the foxes - richard siken / waterloo - ABBA / euripides’ medea - the little theatre / anne carson / the three fates - luca cambiaso / the oresteia - aeschylus / road to hell II - hadestown / when i met you - mira lightner / andersen’s fairy tale anthology

[claymotif]

orpheus but he's sisyphus

Ovid’s The Story of Orpheus and Eurydice (tr. Rolfe Humphries) / Spirited Away dir. Hayao Miyazaki / @mag200 / Jenny Diski, “Housewife” / Franz Wright, God's Silence / Adrianne Kalfopoulou, “Poem in Pieces, a Log” / Jon Ware, I am in Eskew / Kazimierz Wierzyński, “A Word of Orphists” (tr. Czeslaw Milosz) / @prisonhannibal / Aeschylus, The Oresteia / Ocean Vuong, Eurydice

image ids under cut:

image 1: a quote from Ovid that reads: "And Orpheus received her, but one term was set: he must not, till he passed Avernus, turn back his gaze, or the gift would be in vain."

image 2: excerpt from the script of the film Spirited Away that reads: "Haku: But I can't go any farther. Just go back the way you came, you'll be fine. [highlighted] But you have to promise not to look back, not until you've passed through the tunnel."

image 3: a drawing, labeled in all-caps handwriting "a venn diagram of love vs. grief:". the drawing is a single circle.

image 4: an excerpt, highlighted and italicized, from Jenny Diski that reads: "People don't understand about repetition, do they? How it is at the heart (thump, thump, thump) of obsession; at the erotic centre (drip, drip, drip) of desire. You do, of course. Repetition is insatiability spelt sideways."

image 5: a quote from Franz Wright reading, "And let me ask you this: the dead, where aren't they?"

image 6: a quote from Adrianne Kalfopoulou in red text, reading, "Grief will keep you reaching back / for what is not there"

image 7: an excerpt from Jon Ware that reads, "Here's my question. If the ghost wants nothing more than to be witnessed, why would it appear behind you, not in front of you? The only answer I can think of is this: [underlined] it appears behind you because it already knows, to an absolute certainty, that you will have no choice but to look back."

image 8: a quote from Kazimierz Wierzyński that reads: "I understood the true fate of Orpheus, that [highlighted] love is a constant terror of loss."

image 9: a screenshot of a tumblr ask from an anonymous user who says, "What's the point?" user prisonhannibal responds, "of what? it's love though".

image 10: two lines from aeschylus reading, "Orestes: This was always going to happen. She's been dead since the beginning."

image 11: an excerpt from Ocean Vuong that reads, "Your absence has gone through me // Like thread through a needle. / Everything I do is stitched with its color."

end ids.

[papermenageriie]

From David Grene's review of Robert Lowell's translation of Aeschylus's Oresteia, cited in Wendy Doniger's translation of the Rig Veda

[illustratus]

An Audience in Athens during the Representation of Agamemnon by Aeschylus — by William Blake Richmond

[the-cassandriad]

i've not written poetry in years (i'm more of a novelist) but i allowed myself some cassandra thoughts (as a treat). i actually had a lot of fun with this and i'm desperate to do more with the idea in the future so we will see.

inspired obviously by my own muses, @two-bees-poetry for the brilliant contrapuntal poems about greek myth, and anne carson, specifically when she talks about cassandra's speech being split in two and her bridging of past and future!

more of my logic in the tags because i'm annoying!

[sop-soap]

everyone talks about anne carson's translation of oresteia because of the "it's rotten work" "not to me, not if it's you" but what about these,

[hlblng]

“I shall teach you old men the lesson you failed to learn when you were children” Clytemnestra in Aeschylus' Agamemnon (trans. Ted Hughes)

Clytemnestra is the wife of Agamemnon, the king of Atreus and commander of the Greek army that assails the walls of Troy. In order to placate the goddess Artemis, he sacrifices his oldest daughter Iphigenia on the goddess’ altar, spilling her blood and breaking the heart of his wife in the process. Clytemenestra, consumed by hatred and the desire for revenge after the murder of her daughter, invites Agamemmnon’s cousin and enemy Aigisthos into the palace and into her bed, while Agamemnon is away at Troy. Finally, after 10 years of waiting, Agamemmnon returns triumphant to his city, palace and wife. Finally, after 10 years of waiting, Clytemnestra gets her revenge and murders her husband in the bath. Through fear and intimidation tactics, she and her lover Aigisthos assume the throne and live happily - for a while. Years later, her now grown son Orestes, who grew up far away, and her daughter Electra conspire to kill their own mother as revenge for the murder of their father. She dies screaming, kicking, cursing and Orestes falls mad with the blood guilt of murdering your own mother. Only after the intervention of a god or two, order is restored in the house of Atreus. For now, at least.

To me, Clytemnestra is a character transcending boundaries. The adulterous wife, the villainess that kills her husband, the wronged mother revenging her daughter, the cold queen disowning her grieving children, “a man’s heart in a woman’s body”, as Aischylos puts it. She’s all that and more. In Euripides’ Electra she even is a doubting woman looking back on her life and her choices, maybe not regretting but perhaps questioning what it was all for. She’s all of these things, yet none of them wholly. You look at her and you feel for her because how could he, how could her beloved husband murder their perfect innocent daughter, all for the promise of Troy. You look at her and you revel in her bloodlust as she swings the axe at Agamemnon and gives the perfect villain speech at the steps of his, well now her, palace. You look at her and you’re repelled by the ice cold indifference towards her remaining children, abandoned like a toy no longer worth playing with. Was there only enough love for the one daughter in her? When she kills Agamemmnon does she feel relief, satisfaction, finally she has had her triumph over the one who wronged her more than any other? Or is there also a tinge of sadness, of grief, for the life she used to know, before the day her daughter’s blood got spilled in the name of a war she doesn’t care about? 

She certainly doesn’t tell us. None of the characters do.

[asoftepiloguemylove]

laika and the pain of loss

Matthew Stover Revenge of the Sith // Laika in a flight harness (via wikipedia) // Aeschylus Aeschylus: The Oresteia // Haruki Murakami Sputnik Sweetheart // Olessya Turkina Soviet Space Dogs // Haruki Murakami Norwegian Wood // Ada Limon Sharks in the Rivers // Marina Tsvetaeva from a letter to Boris Pasternak // @fateology muttnik // H.D. Loss // Lavinia Greenlaw For the First Dog in Space // Why Laika the Space Dog is All Animals (via lakia magazine)

[hauntedbythenarrative]

An Oresteia, Aiskhylos//House of the Dragon (2022-)

[dykeganseythethird]

florence welch as clytemnestra

[katerinaaqu]

Others: Hahaha Hollywood has the best catchphrases of cheeky or sneering heroes

Aeschylus: *Orestes to Clytemnestra over the body of Aegisthus like a hunter over a deer*

Orestes: I was looking for you! This one here has had enough already!

(Translation by me)

Like...DUDE! 😆👌🏻 "he has had enough"! Dude! And gets even better!

Clytemnestra: Oh no, my beloved Aegisthus! You have been slain so violently!

Orestes: Oh, you love this man? Then you will lie in the same tomb together so death will never do you part!

(Translation by me)

Dunno about you guys but THIS is the real stuff! Don't tell me you don't imagine Orestes pointing at the body nonchalant while saying that!

[reverie-quotes]

Death is a softer thing by far than tyranny.

— Aeschylus, The Oresteia (tr. Lattimore)

[mirefireflies]

cassandra, daughter of troy

cassandra - florence and the machine / mad, mad, mad - m.c (@diradea)/ roman-pompeian wall painting, first century bce / cassandra - robinson jeffers / cassandra - evelyn de morgan / the oresteia: agamemnon - aeschylus / little girls - mira lightner (@aliralyre) / cassandra - abba / cassandra - anthony frederick augustus sandys

[drowningparty]

Aeschylus, Agamemnon.

[ditoob]

why did nobody tell me the Oresteia was so good Orestes is slowly becoming one of my faves