Bakkhai

by Euripides, Reginald Gibbons (Translator), Charles Segal (Introduction)

Overview

Regarded by many as Euripides' masterpiece, Bakkhai is a powerful examination of religious ecstasy and the resistance to it. A call for moderation, it rejects the temptation of pure reason as well as pure sensuality, and is a staple of Greek tragedy, representing in structure and thematics an exemplary model of the classic tragic elements. Disguised as a young holy man, the god Bacchus arrives in Greece from Asia proclaiming his godhood and preaching his orgiastic religion. He expects to be embraced in Thebes, but the Theban king, Pentheus, forbids his people to worship him and tries to have him arrested. Enraged, Bacchus drives Pentheus mad and leads him to the mountains, where Pentheus' own mother, Agave, and the women of Thebes tear him to pieces in a Bacchic frenzy. Gibbons, a prize-winning poet, and Segal, a renowned classicist, offer a skilled new translation of this central text of Greek tragedy.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780199880812
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	02/22/2001
Series:	Greek Tragedy in New Translations
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Poet and translator Robert Bagg is professor of English at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. His translations of The Bakkhai, Hippolytos, and Oedipus the King (University of Massachusetts Press, 1982) are often performed.

Editorial Reviews

"[Bagg's translation] would be a good choice to use where one wants to rouse an initial enthusiasm for Greek tragedy. It has immediacy and excitement. By the same token it ought to be the best acting version. Robert Bagg has given us a contemporary, dramatic rendition of the Bacchae."—Classical Outlook

"Without often straying beyond the strictest sense of the Greek, Bagg has successfully translated one work of art into another, rendering living Greek into living English. The clarity of his poetry confronts the audience directly with the horror and stunning beauty of the Dionysiac forces, and thus I believe the version would lend itself well to production."—Carleton Miscellany

"This interpretation and version of the play are excellent, very much alive and full of insight."—Robert Fitzgerald

From the Publisher

This interpretation and version of the play are excellent, very much alive and full of insight.

Robert Fitzgerald

Without often straying beyond the strictest sense of the Greek, Bagg has successfully translated one work of art into another, rendering living Greek into living English. The clarity of his poetry confronts the audience directly with the horror and stunning beauty of the Dionysiac forces, and thus I believe the version would lend itself well to production.

Carleton Miscellany

[Bagg's translation] would be a good choice to use where one wants to rouse an initial enthusiasm for Greek tragedy. It has immediacy and excitement. By the same token it ought to be the best acting version. Robert Bagg has given us a contemporary, dramatic rendition of the Bacchae.

Classical Outlook