4 of 5 stars

What can’t you like about Greek tragedy in a Modern Library format! 🙂

I bought this originally for the Ajax play, something I’d heard about but had never read. The translation by John Moore was fantastic. I’d rate the play as excellent and a valuable component for those interested in the Epic Cycle and Greek tragedy’s interpretation and engagement of it. I loved the Chorus’s line about Ajax’s behavior “Either he is still mad, or else can’t bear / The company his madness made around him” (lines 337-8, p. 23).

The Women of Trachis, translated by Michael Jameson, was very good. I hadn’t been familiar with the story. It wasn’t as enjoyable as the Ajax, but that’s just my personal preference. It was well worth the read.

I’d read Sophocles Electra already, in a translation by Mary Lefkowitz. The translation itself was good but I didn’t enjoy the actual play. I felt the same way here, though I also wasn’t as happy with David Grene’s translation. For the story of Electra, I much prefer Aeschylus’s The Libation Bearers.

Like the Ajax, I also wanted this Sophoclean volume for the Philoctetes. It was incredibly enjoyable, especially the interplay and contrasts of Odysseus and Neoptolemus (Achilles' son). In this lay, I enjoyed David Grene’s translation.