Medea and Other Plays (Penguin Classics)

Euripides is the tragic author who rings most familiar to modern ears. While Aeschylus is not far removed from the origins of tragedy in Dionysian rituals, the constant theme of Euripides is the effort we must make to sustain civilization and a reasonable life within it against the entropic forces which always threaten its dissolution. The influence of Socrates is not hard to discern. The gods are now believed in because they must be the enforcers of moral law. Men and women ought to resist unreasonable emotional urges or face tragic consequences. The single worst fate man can encounter is the loss of his reason. That tragedy made this turn, the gods being pushed off stage and made objects of belief instead of necessity, the characters depicting real people instead of irrational forces of nature and the warm embrace of reason and everything civilized—these are all marks of progress towards a freer and happier human condition. Euripides should be celebrated as a herald of enlightenment thinking. And, of course, the plots themselves have their own interest and merit. All college students should be exposed to Greek civilization and Euripides, humanizing the Socratic revolution by incorporating it into the tragic tradition, is an excellent vehicle to introduce it. This translation, while some fifty years old, reads like modern English and can still be used at the collegiate level. Highly recommended.

Everything ok

The book was awesome to read and also very easy to understand. I really enjoyed this book. If your looking to read great book on Greek tragedies then this is the book for you.

My kids used this for a unit on Greek plays. The book is a good resource. Easy enough to digest given the complexity of the topic. Good notes included.

Good paper weight

Love Euripides. It's a decent translation.

Reading Medea in 2025 is surprisingly fresh and an exciting read! Way to go, Euripides!

Great Book, would recommend especially for students or if you just want a Shakespeare classic.

the book is very interesting. the descriptive notes makes it easy to place the paly in the historical and cultural context.

The plays collected here differ in structure and tone, and the introduction to this work - which I recommend reading piecemeal AFTER one has read the plays concerned - is very informative. These are plays where a student of dramaturgy, or someone casually interested in the plays here (and how they have informed much cultural production in the millennia after their creation) can find much to enjoy. I suggest reading the short introductions to each play after one has read them and gathered one's own thoughts about them, so as not to be too directed by critical attentions. What is more important with plays of this sort than anything else, is for you to first engage with them as they are, as you come to them, and only then seek out what others think. This is because, these plays being as famous as they are, it is easy to be swayed by the wealth of critical opinions - and there are many very fine companion books one can find to broaden one's engagement with this. But you, dear reader, whomever you are, you also have the capacity to engage creatively with the plays here, and these words must come to you directly (through the medium of able translation) before additional illuminations from the introductions or other critical discussions come to expand and augment that which you experience first. These are plays to read aloud, to hear the prosody and the force of character. Enjoy yourself!

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Good., as we expected to be delivered

This Review is for Medea only. This was my first Greek Tragedy as I continue my journey through classic literature. I expected a play that would be hard to understand but I was pleasantly surprised. I picked the penguin edition because it has other plays in too and the translation was easy to read. The author Euripides was born in 484 BC and he was from Athens. I read a play that is 2500 years old. Wow. Medea is a scorned woman. Her lover and father of her two children Jason has married a princess and left them. Medea is furious and the play is about her revenge. It's shocking stuff. She doesn't hold back. Medea is ripped apart by Jason's betrayal and cannot let it go without punishment. It's gripping right from the beginning and the action never faltered. Those that have experienced cheating partners will understand the devastation. However a sensible person would not go to the great lengths Medea goes to for revenge. Moving forward to a happy place is far better than reeking havoc and revenge. It's a quick play. I read it in an hour and really enjoyed it. I will delve deeper into Greek Tragedy now.