Weren’t you just now telling me, if
you only had the power, you’d hate
them for the whole world to see!
Yet now when I’m doing all I can
to avenge Father, you back down.
You try to make me back down.
On top of everything . . . cowardice.
Tell me—no, let me tell you—what 410
do I gain if I stop grieving?
Now, I’m alive. Miserable,
for sure, but it’s enough for me.
I give them grief—and that comforts our dead,
if they can feel pleasure in Hades.
But you, bragging about your hatred?
Your hate is spoken. When it comes to action,
you’re in the camp of Father’s killers.
I’ll never surrender to them,
even if they tried to bribe me 420
with privileges they buy you with.
Keep your seat at their rich table.
Eat your fill. Enjoy your luxuries.
For me it’s sustenance enough
that I don’t starve my conscience.
I don’t hunger for what you’ve got.
Nor would you, if you knew better.
But now, when you could be called
child of the best father ever, you
choose to be your mother’s daughter. 430
People will call you a traitor to your
dead father and those who love him!
LEADER
No more angry talk! Please!
Elektra, Chrysòthemis, can’t you
learn something from each other?
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
Learn what? I’ve heard all this before.
My friends, I wouldn’t bring
this matter up, but I’ve heard
something truly evil will cut short
her incessant lamentations.
ELEKTRA
What kind of “evil”? Let’s hear it! 440
If it is worse than my life now,
I will shut up for good.
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
All right, I’ll tell you what I know.
They’re going to shut you up
in a cave, in another country.
You won’t see any sun down there,
but you can still feel sorry for yourself.
Face that prospect. Think about it.
Don’t blame me when it’s way too late.
ELEKTRA
That’s what they plan to do to me? 450
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
Yes. When Aegisthus gets back.
ELEKTRA
That’s it? Then I hope he comes soon.
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
You’re crazy! What a sick wish!
ELEKTRA
Let him come, if that’s what he intends.
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
So you can suffer? How insane is that?
ELEKTRA
It will put plenty of distance
between me and the likes of you.
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
You’ve no interest in the life you still have?
ELEKTRA
Oh what a lovely life I have.
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
It could improve. If you’d restrain yourself. 460
ELEKTRA
Don’t give me any lessons in betrayal.
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
I don’t teach that. Just . . . give in to power.
ELEKTRA
Give in to them? That’s your way, not mine.
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
Better than suicidal folly.
ELEKTRA
If I’m killed, I’ll do it fighting for my father.
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
I know Father forgives what I’m doing.
ELEKTRA
Cowards comfort themselves with pieties like that.
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
So you won’t wake up? And take my advice?
ELEKTRA
Forget it. Be a while before I’m that desperate.
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
OK. I’ll go finish my errand. 470
ELEKTRA
Go where? Who are those offerings for?
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
They’re from our mother. For Father.
ELEKTRA
What are you saying? For her worst enemy?
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
“The man
she killed with her own hands”—as you’d put it.
ELEKTRA
Who put her up to this? Who wanted it done?
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
She was reacting, I think, to a nightmare.
ELEKTRA
Oh you family gods! At last you’re with me!
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
What terrifies her, inspires you?
ELEKTRA
First tell me her dream. Then I’ll explain.
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
I know very little of it. 480
ELEKTRA
Then let’s hear that. One little word
has often made men or broken them.
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
Word has it she saw our father in sunlight,
come back to sleep with her again.
He took hold of the scepter—his own, once,
though now Aegisthus carries it around—
and planted it by his hearth. Instantly
a fruit-laden bough shot up from it,
casting darkness all over Mycenae.
I heard this from someone who was there—
when she was telling her dream to the Sungod. 490
That’s all I know—except . . . because of that
alarming dream, she sent me on this errand.
ELEKTRA
Don’t, my dear sister, do this.
Don’t let any of these offerings
touch his tomb. They’re from a wife he hates!
Neither custom nor devotion allows food
or drink to be passed on to our father from her.
No. Let the wind blow them away.
Or bury them deep, at a distance.
Leave Father’s tomb undisturbed. Then, 500
when she’s dead, she can dig them up.
If she weren’t the most unfeeling of women,
she’d never try to pour remorse
offerings over the grave mound
of the husband she murdered.
Think now. Is it likely he’d take
these honors kindly—from the same hands
that hacked off his extremities?
As if he were an enemy soldier?
Then wiped the blood off on his hair? 510
How could she think what’s in your hands
would absolve her of that murder?
It can’t. Just throw these things away.
Take him some of your own hair instead,
then something from me—though I’m such a mess.
I’ve nothing to offer but my unwashed hair.
And this sash—no baubles stitched into it.
ELEKTRA unties her plain cloth belt and, using the knife hanging from it, cuts off a lock of her hair and hands both to CHRYSÒTHEMIS.
Then fall face down and pray for him
to rise up from Hades and help us
attack his enemies. Pray that his son 520
Orestes lives—powerful enough to crush
Father’s enemies underfoot. So ever after
we may decorate Father’s tomb with hands
richer than ours are now. I’m thinking that . . .
Father had something to do . . . with sending
her these terrifying dreams. Go, sister,
honor him. You will do yourself some good—and me—
and him, the most belovèd man ever,
who lives now with Hades. Your father. Mine.
LEADER
Devout advice you’d be wise to take, friend. 530
CHRYSÒTHEMIS
I agree. And I’m duty bound.
There’s no reason to weigh
any alternatives.
I’ll do it now. And while
I do it, tell no one.
If mother hears what I’m up to,
I think I’ll regret it.
CHRYSÒTHEMIS exits.
CHORUS
(singing)
If I’m not some deluded prophet,
Justice, who sent us this signal,
will strike the righteous blow 540
herself, and strike soon, child.
I’m breathing in the sweetness
of that reassuring dream.
The lord of Hellas, who
begot you, hasn’t forgotten.
That keen, bronze, twin-bladed ax
hasn’t forgotten either—forced to strike
the savage blow that killed him.
The Fury whose legs never tire,
who waits in her deadly ambush, 550
will destroy with an army’s might
the wicked—still blazing with the lust
that flung them on a stolen bed, then
into a guilt-cursed, blood-drenched
adulterous marriage.
We’ll see, I don’t doubt,
this nightmare omen
punish the criminal pair.
And if it fails to happen
we mortals are hopeless 560
at reading the future
from oracles or dreams.
Pelops ran generations ago!
It doomed your family forever,
scattered disaster in its wake—
when dazed Myrtilos sank
to his rest on the sea bottom
after a murdering hand shoved him
deathward off that golden racing car. 570
Since then, this house has never
been free from savagery and grief.
Enter KLYTEMNESTRA.
KLYTEMNESTRA
I see you’re running around loose—
because my husband isn’t here
to stop you sneaking out the gates—
where you embarrass the family.
And with him gone you couldn’t care
less about me. Forever telling people
I’m a tyrannical bitch who puts
down you and all you care about. 580
But don’t charge me with insolence.
You lash out at me, I lash back!
Your father—now this always sets
you off—was killed by me. True.
I’m sure he was. Without a doubt.
But it was Justice herself, not
just me, who killed him. And Justice
is a goddess you should respect,
if you had any sense whatever,
knowing that this father of yours, 590
the one you can’t stop crying over,
was the only Greek generous
enough to please the gods by killing
his own daughter—he, who never felt
what a mother feels giving birth.
So tell me this: why, or to please
whom, did he sacrifice her life?
Dare you say: to please the Argives?
No. They had no right to kill her.
Or if he was obliging his brother 600
Menelaus when he killed my daughter,
shouldn’t he owe me his death—for that!
Menelaus had two children, they
should have been sacrificed before
my child was—their parents caused that war!
Or did Hades have some perverse
craving to feast on my children,
not Helen’s? Or had this heartless father
stopped loving children born from my womb,
loving instead those from that whore? 610
What sort of sick, selfish parent
would do that? Oh, you disagree?
But wouldn’t your dead sister
side with me, if she had a voice?
I regret nothing I have done,
and if you think I’m cold-blooded,
ask how impartial your judgment is
before you condemn someone else’s.
ELEKTRA
You can’t say, this time, that something
I did provoked what you’ve just said. 620
But if you’ll permit me, I’ll tell you
the truth about my father and sister.
KLYTEMNESTRA
Go ahead. Permission granted.
If you always spoke in a tone
this calm, it wouldn’t be so painful.
ELEKTRA
All right, I’ll talk to you. You said you killed
my father. Could you say anything
more damning? Whether you killed him
justly or not? But killing him
wasn’t just. No. You were seduced 630
to murder him by the criminal
lowlife who is now your husband.
Ask Artemis, who looks after hunters,
what crime she punished when she stilled
the sea breeze at Aulis to a dead calm.
No! Let me tell you. She never would.
Here’s what I know. My father once
was tracking game, when his footsteps
startled a stag with a giant rack.
He shot it down, recklessly 640
whooping a boast about his kill.
Outraged, Artemis then becalmed
the Greek fleet, demanding this
price for killing her forest creature:
that he sacrifice his own daughter!
That’s how it happened. How she died.
Otherwise the fleet was marooned.
Couldn’t sail to Troy or sail home.
That was Father’s predicament—he
was forced to make the choice he did. 650
He was bitterly reluctant,
but he did finally kill her.
And not for Menelaus’ sake!
But let’s suppose you’re right. That he
did do it to help out his brother.
Would that justify killing him?
With your own hands? What law was that?
Take care. If you invent a law
and apply it to all humankind, won’t it
inflict guilt and grief back on you? 660
you’ll be the next to die,
you’ll get the justice you deserve.
Take a hard look at your own life.
Living openly with a killer
who helped you slaughter my father?
You started a family with him—
cutting off your legitimate children
who have done nothing wrong. You have!
Who could approve the things you’ve done? 670
You married Aegisthus to avenge your
daughter? What a coarse claim: marry
an enemy for your daughter’s sake?
Why am I even giving you advice?
You shout that I disparage my mother.
Well, I think you’re much less
a mother than my slavemistress,
so rotten is the life I lead,
kicked around by you and your mate.
Then there’s the one who got away, 680
who slipped through your fingers, pathetic
Orestes, bored stiff, rotting in exile.
You accuse me of raising him
to make you both pay for your crimes;
I would have done that—if I could.
You better believe it. Go ahead,
tell everyone I’m treacherous
if you like. Tell them I’m strident,
that I’m brazen—because if I
possessed all those traits 690
I’d be a daughter worthy of you.
LEADER
(to KLYTEMNESTRA)
Lady, I can tell you’re seething.
But ask yourself. Could she be right?
KLYTEMNESTRA
(to CHORUS)
Should I care how I treat her—a grown
woman abusing her mother! Is there
one thing she’d be ashamed to do?
ELEKTRA
I’ll tell you one! I am ashamed
of my rage, though you won’t see why.
I know my conduct’s unbecoming
for a woman my age. 700
It’s utterly unlike who I was.
But your hostility, your actions—
they have made me do things
that aren’t in my nature.
I’m so given to disgusting
displays because they’re all around me.
KLYTEMNESTRA
Aren’t you a piece of work. Obsessed
with Who I am, what I say, what I do!
I give that mouth of yours
way too much grist to grind. 710
ELEKTRA
You said it! I didn’t! Right.
What you do provokes what I say.
KLYTEMNESTRA
Artemis will make you
pay for your insolence
when Aegithus gets back.
ELEKTRA
Look at yourself—fuming mad,
out of control! You want me
to speak—then you don’t listen.
KLYTEMNESTRA
Then won’t you just shut up
and allow me to sacrifice?
Now that you’ve had your say? 720
ELEKTRA
Go ahead, sacrifice.
I won’t get in your way.
KLYTEMNESTRA
(to a Maidservant carrying a basket)
Girl! You. Lift those fruits up high,
so I may start praying to our god.
And quiet the anxiety I feel.
KLYTEMNESTRA looks up at the statue of Apollo.
You have protected us a long time,
Apollo, my lord. Do listen
attentively to me now. My language
may be somewhat oblique, because
I’m not among friends here. 730
It wouldn’t be wise to speak
plainly, since she can hear.
Her loud spiteful mouth will spew out
exaggerated versions all over town.
No, listen the same way I speak:
aware of what I’m implying.
Promise me, Wolfkiller, if signs I saw
in my perplexing dreams last night
seem harmless, make sure they come true.
But if they seem to you dangerous, 740
turn them against those who hate me!
If anyone plots to throw me
out of this house, and steal my wealth,
stop them! Allow me to go on
living in the house of Atreus,
ruling this kingdom, enjoying