Imagism: hilda doolittle, ezra pound

Suppliants

The title figures of Suppliants (c. 423 BC; Greek Hiketides; Latin Supplices) are the mothers of the Argive leaders who have been killed while attacking Thebes. The bodies of their sons have been left unburied by the Thebans, and they eventually persuade the Athenians to recover them. It is disputed whether the play is a straightforward eulogy of Athens and its democracy, or whether its sentiments are being expressed ironically.

Electra

The title character of Electra (c. 418 BC; Greek Ēlektra) and her brother Orestes murder their mother, Clytemnestra, in retribution for her murder of their father, Agamemnon. Electra herself is portrayed as a frustrated and resentful woman who finally lures her mother to her death by appealing to her maternal instincts. After the horrible murder both Electra and her reluctant accomplice Orestes are consumed by remorse. This is a bitterly realistic and antiheroic play that draws a disturbingly convincing portrait of both Electra’s sufferings and her unattractive personality.

Madness of Heracles

The title character of Madness of Heracles (c. 416 BC; Greek Hēraklēs mainomenos; Latin Hercules furens) is temporarily driven mad by the goddess Hera and kills his wife and children. Subsequently Heracles recovers his reason and, after recovering from suicidal despair, is taken to spend an honourable retirement at Athens.

Trojan Women

The setting of Trojan Women (415 BC; Greek Trōades) is the time immediately after the taking of Troy, and the play treats the sufferings of the wives and children of the city’s defeated leaders, in particular the old Trojan queen Hecuba and her children. Hecuba’s daughter Cassandra is taken off to be the concubine of Agamemnon, and then her daughter-in-law Andromache is led off to be the slave of Neoptolemus. Andromache’s son Astyanax is taken from her to be hurled to his death from the walls of Troy. Finally, as Troy goes up in flames, Hecuba and the other Trojan women are taken off to the ships to face slavery in Greece. This play is a famous and powerful indictment of the barbarous cruelties of war. It was first produced only months after the Athenians captured the city-state of Melos, butchering its men and reducing its women to slavery, and the Trojan Women’s mood may well have been influenced by the Athenians’ atrocities and the Melians’ fate, which are both mirrored in the play.