Matthew Jankowski’s Reviews > The Oresteia: Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, The Eumenides > Status Update

Eumenides: Orestes flees to the temple of Apollo. The furies close behind. Apollo welcomes Orestes, telling him to go be purified at the temple of Athena in Athens. The furies fall asleep, Clytemnestra ghost wakes them. Apollo fights off the furies, they resume to chase Orestes. The very role of the furies is debated.

Orestes and Pylades deceive Clytemnestra and kill Aegisthus and Clytemnestra. After the killing the furies assail Orestes. The chorus asks Orestes to stay, he has done Argo and his father well. Furthermore, Apollo sanctioned this killing. Nonetheless Orestes leaves, fleeing the furies.

Clytemnestra admits the murder. She claims justice for her dead girl. She dealt justice to Agamemnon and his slave Cassandra. The old men of the chorus are inflamed. More so when Aegisthus walks out and also claims justice. How his father was turned out of Argos by Agamemnon's father when Aegisthus was but a babe. Concludes when Clytemnestra narrowly heads off violence between the Greeks and Aegisthus.

Cassandra, ravaged by Apollo, prophesies her own death and Agamemnons at Clytemnestra's hands. Her speech is quite moving. She goes in to the palace where soon Agamemnons cries are heard. The chorus rushes in to see Agamemnon and Cassandra dead on the floor. Clytemnestra holds a bloody sword. She begins to speak.

Agamemnon returns. He speaks to the chorus, knowing their are wrongs that mist be set right. Clytemnestra welcomes him home, asks Agamemnon to walk on the red carpet. Agamemnon refuses. Only the gods deserve such honors. Clytemnestra insists and Agamemnon, with regret,takes off his 'slaves' and walks into the palace on red with Clytemnestra.

A herald arrives on the beach, confirms troys fall. The elders welcome the herald, mourning the lost. All the lost. The herald reports disaster at sea, the armada crushed. Of Menelaus there was no report. Agamemnon survived. The chorus relates how old violence begets new violence. Justice loves a hovel. Agamemnon arrives.

Agamemnon: the watchman sees the fire on the horizon. The chorus relates a story of how the warlord sacrifices his virgin daughter, all to appease Artemis. Clytemnestra tells the leader that Troy is argive. She relates how signal fire to signal fire sends the news. Sounds like the return of the king to me :)