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Prometheus Bound (Dover Thrift Editions)

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This is a stunningly modern translation of The Prometheus Bound. James Scully, the poet-translator, has done the impossible, he's turned one of the world's oldest dramas into a can't-put-it-down pageturner. If you've never read the Prometheus or read it and found it dull and archaic, read this translation. Additionally, there's a fascinating discussion at the end of what territory the next two plays in the Prometheus trilogy probably covered and this includes all the fragments of the other two plays that have been found. It was a great loss to Western Civilization when the rest of the trilogy failed to survive the Dark Ages for all the fragments hint that, where the play we have is pure defiance, Prometheus as the lone rebel against tyranny, the trilogy as a whole was about reconciliation, the ability for irreconciliable opposites to come to terms with each other without surrender or compromise. Still, even without that, the play we have gives an overwhelming image of the unbreakable human spirit and that alone makes it well worth reading. Prometheus Bound in a good translation is a must read.

Of my free will, my own free will, I erred, And freely do I here acknowledge it. -Prometheus

Aeschylus is considered to be the father of Greek Tragedy as we know it, if for no other reason than his introduction of a second actor onto the scene. Up until his time, plays had consisted of just one actor, changing masks if necessary. But in addition to being an innovator, Aeschylus wrote one of the really pivotal works in the history of literature and of the human quest to understand our purpose in the universe: Prometheus Bound.

The parallels to the Biblical account of man's fall are obvious. Prometheus is a Titan, more than human but less than God, like the angels. He gives fire to mankind in violation of Zeus' orders, making man a threat to the gods. Zeus punishes him by chaining him to a boulder where vultures peck out his innards every day, only to have them grow back at night, a little harsher than making the serpent crawl and banishing man from Eden, eh? And so on...

The play opens as Prometheus is being bound by the reluctant Hephaestus, god of fire, who is the first of several characters to beg him to repent and apologize to Zeus. Not only does Prometheus refuse, he is outwardly defiant of the king of the gods:

PROMETHEUS These things are sorrowful for me to speak, Yet silence too is sorrow: all ways woe! When first the Blessed Ones were filled with wrath And there arose division in their midst, These instant to hurl Cronos from his throne That Zeus might be their king, and these, adverse, Contending that he ne'er should rule the Gods, Then I, wise counsel urging to persuade The Titans, sons of Ouranos and Chthon, Prevailed not: but, all indirect essays Despising, they by the strong hand, effortless, Yet by main force-supposed that they might seize Supremacy. But me my mother Themis And Gaia, one form called by many names, Not once alone with voice oracular Had prophesied how power should be disposed- That not by strength neither by violence The mighty should be mastered, but by guile. Which things by me set forth at large, they scorned, Nor graced my motion with the least regard. Then, of all ways that offered, I judged best, Taking my mother with me, to support, No backward friend, the not less cordial Zeus. And by my politic counsel Tartarus, The bottomless and black, old Cronos hides With his confederates. So helped by me, The tyrant of the Gods, such service rendered With ignominious chastisement requites. But 'tis a common malady of power Tyrannical never to trust a friend. And now, what ye inquired, for what arraigned He shamefully entreats me, ye shall know. When first upon his high, paternal throne He took his seat, forthwith to divers Gods Divers good gifts he gave, and parcelled out His empire, but of miserable men Recked not at all; rather it was his wish To wipe out man and rear another race: And these designs none contravened but me. I risked the bord attempt, and saved mankind From stark destruction and the road to hell. Therefore with this sore penance am I bowed, Grievous to suffer, pitiful to see. But, for compassion shown to man, such fate I no wise earned; rather in wrath's despite Am I to be reformed, and made a show Of infamy to Zeus.

Later he explains just what the possession of knowledge will mean to mankind:

PROMETHEUS Think not that I for pride and stubbornness Am silent: rather is my heart the prey Of gnawing thoughts, both for the past, and now Seeing myself by vengeance buffeted. For to these younger Gods their precedence Who severally determined if not I? No more of that: I should but weary you With things ye know; but listen to the tale Of human sufferings, and how at first Senseless as beasts I gave men sense, possessed them Of mind. I speak not in contempt of man; I do but tell of good gifts I conferred. In the beginning, seeing they saw amiss, And hearing heard not, but, like phantoms huddled In dreams, the perplexed story of their days Confounded; knowing neither timber-work Nor brick-built dwellings basking in the light, But dug for themselves holes, wherein like ants, That hardly may contend against a breath, They dwelt in burrows of their unsunned caves. Neither of winter's cold had they fixed sign, Nor of the spring when she comes decked with flowers, Nor yet of summer's heat with melting fruits Sure token: but utterly without knowledge Moiled, until I the rising of the stars Showed them, and when they set, though much obscure. Moreover, number, the most excellent Of all inventions, I for them devised, And gave them writing that retaineth all, The serviceable mother of the Muse. I was the first that yoked unmanaged beasts, To serve as slaves with collar and with pack, And take upon themselves, to man's relief, The heaviest labour of his hands: and Tamed to the rein and drove in wheeled cars The horse, of sumptuous pride the ornament. And those sea-wanderers with the wings of cloth, The shipman's waggons, none but I contrived. These manifold inventions for mankind I perfected, who, out upon't, have none- No, not one shift-to rid me of this shame.

CHORUS Thy sufferings have been shameful, and thy mind Strays at a loss: like to a bad physician Fallen sick, thou'rt out of heart: nor cans't prescribe For thine own case the draught to make thee sound.

PROMETHEUS But hear the sequel and the more admire What arts, what aids I cleverly evolved. The chiefest that, if any man fell sick, There was no help for him, comestible, Lotion or potion; but for lack of drugs They dwindled quite away; until I taught them To compound draughts and mixtures sanative, Wherewith they now are armed against disease. I staked the winding path of divination And was the first distinguisher of dreams, The true from false; and voices ominous Of meaning dark interpreted; and tokens Seen when men take the road; and augury By flight of all the greater crook-clawed birds With nice discrimination I defined; These by their nature fair and favourable, Those, flattered with fair name. And of each sort The habits I described; their mutual feuds And friendships and the assemblages they hold. And of the plumpness of the inward parts

I always find the prospect of reading ancient literature daunting, but this play was very easy to understand. I would definitely recommend this as a supplement for those studying ancient Greek Mythology. It really added depth to my understanding of Prometheus, Zeus and the mind set of the Ancient Greeks.

Title: Prometheus Bound by Aeschylus, translated by James Scully and C. John Herington

Pages: 117 total. The play itself consists of about 54 pages.

Time spent on the "to read" shelf: A year or two.

Days spent reading it: 1 day.

Why I read it: I actually liked the Greek tragedies we read in High School. I also think that Prometheus is an interesting character, so I thought this play might be interesting.

Brief review:
I really liked this play. In the beginning of the story Prometheus is bound by Hephaistos to a rock to serve as his punishment for giving mankind fire. Prometheus has a number of conversations with people as they wander by in their travels. These make up the major movements of the play.

The themes of his conversations include: Suffering, usurping power, tyranny, human culture, hope, civil disobedience, restoration, fate, brute force vs. cunning thought, and a host of other themes.

Some interesting elements about Prometheus in Greek mythology:

Prometheus is the god who stole fire from Zeus and gave it to humanity. Fire seems to also include self awareness and human culture, because that's what else Prometheus claims to have given to mankind. Prometheus also claims mankind once foresaw their own deaths, but that he overcame their visions by giving them the gift of hope.

Prometheus Bound is apparently a part of a trilogy. We only have scraps from what was perhaps the sequel, Prometheus Unbound. It is a shame that we will never see the full story arch that Aeschylus prepared for Prometheus.

I enjoyed this short play. If you enjoy Greek drama, this is a must read. If you do not appreciate Greek drama, this one will probably not warm your hearts to it. Further, I appreciated the notes and introduction to this play as well. I read them after I read the play, and felt like they enhanced my experience of reading instead of bogging it down. This was one play I am glad I got the chance to read for myself.

Favorite quote: It's easy enough for the bystander, who's not bogged down in sorrow, to advise and warn the one who suffers. Myself, I knew all this and knew it all along. Still, I meant to be wrong. I knew what I was doing. Helping humankind I helped myself to misery.

Stars: 4 out of 5.

Final Word: Captivating.

While most people enjoy Prometheus Bound as a fable of Greek mythology, much lies in this tragedy. Prometheus Bound is one of the earliest surviving tragedies, written by the man, Aeschylus, who created the classical Greek style of drama.

Outside of Sophocles' Oedipus cycle, there is not tragedy to compare with this. There is here an exploration of the nature of man, of the universe around him, and of the fate that binds him. In Prometheus is the ultimate classically tragic figure: complete self-knowledge, yet bound by fate to suffer interminably.

I recommend this work as highly as I am able. Aeschylus is my favorite tragedian, one of the most difficult authors I have ever encountered, and as brilliant as any I have found. Read Prometheus Bound now. And if you can't do it now, do it tomorrow.

Though I do not doubt the literary quality of this great piece of literature, in this ebook, the formatting and proofreading quality (wast for waste...) is horribly distracting and is frankly terribly annoying.

for those interested in this period in greek mythology (around the fall of the titans) the story is a must read. it offers a more in depth account as well as actually bringing out a better understanding of the characters within. While it is short it is still an important work and much can be uncovered in its words. recommended

This is a review of Mark Griffith's commentary on Prometheus Bound for the Cambridge green and yellow series. I found this book to be an exceptionally useful commentary in that it provides a very sophisticated and comprehensive analysis of the play at the same time that it prioritizes making the Greek comprehensible for the reader. In practical terms, this means that lengthy notes about textual variants, intertextual connections, and mythological parallels are often paired with straightforward explanations of grammatical concepts and helpful renderings of particularly difficult sentences into idiomatic English or sometimes into more literal "translation-ese". The commentary also eschews the irritating practice of discussing rare or obscure words while expecting the reader to look up their meaning in a dictionary. The vast majority of such words are in fact defined by Griffith in the commentary proper.

Prometheus' place in mythology and the play's relationship with the mythological tradition are treated in great detail throughout the commentary, as are metrical issues and questions about the original staging of the play. There is also a 25 page appendix that collects the fragments of the putative trilogy of which Prometheus Bound was a part and analyzes them. There is ample discussion of bibliography and scholarship on the play, but this only goes up to 1982 when the commentary was published.

The Prometheus Bound is something of an anomaly in the corpus of extant Greek Tragedies given its somewhat unique style and its sometimes disputed authorship, and perhaps for this reason Griffith seems to avoid interpreting it through the lens of an entirely Aeschylean worldview and poetic program. Moreover, the textual parallels and antecedents discussed in the commentary are not limited to the tragedians, but one encounters citations of Hesiod, Pindar, and Plato (among others) about as often as citations of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides. Thus, the overall effect is that the Prometheus Bound is presented on its own terms in the context of Greek Literature in general rather than as the product of a particular author or genre with all the baggage such a particular attribution entails. I think that this is an excellent approach to take, and I think it does much to enhance the reader's enjoyment of and interest in the play.

As for the play itself, I found that it was well worth reading and that it contains many tensions and ideas that I was not expecting. For example, reading Zeus as the leader of a successful coup d'etat who is attempting to consolidate the power of his new regime through force and fear (as the commentary more or less leads one to do), makes this play a remarkable and poignant illustration of Greek political thinking about tyranny, power, and oppression in the fifth century BC. The difficulty of the Greek is nowhere near the level of the Oresteia and is actually quite comparable to a moderately difficult play by Sophocles or Euripides. On the whole, then, I would highly recommend this play and this commentary as an especially rewarding and unique example of what Greek Tragedy, and the scholarship on it, can do.

Actor Robin Field reads one of the classic plays of Ancient Greece by 'Aeschylus (525-456 B.C.), as translated by E. H. Plumptre. According 'to Charles W. Elliot (editor of The Harvard Classics), "The importance 'of Aeschylus in the development of the drama is immense. Before him 'tragedy has consisted of the chorus and one actor. By introducing a 'second actor, . . . he practically created Greek tragedy as we 'understand it. . . . Of the 70 or 80 plays which he is said to have 'written, only seven survive." In Greek mythology Prometheus is a giant 'who steals the fire of the gods and gives it to mankind. Zeus, ruler 'of all the gods, punishes him by having him chained to a rocky cliff, 'where he is tortured by a vulture for centuries. But in this drama the 'significance of Prometheus is profoundly expanded. Fire becomes a 'metaphor for Reason. Prometheus, whose name means "forethought," gives 'man his defining characteristic, his means of survival, the source of 'all his knowledge. In this interpretation Prometheus becomes the 'provider of all human values, therefore the greatest possible hero -- 'which makes his punishment for it the greatest possible tragedy. The 'reading is over an hour long on one Audio CD.

If you are a student of Classical Greek looking to read your first tragedy in the original, I think that this edition of Prometheus Bound would make an excellent choice for many reasons. First of all, the play itself is one of the best of all the extant tragedies. Although there is virtually no action in the play, the playwright (most definitely not Aeschylus in spite of the attribution) mangaes to maintain interest by creating an unbelievably vivid sense of location -- here the craggy wasteland at the end of the earth -- as well as by bringing Prometheus to life with lines and speeches -- particularly his first speech -- whichh achieve the level of grandeur required by the stark and primal mythic moment enacted onstage.
The Greek used by the playwright is somewhat stiff and archaic-sounding when compared to that of Sophocles, but rather than being a defect, it is actually perfectly suited to the hard, stony character of the place and the person at the centre of the play.

In addition to being beautifully written, the play is of interest to a modern reader by virtue of the fact that in it you find addressed one of burning themes of contemproary thought: the nature of technology. I for one was quite fascinated by the very Greek, very un-modern treatment of the issue of technology. The play underscored for me the importance of avoiding an overly melodramatic thinking about technology (i.e., technology is all evil vs. technology is all good) to something more ambiguous, more tragic, as it were.

In addition to high literary quality and contemporary interest, the play makes for a good first leap into the Greek of tragedy because of the relative simplicity of the language. Overall, sentences are simpler in structure than those found in the plays of Sophocles or Aeschylus. The vocabulary didn't feel quite as dense as that in other tragedies and there did not seem to me to be as many 'odd' usages of words or as much syntactical fuzziness as is to be found in the other top-quality tragedies. Also, the play is well-preserved, so there is no plodding through hoeplessly mangled choral odes such as one finds in Agamemnon or The Bakhai. It was as easy to read if not easier than any play of Euripides.

The commentary serves its function admirably. It provides suitable help to learners that enables them to better make sense of the text. Unfortunately, the Cambridge series is somehwat uneven in the quality of its commentaries in this regard of the Greek sentences being read. For example, the commentary for Sophocles' Oedipus Rex in this series is woefully deficient in assisting the student understand the Greek.

Overall an excellent purchase for someone new to Greek tragedy or to more seasoned readers seeking to refresh their acquaintance with this beautiful play.