XII
EURIPIDES
Euripides, son of Mnesarchides or Mnesarchus,
from Phlya (ca. 480–406 B.C.)
We possess eighteen plays from the hand of Euripides, as against seven each from the other two tragedians; and we have more material for knowledge about him than about any other Greek poet, yet he remains, perhaps, the most problematic figure in ancient literature. He was essentially representative of his age, yet apparently in hostility to it; almost a failure on the stage—he won only four[1] first prizes in fifty years of production—yet far the most celebrated poet in Greece. His contemporary public denounced him as dull, because he tortured them with personal problems; as malignant, because he made them see truths they wished not to see; as blasphemous and foul-minded, because he made demands on their religious and spiritual natures which they could neither satisfy nor overlook. They did not know whether he was too wildly imaginative or too realistic, too romantic or too prosaic, too childishly simple or too philosophical—Aristophanes says he was all these things at once. They only knew that he made them angry and that they could not help listening to him. Doubtless they realised that he had little sense of humour and made a good butt;
- ↑ The fifth was after his death.
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