Weekend Quote #38

“Who loveth once, must love alway.”

Still Euripides' Trojan Women. It also surprises me how many quotes touched my heart from such a short play. Hecuba tells Menelaus not to bring Helen on the same ship as he, because then he won't have the heart to kill the lady. Well, we know well enough from Odysseus that Helen regains her position as Menelaus' beloved wife instead of being killed as Menelaus promised to Hecuba.

I feel so touched by what she said, how love is hard to forget. So many other writers wrote the same idea. Shakespeare says “Love is not love which alters when alteration finds.” Mercedes also said to Monte Cristo that one can only love once. Even Pushkin's brave and resolute “I loved you” is succeeded by a weaker phrase, “and perhaps I love you still.”

It's a good thing and a bad thing, to love so hard and so long. When requited, eternal love will make eternal bliss and happiness. When not, eternal torment. Haha. Happily, we can always move on. I think love is not like a star that fixes its place in the universe, but like a plant in the garden that can blossom and die when we see most fit to make it so. Still, love will leave a mark, somewhere in the corner of our hearts, when we loved somebody.

That's the quote I want to share with you this weekend. I invite you to share yours. :D

Weekend Quote #37

I have not so much as hope, the last resource of every human heart, nor do I beguile myself with dreams of future bliss, the very thought whereof is sweet.”

Another sad quote from Andromache in The Trojan Women. She compared herself with Polyxena, whom she thought had better fate than she because Polyxena had died, and therefore, felt no pain anymore while she had to live without hope.

But I love how she mentioned hope as 'the last resource of every human heart', because, yes, it is. Hope is so precious, something that we can still have even when we have lost all other things. When somebody loses his/her hope, the effect is paralytic. Therefore never, ever, lose your hope. It's a resource that will help you go through many sufferings and disasters in this world.

That's all from me. Please share yours below or through the linky.

Weekend Quote #36

“'Tis all one, I say, ne'er to have been born and to be dead, and better far is death than life with misery. For the dead feel no sorrow any more and know no grief; but he who has known prosperity and has fallen on evil days feels his spirit straying from the scene of former joys.”

I don't know why this quote sits so in my heart. Perhaps I watch too much of Hamlet that I'm somehow infected with his melancholy.

I love Andromache. She's a fine woman. When she weeps about her misery and wishes for death, I cannot bear it. I read truth in her words, that in respect of pain, death is so much more painless than life. I cannot help thinking about what Hamlet says in one of his great monologues:

“And by a sleep to say we end the heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to. 'Tis a consummation devoutly to be wished.”

When we are sad, it's so easy for us to think that death is far better. “To die; to sleep.” And about not being born, doesn't the book of Ecclesiates from the Bible say as much, 'it's better the dead than the living, but better still the ones that not yet born'?

And yet, when we are happy, and in sober mind, is there anything we want better than to stay so – happily alive?

The Trojan Women: Mother and Daughters

The Trojan Women by Euripides opens with a meeting between Poseidon and Athena, two deities that agree to bring calamities upon Troy conquerors, who are so sure about themselves. The story then moves to the Trojan women, namely, Hecuba the queen and her daughters and daughter-in-law.

Hecuba mourned the death of her husband and sons, then inquired what would happen to her and her daughters. Talthybius, the messenger, informed her that Cassandra would be Agamemnon's wife, Andromache would be Neoptolemus' (also known as Phyrrus) wife, Polyxena would serve at Achiles' tomb, and she would be Odysseus' slave.

Then Cassandra came, bearing a prophecy of Agamemnon's death and riot in his family, she also prophesied that Odyssus would face so many troubles on his way home and that Hecuba herself would die in Troy (but due to her curse, of course no one believed her).

Next Andromache came, with her son Astyanax. She told Hecuba that Polyxena was dead. She wailed her fate of becoming Phyrrus' wife, fearing that by becoming another's she betrayed the memory of her husband, Hector. Hecuba encouraged her to continue her life. Talthybis came back, telling them that Astyanax should be put to death. Andromache complied with a heavy heart.

After that, Menelaus came, taking Helen back with him to Sparta. He promised Hecuba that he would kill her, but we know better.

Overall, this is perhaps the most touching Greek play I've ever laid my hands on. The emotion expressed, especially by Hecuba and Andromache, touches me deeply. It might be because I myself am a woman, I can relate more to these ladies than to the heroes (fond as I am of them). Perhpas my favourite part is Andromache's words when she bewails her fate and weeps for Hector, whilst remembering that she would soon be Phyrrus' wife.

“And if I set aside my love for Hector, and ope my heart to this new lord, I shall appear a traitress to the dead, while, if I hate him, I shall incur my master's displeasure. And yet they say a single night removes a woman's dislike for her husband; nay, I do hate the woman who, when she hath lost her former lord, transfers her love by marrying another. Not e'en the horse, if from his fellow torn, will cheerfully draw the yoke; and yet the brutes have neither speech nor sense to help them, and are by nature man's inferiors. O Hector mine! in thee I found a husband amply dowered with wisdom, noble birth and fortune, a brave man and a mighty; whilst thou didst take me from my father's house a spotless bride, thyself the first to make this maiden wife. But now death hath claimed thee, and I to Hellas am soon to sail, a captive doomed to wear the yoke of slavery.”

I'd give this play a great applause, could I watch it on stage.