Euripides: Encyclopedia II - Euripides - His plays

Euripides - His plays

Euripides first competed in the famous Athenian dramatic festival (the Dionysia) in 455 BCE, one year after the death of Aeschylus. He came in third, because he refused to cater to the fancies of the Judges. It was not until 441 BCE that he won first place, and over the course of his lifetime, Euripides claimed a mere four victories.

He was a frequent target of Aristophanes' humor. He appears as a character in The Acharnians, Thesmophoriazusae, and most memorably in The Frogs, where Dionysus travels to Hades to bring Euripides back from the dead. After a competition of poetry, Dionysus opts to bring Aeschylus instead.

Euripides' final competition in Athens was in 408 BCE. Although there is a story that he left Athens embittered because of his defeats, there is no real evidence to support it. He died in 406 BCE, probably in Athens or nearby, and not in Macedon, as some biographers repeatedly state. The Bacchae was performed after his death in 405 BCE.

When compared with Aeschylus, who won thirteen times, and Sophocles, with eighteen victories, Euripides was the least honored, though not necessarily the least popular, of the three — at least in his lifetime. Later, in the 4th century BCE, the dramas of Euripides became more popular than those of Aeschylus and Sophocles. His works influenced New Comedy and Roman drama, and were later idolized by the French classicists; his influence on drama reaches modern times.

Euripides' greatest works are considered to be Alcestis, Medea, Electra, and The Bacchae.

In June 2005 CE, classicists at Oxford University employed infrared technology – previously used for satellite imaging – to detect previously unknown material by Euripides in fragments of the Oxyrhynchus papyri, [2] a collection of ancient manuscripts held by the university. [3]

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "His plays", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki