(Stephen Halper is a professional Virtual Assistant and content creator. He helped Jesse out tremendously by completing some projects including this blog post. Thanks, Stephen!)
Euripides was born in 480 B.C. somewhere on Salamis Island. From the very beginning, Euripides was destined to become a misunderstood poet. Along with Aeschylus and Sophocles, he is one of the three ancient Greek tragedians for whom any plays have survived in full. He is attributed to over 90 plays, but of those only 19 survived more or less complete. In his youth, Euripides also performed as an actor, but his voice was not strong enough to carry to the back of a typical 14,000-seat Greek theatre. His playwright career focused on Greek tragedy also being the producer and director of his plays.
A Greek Tragedy was often performed at religious festivals. At these festivals playwrights, each wrote three tragic plays and a satyr to compete for a prize. Euripides presented his first set of tragedies at the Great Dionysia in 455 B.C. but did not win his first victory until 441. In fact, he only won five awards, one of those coming after his death. His counterparts Aeschylus and Sophocles won around 50% of the competitions they entered.
Euripides did not cater to the fancies of the Athenian crowds. He did not approve of their superstitions and refused to condone their moral hypocrisy. While most plays focused on the Gods as characters Euripides’ plays usually had the Gods in minor roles at the beginning of his plays. Instead, he focused on common people being his lead roles, and even a lot of the time strong, complex female characters. Always a lover of truth, Euripides forced his characters to confront personal issues, not just questions of State.
Euripides was a pacifist, humanitarian, and free-thinker. These qualities were often overshadowed by intolerance and violence in those times. Perhaps that’s why Euripides spent much of his life in seclusion in a cave on Salamis.
Although many of Euripides’ plays dealt with personal issues, he did not shy away from the social issues of the time including the cruelty of Greek warriors. However, while he was exposing the evils of his society others were laughing at his expense. Euripides was an easy target for being the continual butt of the comic poets. Meanwhile, the playwright’s life was falling apart around him. It was public knowledge that his wife was unfaithful, one of his closest friends was murdered by the state for his liberal views, and he narrowly escaped the same fate. In the end, he left Athens in a cloud of controversy. Finding temporary reprieve in the court of Macedonia he could not escape a tragic fate. He was torn to pieces by the king’s hounds in a devastating accident.
Despite Aeschylus and Sophocles being more popular during the time Euripides is now remembered as one of the best-known and most influential dramatists in classical Greek culture. His works Medea, Hippolytus, and The Bacchae are considered one of the top 100 stories ever written.
Euripides never gave up on his craft. Even though he had a less popular writing style and more controversial topics he never gave up. Despite the lack of success in competitions he never gave up. He never compromised his beliefs or unique style to fit in with the society norm of the age. His stories have stood the ultimate test of time and he will forever be known for writing some of the best Greek tragedies.
Photo: Wikipedia
Sources: Moonstruck Drama, World History Encyclopedia, biography.com, Classics/Upenn
