Alcestis

Euripides

Euripides. The Plays of Euripides, Translated into English Prose from the Text of Paley. Vol. I. Coleridge, Edward P., translator. London: George Bell and Sons, 1906.

  1. into my house to my deserted couch.
Chorus
  1. Hard upon prosperous fortune came this sorrow to thee, a stranger to adversity; yet hast thou saved thy soul alive.
  2. Thy wife is dead and gone; her love she leaves with thee. What new thing is here? Death ere now from many a man hath torn a wife.
Admetus
  1. My friends, I count my dead wife’s lot more blest than mine, for all it seems not so; for nevermore can sorrow touch her for ever; all her toil is over, and glorious is her fame. While I, who had no right to live, have passed the bounds of fate
  2. only to live a life of misery; I know it now.
    For how shall I endure to enter this my house? Whom shall I address, by whom be answered back, to find[*](Nauck brackets this line as spurious.) aught joyful in my entering in? Whither shall I turn? Within, the desolation will drive me forth,