Bacchae
Euripides
Euripides. The Tragedies of Euripides. Vol. I. Buckley, Theodore Alois, translator. London: Henry G. Bohn, 1850.
- Alas! A miserable exile has been decreed for us, old man.
- Why then do you delay what must necessarily be?
- Child, what a terrible disaster we have all come to—unhappy you, your sisters, and unhappy me. I shall reach a foreign land
- as an aged immigrant. Still it is foretold that I shall bring into Hellas a motley barbarian army. Leading their spears, I, having the fierce nature of a serpent, will bring my wife Harmonia, daughter of Ares, to the altars and tombs of Hellas.
- I will neither rest from my troubles in my misery, nor will I sail over the downward flowing Acheron and be at peace.
- O father, I will go into exile deprived of you.
- Why do you embrace me with your hands, child,
- like a swan for its exhausted gray-haired parent?
- For where can I turn, banished from my father-land?
- I do not know, child; your father is a poor ally.
- Farewell, house, farewell, city of my forefathers. In misfortune I leave you,
- a fugitive from my chamber.
- Go now, child, to the land of Aristaeus . . . ---
- I grieve for you, father.
- And I for you, child, and I weep for your sisters.
- Terribly indeed has
- lord Dionysus brought this misery to your home.
- Yes, for I suffered terrible things at your hands, with my name not honored in Thebes.
- Farewell, my father.
- Farewell, unhappy