Ajax
Sophocles
Sophocles the plays and fragments, Part 7: The Ajax. Jebb, Richard Claverhouse, Sir, translator. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1891.
- It is true: all is possible when a god contrives.
- Stand silent, then, and stay where you are.
- I must stay. But I would prefer to be far from here!
- You there, Ajax, once again I call you! Why do you show so little regard for your ally?
- Welcome, Athena! Welcome, daughter sprung from Zeus! How well have you stood by me! I will crown you with trophies of pure gold in gratitude for this quarry!
- A fine pledge. But tell me this—have you dyed your sword well in the Greek army?
- I can make that boast. I do not deny it.
- And have you launched your armed hand against the Atreidae?
- Yes, so that never again will they dishonor Ajax.
- The men are dead, as I interpret your words.
- Dead they are. Now let them rob me of my arms!
- I see. And the son of Laertes, how does his fortune with respect to you? Has he escaped you?
- That blasted fox! You ask me where he is?
- Yes, I do. I mean Odysseus, your adversary.
- My most pleasing prisoner, mistress, he sits inside. I do not wish him to die just yet.
- Until you do what? Or win what greater advantage?
- Until he be bound to a pillar beneath my roof—
- What evil, then, will you inflict on the poor man?
- —and have his back crimsoned by the lash, before he dies.
- Do not abuse the poor man so cruelly!