Philoctetes

Sophocles

Sophocles the plays and fragments, Part 4: The Philoctetes. Jebb, Richard Claverhouse, Sir, translator. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1898.

  1. The time is ripe for you to take blood for blood, to sate yourselves to your heart’s desire on my discolored flesh! Soon I will leave life, for from what source can I find the means to live? Who can feed, as I will have to,
  2. on the winds, when he no longer owns any of the bounty that the life-giving earth supplies?
Chorus
  1. In the name of the gods, if you have any reverence for a friend who approaches you in all kindness, approach him!
  2. But know this, and know it well: it is in your power to escape this plague. Cruel is it that you feed it with your own flesh, and that there is no way for you to learn to endure the countless torments that dwell with it.
Philoctetes
  1. Again, again, you have recalled the old agony to my thoughts—kindest though you are of all who have visited before! Why have you ruined me? What have you done to me?
Chorus
  1. What do you mean?
Philoctetes
  1. That it was your hope to take
  2. me to that Trojan land I abhor.
Chorus
  1. Yes, I believe that to be the best course.
Philoctetes
  1. Leave me, then—immediately!
Chorus
  1. Pleasant, pleasant, indeed, is the task you set me, and I am ready to obey.
  2. Come, let us be going, each to his station in the ship!
Philoctetes
  1. By Zeus who hears men’s curses, do not go, I implore you!
Chorus
  1. Be moderate.
Philoctetes
  1. Friends, in the name of the gods, stay!
Chorus
  1. Why do you call?
Philoctetes
  1. Ayee, ayee! Doom, Doom! My suffering kills me! Foot, my foot, what shall I do with you in the days to come?
  2. O friends, return, come back to me!
Chorus
  1. To do what that has a different spirit from that of your former commands?
Philoctetes
  1. There is no reason for indignation when the words of one crazed