Philoctetes
Sophocles
Sophocles the plays and fragments, Part 4: The Philoctetes. Jebb, Richard Claverhouse, Sir, translator. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1898.
- Son, whose voice was that? Do I hear Odysseus?
- Be sure of it, and you see him at your side, who will carry you to the plains of Troy by force, whether or not the son of Achilles is willing.
- But it will bring you no joy, if this arrow fly straight.Odysseus flees from the stage.
- Wait—by the gods, no! Do not let it fly!
- Let go of me, in the name of the gods, dear boy!
- I will not.
- Alas! Why did you take from me the chance to kill my hated enemy with my bow?
- It would have been honorable neither for me, nor for you.
- Well, you may be sure of one thing, at least: the army’s chiefs, the lying heralds of the Greeks, though bold with words, are cowards in the fight.
- Good; the bow is yours, and you have no cause for anger or complaint against me.
- Agreed. You have revealed the true stock, my son, from which you spring. You are no child of Sisyphus, but of Achilles, whose fame was the fairest when he was among the living, as it is now with the dead.