Philoctetes
Sophocles
Sophocles the plays and fragments, Part 4: The Philoctetes. Jebb, Richard Claverhouse, Sir, translator. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1898.
- It cannot be that offense at my sickness has persuaded you not to take me aboard your ship?
- All is offense when a man has abandoned his true nature and does what does not suit him.
- But you, at least, are not departing from your begetter’s
- example either in word or deed, when you help a man who is noble.
- I shall be found to have no honor—this is the thought that long torments me.
- Not because of your present deeds, at least. But because of your words, I worry.
- O Zeus, what shall I do? Must I be twice found base—by disloyal silence, as well as by shameful speech?
- Unless I am lacking in judgment, he means to betray me, leave me behind and sail away!
- Leave you? No, not I. Rather, to your pain, I will bring you along. That is my torment.
- What do you mean, son? I do not understand.
- I will conceal nothing. You must sail to Troy, back to the Achaeans and the forces of the Atreids.
- Ah, no! What have you said?
- Do not wail in grief, before you understand!
- Understand what? What do you intend to do to me?
- Save you, first, from this misery, and then,
- together with you, go and plunder Troy’s plains.
- And this is your true intent?
- A harsh necessity governs these events, so do not be angered at hearing of them.
- I am destroyed—ah, misery!—betrayed! What have you done to me, stranger? Return my bow at once!
- No, it is not possible. My duty and my interest alike constrain me to obey those in power.