Alcestis

“You at this house, Phoebus? Why do you haunt

The place? It is unfair to take for your own

And spoil the death-spirits’ privileges.

Was it not enough, then, that you blocked the death

Of Admetus, and overthrew the Fates

By a shabby wrestler’s trick?

With his first words to Apollo (“Phoebus” was one of Apollo’s titles in antiquity), Death raises important questions about whether Apollo was right to meddle in human affairs by finding a way for Admetus to postpone his death. Apollo claims that he is rewarding Admetus for his virtuous behavior, but Death views his actions as unfair nepotism, and some readers have concurred with this view.

“It is quiet by the palace. What does it mean?

Why is the house of Admetus so still?”

The first lines chanted by the Chorus introduce the motif of silence, which will recur throughout the play until its culmination at the very end, when Alcestis is restored voiceless to her husband. The house’s silence represents the silent approach of Death. The entire house is suspended between existence and non-existence; the house is increasingly identified with Alcestis, and when Alcestis dies, the house is even imagined as dying with her.

“CHORUS LEADER. We would like to know

Whether the queen is dead or is she is still alive.

MAID. I could tell you that she is still alive or that she is dead.

CHORUS LEADER. How could a person both be dead and live and see?

MAID. It has felled her, and the life is breaking from her now.”

Alcestis is described as both living and dead: She is still alive, but because she is fated to die, she is also, in a sense, already dead. This paradoxical state is explored throughout the play, both in the first few episodes as Alcestis dies as well as at the end, when Alcestis is snatched away from Death and restored, voiceless and veiled, to Admetus.

“O marriage bed,

It was here that I undressed my maidenhood and gave

Myself up to this husband for whose sake I die.

Good-bye. I hold no grudge. But you have been my death

And mine alone. I could not break my faith with you and him:

I die. Some other woman will possess you now.

She will not be better, but she might be happier.”

With these words—quoted by the Maid—Alcestis says goodbye to her marriage bed, the symbol of her marriage to Admetus. By holding her marriage bed responsible for her death, Alcestis reveals that as a virtuous wife, she could not bring herself not to die for her husband, and she knows that her sacrifice will win her fame and ensure that she will always be deemed “better” than any other wife Admetus may take after she dies. Alcestis’s reference to “some other woman” clashes with her later request that Admetus never remarry, possibly hinting that Alcestis does not expect Admetus to keep his promise.

“That is what Admetus and the house are suffering. Had

He died, he would have lost her, but in this escape

He will keep such pain; and it will not ever go away.”

The Maid conceives of the loss of Alcestis as the greatest loss that Admetus and his house can suffer, implicitly identifying the virtuous Alcestis with the house of Admetus: Without Alcestis, the rest of the house is doomed, as is Admetus himself. Admetus gains nothing by escaping his death if the only way to do so is by losing his irreplaceable wife, which he comes to realize as the play progresses.

“Let me go now, let me down,

Flat. I have no strength to stand.

Hades is close to me.

The darkness creeps over my eyes. O children,

My children, you have no mother now,

Not any longer. Daylight is yours, my children.

Look on it and be happy.”

Alcestis, realizing that she is dying, can perceive Hades, the god of the Underworld, already at her side. By saying that the darkness of death “creeps over” her, Alcestis distinguishes between the bleak Underworld and the bright daylight of the land of the living, making this juxtaposition explicit when she tells her children to enjoy the daylight when she is gone.

“For I must die. It will not be tomorrow, not

The next day, or this month, the horrible thing will come,

But now, at once, I shall be counter among the dead.

Good-bye, be happy, both of you. And you, my husband,

Can boast the bride you took made you the bravest wife,

And you, children, can say, too, that your mother was brave.”

Alcestis realizes that she must die, even as Admetus begs her in vain not to forsake him: She can feel, more or less literally, the hands of Fates claiming her life. As she says goodbye, she shows that she knows what her legacy will be, that by dying for her husband, she will be remembered as “the bravest wife.” It is important to her that not only her husband but also her children remember her this way.

“I shall go into mourning for you, not for just

A year, but all my life while it still lasts, my dear,

And hate the woman who gave me birth always, detest

My father. These were called my own dear ones. They were not.

You gave what was your own and dear to buy my life

And saved me. Am I not to lead a mourning life

When I have lost a wife like you?”

Admetus makes lavish oaths to the dying Alcestis, promising to mourn her for the rest of his life. He immediately begins to break his promises, even before Alcestis is buried. His disavowal of his parents—who had refused to die for him—occurs in the fourth episode when Admetus fights bitterly with his father Pheres.

“ADMETUS. Ah me, what shall I do without you all alone?

ALCESTIS. Time will soften this. The dead count for nothing at all.

ADMETUS. Oh, take me with you, for god’s love, take me down there too.

ALCESTIS. No, I am dying in your place. That is enough.

ADMETUS. O god, what a wife you are taking away from me!”

This stichomythia (a conversation in single verses of dialogue) highlights the differences between Admetus and Alcestis. Admetus is effusive in his expressions of sorrow for Alcestis, while Alcestis, though dying, is more composed. As Admetus is already beginning to wonder whether he will even want to live without Alcestis, Alcestis tells him that time will soften his grief—a sentiment that is echoed by Heracles (who was likely played by the same actor who played Alcestis) when he tries to convince Admetus to remarry in the exodos (1085).

“May it only be mine to win

Such wedded love as hers from a wife; for this

Is given seldom to mortals; but were my wife such, I would have her

With me unhurt through my lifetime.”

In praying that they may win a wife as noble as Alcestis, the Chorus explicitly praises Alcestis while implicitly criticizing women in general: writings from ancient Greece, including Euripides’s own, describe women as the bane to mankind sent by Zeus to punish them. By saying that they would keep such a wife “unhurt through my lifetime,” the Chorus implies a critique of Admetus, who has not managed to do this.

“I am Alcmene’s son, and the man does not live

Who will see me break before my enemy’s attack.”

Heracles speaks these words when he learns from the Chorus of the dangers he will face when he goes to meet Diomedes in Thessaly. These lines provide a glimpse of the strength and resolution of Heracles’s character. By evoking Heracles’s resolution in the face of an “enemy’s attack,” these lines also foreshadow Heracles’s fight with Death, which will mark the turning point of the play and set the stage for the reunion of Admetus and Alcestis.

“And if I had driven from my city and my house

The guest and friend who came to me, would you have approved

Of me more? Wrong. My misery would still have been

As great, and I should be inhospitable too,

And there would be one more misfortune added to those

I have, if my house is called unfriendly to its friends.”

Admetus defends his decision to entertain Heracles to the Chorus by arguing that turning Heracles away would do nothing to solve his problems but only exacerbate his problems by ensuring that he is seen as inhospitable. Hospitality (xenia in Greek) was an important virtue in the ancient Greek world, where relationships between hosts and guests were regarded as sacred. Here as elsewhere, Admetus is preoccupied with how others see him and wants to make sure that he is seen only as virtuous and noble—though the consequence, in this case, is that Admetus’s pursuit of one virtue (hospitality) conflicts with his ability to properly pursue another virtue (mourning for his wife).

“The noble strain

Comes out, in respect for others.

All is there in the noble. I stand

In awe at his wisdom, and good hope has come again to my heart

That for this godly man the end will be good.”

The Chorus, though initially horrified by Admetus’s decision to show hospitality to Heracles while mourning for his wife, considers Admetus’s point that he is simply behaving as virtuously as possible. This gives the Chorus a sliver of hope that Admetus will be rewarded for his righteousness—one of the few hopeful sentiments expressed by the Chorus, most of whose songs are about the inevitability of death and the futility of trying to avoid it.

“You like the sunlight. Don’t you think your father does?

I count the time I have to spend down there as long,

And the time to live is little, but that little is sweet.”

With these words, Pheres summarizes one of the central themes of the play: All human beings must eventually die, but inescapable death makes life even sweeter. Pheres explains to Admetus that though he is already an old man who may not have much longer to live, he does not want to die any more than Admetus does. For this reason, he does not think he acted unfairly when he refused to die in Admetus’s place. Pheres illustrates a very human impulse to live for as long as possible—an impulse that is also illustrated by Admetus who, as Pheres points out, sacrificed his own wife to avoid his death.

“There were two kinds of music now

To hear, for while he sang and never gave a thought

To the sorrows of Admetus’s house, we servants were mourning

Our mistress; but we could not show before our guest

With our eyes wet. Admetus had forbidden that.”

The Servant, complaining about Heracles’s inappropriate behavior as a guest, highlights the extent to which Admetus has broken his promises to the dying Alcestis. Though he promised to shun revelry and music from his house, Admetus has taken in the famously boisterous Heracles as his guest, and now the house is filled with “two kinds of music” (one being the mournful weeping of the household slaves). Commanded to entertain Heracles, the Servant and the other members of the household are not even able to mourn their mistress properly, so that by succeeding as a hospitable host Admetus is simultaneously failing to honor his deceased wife.

“Death is an obligation that we all must pay.

There is not one man living who can truly say

If he will be alive or dead on the next day.

Fortune is dark; she moves, but we cannot see the way

Nor can we pin her down by expertise and study her.”

These lines represent the core of the hedonistic philosophy Heracles tries to explain to the Servant, who has been tasked with entertaining him. It represents an alternative to the views expressed by characters such as Admetus, Alcestis, and Pheres. Heracles filters many of the play’s central themes—the inevitability of death, the preciousness of life, the power of gods and divine forces over human affairs—through his own worldview: Mirroring intellectual notions that were beginning to gain currency at the time, Heracles reasons that human beings all die and that, since they do not know when they will die, should live each day to the fullest. The message is the same as Horace’s “carpe diem.”

“I must save this woman who has died

So lately, bring Alcestis back to live in this house,

And pay Admetus all the kindness that I owe.”

Heracles decides that Admetus’s extraordinary hospitality deserves an equally extraordinary reward, in this case restoring his host’s wife to him. One could interpret Admetus’s hospitality differently, as inappropriate, and even offensive to Heracles; by lying to his guest, Admetus causes him to behave improperly in a house that is in mourning.

“Friends, I believe my wife is happier than I

Although I know she does not seem to be. For her,

There will be no more pain to touch her ever again.

She has her glory and is free from much distress.

But I, who should not be alive, who have passed by

My moment, shall lead a sorry life. I see it now.

Admetus at last grasps the paradox of his situation: He is able to live because Alcestis died for him, but with Alcestis dead, he no longer wishes to live. In realizing that Alcestis is “happier” than he is, Admetus acknowledges that it would have been better for him to die than to seek a substitute to die for him. Admetus also realizes that Alcestis has won “glory” in dying for her husband while his reputation will now suffer, as others, like Pheres, accuse him of being a coward and of going to inappropriate lengths to escape his death.

“I myself, in the transports

Of mystic verses, as in study

Of history and science, have found

Nothing so strong as Compulsion,

Nor any means to combat her […]”

The Chorus begins their fourth and final stasimon by expounding on the power of the goddess Compulsion (Ananke in ancient Greek). That which Compulsion forces human beings to endure—in Admetus’s case, the loss of Alcestis—cannot be avoided, and all human beings must ultimately die. This idea reinforces the notion, a prevalent theme throughout the play, that all human efforts to escape their fate are, in the final analysis, futile.

“Bear up... You will never bring back up, by crying,

The dead into the light again.”

The Chorus reiterates to Admetus that he must endure his fate because he has no other choice. In a sharp reversal, however, the scene that immediately follows shows Heracles reversing death when he restores Alcestis to Admetus.

“ADMETUS. But let the woman go away

HERACLES. She will, if she should. First look. See if she should.

ADMETUS. She should, unless it means you will be angry with me.

HERACLES. Something I know of makes me so insistent with you.

ADMETUS. So, win again. But what you do does not please me.

HERACLES. The time will come when you will thank me. Only obey.”

Heracles gradually prevails on Admetus to take charge of the veiled woman he has brought with him, revealing Admetus’s priority to maintain his reputation as hospitable and agreeable; In giving in, Admetus breaks the promise that he made the dying Alcestis never to take another woman or wife into his home, raising the question of whether Admetus has learned anything from his experiences.

“Gods, what shall I think! Amazement beyond hope, as I

Look on this woman, this wife. Is she really mine,

Or some sweet mockery for a god to stun me with?”

This is the culmination of the play’s “recognition” scene, a component of many Attic tragedies, which usually unfolds in phases. The recognition scene shows a character’s journey from ignorance to knowledge. In Alcestis, Admetus realizes that the woman Heracles has introduced to him as a slave woman won in an athletic competition is, in fact, his wife.

“You are not allowed to hear her speak to you until

Her obligations to the gods who live below

Are washed away and the third morning comes.”

Heracles explains the silence of the resurrected Alcestis by an otherwise unattested theological principle. Dramaturgically, Alcestis cannot speak because she is played by a silent extra, while the actor who played her earlier in the play is now playing Heracles (Alcestis used only two speaking actors who shared the parts between themselves). Alcestis’s silence informs our interpretation of the play, rendering the Alcestis of the final scene an ambiguous and even unrecognizable figure.