Yes, he has won, but his victory is soiled and has no pride. Why is it that the Greek playwrights of three thousand years ago can rip your heart to shreds? Or should the question be, how do they do it?
I knew a long long time ago that I was not a Shelley or Wordsworth kind of’ ‘girl.’ I mean, I liked them and all — I walked Wordsworth’s Lake District, and visited Dove Cottage. and Shakespeare’s thatched shack on Stratford-Upon-Avon.
But all of it paled beside the Greek playwrights, besides Euripides: And shall not Loveliness Last Forever. Besides Sophocles: He has won, but his victory is soiled and has no pride. Also, there was the Roman Catullus: I love and I hate and I know not which, and the pain is crucifixion.
Tomorrow — or at least soon, I am going to unearth these brief writings that had such an eviscerating, enlivening affect on me and I am going to Amaze you with them:
Aristophanes:
And even in our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart, and in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom to us by the awful grace of God