The Oresteia (Unabridged) cover art

The Oresteia (Unabridged)

 Preview

Get 30 days of Premium Plus free

£8.99/month after 30-day free trial. Cancel monthly.
Try for £0.00
More purchase options
Buy Now for £7.99

Buy Now for £7.99

About this listen

In The Oresteia, Aeschylus dramatizes the myth of the curse on the royal house of Argos. The action begins when King Agamemnon returns victorious from the Trojan War, only to be treacherously slain by his own wife. It ends with the trial of their son, Orestes, who slew his mother to avenge her treachery - a trial with the goddess Athena as judge, the god Apollo as defense attorney, and, as prosecutors, relentless avenging demons called The Furies. The results of the trial change the nature of divine and human justice forever.

An adaptation by Yuri Rasovsky, based on a translation by Ian Johnston.

Also included is an excerpt from Blackstone's dramatization of The Odyssey, in which Agamemnon's brother Menelaus learns of the events of The Oresteia from Proteus, the sea god.

(P)2007 Blackstone Audio Inc. Ancient, Classical & Medieval Literature Classics Collections Drama Literary History & Criticism Ancient Greece Mythology Royalty Adaptation Ancient History Greece
All stars
Most relevant
The Oresteia is a very complicated yet catching tragedy. It is a deviation from Greek tragedies such as Oedipus, and this makes it both interesting and difficult to understand the challenges and struggles between furies and olympian Gods marks a transition in Greek mythology.

This Hollywood version of the Oresteia has the advantage of using colourful voices and effects in order to help the listener to imagine the different kinds of beings who are involved in the play viz. humans, Gods, and Furies.

Of course the Hollywood version of the Oresteia cannot replace the text itself and it is highly recommended to the philhellenics to read the text as well. But this audio-play will certainly ease the readers way to the text, which prior to it might seem very difficult to understand.

Paves the way to the text

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Lame translation and weak if dogged performance. Can this be one of the masterworks of Greek drama?

Avoid if possible

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.