This republication of a translation first published in 1979 is part of a series called Bloomsbury Revelations, focusing on the work of well-known philosophers, scholars and theorists of literature, politics, religion and culture. The series is described as ‘non-fiction’ although it includes the Odyssey as well as this Oresteia; Aeschylus is described as ‘the first great writer in the Western theatrical tradition’. The translation has many strong points, above all the ample introductions and notes, far more detailed than most recent translations provide, including information about Greek history, politics, religion, performance conditions, Aeschylus’ style, pronunciation, textual problems, other poets’ treatment of the story, and a detailed description of and commentary on each play. Terms which a reader unacquainted with Greek culture might find strange (‘pollution’ incurred by murder; ‘falls’ in wrestling, ‘trace-horse’, etc.) are fully and carefully explained. The translation is in prose, with varied line-lengths but the same number of lines as the Greek, and is generally readable, despite some rather archaic language (‘plashing tear’ p. 119, ‘bulwark’ p. 120, ‘utterance’ p. 137, ‘influxes’ p. 208, etc.). It is not suitable for performance, however; there are much more actable versions of the Oresteia available, such as P. Meineck (1998).

There are also significant problems. L.-J. states that he has tried ‘to reproduce the impact made by the original more faithfully than a translation with literary ambitions could afford to do’ (p. 9). This indicates his belief that he somehow knows what impact the original made, and throughout the introductions and commentaries he insists on his certainty about the meaning of everything in the text. The death of Agamemnon, ‘the greatest king of the heroic age’, is ‘a particularly poignant subject for a tragedy’, especially since he was struck down by a ‘domestic conspiracy’ at the hands of a woman (p. 11). Agamemnon had no choice to but sacrifice his daughter since ‘clearly it was the will of Zeus that Paris and the Trojans should be punished’, and Clytemnestra's revenge on Agamemnon for killing Iphigenia was intertwined ‘with guilty passion’ for Aegisthus. Clytemnestra's welcome to Agamemnon on his return from Troy is not a carefully composed speech which might have aroused his suspicions (if he were paying attention) – no, it is ‘effusiveness … on the borders of hysteria’ (p. 16). L.-J. finds nothing odd about Cassandra's lamenting the fate of the man who destroyed her city, raped and enslaved her – no, Cassandra ‘is the poet's master-stroke’ (p. 18) because she is ‘especially well qualified to deliver the comment upon human destiny’ (p. 19). Agamemnon is clearly a ‘predestined victim of Atě’ and ‘is far more favourably presented than are his murderers’ (p. 22).

And so it goes through the rest of the trilogy. L.-J. insists that ‘Aeschylus has no interest in character [that is, individuality] for its own sake’ (p. 108). Hence Electra is devoted to her father and brother because she is a ‘conventional’ princess (p. 108), and Orestes never considers disobeying Apollo (p. 109). The only ‘individual’ is Orestes’ Nurse, whose ‘vivacious garrulity’ contrasts with the ‘stiff archaic dignity of the heroic characters’ (p. 109) – and also conveniently undermines Clytemnestra's expression of grief at hearing of Orestes’ death. The problem with this assertion about lack of individuality is that each of these characters is portrayed by an individual actor. Finally, at the conclusion of Eumenides Athena must use ‘all of her persuasive power’ to convince the Erinyes not to harm Athens, and she backs it with a handsome offer’ (p. 210) including new clothes, a wonderful new home in a cave and promises of honour – but also threats of divine punishment if they refuse (p. 213). L.-J. has no doubt about the justice of the conclusion when the Erinyes accept: ‘the trilogy ends with their triumph’ and ‘they are pillars of every government’ (p. 172).

The Oresteia is a masculinist text that validates male superiority to and control of females, a doctrine that ‘few among the play's original audience are likely to have questioned’ (p. 205). It also indicates, as L.-J. points out, that violence used justly is essential to human civilisation (but what constitutes just violence remains uncertain). What is striking about L.-J.'s discussion is its complete rejection of any serious questioning of that validation in the script – Agamemnon's murder of his daughter, Clytemnestra's intelligence and cunning, Apollo's assertion that the male is the only parent of a child (p. 206), Athena's voting for Orestes because she ‘approves of the male in all things’ (p. 210), or whether the Erinyes’ new status is really such an honour. There is also no reference whatever to different ways these plays might have been performed, no acknowledgement of what difference performance choices might make to the meaning of lines, character portrayal, audience response and more. The few references to audience reactions presuppose a unified response (p. 171). Such a stance ignores the well-documented lively and varied responses of Athenian audiences to drama (see now D. Roselli [2011]). L.-J. engages with other critical perspectives very briefly, without citation, and negatively, for example ‘modern critics whose minds have been dominated by the unconscious presuppositions dictated by modern drama’ (p. 108). The bibliography is incredibly sparse: two editions of Agamemnon, two translations of each play, three general studies. L.-J. does not need to consider other scholars’ views because in his view only Aeschylus matters and L.-J. knows exactly what the playwright was thinking: ‘in his conscious mind, at least, Aeschylus conceived the madness instilled by the Erinyes as a purely external visitation’ (p. 109). The assumption that a critic can and should know what an author had in mind, and that such knowledge defines the meaning of the text, was challenged long ago as the ‘intentional fallacy’ by the influential proponents of the ‘New Criticism’ (W.K. Wimsatt and M.C. Beardsley [1954]). Such an assumption is especially questionable in the case of drama.

Investigations of Athenian drama have come a long way in the 36 years since 1979, with increased attention to the physical theatre, the use of space, actors, music, political implications, gender and the reception of scripts by later dramatists. Even in 1979, however, when this study was first published, there were studies which offered alternatives. F. Zeitlin's important feminist interpretation, ‘The Dynamics of Misogyny: Myth and Mythmaking in the Oresteia of Aeschylus’ appeared in 1978 (Arethusa 11). O. Taplin's ground-breaking The Stagecraft of Aeschylus (1977) contains detailed analysis of staging possibilities and how they might have affected the meaning of the Oresteia. An especially provocative study is P. Vellacott's ‘Has Good Prevailed? A Further Study of the Oresteia’ (HSCP 81 [1977]), which argues that the conclusion of Eumenides, far from being a celebration of the justice of Athens, reveals the city's and its protectors’ corruption: ‘A nation where the strictness of moral authority is weakened, and replaced with a pliant judicial formality, where even justice is in applicable to one half of the free community, and where the most polluting of crimes can now hope for acquittal – such a nation is more likely to inherit the curse the Erinyes uttered before they were corrupted than the blessing they pronounced after’ (p. 122).

Given L.-J.'s indifference to performance, the inclusion in this volume of a very brief but very thoughtful performance history of the trilogy by I. Ruffell, with full documentation, is most welcome. In 2016, new translations appear regularly; information about many productions of the Oresteia is readily available thanks to the Archive of Performances of Greek and Roman Drama (www.apgrd.ox.ac.uk); every year sees more productions all around the world; and volumes such as Agamemnon in Performance 458 BC to 2004 (2005) add to our knowledge. Instead of focusing on narrow older works such as this, however ‘classic and authoritative’, presses would be well advised to look to the future.