Euripides

By : Virginia Young, Matthew Tatum, Allyson Dunn, Kaitlin Galantis

Life

• Born in Salamis 480 BC-406 BC• His father's name was either Mnesarchus or

Mnesarchides and his mother's name was Cleito• the family was wealthy and influential• It is recorded that he served as a cup-bearer for

Apollo's dancers, but he grew to question the religion he grew up with, exposed as he was to thinkers such as Protagoras, Socrates, and Anaxagoras

Family

• He was married twice, to Choerile and Melito, though sources disagree as to which woman he married first

• He had three sons and it is rumored that he also had a daughter who was killed after a rabid dog attacked her (some say this was merely a joke made by Aristophanes, who often poked fun at Euripides).

Plays

• Euripides first competed in the City Dionysia, the famous Athenian dramatic festival, in 455 BC, one year after the death of Aeschylus.

• In the 4th century BC, Euripides' plays became the most popular, largely because of the simplicity of their language

• Euripides' greatest works include Alcestis, Medea, Trojan Women, and The Bacchae. Also considered notable is Cyclops, the only complete satyr play to have survived.

• His works influenced New Comedy and Roman drama, and were later idolized by the French classicists; his influence on drama extends to modern times

Sculptures of Euripides

His Quotes

• Circumstances rule men and not men rule circumstances.• Do not consider painful what is good for you.• Short is the joy that guilty pleasure brings.• Talk sense to a fool and he calls you foolish.• The best and safest thing is to keep a balance in your life,

acknowledge the great powers around us and in us. If you can do that, and live that way, you are really a wise man.

• The wisest men follow their own direction.• Waste not fresh tears over old griefs• When a good man is hurt, all who would be called good must

suffer with him.

More Quotes• Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad.• Your very silence shows you agree.• Slight not what's near, while aiming at what's far.• I have found power in the mysteries of thought• A bad beginning makes a bad ending.• The company of just and righteous men is better than wealth and a rich

estate.• Time will explain it all. He is a talker, and needs no questioning before he

speaks.• A second wife

is hateful to the children of the first;a viper is not more hateful.

Reputation• Euripides, in the estimation of the ancients, certainly held a rank

much inferior to that of his two great rivals.• The caustic wit of Aristophanes, whilst it fastens but slightly on the

failings of the giant Aeschylus and keeps respectfully aloof from the calm dignity of Sophocles, assails with merciless malice every weak point in the genius, character and circumstances of Euripides

• The comedian banters or reproaches him for lowering the dignity of tragedy, by exhibiting heroes as whining, tattered beggars; by introducing the vulgar affairs of ordinary life; by the sonorous platitudes of his choral odes; the voluptuous character of his music; the feebleness of his verses, and the loquacity of all his personages, however low their rank.

His Death

• Died in 406 BC• Where- Macedonia• How- accidentally attacked by the king's

hunting dogs while walking in the woods.

The END