Publisher's Synopsis
Alan Kilburn's adaptation of The Oresteia of Aeschylus turns the original into a three act play that presents its theme of revenge and justice with reference to the world of modern power politics. We move from a tribal society in Act 1 to a modernising autocracy in Act 2 to the imperial democracy of ancient Athens. The old and the new conjoin. The old men of Argos, who speak in manneredalliterative prose, confront a Queen who tries out Englightenment heroic couplets: an urbane goddess Athena disputes with a chorus of Furies whose language is riddled with tabloid headlines: a teenage Electra and Orestes act with violent impulsiveness from the urgency of unresolved inner conflicts: ancient gods and humans battle in a court under the flags of the United Nations, the U.S.A. and the European Union. The highest claims of civilised rule ride on savagery. This astonishing presentation of one of the world's greatest plays will startle with both its homage to an old masterpiece and its telling modernity. A timeless conflict of revenge and justice is made contemporary and shocking.
