The Trojan Women

By Euripides

The consummation of a great conquest, a thing celebrated in paeans and thanksgivings, the very height of the day-dreams of the unregenerate man - it seems to be a great joy, and it is in truth a great misery. It is conquest seen when the thrill of battle is over, and nothing remains but to wait and think. We feel in the background the presence of the conquerors, sinister and disappointed phantoms; of the conquered men, after long torment, now resting in death. But the living drama for Euripides lay in the conquered women.