As I wrote last year when the earthquake hit Haiti, all human language, even literature, comes up short when faced with disaster and death. Literature is language by humans about humans, and destruction on this scale seems to laugh narrative and image to scorn. Nevertheless, being human, we try to bring even apocalyptic disasters into a […]
Tag Archives: Bacchae
Mess with Dionysus and You’ll Pay
Euripides’ The Bacchae was written 2500 years ago. Given the shape our environment is in, the play is more urgent than ever. The story involves the nature god Dionysus, who visits Thebes followed by a troupe of dancing women, the Maenads or Bacchae. Dionysus is the product of a union between Zeus and Semele, a […]
