Helen
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Original / primary: Perseus Eng2
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Chorus Leader
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You have sorrows, I know; but it is best to bear as lightly as we can the necessary evils of life.
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Helen
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Dear friends, to what a fate am I yoked? Did my mother bear me as a wonder to mankind? For no other woman, Hellene or barbarian, gives birth to a white vessel of chicks, in which they say Leda bore me to Zeus.
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My life and all I do is a wonder, partly because of Hera, and partly my beauty is to blame. If only I could be rubbed out like a painting, and have again in turn a plainer form instead of beauty, and the Hellenes would have forgotten the evil fate that I now have,
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and would remember what part of my life is not evil, as they now remember what is.
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When someone looks to one event only, and is ill-treated by the gods, it is hard, but all the same it can be borne. But I am involved in countless troubles.
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First, although I never acted wrongly, my good name is gone. And this trouble is stronger than the reality, if someone incurs blame for wrongs that are not his own. Next, the gods have removed me from my native country to barbarian habits, and bereft of friends
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I have become a slave although I am free by birth; for among barbarians all are slaves except one. And the only anchor of my fortunes is gone, the hope that my husband would come one day and free me of my woes—he is dead, he no longer exists.
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My mother is dead, and I am called her murderer—unjustly, but that injustice is mine to bear; while the one who was born the glory of the house, my daughter, is growing gray as a virgin, without a husband; and those two Dioskouroi, called the sons of Zeus, are no more.
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But with all my misfortunes, I am as good as dead in my circumstances, though not in fact. And this is the last evil of all: if ever I should come home, I would be shut out by barred doors, for people would think I was that Helen of Troy, coming back with Menelaos.
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If my husband were still alive, we could have recognized each other by recourse to tokens which are evident to us alone. But now this is not so, and he can never be saved.
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Why then do I still live? What fortune do I have left? Shall I choose marriage in exchange for evils,
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and live with a barbarian man, seated at his sumptuous table? But whenever a husband she hates lives with a woman, her own body is also hateful to her. It is best to die; how could this not be well done? To hang oneself, high in the air, is unseemly,
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even slaves consider it undignified; but to stab oneself is noble and good, and the moment of rending life from the body is short. For I have come to such a depth of misery; other women have good fortune from their beauty,
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but the same thing has destroyed me.
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Chorus Leader
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Helen, do not suppose that stranger who came here, whoever he was, has spoken the whole truth.
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Helen
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And yet he said very clearly that my husband was dead.
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Chorus Leader
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Many words might be said in falsehood also.
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Helen
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And the opposite of falsehood is clear in its truth.
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Chorus Leader
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You are carried towards misfortune instead of what is good.
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Helen
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Yes, for terror has embraced me and leads me to the thing I fear.
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Chorus Leader
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How much goodwill is there in this house for you?
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Helen
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All are my friends, except the one who hunts me in marriage.
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Chorus Leader
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Then do you know what you should do? Leave your seat at the monument—
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Helen
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What sort of word of advice are you coming to?
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Chorus Leader
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Go inside and question the daughter of the sea-nymph, Theonoe, who knows all things, about your husband, whether he is still alive, or has left the light of day;
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and when you know for certain, rejoice or be full of mourning, according to your fortune. Before you know anything correctly, what good would it do you to grieve? But be persuaded by me; leave this tomb and join the girl;
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when you have someone in this house from whom you can learn the whole truth, why do you look further? And I myself want to go in and ask about the prophecies of the maiden with you; for, truly, women ought to help each other.
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Helen
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Dear friends, I welcome your advice. Come in, come into the house, to learn within about my struggles.
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Chorus
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You are calling on one who is wholly willing.
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Helen
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Oh, what an unhappy day! What tearful word shall I hear, unhappy as I am?
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Chorus
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Do not be a prophetess of sorrow, dear friend, anticipating lamentation.
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Helen
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What has my poor husband suffered? Does he see the light and the sun’s chariot and the paths of the stars? Or does he have a lasting fate
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among the dead beneath the earth?
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Chorus
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Take a brighter view of the future, whatever will happen.
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Helen
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For I call on you, I swear to you, Eurotas green with watery reeds,
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if this rumor of my husband’s death is true—and what was obscure in those words?—I will stretch a deadly noose about my neck, or drive inward a murderous thrust of slaughter that gushes from the throat,
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a contest of the blade through my flesh, as a sacrifice to the three goddesses and to the son of Priam, who once sat on the hollows of Ida, near the ox-stalls.
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Chorus
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May sorrow be turned aside elsewhere, and may your lot be fortunate!
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Helen
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Oh, unhappy Troy! Through deeds not done by yourself, you are ruined, and have suffered pitiably; for the gift that Kypris gave me has caused much blood
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and many tears; it has added grief to grief and tear to tear, sorrows. . . . Mothers have lost their children and virgin sisters of the slain have cut off their hair by the swollen tide of Phrygian Skamandros.
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And Hellas has cried aloud, aloud, and broken forth in wailing, beating her head, and drenching her soft-skinned cheek with the bloody strokes of her nails.
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O maiden Kallisto, blessed once in Arcadia, who climbed into the bed of Zeus on four paws, how much happier was your lot than my mother’s, you who in the form of a shaggy-limbed beast—the bearing of a lioness with your fierce eye—changed your burden of sorrow;
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and also the one whom Artemis once drove from her chorus, as a deer with horns of gold, the Titan girl, daughter of Merops, because of her loveliness; but the beauty of my body has destroyed the Dardanian towers, it has destroyed them and
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the lost Achaeans.
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Menelaos
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O Pelops, who once held that chariot-race contest with Oinomaos over Pisa, if only, when you were persuaded to make a banquet for the gods, you had left your life then, inside the gods,
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before you ever begot my father, Atreus, to whom were born, from his marriage with Airope, Agamemnon and myself, Menelaos, a famous pair; for I believe that I carried a mighty army—and I say this not in boast—in ships to Troy,
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no tyrant commanding any troops by force, but leading the young men of Hellas by voluntary consent. And some of these can be counted no longer alive, others as having a joyful escape from the sea, bringing home again names thought to be of the dead.
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But I wander miserably over the swelling waves of the gray ocean, ever since I sacked the towers of Ilion; and although I long to come home, I am not thought worthy by the gods to achieve this. I have sailed to Libya’s deserts and all its inhospitable landing-places;
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and whenever I draw near my native land, the blast drives me back again, and no favoring wind has ever entered my sails to let me come home.
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And now I am cast up on this shore, a miserable shipwrecked sailor who has lost his friends; and my ship is
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broken into many pieces against the rocks. But out of its cleverly-wrought fastenings the keel was left, on which I made my difficult escape by an unexpected chance, and also Helen with me, whom I dragged away from Troy. But I do not know the name of this country
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and its people; for I was embarrassed to burst into a crowd and make inquiries, and so I concealed these shabby clothes, in shame over my misfortune. For whenever a man of high degree is badly off, he falls into an unaccustomed state which is worse than that of one who has long been unfortunate.
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But poverty is wearing me away; for I have neither food, nor clothes around my body; one can compare what I am wearing to rags cast out of the ship. The sea snatched away all the robes I once wore, splendid clothes and ornaments. Deep in a cave
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I hid the woman who caused all my troubles, and have come here, after compelling those of my friends who survived to guard my wife. I have come alone, seeking help for those friends there, if I may find it somehow after careful search.
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When I saw this home, surrounded by walls, and the majestic gateways of some prosperous man, I came near; sailors can hope to get something from wealthy homes; but from those who have no livelihood—they could not help us, even if they wanted to.
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Hello! Is there some gatekeeper who might come from the house and announce my troubles within?
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Old woman
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Who’s at the door? Get away from the house and don’t annoy my master by standing at the court-yard gate! Or else you will die because you are
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a Hellene, and they have no business here.
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Menelaos
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My good woman, you can say these same words in a different tone, for I shall be persuaded; but let go your angry speech.
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Old woman
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Go away! Stranger, my orders are to let no Hellene come near this house.
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Menelaos
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Ah! Do not push me, or thrust me away by force.
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Old woman
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You are to blame, for not heeding what I say.
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Menelaos
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Announce to your master inside—
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Old woman
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I think someone would be sorry, if I announced your words.
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Menelaos
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I come as a shipwrecked man and a guest; such people are safe from violence.
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Old woman
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Well, go to some other house instead of this one.
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Menelaos
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No; I am going inside. You listen to me.
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Old woman
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Know that you’re only causing trouble; and soon you’ll be thrown out by force.
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Menelaos
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Alas! Where are those glorious armies of mine?
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Old woman
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Perhaps you were grand somewhere, but not here.
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Menelaos
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O my fortune, how we have been unworthily dishonored.
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Old woman
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Why are your eyes wet with tears? To whom are you lamenting?
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Menelaos
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To my fortunes, which were happy before this.
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Old woman
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Well then, why don’t you go away and give these tears to your friends.
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Menelaos
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What is this land? Whose palace is this?
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Old woman
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Proteus lives here, the land is Egypt.
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Menelaos
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Egypt? O wretched, that I have sailed here!
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Old woman
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And why do you blame the bright gleam of the Nile?
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Menelaos
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I do not blame it; I am sighing for my fate.
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Old woman
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Many people are doing badly; you are not the only one.
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Menelaos
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Is the king you name in the house?
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Old woman
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This is his tomb; his son rules the land.
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Menelaos
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And where might he be? Abroad, or in the house?
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Old woman
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He is not inside; he is most bitterly opposed to the Hellenes.
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Menelaos
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What cause does he have? I have felt the consequences of it!
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Old woman
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Helen, the daughter of Zeus, is in this house.
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Menelaos
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What do you mean? What did you say? Tell me again.
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Old woman
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The daughter of Tyndareus, who once lived in Sparta.
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Menelaos
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Where did she come from? What is the meaning of this?
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Old woman
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She came here from the land of Lakedaimon.
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Menelaos
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When? Surely I have not been robbed of my wife from the cave?
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Old woman
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Before the Achaeans went to Troy, stranger. But get away from the house; for something is happening within, by which the palace is thrown into confusion. You have not come at the right time; and if my master
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catches you, death will be your guest-gift. For I am well-disposed to Hellenes, for all that I spoke harshly to you in fear of my master.
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Menelaos
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What can I say? For after my former troubles, this present event that I hear of is an unhappy one,
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if I have come here, bringing my wife who was taken from Troy, and she is kept safe in the cave, but some other woman who has the same name as my wife lives in this house. She said the woman was born the child of Zeus.
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Can there be a man with the name of Zeus by the banks of Nile? For there is only one in heaven. Where in the world is there a Sparta, except by the streams of Eurotas, with its lovely reeds? The name of Tyndareus is the name of one alone.
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Is there any land of the same name as Lakedaimon or Troy? I do not know what to say; for there are probably many things in the wide world that have the same names, both cities and women; there is nothing, then, to marvel at.
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Besides, I will not run away from a servant’s fears; for no man is so barbaric at heart as to refuse me food when he has heard my name. The fire of Troy is famous, and I, Menelaos, who lighted it, am well known in every land.
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I will wait for the master of the house; he gives me two things to look out for: if he is a cruel sort of person, I will keep myself hidden and go back to the shipwreck; but if he shows any softening, I will ask for help in my present state.
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This is the worst evil for me in my misery, to beg the means of life from other kings, when I am myself a king; but it is necessary. The saying is not mine, but it is a wise word: nothing is stronger than dreadful necessity.