Cirrus@Austlit

Author's note: This Shakespeareanisation of the tragedy of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra (occurring after the mythical sacking of Troy by the Greek forces following their ten-year siege to rescue Helen) arose from my interest in developing new “Shakespearean” blank verse dramas by reapplying some of the rhetorical precepts for composition used by Shakespeare to create forceful blank verse that has an archaic aesthetic akin to the language observed in Shakespeare’s plays. I was initially inspired by teaching the Agamemnon play by Aeschylus and discovering this play might be called a “proto- tragedy” because it was written before Aristotle’s Poetics and seemed to lack those formal elements of peripeteia (tragic reversal) and anagnorisis (tragic recognition) – that is, these things happen offstage in the Aeschylus play so the prospects of an audience experiencing a strong catharsis by sharing these moments with the protagonist seemed diminished. I therefore attempt to reinstate these elements in my script with a view to strengthening the prospects of catharsis. I was also impressed by the presentation of scenes from this play by a group of female students who viewed Clytemnestra’s murder of Agamemnon (through the lens of the #MeToo movement) as a justified reaction against the patriarchal violence subjugating women of her time. I have tried to be faithful to this observation in my development of Clytemnestra’s character as a justified usurper of her husband’s throne and a politically savvy manager of her “queendom” in her husband’s absence.

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Extract from a “Shakespearean” blank verse drama a companion play to Shakespeare’s Troilus and Cressida