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First of all--if I can geek-out for a second--it was so refreshing to FINALLY read an ancient satyr play! For years, I've heard echoed again and again the symbolic value of Greek playwrights staging satyr plays--bawdy farces that served as short satirical finales to tragic trilogies--without having any concrete understanding of how said pieces played. While the concept always fascinated me, the unfortunate dearth of extant satyr plays--"Cyclops" is the ONLY one--has left the style exiled from the theatrical canon. After reading this, I can't help but ask: why? How else can fledgling theatre historians draw any tangible connection to the satyr play style if "Cyclops"--our one link to this world--is left off the required reading list?

Stepping down from my holy-shit-that's-nerdy soapbox, Heather McHugh's translation of "Cyclops" was outstanding! The contemporaneity of the translation was edgy enough to make the humor bite, without sacrificing the rich poetry to MTV-era "relevance." This, matched with the play's natural irreverence (drunken monsters, satyr's running around with erect dongs, etc.) would make this play an instant hit with a modern audience. Also, I'm willing to bet this show would sell to a modern crowd because the gulf between contemporary readers' ignorance of ancient geopolitics and classical tragedies' bevy of timely (aka: obscure) references is MUCH slimmer in "Cyclops" than in most Greek tragedies. (Most people know about Odysseus, right?)

Focusing on the titular character, I couldn't help but draw a connection between Euripides' "Cyclops" and John Gardner's depiction of the Dragon in "Grendel." Both characters live in solitude, spurn such societal institutions as religion and government, and opt to satiate what they consider the only truly worthwhile god: their appetite. For each character, gluttony assumes a unique form--Polyphemus feeds his belly while the Dragon hoards wealth. However, in both cases, the author creates gobs of ironic humor by upending readers' expectations of how such "monsters" would behave; the reader comes to the text assuming the Cyclops and Dragon will act as brutish as their infamous reputations' dictate, only to find the characters pontificating eloquently on such issues as law, religion, government, and human desire. ". . . from the mouths of brutes . . ."

While it's unsurprising that Euripides would write a killer funny satyr play (considering the already tragicomic style of his "tragedies"), I wonder how Sophocles & Aeschuylus pulled it off? The latter two tragedians--while wickedly skilled--are famous for their hyper-serious gravity. Could they cut loose like Euripides? Or was the humor in their satyr plays a bit. . . neutered? Might be worth tracking down the excerpts from their lost satyr plays to see how versatile they were.