Aeschylus (c.525–c.456 BCE) was the earliest writer of Greek tragic drama whose works survive. He is regarded as the founder of Greek tragic drama. His seven extant plays from a known 80 titles include Prometheus Bound and the Oresteia trilogy.
Aeschylus contributed considerably to the methodological development of the dramatic form and the movement away from pure ritual to the theater as we know it. He did so by introducing the concept of two actors in dialogue and by limiting the role of the choral song.
Aeschylus is best known for his trilogy, the Oresteia (458 BCE,) consisting of the tragedies Agamemnon, The Choephori, and The Eumenides.
Using themes from Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, the Oresteia tell the story of the fall of the House of Atreus in a series of retributive murders over three generations. Agamemnon, who has killed his daughter to ensure victory over the Trojans, returns home and is killed by his wife Clytemnestra and her lover Aegisthus. This is followed by the vengeance of their son Orestes.
The Oresteia have inspired some of the greatest artists and thinkers of the modern world—from Richard Wagner and Friedrich Nietzsche to T. S. Eliot and Simone de Beauvoir.
According to legend, Aeschylus was killed when an eagle dropped a turtle onto his bald head, taking it for a stone on which the shell could be broken. Aeschylus’s head was broken; this fulfilled an oracle’s prediction that Aeschylus would be struck dead by a force from the heavens.
More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by Aeschylus
There are times when fear is good. It must keep its watchful place at the heart’s controls.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Fear, Anxiety
Bronze is the mirror of the form; wine, of the heart.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Alcohol
When a match has equal partners then I fear not.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Marriage
Hell to ships, hell to men, hell to cities.
—Aeschylus
There’s nothing certain in a man’s life except this: That he must lose it.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Doubt, Uncertainty, Certainty, Death
Obedience to truth known, is the king’s highway to that which is still beyond us.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Obedience
The sea is there—and who shall quench it?—nurturing the juices which yield much purple worth its weight in silver, wholly renewable, the dye of vestments; there is a remedy for these here with the gods’ help, my lord, from our reserve: the house does not know how to be poor.
—Aeschylus
When a man takes the road to destruction, the gods help him along.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Decisions
Fear is stronger than arms.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Fear, Anxiety
The reward of suffering is experience.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Adversity, Experience
The misfortunes of mankind are of varied plumage.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Adversity
Time as he grows old teaches many lessons.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Time Management
Justice, voiceless, unseen, seeth thee when thou sleepest and when thou goest forth and when thou liest down. Continually doth she attend thee, now aslant thy course, now at a later time.
—Aeschylus
Fortune is for all; judgment is theirs who have won it for themselves.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Fortune
Take heart. Suffering, when it climbs the highest, lasts but a little time.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Suffering
Countless chuckles of the waves of the sea.
—Aeschylus
The wisest of the wise may err.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Wisdom, Mistakes
Everyone’s quick to blame the alien.
—Aeschylus
The future you shall know when it has come; before then, forget it.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Future
Time in its aging course teaches all things.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Time Management
Too few rejoice at a friend’s good fortune.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Fortune
God lends a helping hand to the man who tries hard.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Trying, Helping
For there is no defense for a man who, in the excess of his wealth, has kicked the great altar of Justice out of sight.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Defense
In our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Heart, Pain, Sleep, God, Suffering, Despair, Wisdom, Learn
A prosperous fool is a grievous burden.
—Aeschylus
To be free from evil thoughts is God’s best gift.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Evils
It is not the oath that makes us believe the man, but the man the oath.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Man, Character, Promises
Excessive fear is always powerless.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Fear
There is no pain so great as the memory of joy in present grief.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Pain, Grief
Delay not to seize the hour.
—Aeschylus
Topics: Getting Going, Inaction, Procrastination
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