Medea (Euripedes)

-6-

Chorus

I will do this. It is right that your husband should pay,

Medea. I am not surprised that you grieve over your loss.

But I see Creon, king of this country,

coming, a messenger of some new proclamation.

Creon enters along one of the parodoi (the one leading from the palace)

with an entourage of his henchmen. The chorus might withdraw to the edges of

the orchestra to witness but not participate in the public proclamation.

Creon

You there, with the scowl on your face, raging against your husband,

Medea, I command you to leave this land,

taking your two children with you.

Do not delay. Of this sentence of banishment I am both judge and jury

and I will not go back home again

until I have cast you outside the borders of my country.

Medea
aiai [Oh no]I am ruined ... desperate!

My enemies are unfurling all the sails

and there is no clear landing place from ruin.

But still, though I am in dire straits, I want to know the reason.

Why? Why are you banishing me from this country, Creon?

Creon:

I am afraid of you - no need to cover up my reasons -

in case you do some irreparable harm to my daughter.

Many factors contribute to my dread:

You are innately clever and skilled in many evils,

and you are grieved because your husband has been taken from you.

I hear that you are making threats: - against the father of the bride,

the bridegroom, and the bride, to do us some injury

- this is the news they bring me. I shall take precautions against all this.

It is better to suffer your hatred, madam,

than to be soft now and regret it later.

Medea

This is not the first time, Creon, but over and over again,

people's opinion has injured me and done me great harm.

A man who has full use of his faculties should not

educate his children in any special skills;

apart from the reputation they get for being unproductive,

they will reap the enmity of the citizens.

If you try to show some clever innovation to the inept

you will seem useless and hardly skilled at all;

[if people in the city suspect you of being superior to those

they believe ingenious you will irritate them.]
And I share in this fate myself:

because I have skills, I suffer the envy of some,
and to others I am a rival; but I am not so very clever.

And then you are afraid of me. What harm can you suffer from me?

It is not in my power - don't be afraid of me, Creon -

to do wrong to the royal family.

What wrong have you done me? You married your

daughter to the man you chose for her. But my husband,

I do hate him. You, I think, have acted with good sense in this.

Now I do not begrudge you your good fortune.

Give your daughter in marriage, prosper; but let me live

in this land. I have been wronged,

but I will keep quiet, defeated by my betters.

Creon

Your words are cajoling to my ears, but inside my heart

I am afraid you are forming some evil new plan,[18]

So much the less I trust you than before.

For a quick-tempered woman - the same goes for a man - is easier to guard against than a silent clever one.

But you must leave at once. No more arguments.

The matter is settled and you are not so clever

that you can stay here in our midst, being an enemy to me.

Medea

No, please, at your knees I beg you in the name of the new bride.