Agamênon mostra sua volta da guerra de Troia, na qual saiu-se bem após matar a própria filha, Ifigênia, em sacrifício aos deuses. A morte de Ifigênia não é bem recebida pela mãe, Clitemnestra, esposa de Agamênon, que a vinga assassinando o próprio marido com a ajuda de seu amante, Egisto.
A segunda parte, Coéforas, narra a volta de Orestes, filho de Agamênon, orientado pelo deus Apolo, para vingar a morte do pai. Ele é ajudado pela irmã, Electra, que era mantida como serviçal no sótão do castelo por sua mãe, Clitemnestra. O amante dela também é morto por Orestes com a ajuda de Electra e do deus Apolo.
A terceira parte, Eumênides, traz a ira de Clitemnestra, já morta, materializada nas Fúrias, que são vistas somente por Orestes e responsáveis pela sua loucura. Narra também a a nálise do crime de Orestes: o assassinato da própria mãe, julgado pela deusa Atena.
Se há uma palavra que pode descrever estas tragédias, é transcendental. Catártica seria uma outra boa palavra e suficiente. Não sei se as traduções captam toda a profundidade dos diálogos insanos, mas há em Esquilo uma vocação universal que todo leitor ou espectador sente enquanto o lê ou assiste, encenado, e isso porque estas são 3 histórias tão universais, unidas pela fábula, isto é, a efabulação mitológica. ( )

I found this cycle of plays to be quite profound for what it has to say about breaking a cycle of violence and revenge. The exploration of what justice is can also be seen as the plays progress. I think this is a classic that I will be revisiting again. ( )

For class we were supposed to only read part 1, "Agamemnon", which leaves off at a weird cliffhanger, so I read the rest and the story made more sense. These plays, unlike other Greek trilogies, don't work as standalone pieces at all; reading all of them in quick succession at least resolved the story but it was so so boring. From my non-academic perspective the main reason to read Greek tragedy is because they're metal as hell (Medea!) and while the Oresteia had moments of being metal while the family's caught in a Godfather-like cycle of retribution, the resolution is just... a courtroom scene. I understand what the story is saying with this, but it was very anticlimactic after all that! On top of everything this was very misogynist (especially when compared to later plays like Medea) and I'm honestly getting sick of reading men writing about men.
I guess Meineck's translation was pretty good, it was pretty easy to read, but for whatever reason the footnotes at the bottom of each page didn't correspond with any in-text superscript or asterisk or other markers! This was a very stupid publishing decision! ( )

Classics

This tragedy takes place after the fall of Troy. The main characters are Clytemnestra and Agamemnon, queen and king of Argos, respectively. Orestes is their son. Agamemnon is killed by Clytemnestra and Clytemnestra by her son, Orestes. This play examines the difference between justice and revenge. Quite frankly, there were just more characters in this play than I wanted to process. Also at 208 pages, it is longer than most of this type of work. The chorus played a very major role in the advancement of this story. ( )