A/N: This is the second play I've attempted to write. The dialogue is in blank verse (unrhymed iambic pentameter), and the choral songs are rhymed iambic tetrameter. Although I find it hard to write in verse, I also feel like it captures best the spirit of the ancient Greek tragedies, which I've tried to mimic here. I count among my influences Albert Camus's "The Myth of Sisyphus" which was the first work that I know of to portray Sisyphus as the existential hero, and also Aeschylus's "Prometheus Bound."
If you like it, please leave a review.
-Leia
"So with a broken throne, the great gods mock that captive king; so like a Caryatid, he patient sits, upholding on his frozen brow the piled entablatures of ages. Wind ye down there, ye prouder, sadder souls! question that proud, sad king! a family likeness! aye, he did beget ye, ye young exiled royalties; and from your grim sire only will the old state-secret come." -- Herman Melville, Moby-Dick
SISYPHUS, or THE CAPTIVE KING
Dramatis Personae:
THANATOS, god of death
SHADE of a fallen soldier
CHORUS of shades
SISYPHUS, former king of Corinth
GLAUCUS, son of Sisyphus and Merope
a KER, or spirit of violent death
BELLEROPHON, son of Glaucus and grandson of Sisyphus
GERAS, god of old age
MEROPE, wife of Sisyphus; one of the Pleiades
The setting is Tartarus, the darkest part of the Underworld, where SISYPHUS has been condemned to roll a boulder to the top of a hill for the rest of eternity. Every time he nears the top, the rock rolls back down to the bottom and he must start over.
Enter THANATOS, an imposing black-robed figure bearing a sword and an inverted lantern. He leads the SHADE of a young fallen soldier draped in a white burial shroud. The SHADE pauses for a moment and peers into the darkness, where the shadow of the condemned man is visible. THANATOS turns to him impatiently.
THANATOS
What faltering is this? The time to make delays
has passed. You should have slowed your steps
before you paid the Boatman's fare and crossed
the waters of the Acheron, and ere
your shrouded body burned to ashes on
its fun'ral pyre. No man comes willingly
into this realm, but none that ever lived
has long avoided his descent. Already
your scalded bones lie cold within their tomb.
This final hesitation is in vain;
make haste – ahead awaits the deathly plain.
SHADE
Lord Thanatos, I beg thy pardon; I
would never dare to seek escape from thee.
But only let me ask one question, ere
what little breath I have hath fled away
and left me without speech, and ere my mind
and memories have, like my body, turned
to dust and smoke. Who is he, there within
the shadowed depths, who rolls with phantom hands
his boulder ever up the hill, but watches
it fall again each time it nears the crest?
THANATOS
Avert your eyes and pay him no regard.
Even the pity of a shade, though faint
and subtle as the softest breeze upon
the brow, is solace more than he deserves.
SHADE
Please tell me only who he is, and why he
hath earned a darker fate than other men.
THANATOS
He once was called King Sisyphus of Corinth,
although his wicked actions make me loathe
to grant he ever wore that crown. He robbed
and killed his palace guests, and hating e'en
his very kin, conspired against his brother
and forced his banishment. And as he showed
no sympathy nor courtesy to man,
so too he showed the gods no reverence:
he interfered when Zeus himself, the king
of high Olympus, whose acts no pious man
would dare to judge, seduced the fair Aegina.
Yet all of this was not enough to damn
him to his special torment – he would have shared
the painless fate of ordinary men,
who drift unconscious on the sunless fields,
had not he twice rebelled against his death.
He seemed to think himself a god, that he
might choose to leave the plains of Asphodel
and triumph o'er his body's mortal frailty.
When I commanded that he follow me
to Hades' kingdom he resisted me
and bound my hands in mine own shackles,
and after I was freed to claim his shade
again he planned with his accomplice wife
a clever ruse to trick the Maiden, pale
Persephone, that she would let him leave
the Underworld and breathe the Earthly air.
For this, more than his other crimes, he was
condemned to bear his unremitting burden.
SHADE
This punishment is harsh, even for one
so impious. He must regret his sins.
THANATOS
He is too proud; in all the time since he
descended here at last, dragged down in chains,
he has not once repented. The only words
that leave his mouth are curses. As he wished
to be immortal, let his torment be.
Come with me, shadow, to your own doom;
give thanks to all the gods that you will but
decay and fade, and that your pain will end.
SHADE
I follow, yet I feel for him a trace
of sympathy – my final sentiment.
Whate'er he hath become, or he hath been,
we both have lived and died as mortal men.
Exit THANATOS, leading the SHADE. Enter the CHORUS of shades, singing somberly. They are wrapped in white burial shrouds, some of which are stained with blood. As new arrivals to the Underworld, they are still – at least for now – able to retain their voices and sentience.
CHORUS
Strophe
O gods, hear this my threnody;
O Fates that cut my mortal thread
To cast me hither, pity me
Who joins this chorus of the dead.
Where are the Islands of the Blessed
Whose visions eased my dying fears?
Where is the sweet impending rest
That stemmed my mourners' bedside tears?
What judge at what unearthly bar
Will portion my rewards to come
When naught but children's paintings are
The flowers of Elysium?
Farewell to peace and joy; farewell
To all but plains of asphodel;
Of pale-bloomed asphodel.
Antistrophe
My lifeless body was consumed
In fun'ral flames, my flesh destroyed;
My bones and ashes lie entombed
And now within this lightless void
My last quintessence hath begun
To fade: my conscious mind grows dim
And mem'ries loosen one by one
Like leaves from a decaying limb.
My tearless eyes have sunk and dried,
My bloodless cheeks are pale, and fast
My breath is fading, every sigh
Of grief one closer to my last.
The flesh does not the soul intern
For nothing lingers when it burns;
We vanish when it burns.
Strophe
I miss the sun whose warming beams
Would make the winter noontides thaw;
I miss the moon whose tender gleam
Could midnight's darkness overawe.
I grieve for all I left above
This lifeless realm, and even mourn
For things I never knew I loved:
The thistle and the rose's thorn,
Cold falls of rain that soak the ground
And turn to marsh the springtime glades,
Wild vines that twist themselves around
The temples' marble collonades.
I would the gods my fate forgive
If I could but a moment live;
A briefest moment live.
Antistrophe
O Father, thou whom once I laid
With mine own hands beneath thy tomb
And carved thy epitaph; thy shade
Now wanders nameless in the gloom.
Sweet Mother, dost thou know my face?
Thou ever wouldst console my fears,
But thy soft flesh and warm embrace
Have faded with thy breath and tears.
And at my graveside, children mine,
All your libations are in vain:
No sweetest oil nor purest wine
Would let me hold ye once again.
Your company was ever worth
All of the sorrows of the Earth;
The pains I bore on Earth.
Epode
But who is he, disgraced and chained,
That rolls yon boulder up the hill
With calloused hands and muscles strained
Against its massive weight, until
It slips and thunders down once more?
Lord Sisyphus, once Corinth's king,
Now slavelike his eternal chore
Sustains, and yet unwearying
He raises his defiant eyes
And with his still unfading breath
Hurls boasts into the distant skies
And curses to the god of Death.
'Tis vain, thou fallen royalty,
And o'er myself I pity thee;
This shadow pities thee.
The shade of SISYPHUS now comes into full view. He appears to be an aged man with a graying beard. He is still dressed in his king's robes, but now they are tattered and little more than rags. Around his wrists are iron shackles connected by a chain. Before him, in a moment of temporary repose, sits the great rock, his everlasting burden. Despite his disgraceful condition he continues to bear himself with pride, even arrogance, when addressing the CHORUS.
SISYPHUS
(contemptuous)
Cease your lament; 'tis strident to mine ears.
CHORUS
Forgive our pity for thee, Sisyphus.
SISYPHUS
Away; I need no pity from the dead.
CHORUS
Thou needst it from the gods, but they have none.
SISYPHUS
I would refuse it even if they had.
CHORUS
What foolish words are these; thou art too proud.
SISYPHUS
What have I left, within this place, but pride?
CHORUS
But 'twas thy pride that brought thee here. If thou
hadst willingly accepted death, thou wouldst
have known at least a gentler doom; thy voice,
thy mind and consciousness, thy memories
of pain and sorrow would have faded out
and left thee but a drifting shadow, like
the smoke that dissipates from fun'ral pyres.
Instead thy misery must never end.
SISYPHUS
Then let it never end; how craven must
you think me, that I would envy smoke and shadows?
CHORUS
We do not think thee craven, but too bold.
No soul that ever sank to Tartarus
hath been so overconfident as thee;
their punishments have burned their pride away.
SISYPHUS
My pride is fire itself – it cannot burn.
CHORUS
It will at last, for thou art only mortal.
None but the gods can bear a punishment
like thine without despair. Thou hast not been
here long; the years will pass, and then a time
will come when thou wilt seek our consolation.
SISYPHUS
(Enraged by the words of the chorus)
What right have you to reprimand me, ghosts?
Am I so far debased that I should feel
ashamed before a crowd of phantoms, and drop
my gaze before their sunken eyes? You are
but shadows, and your words are shadow-words
that fade like etchings on a weathered tomb.
Yes, I am mortal too – and yet while all
your living traits are lost, mine are retained:
your flesh has melted into mist, while mine
is firm; your memories are fading, while
no drop of Lethe's stream has touched my lips.
As I was king on Earth, so I am king
in Tartarus – for I am still a man.
Although mine emptied veins no longer pulse,
yet something in them makes my bloodless heart
beat with defiance, and every time it sounds,
though soft as muffled drops of rain, I feel
as though it shakes the gods enthroned in Heaven.
Let their immortal flesh turn pale to hear
it; let it make them tremble head to toe.
Wherefore this condemnation? What crime did I
that they have never done – what murder and
what robbery; what trick and what seduction?
The gods cared nothing for my paltry sins.
I culled their rage when I deceived them – when
I fastened Thanatos in chains and fooled
the queen of Hades, and when I twice escaped
my death to stay within the living world.
What indignation! – that mortal Sisyphus
had overcome the gods and spurned their will!
They damned me here to salve their honor, but
'twas something more than shame that fueled their wrath:
my challenge frightened them, and they interned
me in defense, as once the lord of all
Olympus, Zeus, had feared his father's might
and bound him in the deepest vales of Hell.
What fools – this punishment itself is my
apotheosis: though I am mortal, yet
they have condemned me like a god! The curse
that sank me here has lofted me above
their heads; I call this rock my subject world,
these iron chains my gilded wristlets, this sweat
upon my brow my heavenly annointment!
No kingly accolade could more exalt me!
O ye abraded hands! O flesh that tears
but sheds no blood; O bones that plead to break!
Bear up your burden proudly, like a scepter!
My heart, forever sound thy rebel's march!
Unstifled voice, suppress thy wearied sighs,
and breathe thou naught but curses to the gods!
And you – you dogs on high Olympus, heed me:
beware your captive; beware King Sisyphus!
Let every mortal 'neath his gravestone lie,
yet this I vow: I was not born to die!
CHORUS
These words are like a madman's, Sisyphus.
What futile boasts are these? Dost thou believe
that thou canst yet escape thy punishment?
SISYPHUS
Do not discount my words. Have I not said
that I have twice been conquerer of death?
My victory will come again. Three Fates
control men's destinies: one weaves the thread
of life; one measures it; one cuts it short;
and so three times shall I defy their shears,
until I make my destiny mine own.
CHORUS
Is this the truth? Art thou convinced thou wilt
recross again the river of the dead?
SISYPHUS
I vow I will achieve it, and deceiver
though I have been, my promises are worth
all of the misted waters of the Styx.
Before this rock has rolled one hundred times
down its incline, I will have breathed again
the living air, and seen the golden sun.
CHORUS
Be cautious, Sisyphus; thou art disgraced
and angry, and we think these haughty claims
are but a momentary recklessness.
But look; another shade approaches thee.
--
If Sisyphus seems like a self-centered jerk, it's because he is...whatever good qualities he might also possess. In the next act, he speaks with the shade of his son, Glaucus.