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ANDROMACHE

BY THE SAME AUTHOR
UNIFORM WITH THIS VOLUME
Paper, 1s. 6d.; Cloth, 2s. 6d.
CARLYON SAHIB
A Drama in Four Acts
——
London: William Heinemann
21 Bedford Street, W.C.

ANDROMACHE

A PLAY   
In Three Acts

By

GILBERT MURRAY

LONDON: WILLIAM HEINEMANN
    MDCCCC

All rights, including Acting rights in the
English Language, reserved

Prefatory Letter
Dramatis Personæ
The First Act
The Second Act
The Third Act

PREFATORY LETTER.

My Dear ARCHER,
The germ of this play sprang into existence on a certain April day in1896 which you and I spent chiefly in dragging our reluctant bicycles upthe great hills that surround Riveaulx Abbey, and discussing, so far asthe blinding rain allowed us, the questions whether all sincere comediesare of necessity cynical, and how often we had had tea since themorning, and how far it would be possible to treat a historical subjectloyally and unconventionally on a modern stage. Then we struck (as, Ifear, is too often the fate of those who converse with me) on thesubject of the lost plays of the Greek tragedians. We talked of theextraordinary variety of plot that the Greek dramatist found in hishistorical tradition, the force, the fire, the depth and richness ofcharacter-play. We thought of the marvellous dramatic possibilities ofan age in which actual and living heroes and sages were to be seenmoving against a background of primitive superstition and blanksavagery; in which the soul of man walked more free from trappings thanseems ever to have been permitted to it since. But I must stop; I seethat I am approaching the common pitfall of playwrights who venture uponprefaces, and am beginning to prove how good my play ought to be!

What I want to remind you of is this: that we agreed that a simplehistorical play, with as little convention as possible, placed in theGreek Heroic Age, and dealing with one of the ordinary heroic stories,ought to be, well, an interesting experiment. Beyond this point, I know,we began to differ. You wanted verse and the Greece of the Englishpoets. I wanted, above all things, a nearer approach to my conception ofthe real Greece, the Greece of history and even—dare I say it?—ofanthropology! I recognise your full right to disapprove of every wordand every sentiment of this play from the first to the last, but I hopeyou will not grudge me the pleasure of associating your name with atleast the inception of the experiment, and thanking you at the same timefor the many