Reviews for Alcestis

The average rating for Alcestis based on 2 reviews is 3.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2018-02-20 00:00:00 Shawn Wendt Last night, on our first evening of the Adelaide Fringe, we saw a fine production of Alcestis by the Scrambled Prince Theatre Company. It was most enjoyable, but I'm afraid that on returning home I immediately went and looked up an online translation. Could it really be the case that the dialogue between Death and Apollo in the second scene consisted mostly of off-colour BDSM jokes? You will probably not be astonished to hear that the answer is no. I hang my head in shame. That I, of all people, should have been fooled so easily!

Review # 2 was written on 2010-09-16 00:00:00 Andy Rogers I'm pretty sure this was either a masterpiece or a train wreck. I'm leaning towards masterpiece. Admetus knows he will die soon, but Death offers him the chance to live if he can find someone to take his place. Admetus' wife, Alcestis, accepts. As Lattimore writes in the introduction, the tale isn't so much "How noble must a wife be to take her husband's place in death," as "How selfish and cowardly must a husband be to let his wife die for him." But Heracles rescues Alcestis and brings her back to life in the last five pages. We don't hear from her after her revivification, which leaves the reader wondering how this family can ever be reconciled--can such a noble wife return to living with and loving a man who let her die for him? This is supposed to be a tragicomedy, but I think that the ending is intentionally lacking in satisfaction to force the reader to consider what's left unsaid. I wonder if this myth had any bearing on Shakespeare's A Winter's Tale. The endings remind me of each other so.