The Bacchae
Euripides405 BCEEuripides wrote the most terrifying play about what happens when a society represses the irrational.
Read this if you…
- want a fun, fucked up plot where a bunch of partying ladies go nuts
- loved Medea and want more Euripides
Skip this if you…
- haven't read Medea to see if you like Euripides
Why It Matters
Euripides wrote the most terrifying play about what happens when a society represses the irrational. Dionysus shows up in Thebes, and the king who tries to ban him gets literally torn apart by his own mother. It is the ultimate cautionary tale about the cost of denying the chaotic, primal forces in human nature.
The 
Take
Fun little play about Dionysus brainwashing everyone and having the mother of the kings and a bunch of other ladies tear him to pieces, all because they don’t acknowledge the god of partying. Gotta love he got pentheus to dress up as a lady
Depicted in Art
Two maenads in a frenzy seize Pentheus by the limbs and tear him apart; a third figure recoils. Interior shows a single dancing maenad.
Douris, -480
Pentheus, half-fallen, is set upon by maenads on a rocky slope: his mother and aunt rip at his arms while another swings a rock and others wield thyrsi like clubs.
70
Pentheus, disguised as a woman in Bacchic dress, flees in terror across a wooded landscape while the maenads close in.
Charles Gleyre
Pentheus is pulled to the ground in an open landscape as his mother and sisters grapple at his limbs to tear him apart.
Antonio Tempesta, 1606
Recommended Editions
Robin Robertson
Free Press · 2008
Robertson's Bacchae is propulsive verse from a poet who understands that Dionysus is supposed to be terrifying, not symbolic. The messenger speeches read like horror, which is the point.
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Deep Dive
What It's About
This summary gives away plot details.
Notable Quotes
“There be many shapes of mystery. And many things God makes to be, past hope or fear. And the end men looked for cometh not, and a path is there where no man thought.”
“What else is Wisdom? What of man's endeavour, or God's high grace, so lovely and so great? To stand from fear set free, to breathe and wait.”