Aeschylus – dwkcommentaries

Robert Kennedy’s Moving Eulogy for Martin Luther King, Jr.

A prior post discussed the eloquent eulogy by Robert f. Kennedy for Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on the night King was assassinated, April 4, 1968.

David Margolick, a former New York Times journalist who is writing a book about King and Kennedy, reminds us that before that night, the two men had a “testy” relationship[. King was horrified to learn of RFK’s appointment as Attorney General because of “his early ties to Senator Joseph McCarthy, [Kennedy’s] attacks on organized labor, his cozy relationship with Southern racist politicians and his reputation for being his big brother’s consigliere.” Their subsequent contacts were infrequent and private. Moreover, Kennedy felt more at home with black militants than many mainstream black leaders like Dr. King. Thus, Kennedy came to Indianapolis that night because of promises he had made to black Indianapolis and despite aides’ worries that Kennedy would be putting his life at risk.[1]

The Eulogy[2]

That night Kennedy arrived late and climbed into the back of a pickup truck as his platform and delivered the following six-minute eulogy:

“I have bad news for you, for all of our fellow citizens, and people who love peace all over the world, and that is that Martin Luther King was shot and killed tonight.”

“Martin Luther King dedicated his life to love and to justice for his fellow human beings, and he died because of that effort.”

“In this difficult day, in this difficult time for the United States, it is perhaps well to ask what kind of a nation we are and what direction we want to move in. For those of you who are black–considering the evidence there evidently is that there were white people who were responsible–you can be filled with bitterness, with hatred, and a desire for revenge. We can move in that direction as a country, in great polarization–black people amongst black, white people amongst white, filled with hatred toward one another.”

“Or we can make an effort, as Martin Luther King did, to understand and to comprehend, and to replace that violence, that stain of bloodshed that has spread across our land, with an effort to understand with compassion and love.”

“For those of you who are black and are tempted to be filled with hatred and distrust at the injustice of such an act, against all white people, I can only say that I feel in my own heart the same kind of feeling. I had a member of my family killed, but he was killed by a white man. But we have to make an effort in the United States, we have to make an effort to understand, to go beyond these rather difficult times.”

“My favorite poet was Aeschylus. He wrote: ‘In our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God.’”

“What we need in the United States is not division; what we need in the United States is not hatred; what we need in the United States is not violence or lawlessness; but love and wisdom, and compassion toward one another, and a feeling of justice toward those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white or they be black.”

“So I shall ask you tonight to return home, to say a prayer for the family of Martin Luther King, that’s true, but more importantly to say a prayer for our own country, which all of us love–a prayer for understanding and that compassion of which I spoke.”

“We can do well in this country. We will have difficult times; we’ve had difficult times in the past; we will have difficult times in the future. It is not the end of violence; it is not the end of lawlessness; it is not the end of disorder.”

“But the vast majority of white people and the vast majority of black people in this country want to live together, want to improve the quality of our life, and want justice for all human beings who abide in our land.”

“Let us dedicate ourselves to what the Greeks wrote so many years ago: to tame the savageness of man and make gentle the life of this world.”

“Let us dedicate ourselves to that, and say a prayer for our country and for our people.”

Conclusion

Margolick observes that although no one in the audience probably had never heard of Aeschylus, the poem’s words “pain,” “despair,” “awful,” “grace” and “God” resonated with them.[3]

Andrew Young, the black leader who that night was with other black leaders in the Memphis motel where King had been assassinated, later recalled, says Margolick, that Kennedy “was in the middle of a totally black community, and he stood there without fear and with great confidence and empathy, and he literally poured his soul out talking about his brother. The amazing thing to us was that the crowd listened. He reached them.” Young also said the feeling in that motel room that night was “He’s probably going to go next.”

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[1] Margolick, The Power of Bobby Kennedy’s Eulogy for Martin Luther King, N.Y. Times (April 4, 2018). An account of Kennedy’s actions regarding King in the days after the assassination is set forth in an excerpt of the new book by Margolick, The Promise and the Dream.

[2] Robert F. Kennedy, Statement on Assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., Indianapolis, Indiana, April 4, 1968, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library & Museum.

[3] Perhaps unartful comments about this poem by Aeschylus were provided in Aeschylus on Suffering and Wisdom, dwkcommentaries.com (Feb. 10, 2014).

The Tragic Extinguishment of the Eloquence of Robert F. Kennedy

Most Americans remember or know about Robert F. Kennedy or “RFK” (1925-1968): brother to U.S. President John F. Kennedy, U.S. Attorney General in his brother’s administration, U.S. Senator from New York, candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1968, and assassinated by Sirhan Bishara Sirhan on June 6, 1968, at a Los Angeles hotel campaign event.

Less generally remembered or known was RFK’s eloquence, undoubtedly aided by his speechwriters: Adam Walinsky, Richard Goodwin and Allard Lowenstein.[1]

One prominent example of Kennedy’s eloquence occurred on April 4, 1968, immediately after the assassination of Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. Speaking to a campaign crowd in Indianapolis, Indiana, Kennedy shocked everyone by announcing the news of the assassination and then went on to refer to his own grief at the 1963 assassination of his brother, President John F. Kennedy. Robert added, “My favorite poet was Aeschylus. He once wrote: ‘Even in our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart, until in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God.’”[2]

Kennedy that night went on to say, “What we need in the United States is not division; what we need in the United States is not hatred; what we need in the United States is not violence or lawlessness; but love and wisdom, and compassion toward one another, and a feeling of justice toward those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white or they be black. . . . Let us dedicate ourselves to what the Greeks wrote so many years ago: ‘to tame the savageness of man and make gentle the life of this world.’”

The next day in Cleveland, Ohio, Kennedy spoke against the “mindless menace of violence in America which again stains our land and every one of our lives.” He added, “Yet we know what we must do. It is to achieve justice among our fellow citizens. . . . We must admit the vanity of our false distinctions among men and learn to find our own advancement in the search for advancement of others. . . . We must admit in ourselves that our own children’s future cannot be built on the misfortunes of others. We must recognize that this short life can neither be ennobled or enriched by hatred or revenge.”[3]

Two other examples of his eloquence were inscribed on Kennedy’s memorial in Virginia’s Arlington National Cemetery:

“It is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is shaped each time a man stands up for an ideal or acts to improve the lot of others or strikes out against injustice he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest wall of oppression and resistance.” (University of Cape Town, South Africa, June 6, 1966)
“Some men see things as they are and ask ‘Why?’ I dream things that never were and ask, ‘Why not?'” (1968)

Yet others were included in the previously mentioned June 6, 1966, speech at the University of Cape Town. They all seem, to this observer, to be indirect references to Jesus’ injunction “to love God with all your heart, mind and soul and your neighbor as yourself” and to the Christian notion of vocation.[4] They are the following:

“First is the danger of futility; the belief there is nothing one man or one woman can do against the enormous array of the world’s ills — against misery and ignorance, injustice and violence. Yet many of the world’s great movements, of thought and action, have flowed from the work of a single man. A young monk began the Protestant reformation, a young general extended an empire from Macedonia to the borders of the earth, and a young woman reclaimed the territory of France. It was a young Italian explorer who discovered the New World, and 32-year-old Thomas Jefferson who proclaimed that all men are created equal. “Give me a place to stand,” said Archimedes, “and I will move the world.” These men moved the world, and so can we all.” (Emphasis added.)
“Let no one be discouraged by the belief there is nothing one person can do against the enormous array of the world’s ills, misery, ignorance, and violence. Few will have the greatness to bend history, but each of us can work to change a small portion of events. And in the total of all those acts will be written the history of a generation.” (Emphasis added.)
“Every time we turn our heads the other way when we see the law flouted, when we tolerate what we know to be wrong, when we close our eyes and ears to the corrupt because we are too busy or too frightened, when we fail to speak up and speak out, we strike a blow against freedom and decency and justice.” (Emphasis added.)
“Few men are willing to brave the disapproval of their peers, the censure of their colleagues, the wrath of their society. Moral courage is a rarer commodity than bravery in battle or great intelligence. Yet it is the one essential, vital quality for those who seek to change a world that yields most painfully to change.” (Emphasis added.)

Conclusion

I weep again at our loss of this inspiring, eloquent and passionate man. How I wish he were still here and our president so that we did not have to listen to the constant falsehoods and drivel from the man who now ineptly occupies that office.

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[1] Larry Tye, Bobby Kennedy: The Making of a Liberal Icon at 373 (Random House; New York, 2016).

[2] Edwin O. Guthman & C. Richard Allen (eds.), RFK: Collected Speeches at 355-58 (Viking; New York, 1993). See Aeschylus on Suffering and Wisdom, dwkcommentaries.com (Feb. 10, 2014).

[3] Guthman & Allen at 358-62.

[4] Tye at 410-12; Guthman & Allen at 231-46. See Another Perspective on the Parable of the Good Samaritan, dwkcommentaries.com (July 27, 2017).

Report for dwkcommentaries–-2014

This blog, which started on April 4, 2011, reports the following activity through December 31, 2014:

YEAR	POSTS	COMMENTS (by dwkcommentaries)	VIEWS
2011	190	26	9,189
2012	179	170	51,164
2013	86	708	49,082
2014	138	47	58,602
*TOTAL*	*593*	*951*	*168,037*

The busiest day for 2014 was December 11 with 321 views; for all time, 361 on December 13, 2012. For 2014 as a whole the viewers came from 183 countries with most from the U.S.A. followed by the Canada and the United Kingdom. This blog has 516 followers (Facebook, 324; direct, 154; Tumblr, 14; and commentators, 24).

The following were the most popular posts in 2014:

Great Britain’s Deteriorating Relationship with Her American Colonies, 1765-1775 (July 16, 2012);
The American Revolutionary War’s Battle of Bunker Hill, June 17, 1775 (July 30, 2012);
The American Revolutionary War’s Battles of Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts, April 19, 1775 (July 22, 2012);
The American Revolutionary War’s Siege of Boston, April 19, 1775–March 17, 1776 (July 27, 2012); and
Aeschylus on Suffering and Wisdom (February 10, 2014).

As indicated in detail in the Pages section on the right side of the home page, the posts and comments for 2011-2014 fall into the categories as stated in the following alphabetical Lists of Posts to dwkcommentaries-Topical:

Cuba [history and politics]
Education [my post-secondary education]
El Salvador [history and politics]
Law (Criminal Justice)
Law (International Criminal Court)
Law (Refugee & Asylum)
Law (Treaties)
Law (U.S. Alien Tort Statute)
Law (U.S. Torture Victims Protection Act)
Lawyering [my practice of law]
Miscellaneous
Personal [my personal background]
Religion [predominantly Christianity]
United States (History)
United States (Politics)

The blogger would appreciate receiving substantive comments on his posts, including corrections and disagreements.

The Novel “Ordinary Grace” Wins Awards

A prior post recorded my delight in the novel “Ordinary Grace” by William Kent Krueger despite my criticism for his use of an Aeschylus quotation about suffering and wisdom. Not surprisingly the book has received many awards.

On May 1, 2014, the Mystery Writers of America granted its 2014 Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best Novel to “Ordinary Grace.”

Earlier the novel had won (a) the 2014 Midwest Booksellers Choice Award for Best Novel of the year; (b) the 2014 Dilys Award from the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association for the mystery book their members most enjoyed selling; and (c) the Squid Award from Left Cost Crime , a group of mystery fans for the best mystery set in the U.S. The novel also has been included on many Best of 2013 lists.

The Extraordinary “Ordinary Grace”

The 53-year old Frank Drum in the novel, “Ordinary Grace,” begins his narration by saying that in 1961, when he was 13 years old, the deaths of his sister and four others in his small southern Minnesota town were not completely tragic. These deaths also brought him wisdom by “the awful grace” of God in accordance with a quotation from Aeschylus, a Greek playwright, that suffering and pain, “against our will, [bring us] . . . wisdom through the awful grace of God.” [1]

The reader thus immediately is faced with two terms: “ordinary grace” and “awful grace.” Do they mean the same? Or are they different concepts? And are they different from “divine grace”? The novel does not answer these questions.

Towards the end of the novel after many horrible deaths, Frank’s father, Rev. Nathan Drum, a Methodist minister, repeats the Aeschylus quotation. Frank responds with this pithy, skeptical question, “Awful?” Rev. Drum merely responds, “I don’t think it is meant in a bad way. I think it means beyond our understanding.” (P. 289.) That was the only other reference to “awful grace” I found in the novel.

Similarly the only time I found the term “ordinary grace” used was in Frank Drum’s description of a lunch at the church pastored by his father. The lunch was just after the funeral service for Ariel Drum, the pastor’s daughter and Frank’s sister. Rev. Drum was quietly composing himself for what everyone expected to be a thoughtful, lengthy prayer of grace before the meal was served. Ruth Drum, the pastor’s wife and the mother of Ariel and Frank, rudely interrupted the solemn silence. “For God’s sake, Nathan, can’t you, just this once, offer an ordinary grace?” (P. 269.) (Emphasis added.)

Everyone at the lunch was stunned into a nervous silence. Jake Drum, Frank’s younger and stuttering brother, broke the quiet and surprised his embarrassed parents and the others with these three words: “I’ll say grace.” Then Jake, after a brief stutter, prayed, “Heavenly Father, for the blessings of this food and these friends and our families, we thank you. In Jesus’ name, amen.” (P. 270.) (Emphasis added.)

Frank, who was startled and frightened by Jake’s announcing he would say the grace, afterwards looked at his brother “with near reverence and thought to myself, ‘Thank you, God.’” Frank also commented that this grace was “so ordinary there was no reason at all to remember it. Yet I have never across the forty years since it was spoken forgotten a single word.” (P. 270.) (Emphasis added.)

Therefore, a simple answer to the question about the meaning of “ordinary grace” is it was the simple prayer offered before lunch by an ordinary person, a young boy without any theological education.

But this is too simple an answer, in my opinion.

Immediately after saying this prayer, Jake’s stutter disappeared, and he told his brother that he thought he never would stutter again. Jake added that this change was a miracle that happened without his seeing a light or hearing a voice. Instead, Jake said he “wasn’t afraid anymore” and if “we put everything in God’s hands, maybe we don’t any of us have to be afraid anymore.” (Pp. 281-82.) Their mother concurred, saying, “it was a miracle by the grace of God.” (P. 292.) (Emphasis added.)

In other words, although the prayer itself may have been an “ordinary grace,” Jake’s being able to say it and its impact on his stuttering were examples of God’s grace or divine grace.

Another example of divine grace entering the lives of the people of this small town in 1961 through the words of an ordinary person was the sermon by Rev. Drum on the Sunday after Ariel’s death.

Rev. Drum said that the events of the past week had caused him to think about “the darkest moment in the Bible [when] Jesus in his agony on the cross cries out, ‘Father, why have you forsaken me?’” In “that moment of his bitter railing [Jesus] . . . must have felt betrayed and completely abandoned by his father, a father he’d always believed loved him deeply and absolutely. How terrible that must have been and how alone he must have felt. . . . Jesus . . . saw with mortal eyes, felt the pain of mortal flesh, and knew the confusion of imperfect mortal understanding.” (Emphasis added.)
Rev. Drum continued with a personal confession. “I see with mortal eyes. My mortal heart this morning is breaking. And I do not understand. I confess that I have cried out to God, ‘Why have you forsaken me?’” (Emphasis added.)
“When we feel abandoned, alone, and lost,” Rev. Drum added, “what’s left to us? What do I have, what do you have, . . . except to rail against God and to blame him for the dark night into which he’s led us, to blame him for our misery, to blame him and cry out against him for not caring? What’s left to us when that which we love most has been taken?”
“I will tell you what’s left, three profound blessings. In his first letter to the Corinthians [I Corinthians 13:13], Saint Paul tells us exactly what they are: faith, hope, and love. These gifts, which are the foundation of eternity, God has given to us and he’s given us complete control over them. Even in the darkest night, it’s still within our power to hold to faith. We can still embrace hope. And although we may ourselves feel unloved we can still stand steadfast in our love for others and for God. All this is in our control. God gave us these gifts and he does not take them back. It is we who choose to discard them.” (Emphasis added.)
“And in your dark night, I urge you to hold to your faith, to embrace hope, and to bear your love before you like a burning candle, for I promise that it will light your way.”
“And whether you believe in miracles or not, I can guarantee that you will experience one. . . . The miracle is this: that you will rise in the morning and be able to see again the startling beauty of the day.”
“I invite you, my brothers and sisters, to rejoice with me in the divine grace of the Lord and in the beauty of this morning, which he has given us.” (Pp. 194-95.) (Emphasis added.)

Frank commented that he “left the church that morning feeling, as I do to this day [40 years later], that I had experienced a miracle, the one promised by my father who had spoken a truth profound and simple.” (Emphasis added.)

For me, these examples and the rest of the novel suggest that there is no difference between ordinary grace and divine grace, which for Christians refers to acts of favor or gifts from God toward humans that we have not earned or do not deserve. Indeed, Saint Paul in his second letter to the Corinthians says, “we are ambassadors for Christ, since God is making his appeal through us.” (II Corinthians 5: 20.) This theological issue is left to the reader to ponder.

The novel reminds us that death comes into everyone’s life, often at unanticipated moments. In other words, death exists in the midst of life. The key issue for those affected by death of family members and friends is how do we respond. Funeral or memorial services always remind me that my days are numbered and that I do not know when my death will arrive. Therefore, I should live each day as if it were my last and be present in the moment. Despite this obvious conclusion, I too often do not live that way.

The novel also reminds us that children, here the 13-year old Frank and his younger brother Jake, can be strong and insightful even when faced with stressful events like the death of family members and friends. Indeed, the two boys seem stronger in some ways than their parents, at least in Frank’s account.

Of course, we are hearing the account of this year from only one participant, 40 years after the fact. We undoubtedly would have other perspectives if there were reports from at least the other members of Frank’s family.

Near the end of the novel Frank, now a high school history teacher, acknowledges these limitations of his account of that summer when he says that “when you look back at a life, yours or another’s, what you see is a path that weaves into and out of deep shadow. So much is lost. What we use to construct the past is what has remained in the open, a hodgepodge of fleeting glimpses . . . . [W]hat I recall of that . . . summer . . . is a construct of what stands in the light and what I imagine in the dark where I cannot see.” (P. 302.)

Indeed, Frank says, “there is no such thing as a true event. We know dates and times and locations and participants but accounts of what happened depend upon the perspective from which the event is viewed. . . . I’m aware that Jake and my father recall things I don’t and what we remember together we often remember differently. I’m sure that each of us has memories that for reasons our own we don’t share. Some things we prefer remain lost in the shadows of our past.”

“Ordinary Grace” offers an extraordinary exploration of grace and wisdom. The five deaths in one summer in a small town also allow the novelist’s mystery-writing skills to peak through. Reading the novel has many rewards.[2]

[1] A prior post expressed my objection to the use of this quotation in this novel.

[2] “Ordinary Grace” was the “January All-Church Book Read” at Minneapolis’ Westminster Presbyterian Church. The novelist, William Kent Krueger, is the author of the award-winning Cork O’Connor mystery series set in northern Minnesota. Now I want to read them.

Aeschylus on Suffering and Wisdom

The chorus in Agamemnon, a famous play by the Greek playwright Aeschylus (circa 525/524 BC—circa 456-455 BC) makes the following statement (in English translation):

“He who learns must suffer. And even in our sleep pain, which cannot forget, falls drop by drop upon the heart, until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God.”

I encountered this statement in the excellent, fascinating contemporary novel Ordinary Grace by William Kent Krueger, about which I will comment in future posts. The statement supposedly was a favorite saying of the novel’s Rev. Nathan Drum, a Methodist minister in southern Minnesota in the 1960’s. The author Krueger has said that he has liked this quotation and always wanted to use it in one of his novels, and so he did by putting it into the mouth of Rev. Drum.

For me, the use of this quotation by Rev. Drum does not ring true to his character. I could not accept that a Methodist minister wanting to impart wisdom to his two sons in the U.S. in the 1960’s would use the words of a pre-Christian playwright, rather than words of Scripture.

When I posed this problem to Mr. Krueger, he said that as the novel explains, Rev. Drum originally was going to be a lawyer and, as the novel did not explicate, he had had a broad pre-law education, which exposed him to Aeschylus. This response does not satisfy me, a retired lawyer who had a broad pre-law education.

I also am troubled by the English translation’s reference to the “awful” grace of God. For me, the word “awful” is strongly negative with “horrible” as a synonym. When Krueger was responding to my question, he referred to an alternate meaning of “awful” as “full of awe.” In the novel towards its end after many horrible deaths, however, Rev. Drum repeats the quotation to his older son Frank, who asks skeptically, “Awful?” Rev. Drum merely responds, “I don’t think it is meant in a bad way. I think it means beyond our understanding.” (P. 289.) Again this response does not satisfy me as one coming from an individual supposedly knowledgeable about Aeschylus.

In my investigations of this quandary I discovered that the quotation was used in 1968 by U.S. Senator Robert F. Kennedy on the night of the assassination of Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. Speaking to a crowd in Indianapolis, Indiana, Kennedy referred to his own grief at the 1963 murder of his brother, President John F. Kennedy. Robert then said, “My favorite poet was Aeschylus. He once wrote: ‘Even in our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart, until in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God.’”

Kennedy went on to say that night in Indianapolis, “What we need in the United States is not division; what we need in the United States is not hatred; what we need in the United States is not violence or lawlessness; but love and wisdom, and compassion toward one another, and a feeling of justice toward those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white or they be black… Let us dedicate ourselves to what the Greeks wrote so many years ago: to tame the savageness of man and make gentle the life of this world.” (The quotation from Aeschylus was later inscribed on a memorial at the gravesite of Robert Kennedy following his own assassination.)

I certainly recalled that Robert Kennedy made an emotional and moving extemporaneous statement on the night of Rev. King’s assassination, but I did not remember the specifics. Learning the specifics helps me understand why novelist Krueger wanted to use the Aeschylus quotation in a novel, but, in my view, does not justify putting those words into Rev. Drum’s mouth seven years before the King assassination.

Moreover, the English translation is poetical and sounds profound, but is misleading on a simple analysis, in my judgment. First, is suffering a necessary condition for obtaining wisdom or without suffering is wisdom impossible? “No” is the obvious answer for me. Second, is suffering a sufficient condition for wisdom or is wisdom always a consequence of suffering? Again, “No” is the obvious answer to this question.

In my opinion, suffering sometimes (but not always) provides an opportunity to gain wisdom that sometimes (but not always) produces wisdom. That opens for me the broader and more important question of how does one learn from suffering or pain in one’s life.

My cursory research about Aeschylus reveals that he “was a deep, religious thinker. Few poets have ever presented evil in such stark and tragic terms, yet he had an exalted view of Zeus, whom he celebrated with a grand simplicity reminiscent of the Psalms, and a faith in progress or the healing power of time.” (Emphasis added.)

This source recognizes what I believe to be the polytheistic belief system of the ancient Greeks and casts doubt, in my opinion, on any attempt in our time to use this Aeschylus quotation to elucidate the Christian perspective of a Methodist pastor or anyone else.

Agamemnon is the first play in the trilogy The Oresteia, telling the bloody story of the family of Agamemnon, King of Argos. It begins with the triumphant return to Mycenae[1] of King Agamemnon from his victory in the Trojan War, as told by the town’s people (the chorus) and his wife, Clytemnestra. She was angry with the King because of his sacrifice of their daughter Iphigenia to assuage the Gods to stop a storm hindering the Greek fleet in the war and also because of his keeping a Trojan prophetess Cassandra as his mistress. Cassandra foretells of the murder of Agamemnon, and of herself, to the assembled townsfolk, who are horrified. The play ends with a prediction of the return of Orestes, son of Agamemnon, who will seek to avenge his father.

I earnestly seek responses from those who know the ancient Greek language and who can shed light on the previous English translation of the Aeschylus quotation by Edith Hamilton.[2] I also welcome comments from those who are knowledgeable about Aeschylus more generally and about Agamemnon specifically.

Provide new insights. Correct my errors.

[1] Mycenae is now an archeological site in Greece, located about 56 miles southwest of Athens in the northeastern part of the Peloponnese. Argos is 7 miles to the south; Corinth, 30 miles to the north. From the hill on which the palace was located, one can see the Saronic Gulf. In the second millennium B.C., Mycenae was one of the major centers of Greek civilization, a military stronghold that dominated much of southern Greece. A number of years ago I visited the impressive site.

[2] Here are two other English translations that I have found. First, Ian Johnston in 2002: “Zeus, who guided mortals to be wise, has established his fixed law– wisdom comes through suffering. Trouble, with its memories of pain, drips in our hearts as we try to sleep, so men against their will learn to practice moderation. Favours come to us from gods seated on their solemn thrones—such grace is harsh and violent.” Second, Anne Carson in 2009: “Yet there drips in sleep before my heart a grief remembering pain. Good sense comes the hard way. And the grace of the gods (I’m pretty sure) is a grace that comes by violence.”