. of Aeschylus
Arranged for broadcasting and produced by Raymond Raikes from the English translation by Louis MacNeice
Music composed and directed by John Hotchkis
Chorus of Argive Elders:
Carleton Hobbs (leader), Frederick Allen , Maurice Bannister , Martin Boddey , James Dale , William Devlin , Dudley Jones , and Norman Shelley
Scene: Agamemnon's palace at Argos
This is the first play of the Oresteia, a trilogy by Aeschylus which was produced in Athens at a dramatic festival in 458 B.C., when it won the prize. The sequence of events leading up to the Agamemnon is as follows: in the past, Thyestes seduced Atreus* wife; Atreus killed Thyestes' children and gave him them as meat; Helen forsook her husband, Menelaus, and went with Paris to Troy; Agamemnon, brother of Menelaus, sacrificed his daughter Iphigenia to promote the Trojan War. Now Aegisthus and Clytemnestra murder Agamemnon. Later Orestes, son of Agamemnon, will kill Aegisthus and his mother, Clytemnestra.