No More Learning

Phaedra

You Heavens!

Panope

Athens is split over the choice of leader. 325
One gives his vote to your son the Prince: another,
Madame, forgetting the laws of his country,
Dares grant support to the son of your enemy.
They even say that an insolent intrigue
Would crown Aricia and the Pallantides. 330
I thought this peril might be turned from you.
Even now Hippolyte prepares to leave us too:
And I fear that if he appears, in that storm,
The fickle crowd will follow him in swarms.

Oenone

Panope, that's enough. The Queen who's listening, 335
Will not neglect to heed your vital warning.

Act I Scene V (Phaedra, Oenone)

Oenone

My lady, I'd ceased to urge you to live on:
I'd already decided to follow you to the tomb:
I had thought to seek to deter you no longer:
But this new trouble forces new duties on you. 340
Your fate has altered, and shows another face:
The King's no more. Madame must take his place.
You belong to your son, left to you by that death,
A slave if you die, a king while you have breath.
On whom, in this trouble, would you have him depend? 345
His tears will find no hand to dry them, no friend:
His innocent cries, heard by the gods above us,
Will harm his mother, and anger his ancestors.
Live: you've nothing to condemn yourself for there:
Your passion becomes a commonplace affair.
350
Theseus, in dying, destroyed those complications,
That formed the crime, the horror of your passion.
Hippolyte's presence is less fearsome to you now,
And you can see him without guilt on your brow.
Perhaps, convinced of your profound aversion, 355
He'll make himself the leader of this sedition.
Disabuse him of his error: sway his bravery.
King of this happy land, Troezen's his destiny:
And he knows that the law will grant to your son
Those proud ramparts of Minerva's creation. 360
Both of you face the same true enemy:
Combine: oppose Aricia, in harmony.

Phaedra

Well! I will let myself be led by your advice.
Let us live, if they can bring me back to life,
And if love of a son, at this gloomy time, 365
Can re-animate what's left of my feeble mind.

Act II Scene I (Aricia, Ismene)

Aricia

Hippolyte wishes to see me here? And why?
Hippolyte looks for me, wants to say goodbye?
Ismene, is this true? Surely, you're incorrect?

Ismene

It's due to Theseus's death: the first effect. 370
My lady, be ready on every side to view
Those Theseus rejected, who'll flock to you.