Ифигения в Авлиде (1774) Iphigenie en Aulide

Сюжет
Агамемнон соглашается принести в жертву Ифигению, и вызывает её с матерью из Аргоса в Авлиду, говоря, что хочет выдать её замуж за Ахилла. Царь терзается сомнениями, в какой-то момент он передумывает и отправляет старика-раба с письмом об отмене приказа. Агамемнон хочет, чтоб мать и дочь вернулись домой. Но Менелай перехватывает письмо и обличает Агамемнона в трусости. Тем временем Ифигения прибывает в Авлиду, Клитемнестра встречается с Ахиллом, который ничего о свадьбе не подозревает, и наконец старик-раб рассказывает ей об истинной цели их визита. Клитемнестра упрекает мужа в жестокости, Ахилл хочет защитить Ифигению, но она не желает междуособицы и соглашается со своей судьбой. Ифигению ведут на смерть к жертвеннику, и начинает дуть попутный ветер.

Ифигения не погибла, Артемида пожалела её и в последний момент заменила на алтаре ланью, а Ифигению отправила в Тавриду служить жрицей. Клитемнестра отомстила своему мужу Агамемнону за смерть дочери, убив его. Но этого нет в сюжете Ифигении в Авлиде, а известно из других трагедий. О дальнейших приключениях Ифигении Еврипид написал трагедию Ифигения в Тавриде.

At the start of the play, Agamemnon has second thoughts about going through with the sacrifice and sends a second message to his wife, telling her to ignore the first. Clytemnestra never receives it, however, because it is intercepted by Menelaus, Agamemnon's brother, who is enraged over his change of heart.

To Menelaus, this is not only a personal blow (for it is his wife, Helen, with whom the Trojan prince Paris ran off, whose retrieval is the main pretext for the war); it may also lead to mutiny and the downfall of the Greek leaders should the rank and file discover the prophecy and realise that their general has put his family above their pride as soldiers.

The brothers debate the matter and, eventually, each seemingly changes the other's mind: Menelaus is apparently convinced that it would be better to disband the Greek army than to have his niece killed, but Agamemnon is now ready to carry out the sacrifice, claiming that the army will storm his palace at Argos and kill his entire family if he does not. By this time, Clytemnestra is already on her way to Aulis with Iphigenia and her baby brother Orestes, making the decision of how to proceed all the more difficult.

Iphigenia is thrilled at the prospect of marrying one of the great heroes of the Greek army, but she, her mother and the ostensible groom-to-be soon discover the truth. Furious at having been used as a prop in Agamemnon's plan, Achilles vows to defend Iphigenia—initially more for the purposes of his own honour than to save the innocent girl. However, when he tries to rally the Greeks against the sacrifice, he finds out that "the entirety of Greece"—including the Myrmidons under his personal command—demand that Agamemnon's wishes be carried out, and he barely escapes being stoned.

Clytemnestra and Iphigenia try in vain to persuade Agamemnon to change his mind, but the general believes that he has no choice. As Achilles prepares to defend Iphigenia by force, Iphigenia, realizing that she has no hope of escape, begs Achilles not to throw his life away in a lost cause. Over her mother's protests and to Achilles's admiration, she consents to her sacrifice, declaring that she would rather die heroically, winning renown as the savior of Greece, than be dragged unwilling to the altar. Leading the chorus in a hymn to Artemis, she goes to her death, with her mother Clytemnestra so distraught as to presage her murder of her husband and Orestes's matricide years later.

The play as it exists in the manuscripts ends with a messenger reporting that Iphigenia has been replaced on the altar by a deer.

Iphigenia in Tauris
The scene represents the front of the temple of Artemis in the land of the Taurians (modern Crimea). The altar is in the center.

The play begins with Iphigenia reflecting on her brother's death. She recounts her "sacrifice" at the hands of Agamemnon, and how she was saved by Artemis and made priestess in this temple.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iphigenia_in_Aulis
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Музыка - Christoph Willibald Ritter von Gluck - Iphigenie en Aulide
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