Synopsis: In this drama, playwright Anne Carson turns her attention to the sorrows and humiliations of war in Euripides' great play of the Trojan women. Euripides used the old story about the Trojan War as a way of commenting on the war raging during his own time. When it opens, the Greeks have defeated the Trojans. Hecuba, Queen of Troy, is a slave. She has witnessed the slaughter of her husband, Priam, and of all but one of her sons. Her daughter Polyxena is dragged off to become a human sacrifice; then she discovers the corpse of Polydoros, the one son she thought had survived the war. Polymestor, the friend she had left him with for safekeeping, murdered him for his money. Hecuba persuades the Greek king, Agamemnon, to let her set a trap for Polymestor and blinds him while the Trojan women kill his children.

Cast:
Kathyrn Walker .... Hecuba
David Strathairn .... Talthybios
Kate Burton .... Polyxena
Mary Beth Hurt .... Chorus of Trojan Women
James Gale .... Polymestor
Larry Pine .... Oydsseus
Maduka Steady .... Polydoros
Maeve Kinkead .... Hecuba's Servant

Notes:
• Anne Carson, an acclaimed poet and classicist who was the first woman to win the T.S. Eliot Prize for poetry, created this new verse translation of Euripides' Hecuba specifically for the 92nd Street Y Poets Theatre. This reading was its world premiere.
• David also did another reading, Electra, with director and co-star Kathryn Walker in 2002.

Related Links:
Anne Carson - New York Times (off site)
Textkit - Hecuba (off site)
92nd Street Y Theatre (off site)