Books by Edith Hall

They gave us democracy, philosophy, poetry, rational science, the joke. They built the Parthenon and the Library of Alexandria. But who were the ancient Greeks? And what was it that enabled them to achieve so much? This title offers a revelatory way of viewing this geographically scattered people, and more.

Flying to Heaven to demand an end to war, building Cloudcuckooland in the sky, descending to Hades to retrieve a dead tragedian - such were the cosmic missions on which Aristophanes, the father of comedy, sent his heroes of the classical Athenian stage.

As the earliest surviving European drama, Persians is of incalculable interest to students of ancient literature. This edition offers facing translation, commentary and notes that focus on the visual and aural effects Aeschylus created, his extraordinarily rich imagery, and the play's unique contribution to Athenian democratic ideology.

The extensive performance history of Euripides' Medea since the Renaissance underscores its lasting social and political relevance.