ublic prizes and performed in the great theater of Dionysius, supported
by the state. The competitor was obliged to send in three tragedies
called a trilogy, together with what was called a satyric play. This
last might be related to the tragedies or be quite independent, as they
usually were in Sophocles and Euripides. The satyric play was named
from the satyrs or attendants upon Bacchus, and was a farce or burlesque
intended to relieve the feelings of the spectators after the tragedies.
The 'Alcestis' was entered by Euripides as a satyric play, but it only
in parts approaches the characteristics of such a play. In other parts
it has the dignity and beauty of a tragedy. In fact it is more nearly
like a comedy in the modern sense of the word.

2. The structure of the play. This is like that of a typical Greek
tragedy with one exception. It opens, as is customary with Euripides,
with a monologue, which explains the plot and the position of affairs,
spoken by one of the characters, Apollo. Otherwise, it is like a regular
tragedy, presenting two sorts of action, that of a chorus consisting of
men or women whose functions were to comment on the action, draw morals
from it, express sympathy with the actors, and that of the regular
dialogue.

3. Its content. This is a Greek mythological story, in which gods and
mortals are the actors. The plot brings out two social ideals which were
peculiar to Greek civilization. The ideal that it was the duty, approved
of by the gods, that old people should die for their children, and that
wives should die for their husbands, and that such sacrifice should be
accepted as a matter of course; and the ideal of hospitality, which was
incumbent, no matter what pain it might cause to exercise it.

With regard to the first ideal, many critics of this drama take the view
that to the Greeks there would be nothing contemptible or unnatural
in the conduct of Admetus. To quote Mr. Collins again on this point,
'Alcestis would be considered fortunate for having had an opportunity of
displaying so conspicuously the fidelity to a wife's first and capital
duty. Had Admetus prevented such a sacrifice he would have robbed
Alcestis of an honor which every nobly ambitious woman in Hellas would
have coveted. This is so much taken for granted by the poet that all
that he lays stress on in the drama is the virtue rewarded by the return
of Alcestis to life, the virtue characteristic of Admetus, the virtue
of hosp