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Helen
[330] Dear friends, I welcome your advice. Come in, come into the house, to learn within about my struggles. Chorus
You are calling on one who is wholly willing. Helen
[335] Oh, what an unhappy day! What tearful word shall I hear, unhappy as I am? Chorus
Do not be a prophetess of sorrow, dear friend, anticipating lamentation. Helen
[340] What has my poor husband suffered? Does he see the light and the sun's chariot and the paths of the stars? Or does he have a lasting fate [345] among the dead beneath the earth? Chorus
Take a brighter view of the future, whatever will happen. Helen
For I call on you, I swear to you, Eurotas green with watery reeds, [350] if this rumor of my husband's death is true—and what was obscure in those words?—I will stretch a deadly noose about my neck, or drive inward a murderous thrust of slaughter that gushes from the throat, [355] a contest of the blade through my flesh, as a sacrifice to the three goddesses and to the son of Priam, who once sat on the hollows of Ida, near the ox-stalls. Chorus
[360] May sorrow be turned aside elsewhere, and may your lot be fortunate!
Euripides. The Complete Greek Drama, edited by Whitney J. Oates and Eugene O'Neill, Jr. in two volumes. 2. Helen, translated by E. P. Coleridge. New York. Random House. 1938.
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