Gloomy and sombre

'Trojan Women'

by Harshini PERERA

A gloomy and sombre stage was directed to the audience with a brief introduction on the background of the original play, "Trojan Women" written by the Greek playwright Euripides. The adaptation of "Trojan Women" by Dharmasiri Bandaranayeke, was staged at the Elphinstone theatre on October 31.

An insightful portrayal of sorrow and suffering to which women in a war-torn city are entitled mainstreams the whole drama. The stage is set in a form of a destroyed city, only the walls are visible. The curtain opened when Athena and Poseidon discuss how to punish Greek for they condoned Ajax the Lesser to dragging Cassandra from Athena's Temple. Then Athenian soldiers entered the stage from the middle of the audience amidst the beat of a drum and the marching of soldiers. Soldiers who entered, were not only Romans but also soldiers in the guise of Sri Lankan Army uniforms.

The play followed the fate of women in any war-torn city where their husbands are killed and their remaining family are about to taken away as slaves. Fear for slavery and sexual entrapment progressed throughout the drama while Hecuba, the dethroned queen of Troy, together with other women, Cassandra, one of the two daughters of Hecuba and Andromache, wife of Hector grieve the fate they have to suffer in the unknown land of Greece. Their grief followed by heart-felt chorus which never lost its rhythm and facial expressions emphasised the remorse of real war.

The tragical effect of the drama is stressed with the last hope of Troy, shattered when Astyanax, the boy son of Hector, was ordered to be killed, and later carried into the stage in Hector's shield. This marks the climax of the drama but, it was also grieved just as the death of Polyxena or Hector, which features the doom of rebuilding Troy.

The musical effect and chorus gravely delivered the fate suffered by a war-stricken country. Clever mastery of the director can be seen when he employed inter-mingling scenes of Sri Lankan Army soldiers and Greek in the play. Andromache and her boy son accompany a battle tank which had brought about the sorrow to their life. This particular scene invariably reflected the imminent destiny they are to suffer. Finally, Greek put down sails for the voyage and the women of Trojan were carried away with all the collected treasures. Hecuba is handed over to Odysseus, Cassandra becomes Agamemnon's concubine, whereas Andromache will have concubine Achilles' son, Neoptolemus. Throughout the play most of the women are lamenting over the land they lost and the charge they have to pay due to the devastating war.

Greek invade Trojan land to win Helen, the wife of Menelaus, who becomes the stratagem to reach along felt military political grudge against Trojans. So a direct political implication lies in that invasion where East, land of Trojan was invaded by West, Greek in the original play. Thus, political implication is what any war is accompanied with. Therefore, this is the clear image of a power play that had to pay back from the lives of women in fear and grief.