This piece looks into the atmospheric and catastrophic environments that punctuate H of H: storms, ice-breaks, volcanic eruptions, and nuclear explosions that give the tragic narrative an electrifying edge. It draws attention to a “chemical” poetics at the heart of Carson’s translation technique and thinking about Euripides’ play. This mannerism, also found in Euripides’s “combustible mixture of realism and extremism” (Grief Lessons, blurb), is not exclusive to H of H. It can be detected across Carson’s oeuvre – a tendency to (...) combust the reader’s mind in ways that become a philosophy for re-reading Euripides and, more ambitiously, Carson’s own sense of the tragic. (shrink)

This essay serves as an introduction to Anne Carson’s Euripides. It discusses Carson’s ongoing engagement with the tragedian, from Grief Lessons to her latest experimental H of H Playbook and The Trojan Women: A Comic, drawing attention to Carson’s cross-pollinating approach to Euripidean tragedy and antiquity more broadly, as well as the characteristic blending of academic and artistic styles that inform her translation poetics. The introduction includes details of the themes explored in the special issue, together with summaries of the (...) eight ‘takes’ that make up the collection. (shrink)