women of troy

Question 1

they began

Answer 1

they began to die and they kept on dying

Question 2

puddles of

Answer 2

Puddles of blood smear the sanctuaries of all the gods

Question 3

When a town

Answer 3

When a town is destroyed, …all worship ceases…there’s no longer anything left worth a god’s consideration

Question 4

I shall

Answer 4

I shall make the Greeks’ return home a disaster

Question 5

When a man

Answer 5

When a man sacks a town… the same destruction, … will fall on his own head

Question 6

This last

Answer 6

This last lottery of fate will be the end of me

Question 7

Hecuba, whose

Answer 7

Hecuba, whose unnumbered tears match the numberless dead

Question 8

the whole bay

Answer 8

The whole bay… with floating corpses so thick you could walk on them

Question 9

On my

Answer 9

On my rack of pain, my bed of cold stone

Question 10

Keep time

Answer 10

Keep time with the dirge I must sing now, the song of the dead, my threnody of tears

Question 11

Whose misery

Answer 11

Whose misery is greater, the dead, whose day is passed, or the living, who must live in slavery?

Question 12

Perhaps forced

Answer 12

Perhaps forced into the bed of some loathsome Greek

Question 13

It cost

Answer 13

It cost them tens of thousands dead

Question 14

Now their

Answer 14

Now their bodies lie forgotten in a foreign country

Question 15

Any sensible

Answer 15

Any sensible man must hate war, he does his best to avoid it

Question 16

For us

Answer 16

For us, vain dreaming, false hopes. The gods hate Troy

Question 17

Ask the

Answer 17

Ask the goddess, not me, punish her

Question 18

He sees

Answer 18

He sees, and does nothing

Question 19

I knew

Answer 19

I knew… how to give in gracefully to his authority

Question 20

A whole

Answer 20

A whole generation of women raped in their own bedrooms

Question 21

I made it

Answer 21

I made it my business to be the perfect wife, never wanted even to leave his house,

Question 22

I was raped

Answer 22

I was raped, not married. My life in Troy was the most abject slavery, nothing glorious about it

Question 23

Exported

Answer 23

Exported, I was, sold off abroad, my exceptional beauty was a saleable asset for Greece!”

Question 24

With one

Answer 24

With one look she makes men’s eyes her prisoners, she sacks whole cities, burns houses to the ground with that bewitching smile

Question 25

This woman

Answer 25

This woman whose promiscuity shamed Greece

Question 26

She’s a

Answer 26

She’s a wicked woman and she will endure a terrible death that will be a warning to all women in the future to be chaste and moral

Question 27

Be pleasant

Answer 27

Be pleasant, make yourself attractive to him

Question 28

We are loot

Answer 28

We are loot, my son and I, soldiers’ plunder

Question 29

Ran away

Answer 29

Ran away and was unfaithful, because she wanted to

Question 30

Other women

Answer 30

Other women will learn from her example that wives who betray their husbands must expect to die for it

Question 31

Wives for

Answer 31

Wives for their husbands screaming, for their dead sons, daughters weeping desperately for mothers too old to live slaves for long

Question 32

I, an

Answer 32

I, an old woman, with her city destroyed and all her children dead, must bury you, so much younger than I am, such a tender corpse

Question 33

Teach me,

Answer 33

Teach me, gods of song, some harsh lament dissonant with tears and howls… invent new sounds for my grief

Question 34

It comes

Answer 34

It comes to this: to leave my homeland, to leave my city, to watch them burning it to the ground

Question 35

When the city

Answer 35

When the city is taken, and every Trojan fighting man lies dead, you have become terrified of a little child