Heracles and Oedipus in Greek Classical Drama by Professor Joseph R. Laurin offers a scholarly, clear and easy approach to the understanding of two of the greatest heroes of Ancient Greece and of the glory and tragedy of their stories in Greek Classical theater.
Readers and researchers can benefit greatly from the text and innumerable references presented in this book. Students as well as non-academic readers interested in Classical literature or the Theater can find it fascinating and beneficial.
After projecting a general view of the notion of the Ancient Greek Hero, the author develops the mythical stories of Heracles and Oedipus, and the dramas produced from these myths by the three Classical writers of Tragedy: Aeschylus, Euripides and Sophocles.
Four plays convey the dramatic story of Heracles: Alcestis, Heracles Mad, The Women of Trachis and The Children of Heracles. The story of Oedipus spans over several generations covered in six plays: Oedipus the King, Oedipus at Colonus, The Seven Against Thebes, The Phoenician Women, The Suppliant Women and Antigone.
The author's vast knowledge of the sources of information, either in ancient texts or in modern literature, has made his book not only a brief retelling of the stories but a discussion of the major issues of interpretation and a thought-provoking commentary about human life, the universe and the gods.
Heracles and Oedipus in Greek Classical Drama is a valuable contribution to the understanding of two of the greatest heroes of Ancient Greece and of the masterful adaptation of their stories to the theater stage. This book, available either in paperback or hard cover, should inspire further research of thesources and discussion of issues confronting students as well as readers interested in Classical literature or the Theater.

LEXICON AND ATLAS OF THE MODERN WORLD coinciding with THE ANCIENT GREEK WORLD From Solon of the sixth century BCE to Alexander the Great of the fourth century BCE, the Ancient Greek World covered about six percent of our Modern World, but in this small inhabited territory many of the greatest deeds of history were accomplished in places whose names remained the same to this day or changed with the subsequent civilizations. In order to retrieve from this book some brief information about nearly four thousand of these places the researchers can approach it by their names in either the Modern world or the Ancient Greek World. For the Ancient Greeks, the earth was a flat oval sphere surrounded by a huge Ocean, longer from west to east than from north to south. In addition to Hellas (Greece), their world encompassed the lands of Southern Europe, North Africa and Egypt, and West and Central Asia. In relation to the Modern World, it covered from the British Isles and Gibraltar in the west to western China and India in the east and from southern Germany, the Ukraine and Kazakhstan in the north to north Africa, Ethiopia and the Arabian Sea in the south. In this publication, cities, islands, mountains, regions, rivers and seas are listed alphabetically with a brief description in the Lexicon and a reference to their locations on forty-two maps in the Atlas. They are all listed again by groups in the Index. Between the monumental publications about the geography of the Ancient Greek World and the specialized ones, there remained between them a gap to be filled in by an instrument providing a fairly comprehensive and always brief, clear and easy-to-handle listing of places. Filling in this gap with such an instrument is the purpose of this publication addressed primarily to the busy readers and writers of all types.

About the Image on the Front Cover This image is one the most endearing of all the sculptures made during the Classical Period of Athens. It shows a husband and wife whose names, inscribed above their heads, are Philoxenos, dressed in the uniform of a hoplite, one of many foot soldiers fighting in phalanx formation, wearing a metal helmet, breastplate, short tunic called exomis and sandals, and holding a shield on his left arm, and Philoumene, his wife, wearing a long robe, called peplos, flowing down yet attached at the waist, with her hair in a snood and elevated shoes. The pose is classic, standing straight in serene elegance, one knee bent as if they were ready to walk away from each other. They gaze at each other for a tender and sad farewell and shake hands to express their mutual love and loyalty. This scene is carved in relief on a grave stele made of marble, white with a hue of grey, from a quarry on the south side of Mount Pentelikon, about ten miles northeast of Athens. It may have been painted originally, but the paint has disappeared. The dimensions are 102.2 cm (401/4 in.) in height, 44.5 cm (17 1/2 in.) in width and 16.5 cm (61/2 in.) in depth. It is dated of about 400 BCE, during the return to normal life in Athens after the end of the Peloponnesian War in 404 BCE. The timing may indicate that the tribute was from the wife to her husband killed in action and, for this reason, that the gravestone was paid for by her wealthy family. This image is reproduced here from the J. Paul Getty Museum, Villa Collection, Malibu, California, 83.AA.378. See the Museum's Handbook of the Antiquities Collection,