Whitney J. Oates and Eugene O’Neill Jr.’s The Complete Greek Drama: Volume Two

The last page of David Markson’s copy of The Complete Greek Drama: Volume Two by Various (Ed. Whitney J. Oates & Eugene O’Neill, Jr.):

     On which Markson wrote at the bottom of the page:
     “LO, I HAVE SEEN THE OPEN HAND OF GOD
     AND IN IT NOTHING, NOTHING, SAVE THE ROD
     OF MINE AFFLICTION……
                                   —THE TROJAN WOMEN”

—

     “Lo, I have seen the open hand of God;
     And in it nothing, nothing, save the rod
     Of mine affliction…”
     Words spoken by Hecuba in The Trojan Women by Euripides.

     Hecuba, to whom Markson makes mention on pgs. 93-94 of his masterpiece Wittgenstein’s Mistress:
     “But what I am actually now thinking about, for some reason, is the scene in The Trojan Women where the Greek soldiers throw Hector’s poor baby boy over the city’s walls, so that he will not grow up to take revenge for his father or for Troy.
     God, the thing men used to do.
     Irene Papas was an effective Helen in the film of The Trojan Women, however.
     Katharine Hepburn was an effective Hecuba, as well.
     Hecuba was Hector’s mother. Well, which is to say she was the baby boy’s grandmother also, of course.
     Just imagine how Katharine Hepburn must have felt.”

Nothing, nothing, save the rod of mine affliction……

Pg. 257 of David Markson’s copy of The Complete Greek Drama: Volume Two by Various (Ed. Whitney J. Oates & Eugene O’Neill, Jr.):

On which Markson placed a check next to and underlined a stage direction in Euripides’ The Bacchae:
“(who during the rest of this scene, with a few exceptions, simply speaks the thoughts that Dionysus puts into him, losing power over his own mind)”

In addition to some other underlining of lines by Dionysus and Pentheus.

—

Speaking of Dionysus putting thoughts into one’s head and losing power over one’s own mind…

     “The myth that Dionysus invented wine.
     On Mount Nysa.
     In Libya.”
     Wrote Markson on pg. 163 of Vanishing Point.

Pg. 504 of David Markson’s copy of The Complete Greek Drama: Volume Two by Various (Ed. Whitney J. Oates & Eugene O’Neill, Jr.):

On which Markson placed a check in the margins next to a line from Aristophanes’ The Knights:
“Certainly it’s not the moment to think of peace now! If anchovies are so cheap, what need have we of peace? Let the war take its course!”

—

Certainly it’s not the moment to think of peace now…

So…thinking of war…

In an interview with Conjunctions, upon the release of The Last Novel, Markson was asked:
“There are some contemporary references in this book. You mention the Iraq war a couple of times, George W. Bush, and even Rush Limbaugh.”

He responded:
“I hesitated about that; I usually don’t do it. My attitude is that everybody should know even the most obscure painter or composer. But fucking George W. Bush? A hundred years from now? Who will know him any more than they know Chester Alan Arthur? Well, no, it’s different, because he may end the world.”

Let the war take its course!

Pg. 314 of David Markson’s copy of The Complete Greek Drama: Volume Two by Various (Ed. Whitney J. Oates & Eugene O’Neill, Jr.):

On which Markson put an X in the margins next to the following line (which he also underlined) from Euripides’ Iphigenia in Aulis:
“And so for Helen’s sake my girl is doomed?”

—

Once again, as always with Euripides, the blame Helen game…

     “There is no description of Helen’s beauty anywhere in the Iliad.
     Strangely like is she to some deathless goddess to look upon, being all that is said.
     Though the Trojan elders do acknowledge that no one could be blamed for having endured a war because of her.”
     – David Markson, This Is Not A Novel, pg. 29.

     “Although what one doubts even more sincerely is that Helen would have been the cause of that war to begin with, of course.
     After all, a single Spartan girl, as Walt Whitman once called her.
     Even if in The Trojan Women Euripides does let everybody be furious at Helen.
     In the Odyssey, where she has a splendid radiant dignity, nothing of that sort is hinted at at all.
     And even in the Iliad, when the war is still going on, she is generally treated with respect.
     So unquestionably it was only later that people decided it had been Helen’s fault.
     Well, Euripides of course coming much later than Homer on his own part, for instance.
     I do not remember how much later, but much later.”
     – David Markson, Wittgenstein’s Mistress, pgs. 194-195.

     “You go wherever you like. I’m not about to get myself killed for that wife Helen of yours.
     Says Agamemnon to Menelaus—essentially about commencing the Trojan War—in the little that remains of a lost play by Euripides.”
     – David Markson, The Last Novel, pg. 132.

     “And which furthermore now makes me realize that if Euripides had not blamed Helen for the war very possibly I would not remember Helen, either.
     So that doubtless it was quite hasty of me, to criticize Rainer Maria Rilke or Euripides.”
     – David Markson, Wittgenstein’s Mistress, pgs. 196.

Pg. 670 of David Markson’s copy of The Complete Greek Drama: Volume Two by Various (Ed. Whitney J. Oates & Eugene O’Neill, Jr.):

On which Markson placed a check in the margin of the introduction to Aristophanes’ Peace next to the sentence:
“Where Aristophanes is happiest, there is he most candid also, and it is thus particularly gratifying to observe the truth of the further proposition that where he is happiest, there is he bawdiest also.”

—

Markson himself was known for sometimes being “bawdy.”

As the Literary Journal said of his early novel Springer’s Progress:
“Marvelously bawdy.”

Or as the New York Times wrote of his even earlier novel The Ballad of Dingus Magee:
“A bawdy, gaudy charade.”

Pgs. 58 and 59 of David Markson’s copy of The Complete Greek Drama: Volume Two by Various (Ed. Whitney J. Oates & Eugene O’Neill, Jr.):

     On which Markson has underlined two passages from Euripides’ Helen:
     The first:
     “Withhold then the malignant blade from thy sister, and believe that she herein is acting with discretion.”
     The second (the final lines of the play):
     “Many are the forms the heavenly will assumes; and many a thing God brings to pass contrary to expectation: that which was looked for is not accomplished, while Heaven finds out a way for what we never hoped; e’en such has been the issue here.”

—

As it says in the note on pg. 59 in the above scan, the final lines of Helen are “found likewise at the conclusion of the Alcestis, Andromache, The Bacchae, and, with a slight addition, the Medea.”

     Markson noted this on pg. 67 in The Last Novel:
     “Andromache. Alcestis. Helen. Medea. The Bacchae.
     Each of which Euripides ends with his chorus speaking an identical verse—to the effect that the ways of the gods are unpredictable.”

Pg. 534 of David Markson’s copy of The Complete Greek Drama: Volume Two by Various (Ed. Whitney J. Oates & Eugene O’Neill, Jr.):

On which Markson drew a line and a check in the margin next to a paragraph in the endnotes of the play The Knights by Aristophanes:
“18. The original here contains, and the translation omits, a number of details on the new form of vice. Only a pedant would demand their inclusion, for like many other parts of this play they are totally deficient in humour. Cunnilingual activities are not particularly new nowadays anyway, and our psychologists will inform the curious more thoroughly and more reliably than Aristophanes.”

—

While we’re on the subject of cunnilingus…

     “And what a liar’s Loosh. Pox upon tidiness, true metier’s this. Slurp and burble here till dawn.
     So why’s he beached and panting in moments instead? Medical profession looked into the effects of smoking on cunnilingus?
     ‘Fucking cigarettes. Man’s reach should exceed his gasp.’
     ‘Oh, Lord.’
     Vaginal slaver’s all over his face where he’s ascending. Slop it all over Cornford’s, orifice to orifice in wanton wet initiation.”
     – David Markson, Springer’s Progress, pg. 32.

Pg. 635 of David Markson’s copy of The Complete Greek Drama: Volume Two by Various (Ed. Whitney J. Oates & Eugene O’Neill, Jr.):

     On which Markson drew a checkmark next to a line from Aristophanes’ play The Wasps:
     Just before the checked line, Bdelycleon says:
     “There, what do you think of that? I have brought you everything needful and much more into the bargain. See, here is a thunder-mug in case you have to pee; I shall hang it up besides you.”
     Markson puts the check next to Philocleon’s response:
     “Good idea! Right useful at my age. You have found the true alleviation of bladder troubles.”

—

     Reminds me of a line from David Markson’s Vanishing Point:
     “An appointment with E. M. Forster that Tennessee Williams once canceled.
     Because he could not abide old men with urine stains on their trousers, Gore Vidal said Williams said.” (Pg. 140).

You have found the true alleviation of bladder troubles.

The inside front cover of David Markson’s copy of The Complete Greek Drama: Volume Two by Various (Ed. Whitney J. Oates & Eugene O’Neill, Jr.):

On which Markson wrote as an inscription:
“David M. Markson”

—

Up until this month, I had barely touched Markson’s two volumes of The Complete Greek Drama because there was so much marginalia within both editions, I didn’t even know where to start. And I didn’t want to lean too heavily on using scans from these two books—after all, I could have made a whole blog using just the marginalia from them. I ended up barely using scans from these books in my first year and change of doing this blog, for fear of turning these into the blog’s lynchpin or fulcrum.

     As Markson once said:
     “Beware of Greeks bearing fulcrums.”
     – Springer’s Progress, pg. 38.

And yet, here I am, now…
After noticing I’ve barely used these books, I’ve dedicated a whole month to them.

Pg. 493 of David Markson’s copy of The Complete Greek Drama: Volume Two by Various (Ed. Whitney J. Oates & Eugene O’Neill, Jr.):

On which Markson put a check next to a line from the hilariously foul-mouthed Sausage-Seller in Aristophanes’ play The Knights:
“If you open your mouth, I’ll shut it with shit.”

—

Well, isn’t that a stercoraceous line?

Don’t know what stercoraceous means?

     Turn to Markson:
     “‘I started to say. Woeful. Defenstrated. Stercoraceous.’
     ‘Hallelujah. What does that last one mean?’
     ‘Pertaining to shit.’
     That silvery laugh, all longing’s resurgent anew.”
     – Springer’s Progress, pg. 62.