you know him well,

Hippolytos—

PHAIDRA.

OIMOI! [cry]

NURSE.

[Silence, waits]

PHAIDRA.

You destroy me, woman. By the gods

I beg you do not say his name again.

NURSE.

You see? you are quite sane, yet unwilling

to help your children or save yourself.

PHAIDRA.

I love my children. But I’m caught in the storm of a different fate.

NURSE.

Your hands are clean of blood, child?

PHAIDRA.

Hands are clean. The mind is filth.

NURSE.

Is it bad magic, a spell cast by some enemy?

PHAIDRA.

A loved one destroys me, although he doesn’t mean to.

NURSE.

Theseus has done you wrong?

PHAIDRA.

Oh no—and may I never seem evil to him!

NURSE.

Well what is this dread thing that pulls you toward death?

PHAIDRA.

Leave me to my sins, they are not against you.

NURSE.

No I will not give up on you.

PHAIDRA.

What then—force me? cling to my hand?

NURSE.

Your knees too, I will not let go.

PHAIDRA.

Evil, you unlucky woman, evil is what you will find.

NURSE.

What greater evil than watching you die?

PHAIDRA.

To hear it will kill you. My honor is in this.

NURSE.

And you hide it though I plead with you!

PHAIDRA.

Out of what is shameful I am contriving something good.

NURSE.

Won’t you get more honor if you tell it?

PHAIDRA.

Get back, by the gods, let go my right hand!

NURSE.

No I will not. You must tell it.

PHAIDRA.

Yes. I must. I will. I respect your suppliant hand.

NURSE.

I am silent. It’s your story now.

PHAIDRA.

O my poor mother, what a love you fell into!

NURSE.

You mean her lust for the bull?

PHAIDRA.

O my sad sister, wife of Dionysos!

NURSE.

Child, what’s wrong? Why talk old family scandal?

PHAIDRA.

And third—me. Oh I am a sad one. I am lost.

NURSE.

You frighten me. Where is this going?

PHAIDRA.

To where our sorrows began long ago.

NURSE.

Maybe I don’t want to hear.

PHAIDRA.

PHEU! [cry]

If only you could say it for me!

NURSE.

I am no prophet of the invisible.

PHAIDRA.

What is this thing they call falling in love?

NURSE.

Something absolutely sweet and absolutely bitter at the same time.

PHAIDRA.

I feel only the second.

NURSE.

You’re in love? Child! Who is it?

PHAIDRA.

That one, whoever he is, the Amazon’s—

NURSE.

Hippolytos?

PHAIDRA.

You say it, not I.

Phaidra asks the Nurse to promise not to tell Hippolytos of her feelings. The Nurse cannot hold back. Hippolytos hears the truth.

PHAIDRA.

O you agent of ruin! Corrupter of trust!

What have you done to me!

May Zeus

my forefather

grind you to nothing,

blast you in fire from the face of the earth!

Didn’t I see this coming—did I not command you

to keep silent? And now my humiliation!

You would not hold back.