"Now the struggle is for all" (Aeschylus's Persians 405): What a Difference a Few Years Make When Interpreting a Classic

Abstract

They [the Greeks] recognize at once that this is a fight independence, the survival of small nations. --Anon., Hour of editorial in the New York Times, 29 October 1940 I. The Glory That Is Greece: Celebrating the Events of Winter and Spring 1940-1941 In anticipation of 28 October 1941, Louis MacNeice wrote a short play a BBC radio broadcast on this anniversary date. Which anniversary? One year earlier to the day, the Greek dictator Ioannes Metaxas (who ruled 1936-41) had made history with his resolute answer to a humiliating Italian ultimatum that directly challenged Greek sovereignty: Ochi (No!). With this--perhaps apocryphal--response, Metaxas gave the starting signal to the Greek defense against the Italian Fascist invasion on the front. Whether or not Metaxas actually spoke the emphatic No! is far less important than the point that he finally rebuffed Mussolini after his country had suffered a series of Italian provocations. In perhaps his finest hour of his final months, Metaxas galvanized the Greek army and the civilian resistance and led them to the first land victory of World War II over the Fascist Axis of Mussolini and Hitler. The Greek troops routed Mussolini's army and even advanced into southern Albania. The Albanian epic, as it has been called in common Greek parlance, drew the attention of the rest of the world (see fig. 1). (1) [FIGURE 1 OMITTED] While Europe was being rushed into a most frightening war, BBC radio and, in particular, the Features Department, broadcast its share of morale-boosting feature programs. (2) Among these was MacNeice's The Glory That Is Greece, one of his first radio scripts. Laurence Gilliam produced it broadcast on the Home Service on 28 October 1941. (3) By the time of the first anniversary of Metaxas's Ochi however, and through 1944, Greece was occupied by the Axis forces and was suffering many hardships, which the harsh winters exacerbated. But the Greeks continued to make active contributions to the Allied war effort. MacNeice's play sheds light on a historical moment in European as well as Greek history. It offers vivid dialogues set in contemporary Italian and Greek homes and also on the front, which alternate with Greek historical scenes from the Persian Wars (490-480 BCE), which are derived from Herodotus's Histories and from Aeschylus's Persians. (4) The parallel structure of the comparison between the Italian and the Greek domestic reactions to Mussolini's invasion of northwest Greece is enhanced by the analogical structure of flashbacks to the glory days of the classical past: in the radio play, the Greek characters compare their army campaign of 1940-41 with the defense that the ancient Greeks mustered against the Persian leaders Darius and Xerxes in the early fifth century BCE. The odds in 1940 were small, but the power of Greek history and the somewhat strained use of the classical sources revived Greek bravery and foretold ultimate victory broad Western audiences. MacNeice presented the Greeks as rallying around the battle cry from Aeschylus's Persians 405: Now the struggle is all The Greeks received both moral support and military aid from Greek-friendly Britain, where anxious citizens and politicians followed the onset of World War II closely and affirmed that Greece was indeed fighting the battle for all. (5) MacNeice gave his play the title of The Glory That Is Greece, with the emphatic present tense insisting on what had transpired in Greece in the months prior: the country is, in 1940 and 1941, earning its old glory over again. publicity line on the first page of MacNeice's script is telling, too: A programme to celebrate the spirit of the Greek Army and the Greek people on the first anniversary of the entry of Greece into the war. The theme of revived ancient Greek glory was popular in broader and international circles as well. …