Seven Against Thebes: Free Audiobook and Listening Guide

Seven Against Thebes, credited to Aeschylus, is available as a LibriVox volunteer audiobook. This guide identifies the recording, its source summary and its audio tracks.

About the work

The LibriVox catalogue summary, preserved with the recording, reads:

LibriVox recording of Seven Against Thebes by Aeschylus. In this, the only extant tragedy from Aeschylus' trilogy about the House of Oedipus, Thebes is under siege from Polynices, a former prince of Thebes. After King Oedipus left his city and cursed the princes, Polynices and his brother, Eteocles, decided to rule alternately, switching at the end of every year. However, at the end of his year as king, Eteocles refused to turn power over to his brother and exiled him, fulfilling his father's curse that the two brothers could not rule peacefully. In the action of the play, Polynices and a group of Argive soldiers are attacking Thebes so that he can take his place as ruler. Eteocles must combat both the foreign forces outside the walls and the crazed, frightened women within. Note: The ending of this play is suspect. The lines Antigone and Ismene's entrance to the end may have been added later, either after Sophocles' Theban plays became popular or in the Middle Ages. (Summary by Libby Gohn) Narrator: Charlotte Duckett Eteocles: Daniel Vimont Chorus 1: Elizabeth Klett Chorus 2: Libby Gohn Spy: Cynthia Moyer Anigone: Amanda Friday Ismene: Caprisha Page Herald: Alan Mapstone

Recording facts

• Recording title: Seven Against Thebes
• Author credits: Aeschylus
• Language: English
• Original MP3 tracks: 3
• Listed recording duration: 1:10:03

Catalogue topics

• drama
• Oedipus
• Thebes
• Antigone
• Ancient Greece
• Fratricide
• Civil War

Track guide

1. Part 1 — 21:40
2. Part 2 — 29:51
3. Part 3 — 18:33

Listen to this recording

Open the complete recording and player on Internet Archive. The player includes the full track list and available download formats.

Source and rights

This is a record from LibriVox's official Internet Archive collection, with a public-domain licence recorded in its metadata. LibriVox's policy includes its catalogue summaries as well as its recordings. Its public-domain assessment follows United States law; copyright status can differ elsewhere. The summary and track facts are reproduced and reformatted from that record. Dates attached to the archive upload are not treated as original book publication dates.