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I did not read the book entirely. From my brief scanning the book seems to be very informative and instructional-- a good guide.

I really enjoyed reading this one. I actually have a better understanding of myself and my stuff after reading this book.

This book is the only book I've read that has had a permanent effect on decluttering for me. While it is a little tedious to get through, I discovered that upon finishing it, I was actually changing my habits. I had been in the midst of a house-wide declutter project, but it would certainly have crept back to the normal messy state of things if I hadn't changed my habits. It changed the little day to day ways I manage my things and changed my way of thinking. It was a little short on specific strategies, and was quite deficient on managing papers, reading materials and documents (was more focused on getting rid of/managing things), but I am still giving it 5 stars since it has had such a positive impact in my life.

As others have written,I too have read many, many, MANY clutter, organizing, packrat books. I still have so many, they have contributed to the clutter. This was one of the good ones. My problem is not organizing my stuff-- I want to get rid of it. Most books give you detailed file organizing and specific instructions. I wanted to know WHY I couldn't let go of so many things. This may not be everyone's problem, but it was mine. Once I understood why, it actually helped to get rid of them - not organize them.

This is by far the most useful book on decluttering I've read. It gets right down into your heart and helps you sort out what you find there. It doesn't tell you what products to buy, but helps you understand what blips in your brain chemistry or psychology may be contributing to the clutter problem, and suggests specific strategies for dealing with the various reasons.

Love this book, gets you to think in terms of plant groupings & not just on a singular level.

I was looking for a book that would give me a comprehensive guide to xeriscaping with native plants. This book contains one section that approaches my needs but is more of an overview over the native plants of the many diverse vegetation zones of the states. For what it is, it is a nice book. Just not a match for me.

This book is a must have for the California native gardener. I'd say the book's biggest strength is in its' inspiration- contains nice photographs of natural landscapes and gardens modeled after them. It groups plants by communities which is nice, though maybe hard to do. I know I live in an area which doesn't fit exactly into of any of the communities they list, but I can still get the idea they are trying to convey, and look around at what is in my community. California is so diverse you almost want a bunch of more specific and in-depth books for different areas inside California, but I guess maybe those areas of interest are too small to sell enough books to make it worth the while.

It does a good job listing different kinds of plants, my only complaint with this book is that I would have liked more pictures accompanying each plant for which information is given- because you really can't tell from the brief physical description what the plant looks like. As someone else has mentioned, this book is best paired with California Native Plants For The Garden. However, this complaint should be taken with a grain of salt, for designing a California native garden I think this book is the best on the market. Together, these two books provide the backbone to build your California native plant book collection around.

-We need more books like this to make Native Gardening more amenable. What "Landscapers' Challenge" did for Landscaping, this book will hopefully start to do to open up the still rather arcane world of Native Plants. It is practical and full of detailed, appropriate, high quality photographs of sample materials. Visually on par with "Landscape Plants for Western Regions" by Perry.

This book is excellent, with many good photographic examples of complete native landscape. It also set for an excellent philosophy for landscape design for the both the use of native and non-native plants. However it really shouldn't be thought of as a complete source for native gardening. I would also suggest that you pick up 'California Native Plants for the Garden' by Carol Bornstein, David Fross, and Bart O'Brien. Even between these two books all of the possibilities for beautiful California native plants and landscapes created using them have not yet been fully explored, but these books are an excellent start.

I had heard of this particular book before, and it was referred to me by one of my university professors. We practicaly use it everyday now (Faculty of Architecture)

This was a text book of mine and well worth the purchase. It should be owned by all interior designers and decorators. The authors are thourough and clear in their various chapters. They cover everything from decorating to space planning, architecture to furniture styles. A definite addition to an interior design library

A book that looks like a construction kit.
Repetition makes it effective, but sometimes annoying.
I will keep it on my desk for awhile.
I just bought the book on transitions.

This book is smart. It is practical and helpful. Besides offering many great ideas on writing coherant paragraphs, it becomes an excellent aid to brainstorming. My only gripe is that there is no bibliography for reference and further study, and no references to recommended paragraphs by other writers. Still, I know of no book quite like this. I'm glad I bought it.

This book offers a safe route to writing paragraphs that will honor your readers and pay tribute to your intellect. A thoroughly illustrated collection of 30 ways to write paragraphs, "A Writer's Guide to Powerful Paragraphs" will help you save time by planning and organizing your writing.

A Writer's Guide To Powerful Paragraphs by Victor C. Pellegrino is a straightforward, easy-to-understand how-to guide to improving the quality of one's writing, one paragraph at a time. Aspiring writers are provided with thirty different but effective ways to organize and write competent paragraphs, including paragraphs focused on chronology, physical or process analysis, classification, enumeration, cause and effect, dialogue, anecdotes, introductions, conclusions, transitions, and a great deal more. Highly recommended and quite "user friendly", A Writer's Guide To Powerful Paragraphs is a superbly organized and presented supplement for aspiring authors of all ages, backgrounds, and experience levels ranging from the high school novice, through community college and university level writing assignments, to professional contract and free-lance authors.

I was intrigued by one of the author's earlier book's title, Start with NO...The Negotiating Tools that the Pros Don't Want You to Know Start with NO...The Negotiating Tools that the Pros Don't Want You to Know, and thought since this was a newer book maybe he had refined his No Negotiating skills and given us some new insights in this newer book.

Since I haen't yet read his earlier work I don't know how this one compares to it, but I can say this is a fine alternative to the win-win style of negotiating that is so often taught and praised.

His experience of trying to negotiate with foreigners while an airline pilot made him wonder why they would turn down his offer of trying to get a good deal with the promise of future sales benefits to come.

After being rebuffed in his negotiations he later on looked up negotiate in the dictionary and it dawned on him that what he had been thinking did not apply to other people. The whole concept of thinking that if you gave some to get a deal or that others would be resonable and give something for future profits didn't apply after all in parts of the real world.

But there is a lot more talked about in the book.
** Neediness is one of the issues that he discusses and how you don't really need what you might think you do, and also how others can spot your neediness thinking and demand more from you to save a deal you think you reall need. ** Sometimes it is to your best interest just to say no.

But besides business deals common everyday things like talking to teachers about your kids or other everyday situations are also discussed in the book. That is why I say it is about so much more than just a style of negotiating, it is about life in general also.

After ordering but even before the book arrived I used the idea of just saying no twice and it worked. Just thinking about the bold title of this and his previous Start with No.. book changed my whole outlook on possible offers.
I have used the win-win model of bargaining many times in my life, but this whole way of thinking from reading the book has put another tool into my arsenal of negotiating tactics.

Sometimes contrarian attitudes can be useful. You don't have to use this mindset all the time but being able to look at things in a different light can make you much stronger in getting what you ultimately want out of life.

I bought this book for an MBA course in negotiations. It has proven to be one of the more valuable books I've read on the subject, with several principles I've applied directly to both my coursework and outside negotiations. The central theme (that NO is a beginning, not an ending) is unique in this kind of writing, and though I'm not sure about that idea, the peripheral themes are immensely helpful. A very nice counterpoint to some of the classic texts on the subject (Getting to Yes, etc.).

After meeting Jim Camp 19 years ago his System has had an incredible impact on my career. As the Director of Business Development for a National Sales organization it is required reading for all on my team. I recommend this book and Jim's "No System" as the only system to success a negotiator will ever need!!!

Sorry, I couldn't resist. Seriously now, this book opens in Chapter 1 with a phenomenal concept that I've never seen fleshed out so well in a negotiations book. That concept is "neediness". More importantly, understanding that neediness is a state of longing for or desiring something that you don't actually need in most cases and then rooting this out of your thinking in relation to the negotiation process. When you don't feel needy, it's easier to say no.

Also, the book points out how the other party's neediness can be played to your advantage. Watch for signs of this like not wanting to end the discussion, giving more information than is needed when answering questions, being overly enthusiastic, etc.

From here the book moves on to typical concepts covered in negotiation books and differs little from the rest of the pool. However, the first chapter and a few nuggets throughout the book make it well work the reading if you are involved in negotiations of any kind.

I just ordered "No: The Only Negotiating System You Need for Work and Home" after seeing ads and reviews and Camp's StartWithNo.com web site.

The web site offered a "10 Tips" download which I promptly downloaded because I like to study contrarian approaches. All ten were useful, but it's the first one that validated why I know I'm going to love reading "No: The Only Negotiating System You Need for Work and Home"

-- Never begin by asking them to say yes and agree. --

Wow. I've been struggling for years with advice from other gurus suggesting that I change my style this from this. It just is so natural to me. Next time I negotiate, I'm going to be a lot more at ease knowing I've got Jim Camp's advice on my side.

If you're tired of doing the reasonable thing (Another excellent book.. "Be Unreasonable" by Paul Lemberg), look for unconventional thinkers like Jim Camp, Tim Ferris(4 Hour Work Week), Ben Mack(Think Two Products Ahead).

There are still some new tricks us for us old dogs to learn.

Wonderful, wonderful book. I am inspired to find some land and build my own little haven... I guess that makes this the most expensive book I've ever bought.

I love this book because Michael allowed me to feel I could build a place of my own, and because I experienced the process so thoroughly and vicariously through him, I probably won't. I loved reading of the balancing of reality and desire, of architect, builder, and setting. I am amazed at what Michael is able to do, and I savor and share his rightful pride in being able to do so. I appreciate my own home more and view other structures with more curiosity as a result of reading this book. Michael entertains, and makes the process of home-building accessible to any one of us. I sit and look at the cover, wanting a little home of my own, and, as I say, I feel satisfied with what he has built, and the creation of my own little nest within a home that is already mine. And if I change my mind, he is here as guide.

First, I enjoyed reading this book. I'm a carpenter turned cabinetmaker that aspires to build spec homes per my own designs, from bottom to top. Given my existing interest in the field, I most enjoyed his discussion of the various architectural movements and the philosophies thereof. It provides a broad overview of different theories of design and how they result in pleasing (or not so pleasing) structures.

However, he definitely goes overboard - especially with the obnoxious use of esoteric vocabulary. Synecdoche? I'm pretty well read and I don't think I've ever even seen that word written before. It goes on and on like that, and it's unfortunate because it really distracts you from what's otherwise a pretty interesting read. He also seems to slip into a bit of stream of consciousness about the theory behind some detail of construction or another (like muntins). Be prepared.

It was also tiring to read about the conflict between the architect and the builder. If it was indeed as tense as he claims, then he's probably in large part to blame, getting wrapped up in the drama (which I believe he does).

Overall I gave it a 3, because it definitely provided a lot of good information. But I was dragging by the end, and it really felt like once he hit his quota of pages he just stopped. He takes you all the way through the process of construction, but doesn't tell you how it ends. How's the building feel? What worked and what didn't? Is it great in the spring with the windows open, or is it too buggy? Freezing in the winter? By dropping 30 pages of theory and putting in an equal amount of reality it would have made this book a real winner.

... this book is much too wordy and self-consciously "word-crafted." A Place of My Own: 3 stars.

I have loved his other books: The Botany of Desire in particular. He is an excellent writer and great to listen to in a radio interview. However, this book, it seems to me, was written for his former colleagues in the "word industry" as a proof that he can write more intricately structured sentences, more erudite vocabulary, more commas generally THAN YOU CAN!!

I began reading the book with great hopes, and I hate to rate any of his books less than a 5; but I immediately bogged down. It has overly complicated, assertively complicated, prose. It has an immensity of nested clauses delimited by a blizzard of commas. I started looking for a sentence without a comma. I couldn't find one for at least a page and a half. Immensely long, self-consciously crafted sentences. Nothing is just a thing: It's possibly the strangest, most meaningful thing, except that his wife, when in the kitchen, though not generally not on Tuesdays, used to enunciate, with a wry expression on her lips -- a rather inappropriate expression I thought, that it was the opposite of the physical object, in spite of Plato and Aristotle, because her cabalistic, pernicious, atavism. (You get the style?) I think he was trying impress himself that his life, decision to write full time and his little studio were worthwhile. To me, it's navel-gazing at its worst.

If you like the kind of sentence I parodied above (though trust me, it's not that much of a parody) you will like this book. Otherwise, not. As noted, I like Michael Pollan. I could not read this. Thank goodness for his more recent books.

[edited for spelling and grammar 28FEB08]

this book is elegantly written, erudite and entertaining. I'd recommend it highly both to the carpenter who would like to know more about the ancient roots of construction and to the armchair traveller types. It examines the dynamic between builder, client and architect in a manner reminicient of but definitely different from the classic Tracy Kidder "House".

This book is full of beautiful pics and projectS that are easy to follow. Can't wait to get started...

Love this book, it is the perfect book to snuggle up with on the davenport, wrapped in ones favorite quilt & a cup of tea near by.
Some may consider it a coffee table book, but I enjoyed leisurely turning the pages and dreaming of the things I might someday make. Luv it!

After purchasing two books by this author and being totally thrilled, I'd buy anything by the author sight unseen now! The book has such pretty projects to make that would be great for gifts; tote bag, quilt, animals, make-up bags, etc. all done up sweetly.

I love everything girly and these sewing projects are cute, girly, and beautiful.

I loved most of the projects, and I look forward to sewing a lot of things from this book.

They also explain things pretty well in the book, I recommend not being a complete novice when trying to use this book, other than that, awesome book, enjoy!

It seems everyone loves this book and I ordered it based on the cute cover and the great reviews, but on receiving it was very disappointed. True, it is definitely "eye candy" - nice photography, beautiful pastel fabrics (heavy on the pinks), everything displayed in cutesy rooms, like so many pictures I've clipped and saved from Mary Engelbreit's Home Companion magazine for years. Don't get me wrong - I like cutesy!

As a craft book, however, it doesn't seem very meaty to me. While fun to look at, I didn't find that it offered much that I liked enough to bother making ... well, maybe if I had a lot of extra time on my hands, but few of us have that luxury, now! There just doesn't seem to be much new here. Very simple stuffed dogs, cats and bears, and the garden angels with the very skinny arms and legs have been done so many times over. I decided that, for me, the pretty fabrics and combinations of pastel colors, well displayed, were the factors that made this book seem interesting, not the projects themselves.

I guess I must just be at the stage where I want things to be a bit more practical. Although stuffed fabric hearts, strawberries and pears can be darling if made with pretty and expensive fabric, I don't know how long something like that would interest me, just sitting around.

Here are some of the other projects: simple fabric floor mats, slippers, simple table mats, several wall hangings with embroidery, pin cushion, needle case, simple bag for buttons, simple zippered make-up bag, hot water bottle cover, sleeping masks, very simple square chair cushion, fabric tags, boxes and wall pouches.

Also, this is a UK publication, but the work was originally published in Norway. As someone else mentioned, I think there are some translation issues. It just doesn't read well to me and the instructions seem awkward and confusing at times, even though the projects are quite simple.

All that being said, the bamboo-handled bag is cute, would be useful and a breeze to make and the fabric rose is a neat idea and looks nice pinned on the bag or a blue jean jacket. I'd only hoped to get more out of this book. If you love pink, enjoy making cute little stuffed things, or embroidery, you'll probably love this book. I just wanted to warn some of the other jaded old crafters that they might be disappointed.

Browsing through the 80 recipes in this book was a great source of inspiration for my next batch of home brew. If you can't decide what to do next, pick up this book. There is bound to be something you haven't tried.

The title is misleading, the sub-title would be more accurate. It is primarily recipes. The book contains short introductory chapters on ingredients and brewing that other books have covered in more detail. If you don't know what terms like lovibond, OG, FG, and IBU are I would read an introductory how to brew book first.

The recipes are primarily setup for all grain brewers. For extract based brewers the recipes are modified to `fit' the style. I get the sense the authors are all grain brewers who wanted to broaden the market for their book by adding the extract formulations.

This is a great book to browse and see what a style has in common in terms of grains, hops and yeast.

larry 'at' brewersfriend 'dot' com
http://www.brewersfriend.com

Easy to read and follow. Gives extract versions of recipes and conversions for all grain as well.

This is a fantastic book, I've been brewing every week since I got the book 7 months ago. Fantastic recipes, brilliant advice.

Brewing Classic Styles: 80 Winning Recipes Anyone Can Brew

This book is less than the price of an extract kit ... but contains recipes and advice that are worth so much more. I've brewed the Kolsch, the Belgian Wit, and just received my grain for the British Bitter.

I brew the all-grain versions but John and Jamil include extract and partial-mash versions of each recipe. They give you great pointers for each style and give you the exact fermentation temperatures for each recipe.

I have already brewed several of the beers from this book and have had outstanding results. You will need a primary book for the beginner, but if have brewed before and want to get away from kits this is definitely the way to go. You can get most of the recipes free via podcast, but there is other information included in the book that the podcasts miss. I would definitely recommend adding this book to your brewing repertoire.

I had read some of his work in another version and wasn't very impressed.
I am holding him to the standards of the really great authors
of his own day. It is said in the beginning that he was killed by the kings dogs
( By implications that he had offended the king and they were turned on him?).
His tragedy isn't tragic enough, and he rewrites the Trojan war as it pleased him in his age 1000 years later.
In many ways he seems a toned down Greek with less passion and blood on stage and more political insinuations.
Only about half his plays survive and reading these I realize that they were probably worse?
I did find one interesting note in Alcestis that suggest that three days in the grave wasn't a Hebrew superstition, but a Greek one.

10 beautiful and powerful plays by a man whose genius can still be felt today

Euripides was the youngest and the least successful of the great triad of Greek tragic poets. Criticized by the conservatives of his time for introducing shabby heroes and immoral women into his plays, his plays were ridiculed by Aristophanes in "The Frogs." His plays exhibited his iconoclastic, rationalizing attitude toward the ancient myths that were the subject matter for Greek drama. For Euripides the gods were irrational and petulant, while heroes had flawed natures and uncontrolled passions that made them ultimately responsible for their tragic fates. Ultimately, your standard Euripides tragedy offers meaningless suffering upon which the gods look with complete indifference (until they show up at the end as the deux ex machina). However, today Euripides is considered the most popular of the Greek playwrights and is considered by many to be the father of modern European drama.

This volume does not include all of the extant plays of Euripides (we believe he authored 92 plays, 19 of which have survived), but what are arguably the ten most important: "Alcestis," "Medea," "Hippolytus," "Andromache," "Ion," "Trojan Women," "Electra," "Iphigenia Among the Taurians," "The Bacchants," and "Iphigenia at Aulis." The translations by Moses Hadas and John McLean are not as literate as you will find elsewhere, but they are eminently functional and make this volume one of the most cost-effective ways of providing students an opportunity to study the work of a great dramatist.

After reading several Euripides tragedies several things emerge in our understanding of his work. First, he has a unique structure for his plays decidedly different from those of Aeschylus and Sophocles. Usually the play begins with a monologue that provides the necessary exposition regarding the situation with which the characters are confronted. At the end of the play a god usually descends from heaven to provide an epilogue to say what happens afterwards (e.g., "Hippolytus"). Second, Euripides is much more interested in the dynamic interaction of his characters than the role of the chorus. The stasimons and occasional monodies are more what exists between scenes for Euripides instead of an opportunity to comment upon the story as with Aeschylus (e.g., "Agamemnon"). Third, the idea that Euripides is a misogynist just does not bear up under even a basic reading of these plays. This misconception might stem from our understanding of the culture of the times, because the "worst" thing you can say about the women of Euripides is that they are realistic characters.

Fourth and most importantly, clearly Euripides is at his best when there is a political agenda embedded in his story. "The Trojan Women" offers a fascinating counterpoint to the reactions of those same characters at the end of the "Iliad" when Hector's body is returned to Troy, but Euripides is not concerned with commenting on Homer but rather on the Athenian destruction of the city of Melos, which had tried to stay neutral in the Peloponnesian War (compare this with Euripides in a patriotic mode in "Andromache"). Much more is made of Euripides irreverence towards the gods (e.g., "The Bacchants"), however I think his greatness lies not in being an atheist but in being a strong advocate of democratic principles (e.g., the treatment of foreigners at the heart of "Medea"). Hadas reinforces this latter idea in his translations, admitting that for the modern reader it might be better to think of Euripides "as a pamphleteer rather than a poet." Still, Hadas emphasizes that despite the parodies provided by Aristophanes, Euripides was a great poet. Furthermore, Hadas is committed to keeping the translations as poetry rather than prose.

But there is also a sense in which Euripides provides psychological insights into his characters as much as Sophocles, who usually gets the edge in that respect because Freud derived the Oedipal and Electra complexes from his writings. Even though there was a limit of only three characters on stage at a time, Euripides would often made one of these characters, such as the nurse in "Hippolytus" or Pylades (friend of Orestes in both "Electra" and "Iphigenia Among the Taurains"), a normal person, who served as a means for showing the profoundly disturbed nature of the tragic hero.

Reading a single Euripides play is not going to make the validity of any or all of these points clear, but if you read most of these ten plays you should come to similar conclusions. I still like to use Euripides in bracket Homer's "Iliad," looking at the way he presages the conflict between Achilles and Agamemnon in "Iphigenia at Aulis," and the fate of "The Trojan Women," but there is much value to studying the plays of Euripides on their own terms. Granted, you can find better (i.e., more "modern") translations, but finding ten Euripides plays in one volume is going to be impossible and/or expensive.

Some reviewers say that Euripides is not strictly a tragedian in the Greek sense, but a playwright who took Greek drama to a next level of development. I agree, and this can be seen both in structural and styilistic innovations, as well as in the way of treating his subjects, remarkably the Gods, myths, religion and the situation of women. Maybe that's why he was the least successful of the three known Greek "tragedians", the other two being Aeschylus and Sophocles. Structural and styilistic innovations include the opening monologue in which one of the characters explains the situation such as it is at the beginning of the action. Other ones are: a lesser use of the Chorus and the treatment of the final deus-ex-machina. But in my view, the most important aspect of his dramas is the controversial stance he takes against traditions and myths. If Aschylus lives in a world of gods, heroes and titans, and if Sophocles is the great tragedian of Fate, glory, downfall and grandilocuent suffering, for Euripides humans are just humans and the gods are, in the best case, distant, cruel and frivolous entities. With Euripides, it is not so much Fate but every individual's decisions which decide their fortune. He also exposes crudely the disadvantaged situation of women, hand-tied by laws and traditions which preclude their human development. Finally, for him war is not an opportunity for glory, but only destruction, misery and disgrace. War does not purify or ennoble, it just destroys and saddens. In spite of this vision, his plays do not entirely lack a sense of humor, even if it's black humor. Some of the plays included in this volume are:

"Alcestis", a good example of Euripides's anti-tragedy which begins sad and ends joyful. Alcestis volunteers to die instead of her husband, Admetus (whose own parents refuse to sacrifice for him). Admetus has to be one of the most despicable characters in literature. In the end, a drunk Hercules saves the woman and all ends well (more or less).

"Medea" is the terrifyingly cruel story of Jason's wife, who goes mad at his infidelities and punishes him by murdering their children. Chilly.

"Hippolytus", which is more properly a tragedy in the old style. Here the gods do intervene decisively: Aphrodite inspires in Phaedra a lustful love for her stepson, Hippolytus. When the boy finds out about it, he sternly rejects the idea and Phaedra kills herself. She lefts behind a letter accusing Hippolytus of having tried to seduce her, which brings about the boy's death.

"Andromache", a drama about jealousy in which Hector's widow is about to die at the hands of her raptor's wife (the raptor is Neoptolemus, Achilles's son). In the end, she is saved by the wisdom and mercy of Achilles's father.

"Ion", apocryhphal son of Apollo, who is adopted by another man and made priest of his true father's temple (he ignores his true lineage).

"The Trojan Women", where the cruel deaths of Priamus's children are told.

"Electra", very different from the one written by Aeschylus where Electra is a hysterical crazy. Here, she is a cold and firm avenger.

"Ifigenia among the Taurus", where the supposedly sacrificed daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra appears as the guardian of Artemisa's temple in the country of the Taurus, nowadays Crimea. Her brother Orestes arrives to the place with his friend Pilades, escaping from the cruel Erinnis (deities in charge of punishing parricide or matricide). His goal is to steal the statuette of the godess in order to perform some ritual of atonement for his sins. Brother and sister recognize each other and run away together. This isn't either a proper tragedy, but more of a farce.

Euripides laid down the basis for what would be modern drama. The plays are quite good and relevant and so completely recommended.

Euripides is not a definitive tragedian (in the Aristotelian notion) like his contemporary Sophocles; although he mines the same subject matter, he exhibits a number of stylistic differences and peculiarities. His plays tend to begin with a single character delivering a soliloquy that introduces the background of the story, and he makes frequent use of a "deus ex machina" at the end in order to set things right, or as right as they can be.

The biggest difference between Sophocles and Euripides is their approach to tragedy. Sophocles uses tragedy as an enhancement of nobility, an illumination of heroic dignity and grandeur; to Euripides it is just ugly, crude, and awkward, like a ketchup stain on your shirt. Tragedy elevates the Sophoclean hero to a state of fearsome awe, but it merely reduces the Euripidean hero to an object of pity and even derision. In this sense Euripides is more of a realist and a humanist, and therefore more modern.

Euripides's plays transform classical mythology not into morality lessons but into drama in a very basic, empathic mode. He makes the most of every dramatic situation: Medea, who kills her children to punish her unfaithful husband Jason; Hector's widow Andromache, who is enslaved by Achilles's son Neoptolemus and is accused by his wife Hermione of seducing him; Ion, son of Apollo by the rape of Creusa and attendant at his temple, in a classic plot of mistaken identity; Pentheus, king of Thebes, who is murdered by frenzied Bacchantes, one of whom is his own mother; Iphigenia, who is sacrificed by her father Agamemnon to ensure Greek victory in the Trojan War. There is a very clear path that connects Euripides with the conventions of two and a half millenia of Western literature. He might not have been as famous or as respected as Sophocles, but he is no less important a dramatist.