caa a22 4500 38637628X CHVBK 20180307112019.0 cr unu---uuuuu 161130e198911 xx s 000 0 eng 10.2307/632033 doi S0075426900012611 pii (NATIONALLICENCE)cambridge-10.2307/632033 Holt Philip University of Wyoming Laramie, Wyoming 82071 The end of the Trachiniai and the fate of Herakles [Elektronische Daten] [Philip Holt] At the end of the Trachiniai, the dying Herakles gives orders for his cremation on Mt. Oita and is carried off to his fiery end. One of the thorniest critical questions about the play is what we, the audience, are to make of this. Did Sophokles intend the audience to remember Herakles' apotheosis from the pyre and complete the story in their own minds? Or did he omit it in order to deny it, the better to deepen the play's supposed general pessimism or censure of Herakles? The case for assuming Herakles' exaltation suffers from two major weaknesses. Its champions do little to answer the arguments of their opponents, which are often forceful and take into account things in the play which the devout would rather ignore, and they do surprisingly little to explain how their position on the question affects the interpretation of the play. Nevertheless, their case is a strong one and deserves better support than it usually receives. This study will present it in some detail, addressing the objections and in the process offering an interpretation. Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1989 The Journal of Hellenic Studies Cambridge University Press 109(1989-11), 69-80 0075-4269 109<69 1989 109 JHS https://doi.org/10.2307/632033 text/html Onlinezugriff via DOI 1 research-article jats NATIONALLICENCE 856 40 https://doi.org/10.2307/632033 text/html Onlinezugriff via DOI NATIONALLICENCE 100 1- Holt Philip University of Wyoming Laramie, Wyoming 82071 NATIONALLICENCE 773 0- The Journal of Hellenic Studies Cambridge University Press 109(1989-11), 69-80 0075-4269 109<69 1989 109 JHS CC0 http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0 nationallicence BK010053 XK010053 XK010000 NATIONALLICENCE NATIONALLICENCE NL-cambridge