Helen

“There’s an old story that Zeus changed himself / into a swan once and, being chased by an eagle, / flew to my mother Leda’s lap for refuge / and by that trick got what he wanted from her— / which may or may not be true.”

In this quote from Helen’s opening monologue, she relates the traditional account of her own backstory: that she is the child of Leda by Zeus, who impregnated Leda while in the form of a swan. Helen, however, adds a note of doubt about its veracity, suggesting to the audience that the popularized version of a given story may not in fact be the truth.

“Men died for me in thousands by Skamander, / and I, the passive sufferer in it all, / became anathema, for it seemed to the world / that I had betrayed my husband and that he / had pushed Greece into a disastrous war.”

Here Helen relates the painful duality of her condition: Her reputation is ruined because she is assumed to have been the cause of all the pain of the Trojan War, while in fact she never had anything to do with it. Thus she becomes a “passive sufferer” who, while not actually bearing physical wounds from the battles at Troy, is nonetheless wounded by the conflict.

“You have sorrow enough, we know; but one must bear / the burdens of life as lightly as one can.”

The Leader tries to comfort Helen in her grief after hearing Teucer’s report. It was common in Greek theater to have the Chorus and its members (like the Leader) give voice to the moral maxims and practical applications of a dramatic narrative.