The Oresteia: Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, The Eumenides

This is the horror that we think is in the archaic past, but it is everpresent with us, deep down, behind the veil. This is the birth of civilization, the evolution from tribal revenge to Olympian justice, a dawning democracy.<br/><br/>Absolutely transcendent trilogy of tragedies. Gripping, loaded with meaning, and metal as hell. I paired it with Nietszche's The Birth of Tragedy to nice effect. Death and rebirth of the twice-born god.<br/><br/>"So he goes down, and the life is bursting out of him—<br/>great sprays of blood, and the murderous shower<br/>wounds me, dyes me black and I, I revel<br/>like the Earth when the spring rains come down,<br/>the blessed gifts of god, and the new green spear<br/>splits the sheath and rips to birth in glory!"