Tiger at the Gates
| The Trojan War Will Not Take Place | |
|---|---|
Hector reproaches Paris
by Pierre Claude François Delorme |
|
| Written by | Jean Giraudoux |
| Characters |
Hector, Cassandra, Andromache, Priam, Polyxene, Demokos, Mathematician, Paris, Hecuba, Helen, Troilus, Ulysses |
| Date premiered | 21 November 1935 |
| Place premiered |
Théâtre de l'Athénée Paris, France |
| Original language | French |
| Subject | Trojan war |
| Genre | Tragedy |
| Setting | Ancient Troy |
The Trojan War Will Not Take Place (French: La guerre de Troie n'aura pas lieu) is a play written in 1935 by French dramatist Jean Giraudoux. In 1955 it was translated into English by Christopher Fry with the title Tiger at the Gates. The play has two acts and follows the convention of the classical unities.
Within the framework of the Iliadic myth of the Trojan War, Giraudoux criticizes diplomacy and the behaviour of the national leaders and intellectuals who brought about World War I and the lead-up to World War II.
The play takes place the day before the outbreak of the Trojan War inside the gates of the city of Troy. It follows the struggle of the disillusioned Trojan military commander Hector, supported by the women of Troy, as he tries to avoid war with the Greeks. Hector's wife Andromache is pregnant, and this reinforces his desire for peace. Along with his worldly-wise mother Hecuba, Hector leads the anti-war argument and tries to persuade his brother Paris to return Paris's beautiful but vapid captive Helen to Greece. Giraudoux presents Helen as not only an object of desire, but the epitome of destiny itself. She claims that she can see the future by seeing what is coloured in her mind, and she sees war. For Hector, Helen means only war and destruction. But for the other Trojan men, led by the poet Demokos, she represents an opportunity for glory; and they are eager to have others fight a war in her name. The peace agreement Hector negotiates with the visiting Greek commander Ulysses, is no match for Demokos' deliberate lies, and at the end of the play, the seer Cassandra's cynical prediction that war cannot be avoided has been proven right.
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