Edward Albee’s theatre continues to be controversial. The discussion centers around two questions: one has to do with truth, and the other with dramatic structure. The first runs as follows: is the image of human relations in America which Albee presents justifiable because it is in some sense realistic, or is his an essentially flawed and perverted point of view? The second is: are there valid grounds for the invented child in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf and the confused events which lead to Julian’s death in Tiny Alice, or is Albee artistically callow and unable to structure a play properly?

A performance lasting ninety minutes, a language few of the audience can understand, a play more than 2,400 years old, and the immediate result—continuous applause for more than twenty minutes. This is a measure of the success of ancient tragedy in modern Greek translations and productions when on tour. In Greece itself, performances are frequently attended by audiences of twelve to fourteen thousand, most of whom have come from considerable distances, such as the 112 miles from Athens to Epidaurus.

There are two versions of Laius’ murder in Oedipus Rex. First, there is the version that is current in Thebes and is expressed by Creon, Jocasta, the Chorus, and presumably the Shepherd if he were to talk about it. Second, there is Oedipus’ version.

The first version is essentially this: one day, not too long before the Sphinx came to terrorize Thebes, Laius set out—so he said—to Delphi. He did not travel as a king generally might with a great many soldiers, but with only four of his men, one of whom was a herald. Laius himself rode in a chariot. At a place where three roads meet, Laius was met by a group of robbers.

The actions of Hamlet are all beginning and end, with no middle. The play takes place in the shadow of three events—the murder of King Hamlet, the marriage of Claudius and Gertrude, and the death of Polonius. The consequences of these events—the suffering of the wronged, the remorse of the wrongers, the extensive repercussions in subsequent events—are fully and inexorably worked out. Within this atmosphere of prolonged aftermath, numerous actions are begun, stopped, started again, stopped, and not generally brought to completion until the finale. It is these arrested actions which set the main rhythm of the play.