Visual record of Roy Hart's "The Bacchae"

Dionysus:- "Pentheus, you are a man to make men fear; and fearful will be your end - an end that shall raise your fame to the height of heaven. Stretch out your hands, Agauë,, and you her sisters, daughters of Cadmus! I am bringing the young man to his battle; and I and Dionysus shall be the victors."

You do not know what life you live, or what you do, who you are.Dionysus:-""

Pentheus:- "Who I am? Pentheus, son of Echion and Agaue.

Dionysus:- " Pentheus means 'sorrow'. The name fits you well."

Pentheus:- "Take him away. Imprison him in the stables; he'll have all the darkness he wants. -You can dance in there!"

Chorus:- " Hounds of madness, fly to the mountain, fly, where Cadmus' daughters are dancing in ecstasy! Madden them like a frenzied herd stampeding, against the madman hiding in woman's clothes to spy on the Maenads' rapture! First his mother shall see him craning his neck down from a rounded rock or a withered trunk and shout to the Maenads, 'Who is the man, you Bacchae, who has come to the mountain spying on the swift wild mountain dances of Cadmus' daughters?"

Teiresias:- "Then you feel as I do. I am young too; I'll make an attempt at the dance."

Cadmus:" You don't think we should make our way to the mountains by carriage?"

Teiresias: "No, no, that would not show the same respect for the god."

Cadmus: "I'll be your guide then - two old men together."

Teiresias: "The god will guide us there, and without weariness."

Cadmus: "Shall we be the only men in Thebes who dance to Bacchus?"

Teiresias: "We are the only men right-minded; the rest are perverse."

Chorus: "On, on! run, dance, delirious, possessed! You , the beauty and grace of golden Tmolus, sing to the rattle of thunderous drums, sing for joy, praise Dionysus, god of joy! Shout like Phrygians, sing out the tunes you know, while the sacred pure toned flute vibrates the air with holy merriment, in time to the pulse of the feet that flock to the mountains, to the mountains! And , like a foal with its mother at pasture, runs and leaps for joy every daughter of Bacchus."

The Bacchae tearing Penthius apart with their bare hands. This image was taken in one of the original rehearsals of the Roy Hart Theatre at the Abraxas Club in Hampstead, London in 1969.