Sainte-Beuve deemed Athalie comparable to an Athenian tragedy by who?
Athalie Athalie is a 1691 play, the final tragedy of Jean Racine, and has been described as the masterpiece of "one of the greatest literary artists known" and the "ripest work" of Racine's genius. Voltaire considered the play the greatest triumph of the human mind, while Flaubert referred to it in "Madame Bovary" as the masterpiece of the French stage, and Sainte-Beuve deemed it comparable to "Oedipus Rex" in beauty, with "the true God added." August Wilhelm Schlegel thought Athalie to be "animated by divine breath"; other critics have regarded the poetics of drama in the play to be superior to those of Aristotle.
Herakles (Euripides) Herakles (Ancient Greek: Ἡρακλῆς μαινόμενος , "Hēraklēs Mainomenos", also known as "Hercules Furens ") is an Athenian tragedy by Euripides that was first performed c. 416 BCE. While Herakles is in the underworld obtaining Cerberus for one of his labours, his father Amphitryon, wife Megara, and children are sentenced to death in Thebes by Lycus. Herakles arrives in time to save them, though the goddesses Iris and Madness (personified) cause him to kill his wife and children in a frenzy. It is the second of two surviving tragedies by Euripides where the family of Herakles are suppliants (the first being "Herakles' Children"). It was first performed at the City Dionysia festival.