Iphigenia in Tauris

Some time spent with Goethe’s “Iphigenia in Tauris” granted Spalding a fleeting glimpse of the Iphigenia that had Shorter so inspired, but it wasn’t until she immersed herself in Shorter’s own musical portrait of the heroine that her story started to become clear.

Social critics have long turned to Euripides’s plays, especially “Iphigenia in Aulis,” “Iphigenia in Tauris” and “Medea,” which also features a woman tangled up in the whims of the gods.

Shorter is also fascinated by a version of “Iphigenia in Tauris” — which tells of Iphigenia’s life after she escapes from sacrifice — that was translated in the 1700s by the German poet Goethe.

He also created the costumes for the joint Metropolitan Opera-Seattle Opera production of "Iphigenia in Tauris" in 2007.

Among other works produced during this decade were his "Jephtha," a tragedy, with which he himself was much pleased, as fulfilling every requirement of the classic drama; his metrical translations of the "Œdipus Rex," "Iphigenia in Tauris," and the "Trachiniæ;" of Sophocles; the tragedies, "David in Exile" and "David Restored," allegories in which the exile and the restoration of Charles II. were clearly set forth; "Adonis," "Batavian Brothers," "Faeton," and "Zungchin, or, the Fall of the Chinese Empire."