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Cyclops

A play of satyr, Cyclops was created by Euripides.

It centers on Odysseus who has lost his way on his voyage home from the Trojan War. When he and his crew stop by Sicily, a place of Cyclopes, they meet a group of Satyrs and Silenus, their father. This group has been enslaved by a Cyclops. After being helped and then turned on by Silenus, Odysseus and his crew soon find themselves at the mercy of the Cyclops. Odysseus escapes and hatches a plan to get back at their capturer.

Around the ending section of the play, the Cyclops is well drunk and mistakes Silenus for Ganymede, the son of Zeus. Taking him away, the Cyclops enters his cave. The Satyrs worry for their father and Odysseus intends to blind the Cyclops now that he is drunk enough. He calls to Hypnos then to aid him by causing the Cyclops to sleep soon and deeply. During this he identifies him as the son of Nyx.

"And you, Sleep (Hypnos), child of black Night (Nyx), come with undiluted force against this god-detested beast!"

Book sources:
Euripides. Euripides. English translation by David Kovacs. Cambridge. Harvard University Press.

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