During the Interwar period, Seferis, as a poet-prophet (vates), attempts through his poetry to warn the unsuspecting and complacent world about the evil that he predicts is coming —based on ominous international and domestic political developments— namely, the Second World War. He perceived this war as new link in the unbroken chain of conflicts stretching deep into the past. In this context, he frequently included (slightly altered each time) the verse Ἔστιν θάλασσα —τίς δέ νιν κατασβέσει;— in several of his interwar poems (“K ́ [Andromeda],” “The Last Dance”, “B ́ Mycenae,” “Monday,” “Wednesday”). In Agamemnon by Aeschylus, this verse is spoken by Clytemnestra during the episode in which she persuades the newly arrived Agamemnon from Troy to commit hybris by stepping onto the costly, intricately woven purple tapestries as he enters the palace. However, Seferis harbors no illusions. He knows that his poetic prophecies will share the same fate as those of Cassandra. Nevertheless, this does not deter him from continuing to write what he foresees.
