You’re familiar with the tragedies of antiquity, are you? The great homicidal classics?

The line is a characteristically Stoppardian jab: it compresses a whole tradition of “high culture” (Greek and Roman tragedy) into a mordant, almost tabloid summary—“homicidal classics.” The speaker’s tone suggests both familiarity and impatience, as if the prestige of antiquity is inseparable from its stock machinery of murder, revenge, and familial catastrophe. In Stoppard, such phrasing often works to puncture reverence for canonical texts while also acknowledging their enduring dramatic power. The question form (“are you?”) can function as a test of education or sophistication, but the punchline reframes that sophistication as an acquaintance with stylized violence.