CAMBRIDGE, Mass.  In Aeschylus’ “Prometheus Bound” the title character is punished for stealing fire and giving it to humans. For the playwright Steven Sater the idea of having one’s life altered by flames is intensely personal.

When Mr. Sater was an undergraduate at Washington University in St. Louis, his apartment caught fire. As the flames engulfed his bedroom and licked at his body, he jumped out of his third-story window to escape. He was burned on his face and much of the rest of his body and severely injured his spine. While convalescing he taught himself ancient Greek, turning pages with his teeth while immobilized.

During that time Mr. Sater became enamored of the tragedies of Aeschylus, whom he calls the first “radical playwright,” the first to write largely about tyranny and oppression. Years later Mr. Sater has brought Aeschylus’ work to life in English  as a rock musical, with Serj Tankian, the lead singer of the band System of a Down, as composer. Produced by the American Repertory Theater, their “Prometheus Bound” opened on Friday and runs through April 2.

In 2007 Mr. Sater won several Tony Awards as one of the creators of the hit musical “Spring Awakening,” which also drew on an unusual source, a late-19th-century German play by Frank Wedekind. For “Prometheus” he translated Aeschylus and in 2008 approached Diane Paulus, now American Repertory’s artistic director, with the script.