Agamemnon by Aeschylus is an ancient Greek tragedy set in Argos. It begins with the homecoming of Agamemnon from the war in Troy and his wife’s Clytemnestra desire to kill him. The Herald begins a speech on line 493 on page 121 after returning from Troy. He is addressing the chorus and he reports about Agamemnon’s safe homecoming and tells the chorus what happened in Troy during the ten year duration which they were at war for. Aristotle’s theory of ancient Greek tragedies inspiring of both pity and fear is immensely seen throughout this passage. Pity, for the Herald because he is so loyal to Agamemnon and he is so happy to be home and alive and fear for Agamemnon by the way the Herald describes what occurred during the war.
Throughout this passage the message at surface is essentially the Herald recounting the struggles in Troy and his delight to be back home in Greece. And by the Heralds overwhelmed gratefulness to be home safe, Aeschylus exposes the audience to the feeling of pity towards the Herald throughout this passage. Aeschylus creates this feeling of pity by his choice of dialogue and the tone of the Herald. Aeschylus’ diction is this passage consists of emotion-full words, which create the feeling of pity towards the Herald. In particular, he uses “dreamed, hopes, light, salute, loving, shining, warm, [and] cherish.” This diction corresponds to the tone of this passage. For example, in the first five lines of the passage the audience is introduced to the Herald as a very sympathetic character because of the way he is describing how proud and happy he is: “I’m home at last./Never dreamed I’d die in Greece.” This, in effect shows the audience how he is a passionate character. Punctuation, especially exclamation points i...
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...exclamation marks are used significantly throughout this passage. For example, in line 518 the Herald says, “and the high altars. Gone!” This exclamation point adds emphasize to this line, as this line is a reference to the altars that were first introduced at the beginning of the play. These altars also represent Agamemnon’s choice to sacrifice his daughter. This all relates back to how the deeds Agamemnon committed during war in Troy created a negative impression of him from the audience.
The Herald’s speech fits into the Aristotle’s broad ranging categories as seen above. Aeschylus uses the notion of pity and fear for the audience to develop feelings towards the Herald and Agamemnon and for the audience to consider different sides of the story. A side is loyal and passion for Agamemnon as the Herald experiences and another is fear and horror towards Agamemnon.
The Odyssey by Homer is an epic about a man’s return home after fighting in war. The protagonist of the epic is Odysseus, but interactions with and stories of his fellow veterans abound. The story of Agamemnon’s death upon returning home is retold and referred to numerous times and serves as a warning to Odysseus of the dangers that could exist for him in Ithaka. The ghost of Agamemnon is encountered by Odysseus in the land of the dead and is quite changed from the friend he knew and fought with at Troy. Despite his high place in life and exploits in war, Agamemnon demonstrates the suffering of the returning veteran.
Odysseus and Agamemnon are heroes who fought side by side to take down the city of Troy during the Trojan War. In Homer’s The Odyssey, why is Agamemnon slaughtered when he arrives home while Odysseus returns to find his loved ones still waiting for him? The reasons for the heroes’ differing fates are the nature of their homecoming and the loyalty of their wives.
The Greek interpretation of what makes a man “civilized” and what makes him “savage” is a recurring theme throughout the ancient epics, battle narratives, and dramas, including Aeschylus’ Agamemnon. In this first installment of The Oresteia, the chorus of Argive elders expresses keen outrage at the killing of Agamemnon, which suggests that they equate savagery with the madness they see in Clytemnestra: “just as your mind is maddened by the bloody deed, the blood-fleck in your eyes is clear to see” (1426-1427). In many places throughout the play, however, Clytemnestra proves that she does not fit the description of savage that is defined in Homer’s literature, for example and instead gives evidence that she is a very complex, rational woman. The chorus ignores the many admirable qualities of their queen —her skill at running the estate and her compassion for those who have suffered, among other things— simply because she is a woman. These qualities may not entirely excuse Clytemnestra from taking a life, but they combine to form a more noble picture of the queen than the chorus chooses to portray. Clytemnestra has relatable motives and displays empathy and respect for many different people, including the husband who she just killed, which sets her apart from the classical Greek definition of a savage —a designation forced on Clytemnestra by the chorus, but not necessarily to be believed.
Aeschylus begins by portraying Clytemnestra as Agamemnon’s faithful wife brought only to a murderous rampage by the news of her daughter’s murder, but indeed she was stricken with the curse of jealousy and had a yearning so strong to maintain power she killed the father of her
Homer’s moral exemplars in the heroic tragedy, The Iliad, can be analyzed to further understand warrior ethics. Agamemnon, a powerful warrior king, was proud and arrogant. These qualities made him an excellent warrior and the Greeks respected him. However, Agamemnon demonstrated excess pride and arrogance, as well as stubbornness. The Greeks believed that people must face their destiny with pride and nobility.
When Nestor comes to smooth the thick atmosphere they depart from each other. Upon returning to his ship, Agamemnon sends his men to “go to Achilles’ lodge [and] take Briseis at once” (line 378) illustrating how rude he can be. To take someone at once has an impatient type of connotation. Agamemnon has no intentions of keeping the peace with Achilles because he rudely disobeyed Achilles orders. Achilles tried to comply with Agamemnon, but he refused to do so. Regardless, Agamemnon resorted to his threat. When the men reach Achilles’ lodge, he is grief-stricken and allows for his wife to be taken. He is sad and reluctant, but lets them take her back to Agamemnon. No matter what he does, this event was inevitable. Agamemnon was provoking him making him “blazing … [to] [react] quickly” (line 341) showing that Achilles can be easily angered. Agamemnon tries to use Achilles rage and fury to get him to give up and retreat back to the army he left. Even though Achilles felt rage and sorrow, he keeps to his word. He wants to obey Athena’s orders of to not fight back. Although he is sad, he will not let Agamemnon’s threat get to his
Aeschylus, was a master dramatist - he liked to portray conflict between persons, human or divine, or between principles.1 His trilogy of plays, the Oresteia, develops many conflicts that must be resolved during the action of the Eumenides, the concluding play of the trilogy. The central theme of the Oresteia is justice (dike) and in dealing with questions of justice, Aeschylus at every stage involves the gods.2 The Oresteia's climactic conflict in the Eumenides revolves around justice and the gods - opposing conceptions of justice and conflicting classes of gods. This essay will describe and discuss these conflicts and, more importantly, the manner in which they are resolved so that the play, and indeed the entire trilogy, might reach a satisfactory conclusion.
In the play Agamemnon, Aeschylus depiction of gender roles are both typical and atypical of a standard male or female behavior in the culture and era because male characters in ancient Greece resemble the powerful nature of a warrior. They are seen as the head of the household where the male role is to go out and do hard labour to provide for the family and bring honor to the country, while females are to stay home to tend the kids and do house chores. This is most typical when looking at the gender role in Ancient Greece. Female characters are dependent to the status of the male characters. In the play, Clytemnestra hold great power because of her title as the queen of Greece and wife of Agamemnon. Although male characters are significant in the play, female characters such as Clytemnestra and Cassandra depicted by Aeschylus are complex for numerous reasons. First, Cassandra is a very different character, since she was given the ability to tell and predict the future. Her role in the play is symbolic because of her given ability and her constant struggle in the Trojan War. Cassandra went through rape, war, losing her family and abducted to a kingdom cursed by the Greek gods. Her persistent characteristic make her a powerful female character as equal and symbolic as other male characters in the play. However, the reader must understand that in ancient Greece, the cultural mythology of Greek gods and goddesses is primary to understanding the text. The gods hold the greatest power of all. Apollo is a popular god in Greek for his passion to give unnatural power to humanity. Cassandra was chosen by Apollo to inherit the ability of comprehending prophecies. When Apollo has fallen in love with Cassandra, but she refuses, he cursed her ...
Homer's Iliad is replete with "bitterness," a term employed for its absolutist depictions of the ferocity and prolonged spite of ancient Greek warriors. The weight of this term is made apparent in the opening passage: "What god was it then set [Achilleus and Agamemnon] in bitter collision?" (I. 8). The seeds of bitterness have been planted and this story--an epical account of the Greeks pillaging the land of Troy in the final year of the Trojan War--is narrated not to recreate history, but to furnish a backdrop of wartime valor that brings to fore the struggles of pride entertained by Achilleus vis-à-vis Agamemnon. Their fueled interactions form the basis of The Iliad, advancing the plot-line and revealing peculiar insights into their self-absorbed and selfish natures--the ultimate focus of The Iliad.
When a person is accused of a crime they are either found innocent or guilty. This is the basic idea of justice and it is what many feel needs to happen if someone has done something controversial. In the play The Oresteia by Aeschylus, the story of Clytemnestra guilt or innocents is questioned. She does many things that people are not too happy with and those controversial actions throughout the story, mainly in the first part Agamemnon get her into the trouble. As we explore the case that builds against her innocents by exploring the killings of Agamemnon and Cassandra and the boastful expression about the killings.
This essay will illustrate the types of characters depicted in Sophocles’ tragic drama, Oedipus Rex, whether static or dynamic, flat or round, and whether protrayed through the showing or telling technique.
The Achaeans are more concerned with personal glory and achievement rather than the well-being of the city. Two Characters who definitely display this characteristic are Agamemnon and Achilles. Agamemnon is selfish and is only concerned with his own honor. This is seen almost immediately in the poem. In book one, during the tenth year of battle, Chryses visits Agamemnon and offers ransom for his daughter, Chryseis who was taken as plunder early in the war. Although the ransom is attractive, Agamemnon refuses the money because the girl represents power and glory and that is far more important than wealth. Plunder represents victory; therefore, the more women Agamemnon possesses, the more glorified and powerful he feels. Eventually, Agamemnon returns the girl to her father; however, he insists that someone give him a female to compensate for his loss and restore his honor. He views the situation as a challenge to his authority and complains, "I alone of the Argives go without my honor. That would be a disgrace" (1.139-40). Agamemnon demands, the "Argives will give me a prize, a match for my desires, equal to what I have lost, well and good. But if they give me nothing I will take a p...
The Chorus, in this play, guides the audience. In the end, it is up to the individual as to what reaction they have to the play, but the Chorus is there to, in a way makes this reaction more complicated. One could leave the play totally condemning Medea, but the Chorus display’s Medea in a way that makes the audience sympathise with her, and so the moral conclusions that need to be come to side, become more complex. The audience has to base their reaction to Medea on what crimes they have seen her commit, and on what they have heard of her through the Chorus. Their integral part in the play acts in many ways, to follow, revise, and extend the plot of the play, and to influence the opinions and sympathies of the audience. It is a literary, and dramatic device that Euripedes uses, and uses well, to help portray a tragedy, and also a moralistic play, in which the Chorus is the voice that provides the morals.
Agamemnon is the first part of the trilogy known as the Oresteia. Agamemnon is a story where the main character sacrifices his own daughter to a God, Artemis to win a battle and then his wife revenge him for the sacrifice. The concept of fate plays an important role in the tilogy Agamemnon which led to the tragic endings of the play. According to the meaning of fate it means the development of events outside a person’s control, regarded as predetermined by a super natural power. Fate is what send Agamemnon to the war with Menelaus to fight against Paris, fate is what predetermined Agamemnon to sacrifice his own blood for the sake of his ship and companions and fate is what determined Cassandra his wife to plot to kill him and to revenge him for her daughter.