Susan Smith murdered her own two children in 1994. Kathleen Folbigg killed her only child in 1998. Caro Socorro killed her three children in 1999. And in 431 B.C. the fictional character, Medea, murderedmurdured her own two sons. When hearing about these extreme atrocities we are repulsed. What sane mother could murder her own children? But thats just the point isn't it, no sane mother would kill her own young. No, each of these women had underlying psychological issues that led to them committing these unnatural, morally wrong acts. Susan was rejected by her lover, Kathleen's father had brutally murdered her mother, Caro was a victim of a failed marital relationship, whilst in Euripides play, Medea was not only rejected and a victim of a failed marital relationship but she also had her pride torn from beneath her.
Revenge is one of the most primitive, brutal human impulses. When an individual feels threatened by another individual they indulge in fantasies of revenge. But its when these fantasies become reality that society suffers. “Medea” reveals how revenge can take over the mind, sending a person beyond insanity.
Euripides has created an intense revenge tragedy within his play “Medea”. Which allows an audience to study the passion humans hold for revenge as a psychological construct and a moral issue. I mean Medea took revenge to the ultimate by overriding her maternal instinct just to “work revenge on Jason for his wrongs”(line 260, p. 25).
The myth of Medea and Jason was well known within the Athenian society in which it was written. Though there were varying versions of it floating about. Euripides own addition to the text added an intensity to Medea's revenge. In older versions of the myth the children were murdered b...
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...ren, one by one, until she has nothing left? Where the Chorus watches but does not interfere, although Euripides makes sure to remind us that they could? We are left the final tableau of the barbarian sorceress, exultant and destroyed at the same time, having achieved her final victory over her enemies only at the cost of her children's lives. Medea establishes the Euripidean universe, one in which heroism is rare and suffering falls on the innocent and the guilty with equal brutality. Medea's rage, unchecked and unchanged, carries us from the opening of the play to its final horrific moments. The play also implicates us, as her hatred and rage, though extreme, remain unnervingly and immediately recognisable, the grim satisfaction she takes in her revenge, however brutal and self-destructive, bears at least some resemblance to our own secret and unfulfilled fantasies.
Evil exists naturally in the world, and there are many acts that are considered evil. As a result, evil is often a theme in literature. “The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark” by William Shakespeare, and “The Cask of Amontillado” by Edgar Allan Poe each rely heavily on evil to portray a message. Out of all of the evil acts that exist, exacting revenge is the evilest act that a person can make, for a person’s rash decision to exact revenge will ruin their sense of morality. The characters of Hamlet and Laertes in “Hamlet” each commit terrible acts of revenge, as does Montresor in “The Cask of Amontillado.”
Later in the story, our sympathy transfers from Medea to Jason. Her revenge turns immoral, leaving readers with a sense of uneasiness. It is not so much the fact that she kills Creon and his daughter, but the fact that she slays her children in cold-blood.
Medea and Agaue, the tragic heroes of Euripides’ Medea and Bacchae, represent similar ideas. For both plays, the plot focuses on those two characters’ attainment of vengeance, so that their desire for a form of retribution is the primary driving force behind the plays’ conflicts. In each case, the revenges taken by Medea and Agaue are the results of their acting on their most basic, instinctual emotions without the self-control given by a more reasoned nature. Accordingly, the women and their pursuit of revenge become representative of the emotional side of human thinking. The characters that Medea and Agaue eventually destroy, Jason and Pentheus, support and represent reason, civilization, and ambition. As these male characters against which Medea and Agaue take their revenge hold purely civilized and unemotional values, they become the opposite of their play’s women. Thus, the conflict in each play becomes less specific. Instead, both plays seen together become a more generalized reflection on the natural opposition of logic and emotion, and the tragic results of their imbalance.
Medea is a tragedy written by acclaimed Greek playwright Euripides.fortunately, had the opportunity to view last night's performance. Euripides cleverly uncovers the reality of Ancient Greek society, shining a light on the treatment of women and the emotions and thoughts that provoked during their time in society. As they were voiceless, Euripides acted as a voice. The scene is set during a male- dominated society, Medea the protagonist challenges the views and chooses to ignore the normality of civilisation. Treated as an outsider her passion for revenge conquers the motherly instincts she possesses, provoking a deep hatred and sparking revenge towards her once loved family.
Medea is a story about love, passion, fear, and most importantly revenge. Throughout the story the reader witnesses a odd connection between Medea and Jason, they are both quarrelsome, surreptitious, and vigilantes. The characters, Medea and Jason, share many similar traits that they do not even notice mainly because they are both so egotistical. These connection are what really makes the story prominent.
The treatment of both of these groups led Medea to do horrendous things throughout the play The Medea. Euripides wanted to let the Athenian audience see the error of their ways through his play. He wrote the play The Medea to showcase to the Athenian audience the way that the Athenian male treated women and foreigners and that Athenian males need to change the way they thought about both of these groups of people. THE STRUGGLE IS REAL Euripides uses The Medea to make a sociological statement on the poor treatment of women and foreigners in Athenian society. They were regarded as inferior citizens to the male Athenian citizens....
The tragic play Medea is a struggle between reason and violence. Medea is deliberately portrayed as not a ‘normal woman’, but excessive in her passions. Medea is a torment to herself and to others; that is why Euripides shows her blazing her way through life leaving wreckage behind her. Euripides has presented Medea as a figure previously thought of exclusively as a male- hero. Her balance of character is a combination of the outstanding qualities of Achilles and Odysseus.
Euripidis’ Medea, is the story of Jason’s betrayal and Medea’s ambition for revenge,where in Ancient Greece, women were not seen as equal to men. In the play Medea, by Euripides, the setting reinforces the difference in gender roles, but Medea’s character confronts the social norm, constructing her to be a strong impending female protagonist. Euripidis also uses satire to deliver the theme of women rights in a gender divided society.
*Although Medea is arguably the most intelligent character in Euripides’s piece, shown in her dialogue with Creon, she has become ridiculed, and viewed as barbarous and less desirable following her separation from Jason. She is no longer a wife to a Greek man. She is simply an outsider, and a burden on a prosperous
Throughout history, revenge, or vengeance, has been altered by several cultures and even the American culture. This is shown throughout many ancient greek epics. Throughout these two epics, what is just revenge and what the action of revenge is are much different than what Revenge is seen through today’s society. Revenge is the main theme in The Iliad, with Achilles’ revenge on Agamemnon and Hector, and in The Odyssey, with Poseidon’s revenge on Odysseus and Odysseus’s revenge on the Suitors, and these epics define how revenge was seen in the ancient Greek world.
Despite the contrast in the characters of Euripedes' Medea and Aristophanes' Lysistrata, the two playwrights depicted how gender inequality can start a fire. As with Medea and Jason, the battle between the two lead to former's madness, leading to the death of the enemies she considered, and, unfortunately, leading as well to the death of her own children. Medea felt betrayed and left behind by her husband Jason, as well as continuously aggravated by Creon despite the fact that i...
Euripides created a two-headed character in this classical tragedy. Medea begins her marriage as the ideal loving wife who sacrificed much for her husband's safety. At the peak of the reading, she becomes a murderous villain that demands respect and even some sympathy. By the end, the husband and wife are left devoid of love and purpose as the tragedy closes.
Medea’s illegitimate marriage and the betrayal of Jason drive Medea to extreme revenge. Medea chooses to act with her immortal self and commit inhumane acts of murder rather than rationalize the outcomes of her actions. Medea see’s this option as her only resort as she has been banished and has nowhere to go, “stripped of her place”. To create sympathy for Medea, Euripides plays down Medea’s supernatural powers until the end of the play. Throughout the play Medea represents all characteristics found in individual women put together, including; love, passion, betrayal and revenge. Medea’s portrayal of human flaws creates empathetic emotions from the audience. The audience commiserates with Medea’s human flaws as they recognize them in themselves. Medea plays the major role in this play as she demonstrates many behavioral and psychological patterns unlike any of the other Greek women in the play; this draws the audience’s attention to Medea for sympathy and respect.
This mutual suffering between Medea and the Chorus raises issues such as the treatment of women at the time when this play was written. When Medea married Jason, she married herself to him for life. She was expected to be totally obedient and to accept whatever her husband willed. For her to look upon another man other than her husband would have been totally unacceptable. Whereas Jason marries another woman while he...
The purpose of the playwright in employing an all-female chorus is to garner respect for the female protagonist, by having them support and identify themselves with the oppressed heroine. The connection between Medea and the chorus is seen in the exposition as the women step forward to help, "advise a friend" and again later in the play as they appeal to her maternal instincts to prevent her from becoming an "unholy child-killer" ; and even though they do fail in stopping her (owing solely to her unwavering determination), the significance of their bond of sisterhood is shown as they manage to make Medea hesitate in the execution of her plans in her only moment of true weakness in the play, by alluding to great women like "Harmony" and "Aphrodite" and speaking of how morally just they had been, contrasting them with her despicable, unholy actions in an attempt to make Medea comprehend the severity of the sin she was about to commit. Through this sisterhood, the playwright enables a sensitive approach to feminism and uses it as the foundation of the plot while avoiding its inclusion as a central theme, to which the Greek audience could have reacted