Oresteia - The Issue of Justice in Aeschylus' Eumenides
analytical Essay
2472 words
Oresteia - The Issue of Justice in Aeschylus' Eumenides
The concept of justice is manifested through the three plays of Aeschylus' Oresteia. The old tradition of justice, the private blood feud, caused an ungoverned succession of violent acts that spiralled uncontrollably. Aegisthus, Clytemnestra's lover, is introduced in Agamemnon; he desires vengeance for the plot contrived by Agamemnon's father (Ag: 1605-1611).1 Neither Agamemnon nor Aegisthus took part in this "plot" and yet as the chorus explains (Ag: 755-6)
'But ancient Violence longs to breed,
new violence comes
when its fatal hour comes,'
The justice system of this period demanded that one avenge the death of a family member, this can be seen in The Libation Bearers (Lib:45-60)
'The proud dead stir under the earth,
they rage against the ones who took their lives.'
So Aegisthus must take the life of Agamemnon (because Agamemnon's father is not available) in order to let his father's spirit rest. Thus, one need not have an active part in a wrongdoing to be slain for it in the name of justice; one simply had to be members of the same family as the wrongdoer. This ability to substitute family members for vengeance purposes led to a back and forth phenomenon between two families, as soon as one family avenged its member by 'kill(ing) the killers in return' (Lib: 149) the other would pay them back in kind. As the chorus proclaims (Lib: 394-8)
'It is the law: when the blood of slaughter
wets the ground it wants more blood.
Slaughter cries for the Fury
of those long dead to bring destruction
on destruction churning in its wake!'
Similarly, Clytemnestra wants retribution for the fact that Agamemnon brought misery (A...
... middle of paper ...
...stage a trial scene with a jury and an enacted vote, a genuine coup de theatre not apparently emulated by his successors.' So Aeschylus was a pioneer and the originator of Ally McBeal and Perry Mason. I think he would be very happy about that.
Works Cited
Aeschylus 'The Oresteia' (translation: R. Fagles) Penguin (1977)
Cartledge, P. "Deep plays": Theatre as process in Greek Civic Life' in P.E. Easterling The Cambridge Companion to Greek Tragedy Cambridge (1997)
Conacher, D.J. Aeschylus' Oresteia: A Literary Commentary Toronto (1987)
Goldhill, S. 'The Language of Tragedy: Rhetoric and Communication' in P.E. Easterling The Cambridge Companion to Greek Tragedy Cambridge (1997)
Notes
1. All references to the text are taken from Fagles, R. translation (1977).
2. For more on this subject read Conacher, D.J. (1987) pages 197-212
In this essay, the author
- Analyzes how the concept of justice is manifested through the three plays of aeschylus' oresteia.
- Analyzes how the justice system of this period demanded avenging the death of family members, this can be seen in the libation bearers.
- Explains that aegisthus must take the life of agamemnon in order to let his father's spirit rest. one need not have an active part in a wrongdoing to be slain for it in the name of justice.
- Analyzes how apollo cleanses orestes of his crime and sends him to athena, who determines the propriety of the furies dogged pursuit of him.
- Explains that public speaking played a fundamental role in the radical democracy of athens. the word dike is used throughout the oresteia, where the plotting of revenge leads towards resolution through the lawcourt.
- Analyzes how aeschylus' audience could not have missed the reforms of the areopagus and the recent alliance of athens with sparta.
- Analyzes how orestes wastes no time in promising argive support in return for protection at athens.
- Analyzes how orestes' expressions of gratitude for his acquittal emphasize argos and the promised allegiance of argives to athens.
- Opines that the issue of justice in aeschylus' eumenides is an immense one and one that carried as much importance all those years ago as it does today.
- Cites cartledge, p., "deep plays": theatre as process in greek civic life, in the cambridge companion to greek tragedy, cambridge.
- Cites goldhill, s., 'the language of tragedy: rhetoric and communication', in p.e. easterling's the cambridge companion to greek tragedy.
- Analyzes how clytemnestra wants revenge for the fact that agamemnon brought misery upon her 'proud house' by sacrificing his own child.
- Analyzes how aeschylus demonstrates the complexity and futility of the blood feud as a system of justice.
- Analyzes how aeschylus depicts the progression from the traditional from of justice to a much more civilised form, the court system.
- Analyzes how aeschylus displays his belief that a new system of justice must overtake the old system in much the same manner as athena's power did that of the furies.
- Analyzes how the faction fight between the conservative traditionalists and the radical democrats resonated in the minds of the athenian audience.
- Analyzes how aeschylus chose to depict orestes as an argive2 rather than the more traditional mycenean or even spartan prince. he was eager to promote good relations between athens and argos.
- Analyzes how orestes reminds athena that his father agamemnon and she were allies in that victorious undertaking, and apollo, in his preoration, tells her that he has sent him as suppliant to her hearth.
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In this essay, the author
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- Analyzes the war-of-the-sexes taking place in the eumenides, the final play of the oresteia.
- Analyzes how the character of orestes is down-played in the eumenides. he is representative of the new gods and, more specifically, of zeus.
- Analyzes how aeschylus uses the furies to stand for the old and tribal order of society.
- Analyzes how aeschylus has his opinions change subtlety throughout the play. the furies are made to appear less and less as bloodhounds seeking the punishment of a matricide.
- Analyzes how aeschylus' presentation of athene is conspicuously androgynous and ambiguous, representing both male and female values. apollo is inconsiderate and pompous.
- Analyzes how athene reveals her loyalty at the end of the trial when she explains that she will side with the new gods should the voting be tied.
- Analyzes how orestes, whose character plays so little active role in the eumenides, confirms the importance of the female as he needs athene to settle his problems.
- Analyzes how athene acts more as a conveyance of male interests within female vessels, but maintains her definite character all her own. the end of the play is confusing.
- Analyzes how the ambiguity inherent in athene's character has led to no small amount of critical argument. she trumpets the superiority of men while attempting to appease the furies.
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In this essay, the author
- Analyzes how the trilogy begins with violence and ends with peace. progress and linear movement break away from the past in a definitive way.
- Explains that in the eumenides, justice is what ends conflict, while for heraclitus, conflict is justice.
- Explains heraclitus' view that conflict is a necessary part of existence. justice is not opposed to conflict, and harmony grows out of conflict.
- Analyzes how the counter-thrust brings together and from tones at variance comes perfect attunement, and all things pass through conflict.
- Opines that homer was wrong when he said that conflict might vanish from among gods and men. there would be no attunement without high and low notes nor animals without male and female.
- Opines that one must realize that war is shared and conflict is justice. all things come to pass (and are ordained?) in accordance with conflict.
- Opines that in the oresteia, conflict is what justice aims to eliminate. justice and conflict are fundamentally opposing forces and only justice can bring harmony.
- Opines that while for heraclitus justice is everywhere, all the time, in the oresteia it is imposed upon nature and created by men.
- Explains that for heraclitus, justice is inherent in nature, not created by god or man, and merely requiring man's recognition and obedience.
- Opines that humans play an important role in the creation and administration of justice in the eumenides. justice is embedded in a mortal, democratic process.
- Explains that heraclitus' fundamental nature of the universe is unity and oneness; in oresteia, unity does not exist and must be created, imposed.
- Explains that harmony and justice grow out of conflict and the natural tension of opposites, but the essential nature of things is unity and oneness.
- Explains that graspings is convergent divergent, consonant dissonant, from all things one and from one thing all.
- Opines that the wise is one alone, unwilling and willing to be spoken of by the name of zeus.
- Opines that it is wise to agree that all things are one.
- Explains that in the oresteia, there is no sense of unity being the essential nature of things. conflict is natural and unity can only be imposed upon it with difficulty and deliberate effort.
- Analyzes how the overt linear structure of the oresteia conceals a deeper circularity.
- Analyzes how progress, if seen as the achievement of peace, is not really made in the oresteia. the furies vow to protect athens from civil war and the bloodshed caused by revenge.
- Analyzes how justice in the oresteia does not mean an end to conflict at all. throughout the trilogy, statements are made about the necessity of conflict.
- Analyzes how the tension of opposites and the reliance of one opposite on the other for its existence is reiterated through the plays.
- Opines that man who fears nothing is ever righteous? such be your just terrors.
- Opines that justice and conflict are not incompatible with each other in the eumenides trilogy, and that heraclitian ideas regarding the necessity of conflict were latent in oresteia.
- Analyzes how the portrayal of justice as the result of democratic descision-making by humans is problematized by the fact that athene presides over, and indeed initiates the whole process.
- Explains that all human laws are nourished by a divine one. it prevails as it will and suffices for all and is more than enough.
- Analyzes aeschylus' assertion of unity as the fundamental nature of all things, but he does not express an essential unity in the universe unless that unity is implied by the tension of opposites.
- Analyzes how the furies make direct reference to a unity, or "the all" in the text.
- Opines that the oresteia suggests a heraclitean belief in the participation of everything in unity, and the necessity of obeying the divine law.
- Analyzes how an initial examination of the oresteia gives one the impression of a view of justice very different from that which we find in the fragments of heraclitus.
- Analyzes how the oresteia is a story about the inevitability of conflict and its inviolability as divine law of existence.
- Opines that heraclitean ideas form, or exist on, a deeper level. the justice/progress interpretation is more overt, while the heraclitian views take place behind the obvious action of the plays.
- Opines that the tension between the two interpretations of the trilogy is there to be noticed. aeschylus was a clever heraclitean and included such ideas in the plays.
- Opines that the heraclitean interpretation of justice in the oresteia is the deeper and more profound one, because it seems to permeate and encompass the plays in a way which the justice/progress model does not.
- Explains that a presocratics reader. selected fragments and testimonia. patricia curd, richard d. mckirahan jr. hackett publishing company: indianapolis, 1996.
- Explains oresteia, aeschylus, and richmond lattimore, eds. university of chicago press.
- Argues that a close reading reveals more similarities than differences, and that the heraclitean world view runs throughout the trilogy.
- Identifies and describes the four major differences which one notices on an initial reading of the trilogy: 1) the apparent linear movement and progress in the oresteia; 2) the necessity of conflict and its relationship to justice and harmony.
- Analyzes how the fragments of heraclitus suggest a view of justice which is eternal and unchanging, while the oresteia seems to present the appearance of linear progress.
- Explains that for heraclitus, there can be no progress; the order of things is the same for all beings, and there is constant flux within a larger unity which is itself eternal and immutable.
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