Free The Bacchae Essays and Papers

In The Bacchae, Euripedes portrays the character of Pentheus as an ignorant, stubborn, and arrogant ruler. These character flaws accompanied with his foolish decisions set the stage for his tragic downfall. Pentheus' blatant disregard to all warnings and incidents, which prove that Dionysus is truly a god, lead him to his own death. In the end, his mistakes are unforgiving and his punishment is just. Throughout the play, the audience cannot help but feel merciless towards Pentheus. In his opening

play The Bacchae, the ideals that were the foundation of Greek culture were called into question. Until early 400B.C.E. Athens was a society founded upon rational thinking, individuals acting for the good of the populace, and the “ideal” society. This is what scholars commonly refer to as the Hellenic age of Greek culture. As Athens is besieged by Sparta, however, the citizens find themselves questioning the ideals that they had previously lived their lives by. Euripides’ play The Bacchae shows

Otherness in Euripides'Bacchae and Soyinka's The Bacchae of Euripides Both Euripides and Wole Soyinka are focused on a fundamental ethical imperative in their plays: welcome the stranger into your midst. Acceptance of Dionysus as a god, as "an essence that will not exclude or be excluded", is stressed (Soyinka 1). Pentheus is punished severely for excluding, for refusing to acknowledge or submit to, Dionysus' divine authority. In order to carve out a place for himself (in the pantheon, in the

Euripides’ Bacchae presents a challenge to the identity of the Athenian male citizen. The tragedy undermines masculinity and traditional gender roles by exposing their vulnerability and easy transgression, implicates Athenian ideals of rationality and self-control in the fall of Thebes’ royal household, and complicates the concept of what it means to be a citizen. With Athens’ defeat in the Peloponnesian War looming, Euripides represents the Athenian anxiety as they faced their potential destruction

In Euripides’ The Bacchae and in the Medea, there are significant binary oppositions in both plays. Binary opposition is the two opposite terms, such as good versus bad. Binary opposition is used to present both sides of a contrast (Marvin, 1). In The Bacchae and the Medea, Euripides used binary opposition to highlight the central themes. The significant binary oppositions that are used are men versus women, foreigner versus citizen, and god versus man. The contrast between men versus women is an

Views in The Bacchae Throughout my life, I've heard the phrases, "Women shouldn't serve in the Armed Forces; no, I wouldn't want a female president; a woman's place is in the home." Even though our society is drifting from these extremely sexist views, opinions like these are still widely held. Women were mistreated much the same in the ancient Greek civilizations. The views of our society, regarding the social and sexual roles of women, are mirrored in the ancient Greek tragedy, The Bacchae. The idea

Repression of Women in Euripides' The Bacchae Many different interpretations can be derived from themes in Euripides's The Bacchae, most of which assume that, in order to punish the women of Thebes for their impudence, the god Dionysus drove them mad. However, there is evidence to believe that another factor played into this confrontation. Because of the trend of male dominance in Greek society, women suffered in oppression and bore a social stigma which led to their own vulnerability

different myths. Some of the more common ones include the abuse of mortals from the gods, the relationship between men and women, and the way in which lust operates in society. All of these are apparent in the writing style of Euripides in his text the Bacchae. This myth explores the battle between Dionysus, who has just returned dressed as a stranger, and Pentheus, who is the current ruler of the state, over the city of Thebes. As one reads this myth they will clearly identify some of the important subjects

Dionysus and the Unraveling of Ideologies in The Bacchae Some evaluations claim that the Dionysus appearing in The Bacchae is fairly true embodiment of the ideals of ancient Athens. He demands only worship and proper reverence for his name, two matters of honor that pervaded both the Greek tragedies and the pious society that viewed them. In other plays, Oedipus' consultations with Apollo and the many Choral appeals to Zeus reveal the Athenian respect for their gods, while Electra's need for

In ancient myths it always seems that for the most part, mothers adore their male child and do not have the same importance for the female child. However, this is not the case for Agave, mother of Pentheus. In “Bacchae,” Agave is so caught up on a curse brought upon her by her nephew Dionysus that she completely loses sight of what is truly important, her son. In the end Agave ends up chopping the head off her own son, a twist to the everyday myth. In “Demeter and Persephone,” although Persephone