by Jun (9) on January 31st, 2010
Medea was the best of the three Greek tragedies that we studied, it had the most action, and violence. There is an enormous conflict between Medea and Jason. Once again, as in Agamemnon and Antigone there are arguments supporting both Jason and Medea. Jason dumped his wife and married a princess even though Medea had risked everything in order to marry him. Medea, on the other hand, murdered two innocent people and her own children. Although Jason did cheat on her, Medea murdering people does not justify this, she overreacted and did much more than what she should have done.
There are reasons as to why Medea might have acted the way she did. Cheating is not as bad a sin as murder, not to mention the murder of multiple people. In the past, while escaping from her family, Medea had also murdered her brother in a brutal manner. She seems to have no regrets for her actions whatsoever, sometimes she even seems to enjoy to witness other people suffering. Thus, Medea seems to be a violent person, unjustified in her actions and uncontrollable. But, Medea could also be extremely angry with what Jason did, therefore making her do the things she did. Jason knew that Medea risked everything and threw away her past life just to be with Jason, but he still cheated on her. Any wife would be furious if this happened to them, therefore, Medea reacted the way she did.
Jason does not think that he did anything wrong, instead, he accuses Medea of being mad and violent. In Greek misogynistic society, Jason has done no wrong, he has every right to treat women the way he does. But Medea still reacts angrily towards him, so he is confused for the extremities of her actions. Jason later on comes to realize that what he has done was wrong, so he offers to help Medea, but he is still arrogant and thinking about himself more than anyone else.
The climax where Medea was debating with herself whether or not to murder her children was the most interesting. One moment Medea is saying she will murder the children, then she says that she cannnot. The children have not done anything, they are innocent and naive, yet Medea still murders them in the end to avenge Jason. The Chorus thinks that Medea is overreacting too, that she should have stopped after the first murders, but Medea ignores them. Perhaps Medea is going mad, and her emotions are taking control of what she is doing.
Reading Medea, I take Jason’s side because what Medea did was simply too much. She murdered too many people for her actions to be justified, not to mention also murdering her own children. Although Medea has her own statements, she seems to be overcome by madness and cannot control her emotions. Jason simply cheated on her, this happens all the time in our modern society. Not much happens when people cheat today, the most is a divorce, worst case is a murder. In those times, what Jason did was natural, men had concubines and many wives, yet Medea is enraged. Jason has done the mundane by finding another wife, but once again Medea seems to react differently. Maybe Euripides wants women to have a say in society, for men to listen to women and rid misogyny.
by Sean (8) on January 26th, 2010
It seems to me that we are reading the Greek tragedies in order of decreasing monotony. Antigone, then Agamemnon, and now Medea. Medea is by far the best out of the three. It feels more modern due to its incorporation of aspects that were previously unheard of. For example, the play is written in prose, which makes the speech extremely natural (excluding the exposition in the beginning). Furthermore, the chorus is comprised of females so their views on the subject matter change accordingly. They often side with Medea in her perception of Jason, yet the chorus is often more level-headed than Medea, as demonstrated when they are opposed to the murder of the children when Medea cannot control her emotions. This decision by Euripides represents progress in the mentality of men towards women.
I also found the characters very controversial. Jason has obviously committed a crime against Medea, yet Medea’s reaction is obviously too extreme and hateful. There is no clear hero and no clear villain, which raises interesting questions about perception and the definition of right and wrong in relation with emotions, thus making the text much more profound than the previous two. Both characters are extremely interesting in the way they act towards one another.
Jason is very smart, which we can see from his logical argument to Medea in their first encounter in the play. Despite this, he continues to underestimate his ex-wife, whom he knows to be very capable of doing harm from his earlier experiences on the Argo on his quest for the Golden Fleece. Instead of doing the intelligent thing, hiding and fasting in his locked and barricaded room until Medea is long gone, Jason goes to confront her, which inflames Medea’s anger and contributes to the final gory result. This could be compared to Agamemnon’s folly of trusting his revengeful wife, but the difference between the two males is that Agamemnon wasn’t very intelligent, whereas Jason was. Agamemnon used insufficient methods to conquer Troy, yet didn’t change tactics until Odysseus came up with the horse idea ten years later. He is also very self-absorbed, thinking too highly of himself. This is demonstrated in Agamemnon, when Clytemnestra easily persuades him to walk on the dyed tapestry, thus comparing himself to the gods. Jason, on the other hand, not only can speak eloquently and execute complex arguments to support his belief, but can manipulate women to his advantage to move to higher social class. This is shown with his use of Medea to obtain the Golden Fleece and with the Princess (I find it interesting that her name never comes up) to rise in social status. I therefore understand how Agamemnon was lured into his deadly trap by Clytemnestra. I do not, however, understand how Jason couldn’t see the horrors that were bound to fall upon him and his allies due to his actions. This must be attributed to his newfound glory in marrying the Princess of Corinth, which lulled his senses into a false sense of security.
I know Jason was in the wrong by abandoning Medea for the Princess, leaving her with the children. However, when we look at Medea’s reaction it’s very difficult for me to side with her. In fact, it’s impossible. No matter what happens to you, it is unspeakably cruel to murder your own children. You have to be seriously mentally ill to even consider this method of revenge. It is easier to side with Clytemnestra because she takes revenge on those who have mistreated her, yet this is not entirely true. She murders Cassandra, who hasn’t harmed her in any way. Obviously, murdering helpless children is worse in my mind than murdering a slightly crazy woman who can predict the future.
Medea’s awareness of the sadistic and unacceptable nature of her actions is all the more disturbing. If you are aware that what you are doing is wrong, what could possibly persuade you to do it? If she was insane and didn’t realize what she was doing I could forgive her, but the fact that she consciously chose the revenge of her husband over the lives of her children is unforgivable. What makes it worse is that she could have fled with her children alive because she took their corpses with her when she left.
The idea that Medea is a misogynist’s worst nightmare is kind of true. This is partly due to the frequency with which men anger women; if the men didn’t anger the women, they wouldn’t have to be afraid of them, according to Medea. What Medea doesn’t address is the possibility of a women breaking the man’s heart from no fault of the man’s. So Medea is not, in fact, a misogynist’s worst nightmare because she acts defensively, not offensively. However, if was near Medea I would be pretty damn scared of her even though I didn’t do anything to her and I understand that she acts defensively. In this respect I know that most Greek men would view Medea negatively, but it is likely that Jason was also viewed negatively by some. I guess it all matters on how you look at, eh Jun?
by Ian Noguchi (9) on January 26th, 2010
Misogyny-Double Standards and Women treated unequally*
Chorus-Their role in the play
Agamemnon and Creon-Similarities as they are willing to sacrifice their relatives
Misfortune-Does misfortune run down a family?
Antigone+Medea-Where their actions justifiable?
*I would like to do this one
by Chi (9) on January 26th, 2010
Here are some points for compare & contrast, as assigned for as soon as possible.
Antigone & Agamemnon:
- Creon and Agamemnon’s stubbornness
- Misfortune being passed through generations
- Role of the Chorus
Antigone & Medea:
- Who was on the “right” side?
Medea & Agamemnon:
- Subtle plotting & wordplay
- Misogynistic “double-standard”
- Concept of revenge and how it played out
- Medea and Clytemnestra: who was crazier? *
- Male Chorus versus female Chorus
* I shotgun this one.
by Shun Yang (8) on January 25th, 2010
With such violence and malice, Medea has definitely got to be one of the most horrific of all Greek tragedies. Dynamic characters, murderous plot and a grim society basically defines the play. Melodramatic? Not at all. The characters in Medea are definitely dynamic, and when viewed from different perspective, raises question about justice. However, after reading it once, I side with Medea and despise Jason’s actions.
Medea is a very powerful person, whether it’s her sorceress skills or her ability to manipulate men as easily as dogs, she is the character that dominates the play. Raised in a foreign land, the ‘barbaric’ Medea betrayed her family and went along with her love Jason. After helping him in his quest for the golden fleece as well as bearing him 2 boys, Jason decided to marry another princess. And when one gave all she could for this one person, and that person betrays one in the end, how could one not be furious? Yes, Medea was murderous and vile, but that’s only when Jason betrayed and infuriated her. In my opinion, her actions are more or less justified (except the part where she murdered her children, I feel she went too far). What with her ability to manipulate Jason and Aegeus, she definitely wasn’t the one to mess around with.
Jason, on the hand, is similar to that of many men – Men who didn’t care much about women’s sentimental thoughts and feelings. Again, he had hurt a woman in his ambition for power, just like Agamemnon through killing his daughter for war. A very much despised character from my view, he insulted and controlled Medea as if she was his slave. She had done everything – to the point of betrayal of her family – yet he merely blamed it all as Aphrodite’s doings. How can this be a reasoning for his doings?! If he thought he has brought Medea into fame and the harsh life in her home town, then he was wrong. Yes, Medea was well known for her skills as a sorceress, but Jason my friend question yourself: was fame her ultimate goal in helping him?
The reason I side with Medea being the justified one is perhaps because I pity her. She did all she could ever have to a man who betrayed her in the end. Her revenge, therefore is justified and reasoned. Furthermore, Jason was being inconsiderate, being oblivious about how she felt about him. Perhaps women had a lower social status, but that doesn’t mean women were like lowly animals?! Moreover, this does not give Jason the right to manipulate Medea in that way, thus further reasoning Medea’s vengeance.
Mr. MacKnight did say that Euripides has made it possible to side with both characters, and this is why this play is remembered and classified, even after thousands of years, as great literature. However, this first time that I read it has made me side with Medea.
With these amazingly crafted characters, how can I not love Medea (the play)? 9/10
by Ian Noguchi (9) on January 25th, 2010
Great literature raises questions and so does the play “Medea”. This play strongly shows two sides towards the actions Medea takes: one stating that Medea is responisible as she was disrespectful towards Jason and showed jealous towards the princess, and another view stating that Jason is to blame for betraying Medea and breaking her heart by marrying another woman in secret. Although we might believe that the majority of the Greek society would believe in the first idea as there was strong misogyny. However, Euripides almost equally shows both views so it is possible to read the play both ways.
Looking at the reasons which support the views of Medea being responsible of the tragic event, we first see her as barbarous which is caused mainly by the her background coming from Iolcus which is called ‘barbarous’ by many Greeks, including Jason (he even states that he ‘saved’ Medea from the barbarous land of Iolcus). Also, Medea does not understand Greek culture as much, therefore leading her to not act as a good Greek wife and let the marriage between Jason and the princess be. We can also find her being evil, such as her acting and her poisons which she uses to kill the princess (leading her to be called a sorceress by others). Also, the Chorus, who were supporting Medea in understanding that Jason is mistreating her, changed their attitude as Medea also kills her two sons.
However, the views of Medea being evil can be easily reversed. Medea was terribly in love with Jason, but Jason betrays her. She also states that she would have forgiven Jason if she had not bore a son, but Jason marries the princess despite the fact that he already has two sons which leads to Medea’s outrage. This is increased by Creon sending her off to exile. We can say it is only natural for Medea to get so angry with Jason and want to take revenge by killing the princess and her sons too. We can also see the treatment towards women being disrespectful (Jason bring Medea back as if she is a reward from his journey) and both Medea and the Chorus mention their discontent in the treatment they take.
Along with these views are the wrong doings of Jason. Although he swore an oath to be with Medea, he breaks that oath and marries the princess even after having two sons. And yet he tells the gods to punish Medea for her wrong doings. He also mentions that the gods helped him in his journeys, not Medea, which shows his arrogance.
When I try to answer the question “who is responsible for the tragedy”, I cannot get an exact answer and I have to say that both Medea and Jason are almost equally responsible for the cause of the tragedy. Jason’s action is the cause while Medea’s is the effect of consequence. However, if Medea did not go ‘too far’ by killing the princess and her own two children, I would believe that Jason had caused the tragedy due to his immoral acts.
by Chi (9) on January 25th, 2010
Oh Medea, Medea. No drama is as enjoyable when psychotic, sociopathic sorceresses aren’t involved. There’s no doubt I enjoyed the tragedy in some grotesque way but I plead completely sane and claim that I also enjoyed the questions we ask ourselves while reading. Is Medea completely mad? Why is Jason such a selfish twit? Did no one see this coming? Where the hell did those dragons hide all along, and why didn’t she use them earlier?
The questions the text raises confused me, but in a way that got me thinking. Who is the “good guy”, the protagonist here? Surely it cannot be Jason, with his infidel ways and arrogant behaviour that make me want to punch him through the book, in the face. It cannot be Medea either, since she killed Creon and his daughter as well as both her children just to make her husband tick. Personally, I sided with Medea because she’s more interesting, more fun to read. Medea has many layers, from crazily loving, to vengeful and indecisive and mainly, murderous. She cleverly plots and schemes, and did I mention, she has a chariot drawn by dragons.
Related to the good guy, bad guy business going on here, we notice that even when Medea slaughters her own children the gods do not intervene. In fact, they seem to be on her side. Medea insists she has the protection of Zeus and also her granddaddy, Helios, gives her a chariot drawn by dragons to make her great escape on. I suppose this relates to the gods’ role in Agamemnon’s story, how they are sometimes cruel and unjust. Do they protect Medea because she is a demigod? Or is she, despite all the gruesome murders, on the right side?
Also, here’s the obligatory paragraph on misogyny that comes up in every one of my PRs. If one were to flip through Medea’s play and point out all the lines which degrade women, most would come from Jason. He’s arrogant and thoughtless, and perhaps represents how many men in the ancient Greek society feel towards to female sex. However, we can also look for all the seemingly feminist lines and wonder, was Euripides the first third-ish Greek in support of strong female roles, or was he simply warning men the dangers of crazy women (who also happen to be foreigners)? Was he an early feminist or a clever misogynist bending words?
Lastly, let’s look at Medea again, just because she was so much fun to read about. Her shifts in emotion, the way she easily acts the part of the innocent victim shows that she may well be completely insane and deprived of emotion. However we look at the lines 1030 – 1070, we see she clearly loves her children and cannot bear the thought of killing them. She has to convince herself to harm the 2 beings on Zeus’ green Earth she loves and in effect herself, to extract vengeance on Jason. Does this suggest she hates him more than she loves her own children, or that Medea’s simply a crazy barbarian hell-bent on getting her way?
I actually loved this unit of tragedies we read. It made me see the ancient Greek civilization in a brand new light and enjoy their literature and ideologies. Also, the unit brought the crazy. I love reading about crazy people. Like I said earlier, without murderous crazies drama would not be as entertaining.
by Sean (8) on January 24th, 2010
I found Agamemnon much more interesting than Antigone in terms of the chorus, plot, and characters. In the beginning of Agamemnon reading the chorus was quite intimidating because the language was very complex, but once I became accustomed to the structure I found I could understand the meaning quite clearly. I liked that the chorus was more identifiable as a character in Agamemnon due to the use of “Chorus Leader”, who had actual conversations with the main characters like Clytemnestra and Aegisthus. This made it easier to understand the chorus’ point of view and visualize the chorus in the context of the play. I also found the conversation between chorus members on page 92 in Agamemnon much more realistic than the conventional strophe/antistrophe method of conveying the views of the chorus, but the mixture between choral conversations and choral odes was well balanced and gave the play a more modern feeling.
Perhaps the reason I like the plot of Agamemnon better than the plot of Antigone is that Agamemnon is basically a small extension of The Odyssey, which I love. But, ignoring the relationship with The Odyssey, Agamemnon’s plot is much more developed and intricate, which raises much more thought-provoking questions than that of Antigone. The most prominent question is if Clytemnestra’s actions are justifiable or not. Clytemnestra is justified for killing Agamemnon because he committed a terrible crime by sacrificing their daughter, Iphigenia. Nowadays she would not be justified for taking revenge because it would make her as much a criminal as he. But in those times there were no courts for determining justice, so the only justice was in the form of revenge. This is in correlation with the long history of crime and revenge in the house of Atrius. However, Clytemnestra is unjustified in her murder of Cassandra. Cassandra committed no crime towards her. In fact, she should feel empathy towards Cassandra because she is also a victim of Agamemnon’s cruelty. This shows that Clytemnestra is jealous of Cassandra, which reveals that her feelings toward Agamemnon are more complex than simple hatred. Since I’m not a girl I’m not even going to try to dissect Clytemnestra’s feelings towards Agamemnon. I definitely wouldn’t do an adequate job of it.
The characters in Agamemnon are so much more fun than those of Antigone. Although they are both tragedies, Antigone is significantly more depressing than Agamemnon due to its gloomy characters. Agamemnon on the other hand is rich with comedic double meanings in Clytemnestra’s speeches as well as the absurd stupidity of Agamemnon and Cassandra’s raving fits of prophesy. You are forced to take the play with a hint of humour along with the gravity of the situation, which makes the entire play more enjoyable.
All in all, I found Agamemnon to be quite satisfactory. I know absolutely that I am more passionate about it than Antigone, so I’ll most likely be using it and Medea in my World Lit essay. I still have to figure out what aspect I will compare though.
by Jun (9) on January 21st, 2010
Agamemnon was a play that I had heard about before. I knew it was about Clytemnestra murdering Agamemnon in cold blood, but what I didn’t know was how the story could be as interesting as it was. There were so many implications in the text that could only be seen through looking it in more detail.
The most interesting idea in the text was where Clytemnestra justified her actions against Agamemnon. I was naturally supporting Agamemnon’s actions in sacrificing Iphigenia. Even though he murdered his daughter, it did not seem to be such a big deal. This is because Agamemnon was a Greek hero who was famous among his people and feared in Troy; not only because of Agamemnon’s fame, but because he was male. In Greek misogynistic society, males were socially more powerful. It was men who would become heroes and make history.They had all the control. Therefore, in any argument, females were “wrong”, while men were “right”. Thus, one would naturally assume that Agamemnon, who was this sort of heroic character, would do the right thing; so we support him from the start of the play. Agamemnon is considered the “good” character, and Clytemnestra the “bad”. In contrast to this, we are presented with Clytemnestra’s point of view and the reasoning for her actions. At first we do not take her seriously; then she starts to persuade us with intelligent phrases full of double meanings and logical justifications. It was here that I started to become confused about whether I should support Clytemnestra or Agamemnon. Alternatively, if we had first comprehended Clytemnestra’s views, (her anger with Agamemnon sacrificing Iphigenia), before looking at it from Agamemnon’s perspective, we would sympathise with Clytemnestra and think of Agamemnon in a negative way. If the roles of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra were switched, and Clytemnestra had sacrificed Iphigenia while Agamemnon stayed at home with hate boiling in his heart, we would still naturally sympathise with Agamemnon, simply because he is male. It is interesting how we can change our viewpoints so easily. This raises the questions: “What should we believe? Is anything we believe true?” We only believe the things we believe because we have been persuaded to do so; otherwise we might believe something else. With enough persuasion we may adopt a completely opposite view.
Although we may support Clytemnestra after her long speech, she goes a bit too far when she says things such as, she was enjoying herself stabbing Agamemnon, or when she talks about how she did it out of pleasure. We realize that we may not necessarily agree with her. Perhaps she says this out of pure madness, but then again, perhaps she is desperate for vengeance and speaks out of hatred of Agamemnon. Once again, when Clytemnestra says these things, we change our views of her.
At the time the play was written, the audience knew the story of Agamemnon. The build-up before the climax (where Clytemnestra murders Agamemnon), creates a lot of tension, making the play far more interesting. We all know what happens, but don’t know the exact reasoning as to why it happens. The Chorus shows us different views, a third person’s ideas on the event happening. Because of this, we can have many ideas and understand many views regarding one scene or aspect. I think that one of Aeschylus ideas may have been to try to show us that we perceive things from our own points of view, or from one person’s point of view, we need to look at the bigger picture. This idea of perception was what I found most interesting within the text.
Agamemnon was an interesting play, as in Antigone, there was much conflict from two sides. I couldn’t decide whether Agamemnon or Clytemnestra was right, so my opinion fluctuated between the two. As mentioned earlier, I supported Agamemnon when I first started reading the play, but when Clytemnestra argued her point of view, I started to see the other side of the story. I didn’t realize that Clytemnestra’s justifications were as valid as Agamemnon’s because I automatically assumed her to be wrong. This idea of different views and different ideas made me like the play because the conflicts between characters was deep, and observed from many different angles, something we scarcely see in modern works.
by Ian Noguchi (9) on January 19th, 2010
This Greek Tragedy had made me think a lot about perception, how one event could be seen in many ways. Misogyny takes place a lot in dividing views in “Agamemnon”.
The ideology of Clytemnestra wanting to kill Agamemnon could be seen as either just or unjust. Views that support her being just are that Agamemnon was a terrible husband. He killed their daughter to go to war, slept with other women during the war, brought home another woman, and told her that she spoke too much soon after he returned. One could say that these would anger almost anyone. However, there are views that are against these. When Agamemnon sacrificed Iphigenia, he did not want to but found his duties towards his brother was more important. Sleeping with other women and getting a concubine, I believe, would have been something accepted back in those days. If it was not accepted, still Clytemnestra was sleeping with another man herself. The way Agamemnon spoke to Clytemnestra may have been normal as well as there was the idea of man being more superior. Most of the views that do not support Clytemnestra’s actions would be based on Misogyny, men having more rights and freedoms. However, since we are in a society where misogyny is not really found, I believe that we support more of the views of Clytemnestra compared to Agamemnon.
On the other hand, her statements after the murder of Agamemnon are something I do not agree with like her previous ideas towards killing her husband. Cassandra, who was forced to be Agamemnon’s concubine, would have hated Agamemnon and would have shared the same ideology as Clytemnestra. However, Clytemnestra did not think about this and killed Cassandra ‘for the fun of it’ (making Clytemnestra look like a female version of Ian). She also said that Agamemnon would be welcomed by Iphigenia by a kiss. If I was to meet my father who killed me in the afterlife, I would never think about welcoming such a person. I think that these ideas of Clytemnestra are not just as her previous statements before the murder, but to Clytemnestra, it would have seemed just. Again, we have a difference in perception.
The passage where Clytemnestra speaks to Agamemnon at his return, which is my favorite as well as anyone else’s, is very interesting and hilarious. Looking at this passage plainly, it seems like Clytemnestra is a good wife, mourning for her husband at news that he has died, and sees herself blessed as she is reunited with her husband. However, the real meanings of these statements are quite the opposite from Clytemnestra being a good wife. She mourns at the news of Agamemnon’s death as that would represent her not being able to kill him herself and she feels blessed as she has received the chance to kill her husband. Again, this passage’s meaning can be taken differently depending on how you are reading it.
One can make many observations in this book about the different meanings one statement or view could have within this play. I found it interesting being shown different perspectives of one idea and see how one thing can appear as something different to another.
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