Euripides Electra's Dilemma

During the time of Euripides, approximately the second half of the fifth century B.C., it was a period of immense cultural crisis and political convulsion (Arrowsmith 350). Euripides, like many other of his contemporaries, used the whole machinery of the theater as a way of thinking about their world (Arrowsmith 349). His interest in particular was the analysis of culture and relationship between culture and the individual. Euripides used his characters as a function to shape the ideas of the play (Arrowsmith 359).

Clytemnestra fits the character of one of the Argos’s contaminations because of her adulterous acts with Aegisthus and her psychotic murderous plans to kill her husband Agamemnon. In her point of view, justice will only be obtained of she avenges the death of her daughter Iphigenia by killing the one who murdered her, Agamemnon. Cassandra mentions this cycle of fertility and decay when she talks about “the babies wailing, skewered on the sword, their flesh charred, the father gorging on their parts” referring to Thyestes’ babies (A 1095-1097). More blood vengeance and violence only fuels what becomes a never ending cycle of death and decay within the House of Atreus. When Clytaemnestra finally kills Agamemnon she cries, “So he goes down, and the life is bursting out of him—great sprays of blood, and the murderous shower wounds me, dyes me black and I, I revel like the Earth when the spring rains come down, the blessed gifts of god, and the new green spear splits the sheath and rips to birth in glory!”, and she feels reborn from his death and even calls it a gift from the god (A 1410-1415). Not only does Clytaemnestra feel renewed from murdering Agamemnon, but she feels that it was the proper and just thing to do. Although the Furies don’t go after her since this is not a crime of matricide or patricide, killing her husband is unwise and unfair because in Agamemnon’s

Clytemnestra’s overwhelming hate for her husband deepens because Agamemnon shows no feelings of remorse and believes that Iphigenia’s sacrifice “[is] for the best” (216-224). Aeschylus recalls the final moments of Iphigenia’s sacrifice: “her pleading, her terrified cries of “Father”!/[…]/ Her eyes threw a last pitiful glace at her sacrificers,/ but like a figure in a painting,/she could not call to them for help” (228-242). Consequently, Iphigenia’s heartbreaking sacrifice motivates Clytemnestra’s “unforgiving child-avenging Rage” (155) upon her husband, Agamemnon. Clytemnestra’s maternal instinct implores her to take revenge against Agamemnon for his mistreatment of their daughter. Furthermore, Clytemnestra views Agamemnon’s sacrifice of Iphigenia as a betrayal of their marital love. Clytemnestra believes her husband deserves the same fate as Iphigenia because Agamemnon “[has] sacrificed [their] own child, [Clytemnestra’s] labour of love, to charm away the cruel storm-winds of Thrace” (1417-1417). To Clytemnestra, Agamemnon must “suffer, deed for deed,/ for what he [has] [done] to [their] daughter,/Iphigenia, his own flesh and blood!”

Clytaemestra, whose infidelity and Agamemnon`s murder create a domino effect, which in turn brings a reign of chaos and killing begins as conspiracies and family secrets are reveled. Clytaemestra can be viewed as the unethical, evil character, nevertheless, her independed will and ability to murder, translate into strength and intellect. Clytaemestra drives the plot into "the complicated" which forms the majority of the tragedy itself.

The major theme of Aeschylus is one that emphasized the strong understanding of human’s weakness and how the quest of power can corrupt, but mostly he tried to emphasize that violence and vengeance only brings about more violence and vengeance. His work also shows the belief that good always wins and in order for people to learn from their mistakes they must first suffer from those mistakes. Aeschylus confided his message in three plays known as the trilogy, first one is “Agememnon”, and it tells a story of a powerful king Agamennon who returned from a successful battle. However, along the way he was given the choice to either forsake his quest of glory or sacrifice his daughter to gain safer passage and continue on his quest. Choosing to sacrifice his daughter he later returned home only to be murdered by his wife and her lover. Her motive to kill was revenge her daughter death, to replace her husband and make her new lover king.

The murder of Agamemnon by Clytemnestra, supposedly an act of justice for the sacrifice of their daughter Iphigenia, sets a vengeful tone. The chorus of Argive Elders reflects on justice, highlighting the ambiguity surrounding its connection to suffering. In The Libation Bearers, Orestes avenges his father, perpetuating the cycle. The evolution becomes apparent in The Eumenides, where the Furies, once agents of retribution, are transformed into benevolent entities under Athena's justice. Aeschylus shifts from a cycle of revenge to a more nuanced understanding of justice.

The female characters portrayed in Aeschylus and Sophocles’ works have considerably different personalities and roles, yet those females all have the common weaknesses of being short-sighted and stubborn. They intensify the conflicts within their families while being inconsiderate of the impacts that they may bring to their nations and societies, which leads to consequences that they are incapable of taking responsibilities for. Clytemnestra and Antigone, two major characters in their respective author’s works, possess different motivations for their deeds in the stories. While Clytemnestra is driven by the desire of revenge to murder her husband Agamemnon, Antigone acts against Creon’s will and strives to properly bury her brother. Despite having different motivations and personalities, Clytemnestra and Antigone both commit

Clytemnestra also gives her justification for murdering her husband, and for ten long years she thought about how sweet revenge would be when Agamemnon arrived. She also tells her lover, Aegisthus, "Our lives are based on pain" (1690). Clytemnestra does not realize how ironic her statement will be later on when pain controls her. Aegisthus sums-up their code of justice when he says, "There are gods in heaven avenging men, / blazing down on all the crimes of earth" (1607-1608). He also is foreshadowing that his crime must also be paid for and he will suffer the consequences of killing Agamemnon and revenge.

Unfortunately, the same fate awaits him if he commits matricide, thereby avenging his father. Orestes chooses the latter and is besieged by 'the hounds of mother's hate.' (Lib: 1055-6). Through this sequence of murderous events, Aeschylus demonstrates the complexity and futility of the blood feud as a system of justice. There are no winners, and the cycle of violence does not end. Thus, this cycle of vengeance is not justice.

In the first play, Agamemnon, Clytemnestra murders Agamemnon to retaliate for the sacrifice he made of their daughter, Iphigenia. Clytemnestra did this out of revenge, since the code of getting even demanded that someone’s murder must be avenged by their close blood relative. This called for torment at the hands of the Furies, who were female divinities of a terrible frightening aspect, that came upon anyone who murdered a close blood relative. In the second play, The Libation Bearers, Orestes kills Clytemnestra to avenge the murder of Agamemnon. This act is still maintaining the revenge principle, but it is committed primarily at the instigation of Apollo. Apollo takes center-stage in the third play, The Furies, to argue in defense of Orestes in a trial supervised by Athena. This ultimately leads to the end of revenge killing and the establishment of a new order of justice based on the laws of the

Why is the play called the Electra and not the Orestes? That is, in what way does Sophocles make Electra, and not Orestes, the focus of his play? Three great Athenian tragic poets – Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides – addressed to the myth about the killing of Clytemnestra by Orestes. Sophocles's Electra is one of the interpretations of this legend. Although the avenging one is Orestes, Sophocles brings Electra to the fore because of her endless hatred and the will to take her revenge against her father's murderers.

In the play the libation bearers of the Oresteia trilogy comes vengeance that transfers over from the play Agamemnon. Though in the play comes a bright spot where Electra meets her long lost brother Orestes. Nevertheless, this is a story of tragedy because they have to kill their mother. In sense of Greek justice Orestes has the right to kill his mother, for the killing of his father but he will question his actions because it is his mother. The impact of vengeance in the play only ends with more anger and revenge.

Sophocles’ and Euripides’ versions of Electra carry, among many similarities, a central theme of revenge. The characters, Electra and Orestes, must reunite to avenge their father’s murder. Misfortunately, in both versions the just solution leads the siblings to destroying their own mother. Both versions of Electra can be compared to Aeschylus’ Libation Bearers. However, they are both more dramatic, and more similar to each other than if each Electra was individually compared to the play by Aeschylus. The biggest differences between the two versions of Electra, are found within the characters and their development. I also believe that, the differences we see in these characters’ personalities between the

The first play, Agamemnon, tells about the return of the King from the Trojan wars and how his wife has chosen to react to the reunion. Clytemnestra is the queen who was angered by the fact that Agamemnon was away for a decade and that the King sacrificed their daughter Iphigenia to one of the gods. In one part of the play, the Chorus of Elders chants "Zeus who hath paved a way for human thought, by ordaining this firm law 'He who learns, suffers'" (Aeschylus, trans. 1893, 1.176-179) which speaks to the law that was formed by the words. The people of Greece followed the law that a person who commits a crime, whether that be a recognized law or one that the punisher deemed appropriate, is subject to some form of punishment. In Agamemnon's case, Clytemnestra believed that his actions justified his death. She did not believe that it was murder because his actions justified her actions.

Since Sophocles and Euripides’s tragedies Electra and Orestes got so much success, name and received great critical acclaim they have been extensively approached and discussed in terms of characterization, themes, symbols, plot, incestuous love, demolition, betrayal and especially lamentation. For instance, Vengeance is the soul of the both plays and it is largely discussed as major themes of the play. But its connection with the tragedy of characters is far away better to be discussed. It arises towards dramatic conflict and it brings out the real sight of the characters and becomes the reason behind of tragedy in these two masterpieces of Ancient Greek drama. So vengeance is the core of these plays because of its major