Literary Devices In Medea

Euripides is sympathetic to the plight of women in Greece. In Medea most of the characters are women. The male characters in the play do not seem to portray as much depth as the women featured. Jason, Medea’s husband, is leaving her for the king’s daughter. He shows himself as well versed in rhetoric and very self-serving. Creon is the king who openly admits that he is afraid of Medea and her clever ways. Even Medea’s sons seem to serve the purpose of pawns in Medea’s master plan of revenge.

Both Fifth century B.C. playwright Euripides and Roman poet and dramatist Ovid tell the story of Jason ditching Medea for another woman; however, they do not always share a perspective on the female matron's traits, behavior, and purpose. Euripides portrays a woman who reacts to injustice by beginning a crusade to avenge all who harmed her which she is prepared to see through even if it means resorting to the most contemptible methods. Ovid, on the other hand, tells of a much less extreme figure whose humble goal is only to persuade Jason to return. Despite these differences, both Medeas create trouble by acting with emotions instead of with reason, and as a result, put

Medea’s strength is portrayed as her madness as she takes control and decides the fate of her enemies. She is a strong character and Euripides allows Medea to have a voice by allowing the audience to witness her break from the norm of what a woman of her time is expected to do. After giving up her family and former life to be with her husband, Jason, he decides to marry a younger princess while still married to Medea. Medea realizes that women are left to face the most miserable situations and says, “We women are the most unfortunate creatures” (229). Jason feels that Medea is to be grateful for what he is doing by marrying into royalty as it will afford all of them a better life. The representation of Medea by Euripides is powerful, manipulative, and extremely smart, yet because she is a woman she has limited social power.

Superficially, Medea is a critique of relations between men and women, the struggle between Jason and Medea; then the struggle between Creon and Medea. However at the deeper level, Medea is a critique of the quality and state of the contemporary culture of Euripides (Arrowsmith 361). The unique symbolism is that

Internal conflicts within Medea shed light on her true character and her difficulties to make decisions. Throughout the play, there are many cases of Medea contemplating her

Once she learns that Jason has married another woman, Medea's personality turns completely around. The strong loving wife turns into a barbarian huntress in search of revenge. After plotting and changing the course of her revenge a few times, she perpetrates an attack that will certainly kill the new bride. Her method is focused on the woman, but it may or may not affect others around her target. Medea knows that the poisoned dress and head adornment will be lethal to Jason's bride, but she cannot possibly know what will come of Jason, their children, or the king. Her rage knows no bounds and she sends Antigone and Ismene on with the poisoned gifts. Weigel describes the revenge of Medea in his critique of the writing: "Jason becomes entangled with a force that crushes his dignity and detachment, that tears his successes to tatters. At the end he is in exactly the same position as Medea. Both are bereaved of mate, children, and friends. Both are free to grow old without comfort. And both are utterly empty inside, except that Jason is now filled with the same burning hatred that possessed Medea" (Weigel 1391).

Commonly considered one of Euripides greatest pieces, Medea is an insightful depiction of how a woman’s love for her husband, churns into a gruesome revenge scheme against him. This tragedy illustrates a tale of a woman who challenges Greek societal norms. In the era that the story takes place; women are often seen in submissive roles. However, the play’s main character, Medea, challenges their customs through her actions against the Kingdom of Corinth and Jason.

Ever since she found out she had been betrayed by Jason, she has had “no pleasure left” in living. The only purpose left in her “cruel” and “accursed” life is to “strike dead” Jason, Creon and Glauce. Medea ends up killing Creon and his daughter but doesn’t make any attempt to kill Jason. To “perish his whole house” and “work revenge on Jason for his wrongs to [Medea]”, Medea plans to kill her two son as “it is the supreme way to hurt [her] husband”. Although Medea feels sad as shown by her “dewy eyes” and “these tears”, the audience are positioned to feel less sympathetic towards Medea due to her murderous actions towards her “own little

Medea is the tragic story of a woman desperate for revenge upon her husband, after he betrayed her for another woman’s bed. It was written by Euripides, a Greek playwright, in 431 B.C. Throughout the play each character shows us their inconsistent and contradicting personalities, in particular, Jason and Medea. The play opens with the Nurse expressing her anxiety about Jason betraying and leaving Medea for another, wealthier, woman. Our initial reaction is to feel empathetic towards Medea, who has been abandoned so conveniently. But towards the end of the play, when Medea takes revenge on

For the women in ancient Greece, justice was far from reach. In the Greek society, men were allowed to abandon their wives in order to marry younger ones and Medea was not invulnerable to this fate. Despite all of her devoutness to her husband, he relinquished her for someone new. “Oh how unhappy I am, how wretched my sufferings. Oh woe is me. I wish I could die”, Medea cried out at the horrendous news (page 3, line 9). Euripides created a tragedy that many women during the ancient Greek time could relate to.

In ‘Medea’, Euripides shows Medea in a new light, as a scorned woman that the audience sympathises with to a certain extent, but also views as a monster due to her act of killing her own children. The protagonist of a tragedy, known as the Tragic Hero is supposed to have certain characteristics which cause the audience to sympathise with them and get emotionally involved with the plot. The two main characters, Medea and Jason, each have certain qualities of the Tragic Hero, but neither has them all. This makes them more like the common man that is neither completely good nor evil, but is caught in the middle and forced to make difficult decisions.

Lars Von Trier's adaptation of Medea combines many elements from the original plot line, but also differs significantly. Von Trier uses not only visual images to compel his audience, but also incorporates a vast amount of sounds and noises to create dramatic effect. The film follows a lonely Medea without her chorus of companions that an original audience of the play would be used to. Rather than seeming foreign, Medea seems well adapted to her new home and is often seen utilizing the lands bodies of water accordingly. Although it is not outwardly declared, Medea's main mission is to seek revenge and abolish Jason's new life. Jason is pictured as handsome and strong, following stereotypical gender norms. His new bride also is in

Soon after this, Medea is able to manipulate Creon as well. When Creon banishes her, she tells him of her great concern for her children and eventually convinces him to allow her to stay in Corinth for one more day. This allows Medea to continue with her plan to take out revenge on Jason. Medea acts and speaks like a Homeric Greek warrior, but tricks Jason by acting submissively like the ideal Greek woman Jason wished her to be. Medea approaches Jason with gifts for his new wife, apologizes, and tells him that she realized he was right. This move allowed Medea to remove all skepticism from Jason's mind, and he willingly took the poisoned dress to his bride. In the course of a few hours, Medea's ultimate manipulation skills enable her to exploit four individuals who are crucial to her murder plot.

In addition to the interactions between Medea and the Greek Chorus, it is important to explore the scenes preceding the tirade. The nurse’s opening monologue offers great insight into Medea’s state of characterization prior to her newfound interactions. The nurse anaphorically describes Medea’s actions towards Jason. The Nurse begins, “She wouldn’t have made the daughters of Pelias kill him, she wouldn’t have had to flee to Corinth here, she wouldn’t have done all that she did for Jason, She wouldn’t have been so darned complaisant to Jason” (311). Euripides’ use of anaphora creates emphasis on everything Medea has done for Jason. The Nurse believes that upon meeting Jason, “she wouldn’t have” fallen in love with Jason. Medea’s motivation was a clear passion to woo Jason. Formerly, Medea completes Jason’s task of achieving the Golden Fleece, originally a man’s task. With her cunningness, she uses her witch supremacies to her advantage, acting on her desire for Jason. Furthermore, the Nurse foreshadows Medea’s shift in characterization from anguish to dexterity in her

As the famous Greek playwright Euripides once said: “Stronger than lover's love is lover's hate. Incurable, in each, the wounds they make.” Such ideas are portrayed in one of him most famous plays, Medea. This play is a fascinating classic centered on the Greek goddess Medea. Despite its recent fame, during his time, Euripides was unpopular since he used what would be considered a ‘modern’ view where he would focus on women, slaves and persons from the lower classes. In the play, Medea commits filicide, which initially appears extremely horrendous, but as the audience is guided through the play, they develop sympathy towards Medea. In order to achieve this empathy and enhance the understanding of Medea’s pride and ideals, Euripides