The Theme Of Bad Mothering In The Oresteia Trilogy

In the trilogy Oresteia, the issues concerned are the transformation from vengeance to law, from chaos to peace, from dependence to independence, and from old to new. These four significant changes all take place throughout the play and are somewhat parallel to the transformations that were going on in Ancient Greece.

Lysistrata by Aristophanes is seen to be a comical play used to show the impact of war not only on the ones physically in the war, but the ones mentally involved also. This play was written to help express the feeling the author had about the war occurring during the time the work was written. Lysistrata, the main character, is a strong woman who decides to become as what could be said as being “rebellious”. She does this by refusing to have sexual relations with the men in the city until it was agreed that peace would be declared between the two troops. She calls a meeting with the women in the city and include them in her vindictive ideas to bring the war to an end. This play is sure to bring a smile to the readers face due to the comical events that occur. However, comedy is not the only thing that becomes apparent within the play. Throughout the work of Lysistrata there are three themes that become apparent during this play: peace and harmony, control by gender, and politics.

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

Orestes’ father, Agamemnon, is suffered for the truth of the prophecy, the child is the price: if he kills his child, his country will win the war. Due to this prophecy, Agamemnon is tortured and agonizing between his two important roles: father of his family and father of the country. If he chooses his family and doesn’t kill his child, they will lose the war. All people in the country will be tortured as slaves and colonists. However, if he chooses the win, the peace and the pleasant from a family will not exist anymore. His family will be demolished. Eventually, in the middle of the story, he decides to kill Iphigenia. Agamemnon chooses his country, his subjects, and the win, not his family’s peace. He makes Iphigenia drink three solutions including the pills which make her die. “I feel like I’ve done something so wrong that my whole life, my family, nothing will be able to- the worst mistake. I got it wrong. It was wrong. It was wrong” (Aeschylus, 56.) This demonstrates how he is suffered by the truth that he killed his daughter. His choice, even

Clytemnestra had to deal with things that a wife should not have to deal with. Was it him sacrificing his own daughter for the gods, or even him having a mistress while he was gone at war.Agamemnon's main goal was to show that he had dominance over her along with his kingdom. She envied the fact that he was able to make these decisions without any sense of sympathy for anyone. The death of Agamemnon was revenge for the death of her daughter. Agamemnon killed a deer in a grove sacred to Artemis so the gods did not provide wind for the sail boats once they tried to set sail to Troy to go to war. Then it is revealed

The Oresteia is a trilogy of Greek tragedies written by Aeschylus (Oresteia, 2017). The Libation Bearers is the second play in the trilogy of tragedies. In the Libation Bearers, Orestes is the son of Clytemnestra and Agamemnon. After many years of exile, Orestes returned home to Argos in secret to mourn the death of his father and to seek revenge for Agamemnon’s death to his murderers. The House of Atreus has a generation curse of bloodshed on the men in the family that seems as if it cannot be broken, causing the men in the family to kill or sacrifice their own child or family members. Apollo has also threatened to punish Orestes with further exile and more horrible consequences if he disobeys the god quest. But throughout the play, we will learn how one must come to reconcile with their fate. The chorus said that “blood, once spilt, does not seep easily into the earth. It "clots hard" and refuses to disappear.”

This fragmentation of his identity begins as result of a ‘secondary’ trauma (Willis, 2002). Titus experiences a second trauma in knowing that his children have suffered traumatic deaths and injuries (Figley & Klebe, cited by Willis, 2002). This ‘trauma infection’ (Willis, 2002) demonstrates how his children are connected to; and a part of his identity. This connection is also shown in ‘our bitter woes’ [3.2.3] with the possessive pronoun ‘our’ conveying the collective, inter-connected trauma of Titus and Lavinia. The oxymoron ‘speechless complainer’ also illustrates this, in Titus understanding Lavinia’s need to verbally lament, as he does. Therefore, when his sons’ die; part(s) of his identity die; when his Lavinia is mutilated and raped;

You love this man, the man you should have loved you hated” (The Libation Bearers 890-894), the character Orestes goes on to say, “destiny is handing you your death” (The Libation Bearers 898). These two quotes from Orestes show that he believes what he is doing is just and that is fate that requires him to murder his own mother for her crimes. This once again reveals the theme that justice in this culture, needs to be given in a form of revenge. The final time that justice is addressed in the text is when the

Likewise, the Chorus is significantly wrong in mixing up the presence of Clytemnestra for what it truly implies, when they can't trust she will be Agamemnon's executioner. Clytemnestra's activities do, however confirm another social generalization in the play. That ladies are conniving. Obviously, it could likewise be said that Agamemnon is dishonest, since he relinquished his own little girl. At the finish of the play, when the Chorus ridicules Aegisthus by calling him a lady for not going to war and utilizing misdirection to give just desserts to Agamemnon, does this inquiry or fortify generalizations?

We learn why Clytaemnstra must kill her husband, therefore the actions are not clear. There is no clear recognition for the hero, Agamemnon’s death is unwitting, but Casandra recognises the impending slaughter and tells the audience and the chorus why we cannot understand

The poetic tone of Aristophanes' Lysistrata differs greatly from the poetic tone of the Greek tragedies we have read in class. However, after analyzing this Greek comedy, it seems to share some of the main characteristics of Euripides' Medea. Within these plays, we meet shrewd, powerful masculine women who use the art of manipulation to get what they want from others and to accomplish their goals. This theme of manipulation is employed through various means and techniques. The women of these plays also seem to contradict the stereotypical woman and have characteristics similar to the Homeric Greek warrior.

I do believe in justice Orestes should avoid this revenged on his father, and accused her mothers of murder with the council and with Athena’s. In the other hand I can feel the anger from Orestes because it is sad to see that your own mother was the first person to violate and the one who create a plan with her lover in order to murder Agamemnon. For this reason I can say it is a hard decision to say if Orestes is the bad person in here, or his mother by planning a and knowing that she was going to create a crime against the king. I can conclude that Athenians decision could be more critical and to dig more deeply by looking the real purpose of this entire event in order to determined if Orestes deserved to be accused of murdering. How I mention before Athena’s was the one who determined the future of Orestes by looking on the fact that she is the Goddess of

It see ironic that Agemenmon foreshadows his own murder, “ .. in my view, not without some risk.”(line.). For when Clytemnestra coaxes him to walk upon the red carpet, she essentially is leading the lamb to his death. It is only a tyrant, a cruel, devious women who could

Society establishes a set of expectations by which males and females are expected to conduct themselves. For example, a mother is expected to nurture her child, stay at home to take care of her children, be patient, be kind, love unconditionally and to never get angry. If a mother does not live up to these expectations established by society, then that mother is deemed a “bad mother.” Since a mother gives birth to her children and nurtures them, a mother who kills her children is considered to be unredeemably bad. Medea, in the play of the same name, kills her two sons and by societal standards, she would be deemed a bad mother. Contrary to society’s expectations of mothers, I will argue that Medea is not a bad mother. I will do this by proving that: Medea defies the social conventions of motherhood in three ways; she kills her children in order to protect them; and, that she rebels against her husband’s control and male domination by depriving him of his “immortality” by killing his sons and ending his bloodline.

In this paper, I will discuss the different ways Clytemnestra isn't your typical female character. In most of Greek mythology women were mostly seen as passive, weak, and constantly taking orders from men. She was the complete opposite, she was really a one of a kind. More masculine than some of the men in the stories, and definitely more masculine than feminine she was a very strong, solid, independent, powerful character throughout Agamemnon. The story definitely wouldn’t be as controversial as it was if it weren't for the boldness, extremely deceptive tactics, manipulative ways, and ruthless acts of Clytemnestra. She constantly defied the role that was given to women in the art of ancient Greece, she paved the way for powerful women characters for the future.