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The character of Medea in Medea
The character of Medea in Medea
Analysis of character of medea in play
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More handpicked essays just for you.
The character of Medea in Medea
The character of Medea in Medea
Analysis of character of medea in play
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Recommended: The character of Medea in Medea
This is an ironic statement as Medea is actually planning to kill her children, a fact which the audience does not yet know about. Jason uses another form of rhetorical stretching, which includes his plea that leaving his wife and children was a ‘wise move’, and that the decision was made with Medea’s best interests at heart, as much an attempt to convince himself as much as the audience. The chorus is quick to point out that ‘You have betrayed your wife and are acting badly.’ The Nurse is our first instance of anagnorisis during the play. Though an ancient Greek audience would well be in tune with the stories in Greek mythology, the Nurse’s role would still have proved important, as she was a tool Euripides used to transport the audience
Through the epilogue described by the nurse, the audience is positioned to understand medea's desire for revenge. The audience may have viewed her position of being betrayed by Jason to be devastating( insert quote instead of devastating) and hold sympathy for her as she is not only an outsider from a presumed barbaric country, but also an exile. During when the play was first performed, religion played a big role in Athenian lives, during which breaking an oath to the gods was considered a crime. Hence, the audience would understand medea's wish to bestow revenge upon Jason for he broke his oath of marriage to her, which was witnessed by the gods, by laying in the 'royal bed'.
Medea kills many people out of revenge including Creon, Glaunce, and her two sons. The ultimate reason behind it was to cause her husband pain for leaving her for another
In Euripides’ text The Medea, Medea can easily be painted as the villian. She is a woman who killed her own children in an attempt to spite her husband. But, by examining the text, we can see that she deserves some sympathy. She has little to no control over her own life and has to rely on the will of men. And as a foreigner in Corinth abandoned by her husband, she faces even more challenges than the native women of Corinth did.
In Medea by Euripides, Medea 's character flaw that ultimately led to her downfall is revenge. Medea 's husband Jason left her to marry a younger, beautiful woman. Medea becomes outraged, and all she thinks about is getting revenge. She kills Glauce, Jason 's new wife, and her father, Creon. She wanted her revenge to be perfect she even killed her own children to get revenge on Jason leaving her.
Before the events that supposedly drove her insane. Now, when you go up to drop your tokens, keep one last thing in mind. Medea did all this, caused all this, with one single goal in mind. To cause the greatest amount of pain to her ex-husband Jason as possible. This single-minded intensity is what made her kill,and commit these atrocities.
Medea’s dilemma reminded me of a book I read my senior year, Beloved, which is based on a true story of an escaped slave who, upon learning she was discovered, decides to take it upon herself to kill her children in order to save them from the tortures of slavery. Although Medea had additional motives, I believe that her motives are similar. A mother would never want to see her children suffer, and Medea’s options were limited. Either her children would be brutally tortured and murdered for a crime that was not their own, or they would be forced into a life of exile where nobody would ever accept them.
Instead, they were taken too young, as simple pawns in a game. Although Medea has the right to be angry with Jason, she must also accept responsibility for using her children as collateral damage, which ultimately leads to her own
Euripides’ Medea, is a play that follows the journey of a young woman seeking vengeance against her husband, well now ex-husband. The steps she takes to get her revenge make Medea seem like a monster. However, her actions and the torments she has endured make it appear as though she may suffer from a mental illness. So the question is, does Medea have some form of mental illness, or was she just enraged by the injustices committed by her “loving” husband? Evidence leans more toward her being mentally unfit than her being a murderer.
Medea plots her revenge by murdering the king, the bride and her two children in order to make Jason suffer and take away everything Jason cared about. The Greek gods felt that Medea was in her right and they proved this by allowing and even helping her escape in the end of the play
The nurse is explaining the root causes on how Medea became so vengeful. Medea is a very passionate and prideful woman. Medea was different from other women in Greece. “She has a temper that is vile and violent”( line 35) says the nurse. These feelings Medea had caused her to form the most devious plan she could think of.
Lush explains “Although Euripides did not cast Medea as a male solider as its protagonist, the play depicts Medea as suffering from the background Trauma, betrayal, isolation and consequent symptoms attributed to combat veterans with lasting psychological injuries” (Lush, 2014, p. 25). Hence using Lush’s view on Medea’s character as a devoted warrior suffering from Traumatic hardships in her experiences with the man she gave everything to, we can understand why she wanted revenge. Medea believes Jason owes her more than just the normal husband-wife obligations a man swears to when marrying a woman; in her view, she helped him be the man that he is and supported him throughout his heroic journey. Without her, Jason would not have succeeded in retrieving the Golden Fleece. Without her, he would not have had his father resurrected.
Medea was treated unfairly in the patriarchal society that she lived in and due to the circumstances she was forced to abide by, she sought to achieve her own form of justice. Women were mistreated and regarded as inferior to men. In fact, Medea mentioned how women were like foreigners forced to abide by their husband’s laws and remain subservient. Essentially, women were treated as outsiders and were thought to need constant protection from male figures. So, when the King of Corinth kicked her and her children out of Corinth and Jason left them, she wanted revenge since she felt she had been wronged.
Medea has already lost her husband and her home so this decision is an obvious one for her. She wants to leave everyone in the same misery that she has been experienced and continues to experience. After this, she even plans to murder her own children just to distress Jason further. Medea knows that she will live in regret and misery by doing so, but her need to sadden Jason trumps her own future feelings. The murder of her sons also symbolizes the death of her marriage with Jason.
Medea, the protagonist, is a woman driven by extreme emotions and extreme behaviors. Because of the passionate love she had for Jason, she sacrificed everything .. However, now his betrayal of her transformed the beautiful loving passion to uncontrollable anger, hatred and a desperate desire for revenge. Her violent and temperamental heart, previously devoted to Jason, now moving towards its doom.