Medeas Transformation - 1270 Words

Medea’s Transformation Medea is a play featuring a title character who is a very unusual woman. Brad Levett’s essay â€Å"Verbal Autonomy and Verbal Self-Restraint in Euripides’ Medea† exemplifies the thoughts of three authors after discussing how Medea relates to a Greek hero that was invulnerable in all of his body except for one minor spot and/or the play resembling a Greek tragedy that narrated the fate of a warrior after memorable battles. These scholars believed that Medea â€Å"comes into conflict with that part of herself that would have been viewed as more feminine, most obviously her love for her children† (54). This is because at the end of the play Medea murdered her children to get revenge on her ex-husband who had betrayed their†¦show more content†¦After Medea manipulates Creon by asking him to have pity on her children he gives in by stating, â€Å"for a tyrant my will is by nature tender,/and by feeling pity I’ve been hurt before,/more than once . And now, woman, I see/I’m making a mistake, for you can have/your extra day† (412-416). When Creon is unable to resist her persuasion he shows his weakness. Verbal self-restraint, on the other hand is something Medea lacks until far into the play. By her not displaying this strength, she’s seen as feminine. As explained before, a man who is not able to control himself is viewed as â€Å"effeminate† (55). After reading â€Å"Medea produces a torrent of words like the raging sea, while Jason in his speech is the helmsman who is able to master such a torrent† (61) in Levett’s essay I gained the idea that even though Medea never shed a tear in public her loss of control against Jason in their first scene together exemplifies her weakness. He’s to blame for all her grief and anger. Jason is first seen on stage telling Medea she deserves what is happening to her by saying â€Å"but you just wouldn’t stop this silly rage,/always slandering the royal house./That’s why you’ve got to leave the country† (538-540). She immediately becomes defensive and begins to respond by telling him he hurt his family. Since this is his first interaction with her since she had been hurt, his shamelessness sickens her. Medea then begins to rant about everything she had done forShow MoreRelatedEuripides Apollonius Of Rhodes Argonautica1628 Words   |  7 PagesApollonius of Rhodes’ Argonautica, written in the 3rd Century BC, the character Medea’s complexity intrigues, enchants and horrifies us. Her passionate dedication to Jason and, consequently, the failure of their marriage, leads Medea to commit multiple horrific acts. She plans and commits the murders of numerous people, including her own two sons. However, it is not Medea’s free will that leads her to commit these actions. 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Analyzing Medea’s actions using the Nietzschean approach helps explain why Euripides may have not only made her a child murderer but also why he placed her in such a lofty position at the end of the play, apparently escaping any justice imposed from an external force