Medea: Evil and Monstrous

Gordon-Victor Fon ENG 200 Spring 2012 May 7, 2012

One gets to wonder what message the playwright Euripides tried to convey to the audience. The shift in sympathy from Medea, at the beginning of the play to Jason, towards the end of the play questions Euripides intentions. Scholars and readers have debated and argued on the more sympathetic character. Is it Medea or Jason? On one hand, some scholars like Shirley Barlow, and Herbert Musurillo interpret Medea to be an intelligent woman whose actions were based on the betrayal of her love for Jason. Barlow agues that Medea is clever, articulate and above all self aware (160). Musurillo depicts Medea as a woman who has been wronged and is fighting for justice for herself and her gender. On the other hand, scholars like Denys Page, Seth Schein, Aristide Tessitore, and Staurt Lawrence see Medea as intelligent, manipulative, and a barbaric witch. Page sees Medea to be the first of a long line of bad women (x). Schein argues that Medeas exploitation of philia to serve her own heroic ends is fruitless and self-destructive (67). Tessitore states that Medea is perhaps the only woman is forever associated with the horrific act of both premeditated murder of her children and the willingness to continue living in the full awareness of her atrocities (593). Lawrence argues that Medeas actions to help Jason basically give more instances of her ruthless criminality (50).

Though Euripides tries to create some sympathy for Medea by suppressing her evil and monstrous act half way through the play, his intentions were still very clear by the end of the play. He brings out the monstrous aspects of Medea. In contrast to the scholars who see Medeas actions as wise and heroic, it is evident that the flaws of Medea out weigh that of Jason and her actions are irrational, barbaric, and momstrous. In this paper, I will bring out evidence that shows that Jasons actions where due to love for his children and for the benefit of his family. I am also going to show the actions of Medea which depicts her as irrational, barbaric, evil, and a monster. From the words of the chorus, we understand that in the Greek society it was normal for a man to marry another woman. Jasons action was wise and for the benefit of Medea and their children. From the quarrel between Jason and Medea, we could tell that his marriage to the kings daughter was not because of love but solely for the benefits he and his family would gain. Jasons family was in Corinth on exile. Marriage to Kreons daughter was the best way to secure their stay in the land and also to provide them with good financial standing. However, Medeas anger and thirst for vengeance led to her banishment from Corinth. Jason still offers his protection and money to Medea and the children in exile yet, Medea rejects his offers. It is very clear that she was bent on carrying out her evil plans and nothing was going to stop her. She complained about where she would go on exile but Jason was also willing to introduce her to friends who would have treated her well. Jason, in this regard showed extensively that he cared about the welfare of Medea and their children. He even accepted Medeas deceitful apologies and was willing to do everything in his powers to free the children form exile. Though most characters sympathize with Medea through out the first half of the play, we still get a glimpse of her monstrous act echoed by the Nurse. Medea uses her magical powers to persuade Pelias daughters to cut up their father and boil the pieces. Medea cries to the gods and

the audience that she has no father, brother, nor country to turn to. The question one should ask is: What happened to the ones she had? She brutally murdered her brother and deserted her fathers land and her people. Medeas act of vengeance disturbingly is not manifested directly to Jason. She rather goes about killing the innocent people. The murder of the kings daughter was insane. Kreons daughter was not to blame for Medeas predicament. Jason willingly decided to marry the kings daughter and was not forced to leave Medea. Medea also shows how monstrous and evil she is by killing Kreon and his daughter by poison (an act of witchcraft) and after the death of Kreaon and his daughter. Medea much more pleasure in getting details on how they died in agony. This does not only depict her as a barbarian and monster but also a psychopath. Contrary to some scholars interpretations of Medea, like Herbert Musurillo, who states that Medeas cries are merely those of a woman wronged, deceived, and abandoned by a man who has forsworn and betrayed his pledges made to Zeus and Themis. Musurillo also states that Medea's first cry, was not that of a monstrous power and witchery but it was that longing to kill herself (54). We should realize that her childrens death were already fated from the beginning of the play. Though her first words were wishing her own death, the next utterances expressed how much she hated her children I hate you, children of a hateful mother. I curse you and your father (697). This is also in contrast to those who claim she struggles between her motherly love for her children and her desire for vengeance. The nurse ominously foreshadows that I am sure that Medea will not stop raging until she has struck someone, and the only real hope is that she can target an enemy rather than a friend. Medea's initial curses against her children
would seem to challenge the honesty of her present sympathy for them. Her only loyalty is to vengeance and her anger, which has sprung out of her love and needs to vindicate itself through revenge. Abandoning her plan to punish Jason as severely as

possible would be equivalent to denying the seriousness of her emotions and the offense they have suffered. However, like Page argues, the murder of children caused
by jealousy and anger against their father is with no doubts brutality and barbaric (xiv). Medeas contemplations about killing her children only helped in making us realize what

moves her more. Not the motherly love for her children but her blood thirsty soul for vengeance. The murder of Jasons children as we can see did not evoke any type of repentance from Jason. We rather see it clearer that Jasons early claims of acting wisely and working for the profit of Medea and the children were factual. The sorrow he feels at the death of his children opposes the fact that he was willing to let them exiled from Corinth. Above all their death also proved that Jason was passionate and loved his children. On the other hand, the murders committed by Medea were premeditated, efficiently planned, and perfectly executed. Even if one gets to ignore the death of her brother and the death of Pelias probably due to the playwrights manipulation of the play and its characters, one will find it hard to ignore the way she killed Kreon, the princess, and her own children. Will the audience or characters at the end of such a play sympathize with Jason who does everything he could to help Medea and the children or will they sympathize with a woman (Medea) whos unreasonable anger and rage knows no bounds, a murderer of many and an infanticide? Even the characters of the play who were deceived into sympathizing with Medea could not withhold expressing their hatred for her after her monstrous acts.

Works Cited Barlow, Shirley A. Stereotype and Reversal in Euripides' Medea Source: Greece & Rome, Second Series, Vol. 36, No. 2 (Oct., 1989), pp. 158-171Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Classical Association Stable URL:http://www.jstor.org/stable/643169 . Euripides. Medea. The Norton Anthology of World Literature. 2nd ed. Ed. Maynard Mack and Sarah Lawall. New York: NY. 695-725. Print. Lawrence, Stuart Audience Uncertainty and Euripides' Medea Source: Hermes, 125. Bd., H. 1 (1997), pp. 49-55 Published by: Franz Steiner VerlagStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4477177 Musurillo, Herbert Euripides' Medea: A Reconsideration Source: The American Journal of Philology, Vol. 87, No. 1 (Jan., 1966), pp. 52-74Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/292976 Page, Denys L. Medea. Contributors Publisher: Clarendon Press. Place of Publication: Oxford, England. 1938. Pp. vii-xx url: http://www.questia.com/PM.qst? a=o&d=100038424# Schein, Seth L.(1990). Philia in Euripides' Medea. UC Berkeley: Department of Classics, UCB. Pp. 57-72 Retrieved from: http://escholarship.org/uc/item/24j654sp

Tessitore, Aristide Euripides' "Medea" and the Problem of Spiritedness The Review of Politics , Vol. 53, No. 4 (Autumn, 1991), pp. 587-601 Published by: Cambridge University Press for the University of Notre Dame du lac on behalf of Review of Politics Article Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1407307