Literature Analysis #3

Literature Analysis: Medea  by Euripides

Collaborated with Jared Dube, Bailey Reasner, Marcel Dube

1.Euripedes' Medea begins and ends with conflict. Jason abandoned his wife, Medea, along with their two children. He hopes to advance his station by remarrying with Glauce, the daughter of Creon, king of Corinth, the Greek city.

Outside the royal palace, a nurse laments the events that have lead to the present issue. After a long series of trials and betrayals Jason and Medea to seek exile in Corinth. They had settled down and established their family, achieving a degree of fame and respectability. Jason's recent abandonment of that family has crushed Medea emotionally, to the degree that she curses her own existence, as well as that of her two children.

Fearing a possible plot of revenge, Creon banishes Medea and her children from the city. After pleading for mercy, Medea is granted one day before she must leave, during which she plans to complete her quest for "justice." Jason accuses Medea of overreacting. By voicing her grievances so publicly, she has endangered her life and that of their children. He claims that his decision to remarry was in everyone's best interest.

Appearing by chance in Corinth, Aegeus, King of Athens, offers Medea sanctuary in his home city in exchange for her knowledge of certain drugs that can cure his sterility. Now guaranteed an eventual haven in Athens, Medea has cleared all obstacles to completing her revenge, a plan which grows to include the murder of her own children. The pain their loss will cause her does not outweigh the satisfaction she will feel in making Jason suffer.

Medea then pretends to sympathize with Jason  and offers his wife "gifts," a coronet and dress. Ostensibly, the gifts are meant to convince Glauce to ask her father to allow the children to stay in Corinth. The coronet and dress are actually poisoned and their delivery causes Glauce's painful death. Seeing his daughter ravaged by the poison, Creon chooses to die by her side by dramatically embracing her and absorbing the poison himself.

A messenger recounts the gruesome details of these deaths, which Medea absorbs with cool attentiveness. Her earlier state of anxiety, which intensified as she struggled with the decision to commit murder has now given way to an assured determination to fulfill her plans. Against the protests of the chorus, Medea murders her children and flees the scene in a dragon-pulled chariot provided by her grandfather, the Sun-God. Jason is left with his hope of advancing his station by abandoning Medea and marrying Glauce and everything he values has been lost through death and tragedy.

2. In Media the two main themes demonstrated include betrayal and revenge. Betrayal can easily be seen as a theme in the play due to where all the anger and despair that follows when Jason betrays his wife Medea causing her to act out which leads to the second theme of revenge. Her hatred fuels her to do inconceivable acts in the pursuit of revenge which forces her to use manipulation and this ties the two themes together since manipulation is just another form of betrayal.

3. The tone seemingly appears cynical most of the time with Medea constant plotting for her ex husbands suffering yet sometimes sympathetic which relies heavily on the chorus who expressed their sympathy for Medea fates and Jasons slain children in their words.   

4.  

• Symbolism - the murder of Medea’s own children symbolizes her wrath and past love with her husband.
• Symbolism - Deities like Apollo are an obvious symbolic element in Medea.
• Tone - Euripedes sets a bitter and dark overall tone as the murder of her children is a significant influence on the play
• Imagery - Imagery is heavily used throughout the play for Medea, as she is often described to be in a angry and raged state.
• Direct Characterization - The author frequently uses direct characterization for Medea to draw out her personality. It is effective because it clearly implies her rage and fluster through the direct characterization.

Characterization:

1.Direct Characterization:

• her heart passionately in love with Jason.
• Their fine love's grown sick, diseased, for Jason,

  Indirect Characterization:

• Don't fear me, Creon. It's not in me to commit crimes against the men in charge.
• I'm not that clever, but still you fear me.

2.The authors diction does change when Medea talks, the author shifts the diction to be more aggressive compared to the other neutral characters of the play. I feel the reason behind changing the diction is to make Medea stand out as a character who can no longer fit in her society due to efforts in seeking revenge. Although the author changes diction, he doesn’t change the syntax of the play at any point. So all in all, the syntax between Medea and other characters doesn’t cause an obvious difference.

3.Medea is dynamic because she is forced into a problematic situation where her husband leaves her to enhance his position which then make her drastically change into a vindictive character who would resort to killing her children to get revenge. Medea is a flat character because her goals never change and are never impeded on even when feeling sympathetic for the killing of her children which she does just for revenge.
4. After reading this play, I felt that I met a real character because the emotions and thoughts that Medea experiences are somewhat realistic. Although Medea is mostly violent, and she shed the blood of her two sons, the complex emotions that she undergoes is parallel and relatable to anyone. That being said, I would not want to actually meet Medea in real life.