Weknow the good; we apprehend it clearly,
But we can’t bring it to achievement
(ll. 380–381)Medea’s words amount to a chillingly calm expression of clear self-knowledge. She
is alarmingly rational, knows what she is doing and passes judgement on herself.
In making Medea pronounce so consciously upon her own wrongdoing it has
been suggested that Euripides had in mind the Socratic doctrine that wrongdoing
results from a faulty perception of the good, that virtue is knowledge and that ‘no one
willingly does wrong’. The Greek word in the Socratic formulation hamartanei brings
to mind the word hamartia, or error, made famous by Aristotle in his Poetics. Oedipus
makes his error unconsciously and unwillingly, though with apparent freedom of the
will; Medea makes hers consciously and with similar freedom of the will, nor does
she repent of it as she confronts the hapless and helpless Jason in bitter triumph at
the end of the play in a chariot drawn by dragons above the stage. Certainly Euripides’
representation of actual human nature is radically different from the ideal of it made
famous by the Platonic Socrates, stressing as it does the intractable power of irrational
forces in human affairs, which are manifested here in the extremity of Medea’s
revenge (and intensified by Euripides, for the motif of infanticide is believed to be his
own addition to the myth). At the same time, the rationalist poet and liberal humanist
of Periclean Athens seeks understanding of the cause of that irrationality and takes
great pains to make Medea’s motives sympathetically comprehensible.
Aristotle records the remark of Sophocles that while he portrays men as they
ought to be (of the heroic stature of Oepidus or Antigone), Euripides portrays them
as they are (Poetics, 25).This contrast is most apparent in their different treatments
of the myth of Orestes, which is not made the occasion for heroic action in Euripides’
Electra as it is in the Sophoclean drama of the same name. The democratic note is
clear in Euripides from the beginning. Electra has been forced into a marriage with a
peasant on whose farm the action is set. He treats her with respectful kindness and
has not forced consummation of the marriage. When told about him, Orestes reflects
that true nobility has little to do with noble birth: all men including the well-born must
be judged by their relationships (ll. 367–390). While characters are strong in
Sophocles, in Euripides they are subject to weakness and fear. The Sophoclean
Electra is a figure whom suffering has made resolute and single-minded; in Euripides
she breaks down at the end. His Clytemnestra is not the proud, unrelenting character
of Sophocles, but a pitiable figure admitting to frailty and expressing regret for the
revenge she took against Agamemnon. His Orestes questions the wisdom of the
oracle and is goaded into action by Electra’s accusation of weakness. After the
matricide, the chorus rebuke her for persuading him against his will. The Sophoclean
Orestes has unquestioning faith and does not hesitate. In Aeschylus, Orestes is
LITERATURE 161