Medea Quotes Flashcards
nurse about M
Analysis for
Nurse :’ its clear this anger will grow; soon enough her grief like a gathering cloud will be kindled by it and burst into storm’
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- simile suggests violent release of anger and grief is inevitable
- ‘storm’ - shows gathering momentum
- ‘bursts’ - shows violence and instability inevitably lead to danger
Analyse
‘ he tore the withered flesh from his own bones’
M’s sourcery physicallly devours C’s body / reinforces her animalistic capacity for violence
weaponisation of C’s love for Glauce
C dies trying ot protect Glauce
Analyse
Medea to Jason : ‘and yet you have betrayed me’
‘unfeeling monster’
Medea to Aegeus: ‘ prepared to tolerate it’
- “unfeeling” = calous/ cold/heartless
- “moster” = lack of emotion / dehumanisisng
- J = too little feeling for others leading great harm
- J’s willingness to ‘tolerate’ his sons exile justifies M’s anger
Medea : ‘ there is one small kindness i request of you […] your silence’
Chorus : ‘ I will do as you ask, M; it is just that yur should take revenge upon your husband’
- M= recruit chorus as conspirators
- M = calculating / cunning / trying to win support from the chorus
- chorus = endorse M’s quest for revenge
- chorus = empathise with M’s inability to access justice
- M’s options = limited
J to M : ‘ In heaven name,let me touch my childrens soft skin’
- J’s oikos = completely eradicated / alone / isolated
- J’s legacy = erased
- J = completely bereft / greiving for lost children
- J = transformed from a man of logic to a man of emotion
- J = too little too late
- tone = regretful and desperate
- J pleads to the heaven as he betrayed the gods oaths
Stage directions ; ‘ M suddenly appears above the stage, in a chariot drawn by dragons’
- ’ above the stage ‘ - gods endorse and approve of M’s actions
- ’ chariot drawn by dragons’ - gift from holios / grandfather
- ’ chariot drawn by dragons’ - M and J’s roles = flipped
- J = emmotionally criplled and abandoned
- M has no feeling when escaping
chorus’ final message to audience : ‘ what men expect does not happen; for the unexpected heaven finds a way’
- ’ what men expect does not happen’ = humans lives can easily be chnaged
- ‘unexpected heaven finds a way’ = gods are in control of everything and mortals cant predict what and who they will favour
- humans need to respect the gods b/c it can lead to chaos
M to the women of cornith (WOC) : ‘ we women are the most miserable of specimens’
‘ taking a master to play tirant with our bodies ‘
- ‘we’ = m gives voice to tyhe voiceless
- m displays her ability to switch through extreme emotions
- specimens = dehumanised / unvalued
- tone = resolute / ardent / defiant / authorative
- women = imprisoned, chained, helpless within marriage
- women = burden and expense on men
Nurse : ‘M seeks to please her husand in all she does ‘
‘ this is what keeps a marriage intact’
- M = perfect, dutiful and devoted wife
- M’s identity revolves around loyalty and obidience to J
- J = robbed M of an identity
GENERAL STATEMENTS
A didactic tale of violence and revenge, E’s Medea sheds a fresh lioght on the vicious psyche on one of literatures greatest villians
J to M: ‘ I have shown wisdom, yes, and prudence,, and further that i have acted like a true friend to you and my children’
- J = lack of affection and love towards M + children
- J claims remarriage will benefit his sons fortunes
- J has a lack of concern w leaving family
- J boasts about his clever decisions
- J thinks his actions were correct
J to M during Agon : ‘ there should be some other means for mankind to reproduce itself’
‘rid the world of all its troubles’
- J beleives women = responsible for all problems
- world = better w/o women
- demonstrates patriarchal arrogance because J refuses to recognise his own priveledge
BP3
Aegeus : ‘ the fate awaiting mortals who offend against the gods’
Chorus : ‘ Aegeus, you have a noble heart ‘
- A characterised as : pious / respects the will of the Gods / faithful / understands the importance of X hubris even as king \
- Oaths = sacred pledge that invites punishment / deserving of punishment if broken
- ’ a noble heart’ - balanced / moderate / ideal role model for audience
J to M during Agon : ‘ i must prove myself a capable speaker […] like a seasoned helmsman’
- seasoned = experienced
- helmsman = captain of ship
- J = seeking royal oikos
- j feels safe and secure even though he broke oath
- J = calm / rational / capable of controlling tides of M’s emotion
- M’s noisy protestations = childish / immature / unreasonable
- women = ruled by emotion
BP3
chrous : ‘uphil flows the water of sacred rivers; nature and all things overturned’
- betrayal of oaths = disrupted and misaligned nature leading unatural phenomenon that threatens safety
- consequences of hubris = widespread
- man = altering nature by disobeying gods
