Medea

5 Pages 1139 Words

Obsession as a driving force in Euripides’ Medea

“The fiercest anger of all, the most incurable, is that which rages in the place of dearest love” (Medea 32). With this brief sentiment, the collective mind of the female Chorus in Euripides’ Medea relays to the audience the destructive potential of devotion transformed into an obsession for revenge. Medea embodies the ultimate scorned female figure; a person disposed to taking horrific actions to satisfy the need to wound her enemies. Such a personage, often blinded by an insuppressible fury, habitually finds personal justification in taking actions of revenge that may ultimately cause them more grief than their adversary endures. Her propensity to unhindered obsession is ultimately the driving force which propels Medea through her life, first causing her to take extreme actions to secure Jason for her husband, and then to continue her murderous rampage in response to her husband’s infidelity.
Medea’s irrational and horrific response to her husband’s new wife stems from a deeply rooted belief that she is solely responsible for Jason’s successes during their courtship. When Jason first confronts Medea, imploring her to cease her behavior, his scorned wife quickly reminds him of the role she played in his past victories. “The serpent that kept watch over the Golden Fleece…it was I who killed it, and so lit the torch of your success” (Medea 31). Medea continues to remind Jason that she was also responsible for saving his life from the fire-breathing bulls, and that she betrayed her own father and homeland, and caused the death of a king in order to ensure a life of greatness together. Additional players inform the audience that Medea’s compulsion further propelled her to murder her own father and brother before ultimately fleeing with Jason to a life in exile in Corinth. Due to the extremity of her past actions, which she attributes to love, and the fact that ...