Why is Medea still relevant?

Our Ancestors pass on literature that is cherished and relevant in their culture. Euripides was one of three pivotal Grecian playwrights. In 431 B.C. Medea premiered at the City Dionysia and still today remains one of few Greek tragedies in modern repertoire. Medea is among some of the earliest works of performed theater in historical record.

For those of you not familiar with context regarding Jason, Medea, and the Golden Fleece, here it goes:

The story of the Golden Fleece predates the play Medea by about 400 years. It is assumed the audience is aware of this myth before the opening scene of Medea.

The mythological figure Medea is claimed to be divinely descended, granddaughter of Helios: God of the Sun. Once a princess under King Aeëtes of Colchis, Medea lived a privileged, ancient woman's life.

Her way of life is violently uprooted by the arrival of Jason and the Argonauts, and his quest for the Golden Fleece. Medea's father, son of the sun stands in the way of Jason, and the Fleece. It was prophesized the Fleece would make Jason the King of Lolcus, Thessaly.

It follows that Jason does everything in his power to obtain the Fleece — and he isn't rewarded with a not only the throne but also a wife.

note: It is disputed whether or not Medea was compelled by the Gods to fall in love with Jason, or if she chose to love him, expressing free will.

Using her apothecary skills (often considered witchcraft) Medea not only helps but secures the Golden Fleece for Jason. Happily ever after?

The catch? Along the way, Medea is said to have killed and dismembered her brother's body so she and her new husband could escape with the Fleece.

Not only does Medea kill her brother, but she also convinces the two daughters of King Pelias to kill their father and boil him because he would not relinquish the Thessalian throne to Jason.

It should also be noted narratively, these actions can be attributed to Hera — who, through Medea killed the King of Lolcus with her Godly influence.

The beginning of Euripides' Medea begins with Medea screaming for someone to kill her, lest she kills herself.

Things have not gone as planned.

Upon receiving an offer from Corinthians King Creon to marry his daughter, the already wed Jason agrees and abruptly leaves his wife and children. Medea is then banished from Corinth, the only sanctuary she could find after having committed the crimes she performed for Jason.

In howling agony, Medea exacts revenge on those she believes have taken her life and stability away from her. The story ends with four more dead, including her own children. Medea's murder weapon of choice? Poison.

Refer here to the full text.

Refer here for a longer summary and analysis.

Medea and her sons.Wikimedia Commons

What Made Her Do It?

Although Medea spends much of her time on stage in soliloquy, erratically explaining herself — audiences are left with the question: what could drive a woman to kill her own children? What a wicked and satanic woman she must be. In Ancient Greece, much as it isn't now killing, culturally is reserved for men evidenced by almost exclusively male military forces. So, for a woman to kill — ecpecially her own babies — this is received as an incredulous crime.

Hailed as a crime worse than killing dozens on a battlefield, Medea has gone down in history as a despicable, forsaken woman. So heinous was her role, that at first, ancient Greek Audiences did not receive the play favorably and it ranked last place in the City Dionysia. Medea was just too wretched.

But I can't help but feel Medea is treated unfairly not only in the play but by audiences as well.

I'd like to draw attention to the more than likely chance that Medea's character had been influenced by narrative magic to perform her wicked deeds. In a popular telling of the original Jason and the Golden Fleece: as Cupid's arrow sent by Jason struck Medea it sent her into a trance where her crimes were induced by spiritually administered mind control drugs — but we won't dig too deep into that. Did she have free will in her actions during and after the events of the Golden Fleece? If she was indeed compelled to commit these crimes, she was then forced to pay for them although she had no choice in the matter. If this is true, then Medea is innocent of her crimes by reason of duress and coercion. If and when Medea returns to her own free will, she would already be acutely traumatized for what she was responsible for even if she had no control over it.

For brevity's sake, let's assume Medea made the choices to kill her brother, husbands wife/father, and her children without a Rohypnol magic arrow of love.

Is Medea Guilty?

I'm writing this essay in defense of Medea. Although her murderous actions are not excusable, they can be understood using a modern psychological lens.

Most of the play Medea is in a manic state of turmoil: screaming, talking to herself, and crying. There are periods where she seems to disassociate from this behavior and acts accordingly to what those around her want. This could be explained as conscious histrionic manipulation, but in my opinion, I do not believe these shifts in character are meticulously planned out. I believe Medea is at the mercy of her own descending mental state. I'm arguing Medea is criminally insane by circumstance, rather than a conniving monster for villainy's sake.

In the story Jason and Medea, no one is innocent — well, expect the children. The children become the crux of the moral issue for most audiences. Even the Chorus sympathizes with Medea in the beginning. She is banished from her home country, divorced and banished again--all while beguiled by loose promises. This is enough to drive any person mad-- but Medea isn't an average modern person: she is wholly dependent on Jason financially, socially, and emotionally. Medea would not felt driven to commit these crimes if Jason had not controlled and manipulated her.

This being said, it is not Jason's fault that the children are murdered (Unless she told Cupid to shoot her with an arrow that would make her do anything for his attention). For that, I sympathize with Medea--because I know how it feels to be so victimized you feel although you have no choice but to be a villain.

To make matter worse, Medea is presumably in her teenage years, and would not be tried as an adult in many courts today. Her age and status put her in a vulnerable position, to begin with (being at ransom to the patriarchy while also being an exiled immigrant).

Without outside resources, Medea truly believes this is the only viable option — which suggests she had really lost touch with reality. Although talking to oneself is a popular staging technique, especially in pre-modern play-writing--Medea's erratic rants could be indications of several mental disorders including schizophrenia, BPD, Dissociative Identity Disorder, Postpartum depression/mania, and/or bipolar disorder. With no familial, compassionate, or professional support-- Medea is at high risk for harming, aggressive mental illness.

In one modern adaptation of Medea By Euripides. Adapted by Mike Bartlett at Citizen's Theatre, Glasgow, Medea is portrayed more realistically. According to a review conducted by The British Journal of General Practice:

"Rather than forging triumph from victimhood, Euripides illustrated how it brutalizes the victim: Medea is not improved by her oppression, but corrupted by it. Betrayed by her husband Jason (Adam Levy) who leaves her for another woman, her mental health is devastated and she is engulfed by thoughts of violence, delusion, and despair. In a self-mutilation scene where she maims herself by reaching into boiling water (in full view of her son) the impression is of a mad witch's lair, with seething cauldron and eerie atonal music accentuating a warped and dangerous mind."

Children are often considered extensions on oneself--so by killing her children I believe Medea is killing parts of herself in an elevated, rageful dissociation. For revenge, but also to punish herself for not being worthy of a bright future. Psychosis is defined by Dictionary.com as: "a severe mental disorder in which thought and emotions are so impaired that contact is lost with external reality."

Looking at this tragedy through a modern psychotherapy model, I can better understand the motivations behind each character's actions. Although I do not support what Medea did (murder her children), I would plead insanity in the Court of Law and advocate for mental health rehabilitation if not a reduced sentence.

Casey AnthonyWikimedia Commons

In my mind, there is a fundamental difference between modern Medea Casey Anthony and the original. Although both women are product killers--which means they kill for a purpose, not for the purpose of killing-- Casey Anthony was under no socio-cultural distress and committed matricide for her convenience, and to this day pleads innocence (although the evidence is a noose). Medea not only admits to her crimes, but she also laments her actions--regarding them tragic and inevitable.

Six people are killed at Medea's hand, making her an official serial killer. Without knowing how many people/children Jason has killed in his 'heroic' life, I must choose to condemn Medea for matricide--but support her over Jason, nonetheless. Jason as the “hero" and patriarch is an extremely privileged and ignorant character. He pays no attention to the real gendered injustices Medea suffers because they do not affect his own prosperity now that he is to be king with a new bride.

Whether or not Medea was bewitched, the fact of the matter remains: she killed innocents so she could feel better. She needed to fill the gaping hole in her heart, and regain some of her version of pride and dignity. It is important to note how much of a burden being a woman was in this time — meaning a broken marriage would have been ground shattering financially, emotionally, and culturally. For example:

"JASON: You thought the marriage bed was worth your children's lives?
MEDEA: Do you think this a trivial wrong for a woman? (1400)...I am in agony, I am so brutally misused." (110)

I cannot blame her for being desperately heartbroken, but her jump to brutality is criminal. It is obvious she is suffering--that this is not the act of a calculated sociopath. She is not a demon from Hell, she is a sick, sick woman. She equates her children to Jason's sins, and that is where her break in reality shatters. I attest that this is no longer a choice in Medea's mind. I attribute this crime to irrational mental illness aggravated by crushing socio-economic factors.

If she would have been helped in some way, perhaps this crisis could have been averted, and Medea could get the help she obviously needs. The children are innocent. The princess: innocent. In this story, even those who think they are queens are pawns. Medea is a murderer of the innocent because that is what was taken from her. She never gave her children a choice — while she made the choice to bring them into this world she forsook the responsibility that implies, and although this is unforgivable, she did not make this choice in her right mind.

Now for Jason...he is a spineless ameba but he isn't without integrity. I detest what he did: leaving Medea and their children for wealth and power. It's a shitty thing to do nowadays, but a completely debilitating thing to do to a woman 4000 years ago. Despite his selfishness, Jason does not commit any on-stage murder (ignoring the fact that he is hailed as a warrior for killing hundreds) he becomes truly upset upon discovering the loss of his children. Whether his grief is because he feels an extension of himself has been sheered off or because he genuinely loves his boys, he does mourn them bitterly. He also mourns the loss of his reputation and damns Medea to Hell for what she has done to him. All along I think Medea was trying to make him feel some of the same pain and loss of control as she was forced to.

JASON: "This is all that is left to me, all that I can do, to mourn and cry out to the gods and call the divine spirits to witness how she killed my children and keeps me from touching them with my hands and burying their bodies. I wish I had never fathered them to see them destroyed by you." (1410)

In conclusion, both characters are deeply and tragically flawed. Medea succumbs to manic pride while Jason relents to a prestigious pride. Both are ravaged by each other. If we were keeping score I'd say that even though Medea "won"--she got what she thought she needed, she too brutally loses. She sacrificed her humanity, and the humanities of 6 other people, for her purposes — and that compels me to sympathize for those victimized by Medea.

I am compelled to agree with neither Jason or Medea's actions. (Some couples counseling could have really saved a lot of lives in this story). However, I choose to defend Medea whom I believe is legally insane, thus not wholly responsible for her psychotic behavior.