It was standard practice for tragedians to alter not just the genealogy but also the characterization of mythical figures from play to play. Thus the Odysseus of Sophocles’ Ajax is honorable and compassionate, while the Odysseus of Philoctetes is devious and manipulative. Similarly, the cautious Orestes of Euripides’ Electra is slow to reveal himself to his sister Electra; the trustful Orestes of Iphigenia among the Taurians is quick to reveal himself to his sister Iphigenia; the psychotic Orestes of Orestes takes Electra for one of his Furies. Such variations spark renewed audience interest in well-known mythological figures even as they further specific dramatic aims.
What about consistency of characterization within the plays? Aristotle finds fault with the Iphigenia of Iphigenia at Aulis for first supplicating Agamemnon for her life and subsequently affirming her death (Poetics 1454a31-33). Iphigenia herself maintains, however, that she has changed her mind on the basis of insight and reflection (Gibert 1995, 224), and critics must concede that she supplies reasons for her decision, whether or not they agree with them. The contrast drawn by Knox (1966, 213-15) between the inflexible heroes of Aeschylus and Sophocles and the volatile protagonists of Euripidean drama does not stand up to critical scrutiny (Gibert 1995, 255-62). Instead (as might be expected) all three tragedians use doubt and uncertainty to create suspense. In the most spectacular example in all of Greek tragedy, Aeschylus’ Orestes hesitates before he kills his mother (Libation Bearers 899). At the end of Antigone the chorus-leader advises Creon to release Antigone and arrange burial for Polynices (1100-1101); Creon wavers and then capitulates, though his change of course comes too late to save Antigone’s life. But whereas Aeschylus and Sophocles pass rapidly over such moments of indecision, Euripides is inclined to draw them out. Medea agonizes over her decision to kill her sons, and as she contemplates the children’s bright faces (omma phaidron teknon, 1043) her diction - incoherent exclamations, the plaintive question, ‘‘What shall I do?’’ and the repeated cry, ‘‘Farewell, plans!’’ - reflects her torment. Stagecraft can be enlisted for the same purpose. In Hecuba Euripides makes use of a prolonged aside to represent Hecuba’s uncertainty about appealing to Agamemnon: she turns her back on the king (who, unaccustomed to being ignored, manifests increasing bewilderment and impatience) to carry on a debate with herself (736-51; for other aspects of Euripidean stagecraft see Davidson, chapter 13 in this volume).
Euripides does not linger over such moments, I believe, in the interests of verisimilitude, but because they make for effective theater. Critics who regard him as aiming at psychological realism can appeal to Sophocles’ remark that he himself portrayed men as they should be, whereas Euripides portrayed men as they are (Aristotle, Poetics 1460b33-34). Sophocles’ own characterizations are less idealized, however, than this remark suggests - the Odysseus of Philoctetes, for instance, has much in common with the corrupt fifth-century politicians who are also a target of Euripides, and Deianira in Women of Trachis could be any unfaithful husband’s fearful and conflicted wife. Furthermore, Euripides is more concerned, as we shall see, to illuminate aspects of human nature than to delineate specific individuals. It is true, as Seidensticker (chapter 3 in this volume) points out, that Euripides’ incorporation of the homely concerns of everyday life imparts an overlay of realism, as when Admetus imagines the ‘‘unswept floor’’ of his neglected house ( Alcestis 947), or the shipwrecked Menelaus is mortified by his near-nakedness (Helen 415-24). Yet such details may well evoke the literary tradition rather than (or along with) everyday life. Similar concerns already figure in the Odyssey, where the point is made that housekeeping deteriorates in the master’s absence (Odyssey 17.320-21), and the shipwrecked Odysseus is troubled and embarrassed by his own nakedness (6.135-48). Domestic details even find a place in the Iliad, when Phoenix speaks of his care for the small Achilles’ physical needs (9.485-95) - a motif reworked by Aeschylus in Libation Bearers (755-60).
That realism is not a primary aim is made clear by moments when the characters themselves, presumably mirroring within the play an aspect of the dramatist’s own technique, draw attention to the expressive or performative value of their own actions or speech (see Scodel 1999-2000 and Pelling, chapter 6 in this volume). Thus Electra, humiliated at having been married to a farmer and relegated to a cottage in the country, observes that she fetches her own water ‘‘not from necessity, but to display Aegisthus’ outrageousness to the gods’’ (Electra 58; cf. Trojan Women 472-73). The playwright’s preference for illustrative exposition over psychological realism is even more strikingly exemplified by scenes in which a heroine in extremis hallucinates in lyrics, only to follow up with a lucid trimeter exposition of her case. Thus Alcestis on her deathbed, after reacting with terror to her vision of Charon in his boat, calmly explains her rationale for dying on Admetus’ behalf and demands a concession from her husband in return (Alcestis 252-325; for a similar sequence in Aeschylus see Agamemnon 1072-1197, and in Sophocles, Antigone 806-928). The abrupt shift of mood is psychologically implausible, but Euripides is in pursuit of a larger insight: he aims to set forth the two modes, emotional and rational, with which human beings confront their own mortality (cf. Dale 1954 on Alcestis 280 ff.).
World History
