Great Tragedians
Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides
Great Tragedians
Humanities 250
May 30, 2012
The three great tragedy play writes Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides were ahead of their time. The ideals they portrayed in their plays are very relevant in this day and age. Love, loss, religion, politics suffering, being victims of fate; these are all things we hear about each time we turn on the news. The messages that were written into each play by each play write would be related to, understood and very needed today. Reading about them and having some of the excerpts from the plays in the book took me back and reminded me how much I loved studying them in high school. I was transported into each play as if I was watching it play out.
Aeschylus wrote over eighty plays that had traditional religious beliefs and moral values woven through them. He believed in divine justice and that through suffering; one obtained knowledge. He wrote a trilogy of plays that were interconnected addressing immortality, family strife, human relationships with gods and vengeance. The plays in the trilogy are Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, and Eumenides, the first two have the theme of blood vengeance running through them. This is played out beginning with Agamemnon being forced to kill one of his children, one life in return for many. He is later murdered for killing his child by his wife. This is a perfect illustration of how you can be driven to rage in order to avenge the death of a loved one. In The Libation Bearers Agamemnon’s other children are hurt and angered and feel they have to avenge the death of their father. Ultimately this family is torn apart and more lives are loss than necessary, but it shows the pain and anger and moral battle that is fought within when deciding whether or not to do the right thing.
Sophocles was one of the most prolific and successful of the great tragedians. He wrote over one hundred plays but only seven have survived. He was credited with enlarging
Great Tragedians
Humanities 250
May 30, 2012
The three great tragedy play writes Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides were ahead of their time. The ideals they portrayed in their plays are very relevant in this day and age. Love, loss, religion, politics suffering, being victims of fate; these are all things we hear about each time we turn on the news. The messages that were written into each play by each play write would be related to, understood and very needed today. Reading about them and having some of the excerpts from the plays in the book took me back and reminded me how much I loved studying them in high school. I was transported into each play as if I was watching it play out.
Aeschylus wrote over eighty plays that had traditional religious beliefs and moral values woven through them. He believed in divine justice and that through suffering; one obtained knowledge. He wrote a trilogy of plays that were interconnected addressing immortality, family strife, human relationships with gods and vengeance. The plays in the trilogy are Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, and Eumenides, the first two have the theme of blood vengeance running through them. This is played out beginning with Agamemnon being forced to kill one of his children, one life in return for many. He is later murdered for killing his child by his wife. This is a perfect illustration of how you can be driven to rage in order to avenge the death of a loved one. In The Libation Bearers Agamemnon’s other children are hurt and angered and feel they have to avenge the death of their father. Ultimately this family is torn apart and more lives are loss than necessary, but it shows the pain and anger and moral battle that is fought within when deciding whether or not to do the right thing.
Sophocles was one of the most prolific and successful of the great tragedians. He wrote over one hundred plays but only seven have survived. He was credited with enlarging