Tragic Heroines: Medea and Clytemnestra Essay -- Aristotle, Greek trage

Aristotle (384-322 B.C. believed that tragedy, as an sour or mimesis of life as it could be, held more importance than history, which simply records the past. He considered that performance of a tragedy provided the perfect cathartic experience for an audience, go forth them spiritu every last(predicate)y purified and inspired. He felt spectators seeing and experiencing great hardship come to pass the plays hero or heroine would achieve this emotional enounce and benefit from it.The tragic hero, according to Aristotle, moldiness be substantially life-threatening and be of lofty or noble birth. The misfortune that precedes their downfall must evoke compassion and pity. The tragic hero must experience a peripety. Two of the most famous Greek tragic heroes (heroines) were Medea and Clytemnestra. They share characteristics Aristotle deemed essential for the heroic character in a tragedy. They are both of high rank. Medea is a princess and a sorceress, and Clytemnestra was the de f acto ruler of Argos in Agamemnons absence. Their tales initially elicited sympathy, but hamartia and hubris were instrumental in each womans downfall. Both prevail significant peripety as victims of their overly passionate natures. Clytemnestra is obsessed by the desire for vengeance over the death of her daughter at the reach of her economise, Agamemnon. While Clytemnestras passion is for vengeance, Medeas is her unreasonable love for Jason, which turns into seething hatred. Clytemnestras peripeteia begins the moment Agamemnon sacrifices their daughter, Iphigenia. Heartbroken and grieving, Clytemnestra schemes, plotting vengeance for her daughters death. She obsessively plans her husbands murder for so many years that it becomes a fait accompli. Clytemnestra greets his pass by with fa... ...s got to be done, -- do it without flinching. Whatever I do, my life will be unhappy. Ill armor my heart with callousness, and take the sword in my hand...try to go away that they are my children and that I love them. I only need entrust for a short time. And then I can remember all my life. (Medea, pg. 343, 344).Revenge is at the core of the Greek tragedies Agamemnon, the first play in the trilogy Oresteia (Aeschylus (525 - 455 BC), and Medea (Euripides (431 480 B.C.). The protagonists in each play are women who carry out appal acts of revenge on their husbands. Both characters Clytemnestra and Medea are at once heroines, villainesses and victims. whole works CitedCorrigan, Robert W. Classical Tragedy, Greek and Roman 8 Plays in Authoritative recent Translations Accompanied by Critical Essays. New York, NY Applause Theatre Book, 1990. Print.