Thursday, October 1, 2015

Modern Connection in Medea

            The final scene of the play where Medea and Jason verbally fight struck me as very relatable to the divorce of a pair of modern-day parents. Except that the mother murders the children, new wife, and new father-in-law. Medea begins the argument by saying that Jason can’t touch her at this point because she’s in the sky. This is similar to how a divorcee can protect himself/herself so that he/she doesn’t get screwed over by the other lawyer. Jason then tells her about how much he had done for her and how she betrayed him, although it is ironic and doesn’t make much sense. Meanwhile, he warms it up by spewing a few insults at Medea. Medea then joins the blame game by saying that Jason had betrayed her first when she gave up everything for him. They then exchange more of their own sides of the story in this manner, and in the end, they even fight over custody of the children (although Medea killed them), each saying that he/she would have a better place for them to stay. Medea finishes by saying that she absolutely will not give up the sons and that Jason had never loved them to begin with. Jason then tries to play the victim to the gods, even though Medea and the gods all know what really happened.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

It is actually really interesting you brought this up. As much as times have changed since then, men and women are still fighting over the exact same things in the exact same way. My parents aren't divorced so i have not experienced the fighting first hand, but many of my friends have divorced parents. I remember talking to my friend one time about the endless fights her parents would get into about the stupidest things. Reading your post reminded me of that Jack. It is funny because as far as we have come since Ancient Greece, men and women still fight like crazy. Even though they fight constantly, one cannot simply exist without the other.