The final scene of Medea has been much debated. What are your responses to the ways in which Euripides ends the play?
The middle portion of Medea portrayed the main character Medea in a positive manner. Through her monologues, the audience was able to sympathise with her and against Jason. However, towards the end, I believe the playwright opposed this notion by illustrating Medea to kill her children. Within there is a belief that women should have inherent and unconditional love for their children. I believe this notion is still present in modern-day society. While mothers are expected to have unconditional love for their children from the minute they were born, fathers do not have this same expectation. Due to this, fathers abandoning children is not looked down upon to the same extent to which mothers abandoning children is. Hence, by Medea murdering her children, the playwright demonstrates strong opposition to the societal expectations of women. Audience members were likely to react with shock and dislike towards Medea.
After killing her children, the playwright illustrates a duologue between Jason and Madea in which the bicker regarding who’s to blame for their tragedies. This moment, in particular, seems to stand. Medea’s plan was to seek revenge on Jason by killing her children, however, even though Medea has succeeded with her plan, it is apparent that the situation has not been solved. Within the play, the author makes it apparent that Medea had come to accept that she would always feel some level of grief as a result of her situation, however, she is motivated to make Jason feel the same way. Her selfish motivations paired with numerous casualties cause audience members to disassociate with her perspective.
Medea leaves the scene on a charriot. Chariots have an association with the divine and gods. One may interpret that Medea leaving on a chariot alludes to the idea that the gods are helping Medea on her quest. With the society at the time being heavily influenced by religion, the concept of Medea being helped by the gods may allude that her actions were justified in the grand scheme of things.
Overall, I think the ending of Medea forces audience members to question the distinction between right and wrong. The author constantly causes audience members to switch their character allegiance thereby suggesting that we as humans can never truly determine who is right or wrong— it is all a matter of perspective.
