Encyclopedia of Greek and Roman Mythology (Facts on File Library ...

Euripides’ foreshadowing <strong>of</strong> later events is
sometimes suffused with grim irony. In a notable
instance, Creon values his son Menoeceus’s life
over the welfare <strong>of</strong> the polis, <strong>and</strong> makes much
<strong>of</strong> the importance <strong>of</strong> burial. He will reverse this
stance in Sophocles’ Antigone, insisting on the
priority <strong>of</strong> polis over kinship obligations. He will
end up losing his other son, Haemon, through
his rigidity. In a classic instance <strong>of</strong> the double
bind, he loses a son through suicide whether he
prioritizes his kin or the polis.
The ending <strong>of</strong> the play looks forward to the
events depicted by Sophocles’ Oedipus at Colonus:
The blind Oedipus, forbidden by Creon to
remain in Thebes, totters <strong>of</strong>f toward exile with
the support <strong>of</strong> his daughter Antigone. Other
passages inevitably recall oedipus tHe King. We
hear the story <strong>of</strong> Oedipus’s life in detail from different
sources, <strong>and</strong> Oedipus himself is a presence
constantly alluded to even before he appears on
stage at Antigone’s bidding. The moment <strong>of</strong>
Polynices’s attack on Thebes becomes the perfect
vantage point from which to view the crossgenerational
horror. We are able to look back on
Oedipus’s fate <strong>and</strong> consider how the curses he
inflicted on his sons led to the present situation,
<strong>and</strong> at the same time observe how the foundations
are being laid—by Eteocles <strong>and</strong> Creon in
particular—for the next tragic phase involving
Antigone <strong>and</strong> Haemon. Euripides even seems
to go out <strong>of</strong> his way to concentrate as many
sources <strong>of</strong> grief as possible in one place. He
places Jocasta’s suicide in the present sequence
<strong>of</strong> events, following her sons’ deaths—not, as
in Sophocles, after the revelation <strong>of</strong> Oedipus’s
birth. Finally, <strong>and</strong> perhaps most intriguingly,
Euripides provides insight into the genesis <strong>of</strong>
Antigone’s unforgettable character. At the opening
<strong>of</strong> the play, she is under the guardianship <strong>of</strong>
a pedagogue, subject to the dictates <strong>of</strong> female
modesty, limited in her capacity to appear in
public. By the end, she throws aside the scruples
<strong>of</strong> modesty <strong>and</strong> the decorum <strong>of</strong> female humility;
she is fiercely devoted to her principles <strong>and</strong>
willing to st<strong>and</strong> up for them publicly; in other
words, she is Antigone.
Phoenician Women
If Oedipus the King comes closest <strong>of</strong> any
<strong>Greek</strong> tragedy to satisfying the Aristotelian
criteria <strong>of</strong> complete action, Euripides goes to
the other extreme <strong>of</strong> a purposely decentered
<strong>and</strong> structurally diffuse tragic panorama. As in
other Euripidean plays, grief is piled on grief
in long succession, <strong>and</strong> we are left to contemplate
the cruelty <strong>of</strong> fate <strong>and</strong> the apparent
indifference <strong>of</strong> the gods. More than one messenger
scene is required to narrate this string
<strong>of</strong> deaths. Euripides does not make an effort to
set up an all-important moment <strong>of</strong> decision for
the tragic hero; there is no true, central tragic
hero in this play, but only a long string <strong>of</strong> victims
<strong>of</strong> fate. The outcomes seem predestined.
Polynices’s <strong>and</strong> Eteocles’ mutual slaughter is
amply prepared for in the preceding scenes,
<strong>and</strong> as tragic spectators, we have the feeling <strong>of</strong>
going through the motions <strong>of</strong> a fait accompli.
Menoeceus decides instantaneously on suicide.
The only work he must do (which he does easily)
is deceive his father as to his intentions.
This sense <strong>of</strong> weariness <strong>and</strong> exhausted
expectation <strong>of</strong> the next inevitable mishap
extends to the point <strong>of</strong> mild humor. Creon
summons Tiresias as a sort <strong>of</strong> afterthought, as
if summoning him is routine, the sort <strong>of</strong> thing
one always does in a Theban tragedy. Tiresias
hobbles onstage with a certain self-consciousness
regarding his own character as physically
debilitated but prophetically accurate seer.
When he leaves the scene, he grumbles <strong>and</strong>
grouches about the mistreatment <strong>of</strong> prophets
such as himself. No one ever listens to Tiresias,
<strong>and</strong> the consequences are always grim—no
matter how many tragedies he appears in, <strong>and</strong>
no matter how <strong>of</strong>ten he is proven right.
The Chorus <strong>of</strong> Phoenician women who
views <strong>and</strong> comments on this tragedy as it
unfolds is exiled from its homel<strong>and</strong> <strong>and</strong> thus in
a position to appreciate some <strong>of</strong> the play’s key
themes (both Polynices <strong>and</strong> Oedipus are exiles).
It identifies with the Theban community, with
whom it has shared ancestors, but at times, it
also enunciates its difference: It is at once foreign
<strong>and</strong> yet somehow part <strong>of</strong> the community.