Euripides' Alcestis

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Via Bb PDFs.

Journal Entries

Can we say that Alcestis — or another character of your choice — is "being" gender (fulfilling a gender she/he was born into) or performing it? Do characters perform against gender? Does the play seem to offer more evidence supporting Butler's ideas or does it seem to challenge them? Explain. . . .

Some Background

This is our first preserved play by Euripides, though he had already produced several by 438 BCE, when this one first appeared. The "prequel" to it all is that the god Apollo, who had enjoyed the hospitality of Admetus, a mortal, repays the favor with a counter favor: knowing that Admetus is fated to die soon, he has allowed someone else to die in his friend's place. That someone ends up being Admetus' wife, Alcestis — no one else will make the sacrifice. In the course of the play, Admetus is visited by Pheres, his father, and by the great hero Heracles. The exchange between Pheres and Admetus is revealing as to character and motivation; Heracles' arrival is of key importance to the action of the play.

Additional Questions

In exploring the following issues, try to frame your thoughts within the context of the cultural studies we have been undertaking. I.e., knowing a little more now about the sociology of ancient Greece and classical Athens vis-à-vis women, how can you apply that knowledge to your study of this play? So then, ...

  1. Do you think that Alcestis really is meant to be understood as "best of women" for giving up her life for Admetus?

    • Is Euripides suggesting that women really should sacrifice themselves like that?
    • Or is this "feminist" Euripides — is he exposing the kind of system that would lead to such a thing?

  2. What do you think this play may reveal about classical Athenian society, especially attitudes to women? How does it add to or otherwise alter impressions gained from the Against Neaera?

  3. What, exactly, to make of Alcestis? Why does she sacrifice herself for Admetus? And why when she returns from the dead, is she forbidden to speak, at least for a while? Or is it even Alcestis that Heracles brings back to Admetus, or some "facsimile" of her? And what to make of the statue of Alcestis that Admetus wants to set up in his bedroon when his wife has died?
    • Does Alcestis, like Neaera in Against Neaera, appear to be a token of exchange, a signifier of relationships between men?
    • Or does her self-sacrifice betoken autonomy and subjectivity?

  4. What do you think of Admetus? How does he compare to Jason in the Medea? To Neaera's lovers in Against Neaera? (And what, by the way, do you think of Heracles and Apollo?)

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