Meditation 4

The characterization of people in the different plays is varied due to the variety of styles employed by different authors. Aeschylus uses Pylades more dramatically than most; he is the one to convince Orestes to kill his mother by putting it simply, the gods commanded it. In Euripides the one to convince Orestes to kill his mother is Electra. In Sophocles he doesn’t really have to be convinced, also his mother is the first to be killed. Euripides version makes the characters seem much more human, more fleshed out through his use of dialogue. Also Orestes inner and outer conflict with murdering his mother, makes him seem less like a epic hero but rather like the average man stuck in a Catch 22. If he doesn’t kill her he is wrong by the gods, if he does kill her he is wrong by man. Also Electra seems much more vengeful in Euripides version than others, on page 120 of the play, she kills ever single argument of Orestes just to get back at her mother who subjugated her. She is not even really in Aeschylus’s version of the play. Whereas Pylades in Euripides version is simply a plot device for Electra to get married to which I think is a cop out. I feel Aeschylus was more of epic storyteller in his version of events, making it so even though Orestes had a second thought he really never hesitates. Also it is in that version that you really get to see the violence. In Euripides version it seems to happen off screen.