Euripides, Medea (431 BC)

Today I read Medea again. It was so sad. I felt angry at Jason's traechery, after all that Medea has done. The wondor is that, even thousands of years have past, we think in quite the same way. We are no wiser than our ancestors. The only difference is the modern technology that we live with today. We think that people live unhappily nowadays because of the hustle and bustle of modern urban jungle. However, even in Euripides' time, people had long been in never-ending distress.

Among human beings no one is happy.

Wealth may flow in to produce a man

more lucky than another, but no man, [1230]

is ever happy, no one.

I can understand the agony in Medea's heart. It is too unbearable for her to succumb to her enemy and present her children in return for their uncertain fate. And she can only find her way out through revenge and inflicting pains on Jason. She would rather bear the sins of slaughter her own children just to find relief in knowing Jason cannot laugh at her.

The story ends when Jason was left alone in despair. However, the children surely would live no better if they were kept alive with Jason. Also, Jason's grief is momentary. He will find another woman (or women) that is willing to have baby with him and through whom he can ascend to a higher rank in society. There is every reason for Medea to justify her deeds. After all, she was just an innocent girl with powerful magic, blinded by the arrow of Cupid.

I think there is a witch inside me.