Agamemnon Is To Blame In The Oresteia

Agamemnon suffers an untimely death by the hand of his dear wife, Clytemnestra in the first book, Agamemnon, of the trilogy, The Oresteia. He is very angered by this act of treason and would be likely to seek revenge upon Clytemnestra through his son, Orestes in the book Choephoroe part of the trilogy, The Oresteia. Agamemnon firmly believes people should be held responsible for their actions. Although, Agamemnon would still want Orestes to take revenge upon Clytemnestra, because Agamemnon believes she should suffer the same fate as he did, by the hands of a loved one. Agamemnon is furious with Clytemnestra while he spends the rest of his time in Hades. Even after his death, Agamemnon, would warn any person of the evilness of women. He goes …show more content…
She ultimately got what she deserved and it was definitely justified, even the gods approved. A wife should not kill her own husband and a husband shall not kill his wife. These acts of betrayal go against the natural laws of the world, and that is why Clytemnestra is judged so harshly. Agamemnon killing his own daughter goes against the laws too, but being in a difficult decision as he was, he could not make any good decision. Each of them committing murder within the family sealed their fate. Clytemnestra on the contrary was most vile in how she went about her scheme. After she has slayed Agamemnon she shows off her arrogance by stating, “ I stand here, where I struck, over my work, and it was so contrived, I’ll not deny” (Aeschylus 293). She is telling the reader the murder was all planned out. She says, work, as if she has put a lot of time and effort into her plan, mostly likely she did. The arrogance and cold hearted nature of the murder can only be justified by the hands of Orestes. A punishment should be equal to the crime which was committed. Clytemnestra kills a family member, so therefore, she must die at the hand of a loved one. Little does she know, Orestes has heard about murder and on his way to take …show more content…
Orestes would more than likely refuse his father’s request to avenge his death. For if Orestes knew about the death of his sister Iphigenia, his opinions and feelings toward his father would be altered indefinitely. Before Agamemnon actually goes through with it he contemplates, “ A bitter thing surely not to hearken, and bitter too to slay my own child, my royal jewel with unclean hands…” (Aeschylus 256). Seems Agamemnon doesn’t really want to go through with it, but he has no choice and must give something up. If Orestes did find out about what he had done, Agamemnon would argue for the difficult position he was in. Being put in a tough position is really no good excuse, especially the murder of a daughter. Orestes could be tempted to side with his mother now, but he could could not do that either, because his mother did much worse to him directly by banishing him from the country. The curse on the House of Atreus must live