Comparison Of Odysseus And Hecuba

The Odyssey and Hecuba In the Odyssey, when Odysseus takes revenge on the suitors it is expected and revered as honorable and just. However, in Euripides’s Hecuba, her revenge is portrayed as savage and dishonorable. Both characters achieve their revenge through plotting murder, but where the former sees the restoration of his oikos and the salvation of his reputation, the latter relinquishes the remnants of her reputation and is doomed to a worse fate than she was already suffering as a slave. Odysseus, who accomplished his revenge through the same means as Hecuba, is praised by society and the gods because he does what is expected of him. On the other hand, Hecuba breaks the traditional ideal of noble women like Penelope and Polyxena, and …show more content…
The gods, particularly the goddess Athena, support the killing of the suitors because of the injustice they have done to Odysseus’s household and feel that the way to get revenge is to murder them, which is seen when Zeus, when speaking to Athena says, “Wasn’t this your plan, to have Odysseus pay [the suitors] back with a vengeance” (24.496-98). The support of the gods gives a firm justification of the slaying of the suitors. Not partaking in the act of vengeance would be regarded as shameful, as Odysseus tells Telemachus, “Don’t shame your ancestors. We have been strong and brave in every generation.”(24.528-29).This shows that noble men in ancient Greek society had long traditions of being “strong and brave” and if Odysseus had not sought revenge for what the suitors did to his home, he would have been breaking tradition, and would therefore be scorned by society and the …show more content…
The gods are seemingly absent throughout the play. After failing to dissuade Odysseus from sacrificing Polyxena, Hecuba cries out, “Where find a god, a force, a defender” (175-76). The gods that are supposed to distribute justice do not come to her aid, so she decides to take matters into her own hands. By doing this, Hecuba disregards her “duty”, which Odysseys tells her is “Not to let yourself be torn from [Polyxena] by force, not to contest my warrant with your fists, but bow to the strength of your troubles” (241-243) and to “Accept your lot” (349). Hecuba has no validation for her revenge besides a halfhearted consent by Agamemnon to look the other way, and that is only given after Hecuba reminds him of the duty he owes her because of his relationship with her daughter Cassandra. Hecuba, however, refuses to submit to “The slave’s lot, to know pure evil without cease, to bear what no one ought, to be crushed by force” (358-59) without taking revenge, going against Odysseus’s commands and societal expectations of her