Oresteia

Identity is something that can be clearly defined and redefined but never conquered. The ancient Greeks sought to forge their own identity in a world of chaos by not limiting themselves to one definition. As a result, several different sources of spirituality and free thought contributed to the never-ending quest of the Greeks to find what’s worth keeping as everything else shifts around them. Beliefs and reason went hand in hand over time to fabricate the universal truths that the Greeks valued…

The Ineffable Role of Greek Theater The Roman philosopher Seneca once said, “Life is like a play at the theater: it does not matter how long it lasts, but how well it was played.” This is true in several ways; the majority of society will put on a mask to show others instead of their true emotions. The belief that we shield ourselves from society most likely goes back to the ancient Greeks. which raises the question: why were plays an important part of Greek culture? Theater enforced morals and…

Academic Statement The ABA-approved Paralegal Studies program enabled me to gain both academic and professional skills, from drafting documents in civil litigation matters to using trial presentation software. In the Family Law and Civil Litigation classes, I drafted several documents towards filing for divorce, temporary restraining orders, interrogatories, complaints, and responses using several case scenarios. The Paralegal Studies program focused on how technology is shaping the legal…

The life of cosmopolitan women in late-antiquity has remained something of an enigma to scholars. Perceptions of general decadence and moral impoverishment date back to the early research of historians like Edward Gibbon, who argued that a loss of virtue-ethics plagued the secular government. Authors of the 5th and 6th centuries, like Procopius and St. Augustine, offer little to undermine that notion. One would be quick to assume that the general decline in quality of life in the late…

(topic) Apollo's argument, and subsequently represented idea of justice, would be undermined immediately after he proposed it as he abandons his attempts to explain it. (point) By leaving his explanations obscure and turning attention elsewhere, Apollo reveals that even he may not know what he is saying and was using technicalities in place of sound judgement in order to win the trial in favor of Orestes. (evidence) After briefly attempting to explain the reasoning that led to his argument in…

character of divine justice. In the first play, Apollo directs Orestes to kill his own mother to impose justice, while in the latter, gods fail to save their protégée Antigone from Creon’s punishment irrespective of her loyalty to divine law. The entire Oresteia trilogy by Aeschylus is filled with the mixture of justice and vengeance. Sometimes, it is difficult to divide them or to identify the cause and the consequence…

One of the many traditional, core values of the ancient Greek culture that is held in high esteem is the concept of family. In antiquity, family was a closely held treasure that, even to Greeks, was ancient in its’ principle. Allegiance to one’s family was an everyday part of Athenian tradition, and it was a treacherous to go against one’s own heritage. Family relationships are the subject of much interest in ancient Greek myth, and are a reoccurring theme that underlies much of the literature…

The ending of Sophocles' Electra is perhaps one of the most interesting endings of the Greek tragic plays, as it is incredibly dramatic yet at the same time somewhat anticlimactic. The play ends fittingly dramatically with murder, although it never actually occurs on stage; thus, the anticlimax. Although Electra is a Greek tragedy, it does not end in utterly tragic circumstance, nor does it finish in a blaze of glory. The ending is generally interpreted in one of two ways; 'light' or 'dark',…

GREEK TRAGEDY Καλημερα! Today, I decided to take you on a journey through time and space. If you agree, we are now going to leave Australia and catch a flight whose final destination is Athens in the beginning of the fifth century BC. This century was Athens’ Golden Age: it was a political hegemony (ο ηγεμων, ονος : one who leads) which means supremacy, and its economy was growing, but what I am going to speak about today has to do with Athens’ cultural blossoming. The fifth century was the time…

Based on the conflict between Artemis and Aphrodite in Hippolytus, the conclusion which can be drawn is that the Greeks perceived their gods to be selfish, amoral, vengeful and petty, pursuing their own goals in disregard of the moral and responsible path and killing humans to attack the deities which favored said humans; the conflict between Demeter and the rest of the Olympian gods in Hymn to Demeter reinforces the notion that the gods did not care for mortals when solving conflicts between…