Who is too Blame in the Oresteia?
The Story of Agamemnon accumulates more bloodshed as the pages turn. No character is without blame in pushing the plot forward which culminates in Agamemnon’s death and the tyrant Aegisthus’s ascent to the throne. If Hollywood were to remake Agamemnon I could see them telling the story as one of female revenge on shortsighted men. Agamemnon did murder his and Clytaemestra’s daughter which some could view as just cause for killing of Agamemnon. Modern audiences would find it hard to criticize Clytaemestra’s betrayal of her marital bed when Agamemnon committed the far greater crime of infanticide. However the ancient view places Helen and Clytaemestra in equal blame for the tragedy. The blame is placed on two women not out of misogyny but because of the Greek understanding of fate.
It was Helen who first “paid grace to those who had fostered [her] in blood and death” earning her the title of “priest of destruction” [730–735]. The Chorus tells us the citizenry was hesitant to fight a war for a woman who was so disloyal to her country saying to Agamemnon “When you marshalled this armament for Helen’s sake, I will not hide it, ugly style you were written in my heart” [799–801]. Some think that Helen, being a disloyal woman, is not worth fighting for but the laws of the time demand kings fight for their wives no matter how disloyal. Helen is to blame for the war in Troy, not Agamemnon or Menelaus, for she should have known what bloodshed would follow her actions. The Chorus blames Helen for the war in Troy saying “Helen, wild heart, for the multitudes, for the thousand lives you killed under Troy’s shadow, you alone, to shine in man’s memory as blood flower never to be washed out.” [1455–1460] Helen’s infirmity set in course a series of violent actions that in the Greek view are unavoidable. Fate is not mere superstition but philosophically sound. All actions call forth a reaction and so forth. The tragedy of Agamemnon springs forth from “Zues, Zues, first cause, prime mover.” [1485–1486] Wisdom is found in the voice of Cassandra who sees the tragic ending of the story from the beginning. The fool is Clyteamestra who uses fate to excuse her murder but vainly thinks the curse on the house of Atrius will not come for her.
Clyaemestra tries to excuse the murder of her husband by her hand saying that the “conflict born of ancient bitterness is not a thing new thought upon, but pondered deep in time.” [1377–1378] According to Clytaemestra she is just fulfilling the fate that Agamemnon had no way of avoiding. Clytaemestra excuses her actions arguing she is not an agent with free will but merely an actor in a play of fate. It is the vain Clytaemestra who after securing the throne for her lover Aegisthus says “No more violence.” [1653–1655] The mob, angry over their fallen king, says with a sinister smile to Clytaemestra and Aegisthus “Have your way, gorge and grow fat, soil justice, while the power is yours” knowing that fate will come for the two tyrants in time [1668–69]. The last line of the play is Clytaemestra vowing to “bring good order to our house” [1674].Clytaemestra shows her vanity once more thinking that she now can outsmart the curse on the house despite the blood she has spilled on that same house’s floor. The play ends with Clytaemestra the victor but the audience can rest assured that the curse of the house of Atrius still lives on directing the house’s new keepers to a tragic end.
