Euripides’ Hecuba: On Loss and Tragedy Research Assignment

Euripides’ Hecuba: On Loss and Tragedy
Name of Student
Eurpides’ Hecuba deals with the subject of loss and suffering. In the play, tragedy is seen in how loss is experienced; how everything was taken away from Hecuba. This play of the Greek mythology is one of the few that truly closes in on the concept of destruction and desolation which is anchored on a single character that becomes the embodiment of human suffering.
Hecuba, despite her being a queen, shows the core of humanity through how she has dealt with the loss of her people as well as the loss of Troy. The death of her sons and husband establisher her identity as a victim yet this is also what triggers her longing to avenge. The brutality of the play, specifically the experience of Hecuba as queen puts light to the darkness that mythology may also bring.
“What can we take on trust
In this uncertain life? Happiness, greatness,
Pride—nothing is secure, nothing keeps.
The inconsistent gods make chaos of our lives,
Pitching us about with such savagery of change
That we, out of our anguish and uncertainty,
May turn to them.
But how does my sorrow help?
Your loss remains.”[Hecuba, p.50]
In this lamentation, it is clear how suffering has changed the life of Hecuba. The loss she experienced has come in multitudes which helmed the slow yet abrupt change in her character. Through loss, this Trojan queen has definitely let emotions overpower the rest of her disposition in life. The ruin that she was left in was the anchor with how life is defined by Euripides in this play; it is loss, destruction and darkness which is followed by finding a way to still get through all this.
“And now you know:
Life is held on loan
The price of life is death.
Those who take a life—
Repay it with their own.
Justice and the gods
Exact the loan at last.”[Hecuba, p. 56]
In this part of the Chorus of the play, it is clear how the recognition of death, as associated to multiple deaths that Hecuba has experienced, is what led to her newer understanding of life. This understanding shaped Hecuba’s understanding of moral justice in relation to what has happened to Troy. From the victim of suffering and loss, Hecuba came out to shape her identity that would also long to bring forth suffering and loss to who brought it to her. As she accepted death, she also accepted that death in return would be the only solution.
Euripides’ Darkest Timeline
In the story and character of Hecuba, Euripides was able to craft a tragedy that is considered one of Greek mythology’s darkest timelines. The loss that Hecuba and Troy, symbolically, has experienced is so great that this truly embodies what tragedy should be all about. As Hecuba is faced with destruction, she makes it a point to find a way to rise from this and this was through vengeance.
The character of Hecuba is transformed from one that is vulnerable from loss to one who is so willing to seek vengeance. And once she has succeeded, she embodied a queen who was wrathful and who would go through all odds in order to achieve ...