Interpretive questions
What is the significance of the tapestries, why does Agamemnon step on them, and why does that act seal his fate? (cf. p. 14: "Come to me now, my dearest/Down from the car of war, but never set the foot/That stamped out Troy on earth again, my great one.")
By convincing Agamemnon to go "trampling royal crimson," is she also showing her defiance of the gods to whom she was forced to give up her daughter" (p. 117, third paragraph : "There is the sea ... to bring that dear life back.")
Why is Cassandra also killed?
Why does Clytemnestra commit the killings, not Aegisthus?
Interpret Clytemnestra's line (p. 137): "By the Child's Rights, by Ruin and Fury -- the three gods to whom I sacrificed this man"?
Was Iphigenia's death a "sacrifice" or a "murder"? Agamemnon's?
Compare the roles of the watchman (pp. 83-85) and the herald (pp. 100-103, 105-107)
Why in the concluding dialog between Aegisthus and and the chorus leader does the leader question Aegithus's right to become the ruler of Argos? (pp. 143-145).
Textual analysis:
Read and interpret these two choral passages:
pp. 96-99: From "The sky stroke of god!" to "rumors voiced by women come to nothing."
pp. 107-109: From "Who -- what power named the name that drove your fate?" to "She steers all things towards their destined end."
Read and interpret the Agamemnon-Clytemnestra dialog on
pp. 110-118, from "First, with justice I salute my Argos and my gods," to "Speed our rites to their fulfillment once for all!"
Evaluative question
How does the play manifest the biblical notion (Exodus 20) of "the iniquity of the fathers being visited upon the sons"? Does this happen in real life? If it does, are we stuck or can we break free from this mold?
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