As they trade threats, Clytemnestra acts as a peacemaker, telling the Chorus that she and Aegisthus could not have acted any other way, and that peace must now reign in Argos under her rule. The defeated Chorus accepts their authority, but declares that when Orestes returns, he will exact vengeance for his father's murder. Aegisthus and Clytemnestra dismiss these words as empty threats, and together they take up the reins of the state.
Many versions of Agamemnon's story circulated in Aeschylus' time. In some, Aegisthus, not Clytemnestra, stabs the King. Aeschylus chose to celebrate the heroine at the expense of her lover, however, and so Aegisthus appears here as a strutting fool, a poor match for his bold mate. He has skulked in the shadows while she committed the murderous deed, and now he emerges only to bluster and threaten the Chorus.
The terrible story of his family and his brothers' miserable fate wins him some sympathy from the audience, but now that his years in exile have ended, it seems that the only thing he learned in the wilderness was how to bully others into submission. Indeed, Clytemnestra herself appears diminished by her connection to Aegisthus, and their affair is a necessary step in shifting the audience's sympathy from Clytemnestra to her son Orestes in the next play.
Several critics have questioned why Clytemnestra's plot succeeded; why does the Chorus, and all of Argos, submit to a husband- murderer, a blustering braggart and his group of thugs?
The Chorus repeatedly threatens to exile or execute the adulterous couple. Why do they not carry out their threats? From the creators of SparkNotes, something better.
Literature Poetry Lit Terms Shakescleare. Download this LitChart! Teachers and parents! Struggling with distance learning? Our Teacher Edition on Agamemnon can help. Themes All Themes. Symbols All Symbols. Theme Wheel. Everything you need for every book you read. The way the content is organized and presented is seamlessly smooth, innovative, and comprehensive.
He goes to his death unaware of his fate. The play's protagonist, Clytemnestra is Agamemnon's wife and has ruled Argos in his absence.
She plans his murder with ruthless determination, and feels no guilt after his death; she is convinced of her own rectitude and of the justice of killing the man who killed her daughter. She is, a sympathetic character in many respects, but the righteousness of her crime is tainted by her entanglement with Aegisthus. Even so, Aeschylus makes it clear that Agamemnon's death must be avenged.
The elder citizens of Argos, who were too old to fight in the Trojan War. They serve as advisors to Queen Clytemnestra during Agamemnon's absence, and provide commentary on the action of the play. Their speeches provide the background for the action, for they foreshadow the King's death when they describe the events of the Trojan War and discuss the dangers of human pride.
A Trojan priestess, captured by Agamemnon and carried to Argos as his slave and mistress. She was Apollo's lover. Apollo gave her the gift of prophecy, but when she refused to bear him a child, he punished her by making all around her disbelieve her predictions. She sees the ancestral curse afflicting Agamemnon's family, and predicts both his death and her own, as well as the vengeance brought by Orestes in the next play.
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