A Study On “Rebellious” Female Images In Ancient Greek Tragedy By The Three Great Poets

Aeschylus,Sophocles and Euripides is the most popular tragedian in ancient Greek.In their works,women with rebellious spirit constitute the distinctive characters in the Greek tragedy image system.Medea who killed her sons for revenge on her husband because of love to hate,and Clytemnestra who killed her husband for revenge for her daughter,and Antigone who looked affection too highly to against the king,and Hecuba, Cassandra and Andromache,who suffered from was and bold to revenge and complaint.these women above are all the most typical rebellious female images in ancient Greek tragedy of Aeschylus,Sophocles and Euripides.There is brand-new aesthetic implication Behind the rebellious female images.Dare to love dare hate Medea,who choose her spouse by herself and her action of revenge imply the strong response to unfair marriage system.The cost of aesthetic love, able to accomplish in the suffering of killing children.hate evil as like an enemy Clytemnestra,even she is a woman,but she have the remarkable ability to manage the city,and her action of killing her husband who killed her daughter imply the provocation of bloody city-state system.The forming of aesthetic personality, to be completed in the tragedy of killing husband. Brave fearless Antigone,who risked her lives to defy the ban for her brother’s funeral, imply the defying to the authoritarian system.The outcome of aesthetic affection, to be accomplished in sacrifice her life.Stubborn unyielding Hecuba, Cassandra and Andromache,who lived under the brutal war and cruel invasion,their tough complaint to enemy,imply their resistance to unjust war.The show of Aesthetic will,manifested in the protests and injustice.The art form of aesthetic implication, are closely related tragedy conflict, fear, and pity and depicting of characters, this highlights the rebellious female images from the aesthetic.The rebellious women in ancient Greek tragedy of Aeschylus,Sophocles and Euripides,they dare to disobedience and resistance to the existing system of the society,this is their advance. However, their behavior also showed some limitations.firstly,they show rebellious character by extreme way.secondly,they through the form of personal revenge to show the rebellious image.Although in the process of show their rebellious image has certain limitations,but these rebellious women still influences the creation of the later western scholar with their strong personality,they established the prototype of female image in western literature.