The Play of Words: Blood Ties and Power Relations in Aeschylus' "Oresteia" (Trends in Classics - Supplementary Volumes, 26)

"The play of words" examines the dynamics of interfamilial violence in the __Oresteia__. It argues that the key element of the play's discourse about violence is to be found in the inquiry for a definition of Clytemnestra's motherhood. The failure of this research challenges the reader with some open questions: who is Clytemnestra? Where is justice if a mother dies? By reading the play's narrative on interfamilial violence and matricide as a narrative of uncertainties in terms of the role of the mother figure, this book illustrates the complexity of the maternal role of Clytemnestra. It also breaks silence among scholars, who have generally portrayed Clytemnestra as the __bad__ mother who kills the children's father and as the __bad__ wife who betrays her husband. Abbreviations 13 Introduction 15 How I re-read the Oresteia: language, narrative and womanhood 15 Agamemnon 24 I Clytemnestra and Iphigeneia’s sacrifice 24 1 Clytemnestra or Iphigeneia’s mother and Agamemnon’s wife 24 2 Mother, daughter and sacrifice 29 3 Iphigeneia’s silence and paternal violence 34 4 Clytemnestra, Agamemnon’s dilemma and paternal treachery 41 5 Clytemnestra, Agamemnon’s dilemma and maternal sophronein 44 6 Clytemnestra’s motherhood, the Alastor and the Erinys 49 7 Conclusions 57 II Cassandra, the chorus and Iphigeneia’s sacrifice 58 1 Clytemnestra as an adulterous wife and a bad mother 59 2 Problematising Clytemnestra’s representation as a bad mother and a bad wife 64 3 Conclusions 69 III Clytemnestra and the war against Troy 69 1 The chorus on the war against Troy 71 2 Clytemnestra on the war against Troy 74 3 The voice of the other 81 4 Agamemnon on the war against Troy 88 5 The misuse of power 91 6 Conclusions 95 Choephoroi 96 I Clytemnestra as mother-echthros and non-tropheus 97 1 The nurse on trephein 97 2 Clytemnestra on trephein 100 3 Agamemnon as father-tropheus 105 4 Clytemnestra as mother non-tropheus and female tyrant 109 5 Conclusions 112 II Clytemnestra as mother-echthros and non-tokeus 113 1 Agamemnon as father-tokeus and Clytemnestra as mother nontokeus 113 2 The father-tokeus and the estrangement between mother and son 121 3 Conclusions 123 III Clytemnestra as mother-philos 124 1 The adulterous wife is still a mother 124 2 Clytemnestra as mother-tropheus 127 3 Clytemnestra as mother-tokeus 131 4 Maternal sophronein 136 5 Clytemnestra as mother-philos and the death of her son 139 6 Divine command against the mother and human suffering for the mother 142 7 Conclusions 144 IV Shall I kill the mother? The reality (of the metaphors) of son and mother 145 1 The blood of the mother, once again 145 2 The maternal continuum, once again 149 3 Clytemnestra’s dream and metaphorical motherhood 151 4 Orestes and Apollonian logos 154 5 Orestes’ logos and biological motherhood 156 6 Conclusions 160 Eumenides 161 1 The Erinyes and maternal sophronein 162 2 The Erinyes, their painful memory and female genealogy 169 3 The legitimacy of words 174 4 Athena’s persuasion, the Erinyes and/or Eumenides 183 5 Zeus, his Erinyes and the Trojan War 190 6 The son, the father and the war against Troy 195 7 Conclusions 198 General conclusions 200 Bibliographic References 202 Index of Names and Subjects 220 Index Locorum 222

"The play of words" examines the dynamics of interfamilial violence in the Oresteia. It argues that the key element of the play's discourse about violence is to be found in the inquiry for a definition of Clytemnestra's motherhood. The failure of this research challenges the reader with some open questions: who is Clytemnestra? Where is justice if a mother dies? By reading the play's narrative on interfamilial violence and matricide as a narrative of uncertainties in terms of the role of the mother figure, this book illustrates the complexity of the maternal role of Clytemnestra. It also breaks silence among scholars, who have generally portrayed Clytemnestra as the bad mother who kills the children's father and as the bad wife who betrays her husband.

The volume examines the dynamics of interfamilial violence in the Oresteia. It argues that the key element of the play's discourse about violence is to be found in the inquiry for a definition of Clytemnestra's motherhood. The failure of this research challenges the reader with some open questions: Who is Clytemnestra? Where is justice when a mother dies? By reading the play's narrative on interfamilial violence and matricide as a narrative of uncertainties in terms of the role of the mother figure, this book illustrates the complexity of the maternal role of Clytemnestra. It also breaks silence among scholars, who have generally portrayed Clytemnestra as the had mother who kills the children's father and as the hid wife who betrays her husband. Book jacket This book examines the dynamics of interfamilial violence in the Oresteia. It argues that the key element of the play's discourse about violence is to be found in the inquiry for a definition of Clytemnestra's motherhood. By reading the play's narrative on interfamilial violence and matricide as a narrative of uncertainties in terms of the role of the mother figure, this book illustrates the complexity of the maternal role of Clytemnestra. G.M. Chesi, Otto-Friedrich-Universität Bamberg