Hippolytus - Virtuous Tyranny vs. Compassion
Thoughts On: Hippolytus (Ἱππόλυτος, 428 BC)
Phaedra, wife of Theseus, kills herself for having fallen in love with her step-son, yet condemns him for condemning her, leaving Theseus to curse his son to death.
Hippolytus is a play by Ancient Greek playwrite, Euripides. Often noted as a tragedy, Hippolytus tells a tale of desire, honour and death, but is difficult to pin down as a tragedy because of the relationship between theme and drama. Thematically and in terms of plot, this is a serious story that sees Aphrodite, god of love and pleasure, and Artemis, god of virginity and hunting, attempt to hold influence over a family. Pushing directly into the subtext of the narrative, this is about a family who face a difficult truth that tears them between the sophrosyne and the hedonistic, between moderation and expression, between chastity and pleasure. Aphrodite represents hedonism; Artemis sophrosynity. Aphrodite takes possession of the second wife of Theseus (he who slayed the Minotaur), Phaedra, and has her fall in live with a devotee to Artemis, Hippolytus, who is Theseus' son (he was conceived with an Amazon). There are two other characters who play key parts in this narrative: Phaedra's Nurse and Theseus himself. Both of these characters are tasked with confronting the truth of the love between Phaedra and Hippolytus, of making decisions in face of it, whilst Phaedra and Hippolytus, despite being the primary pillars of the dramatic truth, have to harbour and conceal it; Phaedra is ashamed, willing to die before acting on the lust that Aphrodite put within her and Hippolytus is disgusted, entirely unwilling to engage Phaedra by virtue of his chastity, yet also obliged to not reveal how he learned of the truth for fear of betraying his vow of silence to the Nurse, who reveals the secret.
The plot, with such a description, may seem muddled, but we shall return to a clearer explanation. Before this, it must be noted that, whilst the theme is of a serious nature in this play, the drama is not. Undoubtedly melodramatic, yet possibly satirical, maybe comedic, the action of characters in this narrative is highly contrived so that the characters themselves become symbols, objects possessed by themes so explicitly that one does not feel their humanity. At least, I believe this to be the case with Hippolytus and Theseus in particular. Both of these figures act with incredible hubris, with very basic reasoning, before a character in Phaedra who very much so seems trapped and, though irrationally depressed, rationally fearful. Because Phaedra has more logical reasoning build her character and influence her place in the general drama, she welcomes empathy where Theseus and Hippolytus do not; we understand her actions as she reasons them, yet we see Theseus' and Hippolytus' actions through their misguided sophrosynity; they become the fools who stumble over their own feet once tripped by deception whilst Phaedra is a victim of her own impulse (or, if we read the play literally, of Aphrodite). And it does not help that Euripides opens his narrative with exposition from Aphrodite herself, who speaks with a truthful tone of the gods' pridefullness, yet also of the arrogance of Hippolytus, who is constantly selling himself as one of the most virtuous men who has ever existed. It then becomes easy to lean towards Aphrodite's view and see Hippolytus as more the fool than the tragic hero, the victim of his own arrogance, less of a fate and the gods; furthermore, it is easy to agree with Aphrodite's philosophy over Artemis', to see the value in family and little virtue in simply remaining chaste. Because there is this discord in the drama, because it does not play seriously, and because there is further discord between theme and drama, this does not feel particularly tragic, instead, it feels particularly messy - more funny than catastrophic. And the difference between a tragic mess and a comedic mess is simple: one would rather clean up a comedic mess. So, rather than feel the endless impasse of a true tragedy, one feels that the mess that Hippolytus becomes could have been avoided and sorted through at many points.
To take a step back and look at the plot in better detail, we start again with Aphrodite. She, enraged by Hippolytus' constant hunting, his pride and arrogance, his chastity, his abhoration of family - his lack of honour in her name - has his father's second wife fall in love with him. Why Aphrodite chooses to do this, to destroy a whole family and victimise Phaedra, is difficult to decipher--is probably the most complicated element of the play. However, I believe the answer resides in Theseus and the fact that Aphrodite is not just punishing Hippolytus, but Hippolytus as an ideological offspring of Theseus, who, in connection to the symbol of the bull, is a character that is in significant tangles with his own nature.
To make things more clear, it must be noted that Euripides gives this story many subtle links to Theseus' famous ordeal against the Minotaur and his bond with King Minos of Crete, who, to frame things simply, was considered a 'bad king'. Not only are there then allusions to the Pallentides, but Phaedra also features in this play. The Pallentides were nobles of Attica, which encompasses Athens (which Theseus was prince, later king, of). They wanted to rule Athens and so made many ploys to take the throne. One ploy involved befriending one of Minos' sons, Androgeos, who was killed by Theseus' father to prevent the Pallentides allying with Minos. (It is noteworthy that some stories suggest that Androgeos was killed by the Marathonian Bull ). Another Pallentide ploy involved a battle that Theseus prevented by slaying all fifty of the Pallentide brothers. It is for this that Theseus is said to have been exiled from Athens by Euripides in Hippolytus - how much later Theseus chooses to go into exile is very difficult to tell, but it must have been years or decades after the actual event - and reasons for this, I have not come across. Alas, it is because of the Pallentides that Euripides' play takes place in Troezen and not Athens. So, whilst there is one tie to Minos there, as subtle as it is, there is a far more concrete one in the fact that Phaedra is King Minos' daughter that Theseus encountered (abducted) during his ordeal with the Minotaur, which is the son of Minos' wife, born of a white bull that was gifted to Minos for the slaughter by Poseidon. Because Minos chose to not slaughter the bull, his wife was made to fall in love with it and conceive the Minotaur - which was put in a labyrinth. The Minotaur, symbolic of Minos' greed and power, was used to terrorise the citizens of Athens. For it was because Minos' son, Androgeos, was killed by Theseus' father for his connection to the Pallentides that King Minos decreed that Athens had to give seven of their girls and boys to Crete. These children were sent into the labyrinth and killed by the Minotaur until Theseus one day slew it. Other stories suggest that it was because Theseus captured and sacrificed the bull that Poseidon sent to Minos, and then lost a battle to him over it, that Athenian children had to be sent into the labyrinth. (Sidenote: it is this very bull, the Marathonian bull, that is said to have killed Minos' son after Theseus' father sent him to battle it. Moreover, Heracles also fought this bull as one of his labours).
What one gets from this picture of Theseus' relationship with Minos is that, whilst his kingdom is intimidated and oppressed by Minos', he remains the better king; he who is smarter, who fulfils Poseidon's wish (in a way; Theseus sacrificed the bull to Athena and Apollo, not to Poseidon) and is more just and good. This idea is marked over and over by the image of a bull, which, for Minos seems to be a symbol of virility, and a king's power. However, whilst Minos abuses this power and has his son destroyed by it, in being the better king, Theseus is far more careful with it - at least, before Euripides' tale. After all, it is Theseus who corrects Minos' mistakes in sacrificing the bull sent by Poseidon and in ending Minos' rule of terror by slaying the Minotaur. And it is for this that Theseus seemingly won the love of Minos' daughters, Phaedra being one of them, the one he later married. The bull, to Theseus, then is a marker of his kingly virility that can potentially become tyranny. This is so important to recognise as it is the story of Hippolytus that sees the symbol of the bull become tyranny again; after it all, Poseidon, at the wish of Theseus, uses the bull to kill Hippolytus in the end of the narrative.
To delve a little deeper into the symbology of the bull, it would be important to make account of the story of Zeus and Europa. Europa was a Phoenician princess descendent of Io and Zeus (Poseidon is also in the family lineage; he ravaged Zeus and Io's granddaughter, Libya). Zeus, however, falls in love with Europa upon seeing her, and so decides to disguise himself as a white bull. Europa touches the cow and eventually climbs on its back, at which point it bolts into the ocean and swims away to Crete. On land, Zeus transforms again and sleeps with Europa, making her mother to three children: Rhadamanthus, Sarpedon and Minos.
What we see here is Zeus himself placing the symbol of the bull at the very top our expanded story; it is the bull that conceives Minos, it is the bull that Poseidon sends to Minos to confirm he is king, it is the bull that Minos' wife mates with, it is the bull that one of Minos' sons becomes, that kills another of his sons; it is the bull that Theseus tames and sacrifices in Marathon, it is the bull, the Minotaur, that Theseus destroys in Crete, but it is the bull that kills Theseus' son. The bull in this symbolic lineage remains an image of kingly decision and virility. It is then bound to sexuality, Zeus himself seducing and abducting Europa, yet is also a signifier of compassion, purity and the king, Zeus as the white bull. More than complicated, this symbol bears a dichotomy between tyranny, Zeus abducting Europa, and compassion, Zeus' love for Europa. It then seems to encompass the ancient Greek concept of what a king was; he took what he wanted to posses (most commonly women; this is how Theseus acquires Phaedra), yet could only do so because he was perceived as virtuous. The king as the good bull is loved by his captors. And in the case of Zeus and Europa, this seems to be a comment on Zeus representing the heavens and light and "Europa" being a name connoting the earth and darkness. The bull in respect to this is an agent mediating between light and dark, yin and yang, male and female; if the bull is good, it is pure and loved and brings men and women together, if it is tyrannous, like Minos and his wife's son, the Minotaur, it is dark and feared and so tears families apart. In this, purity lies in a Grecian celebration of the light of the patriarch and a warning of the darkness in the corruption of females - in females aligning with he who is bad. This seems to be why Europa's son, Minos, is initially considered to be good (he is the product of a union between a light patriarch and the obliging, nurturing wife), but, once he becomes bad, produces the Minotaur by turning his wife away from him. The same can be said in regards to Theseus; he is the good bull until he believes that his son slept with his wife, and then a bull emerges to act out his tyranny and kill Hippolytus.
The bull is the punisher and the saviour; he saves women when he initially manifests, but punishes men through women when he is called upon and betrayed. This is true in the case of Minos and, as is seen in Hippolytus, this is true for Theseus too. And so the bull is ultimately an embodiment of both compassion and tyranny; it reveals the nature of a king, good when he is, destructive when he is.
In Euripides' tale Theseus is the good bull to Minos, the bad bull. Theseus' virtue is bestowed upon Hippolytus and so he acts out the virtues of a king in being a great hunter, master of animals - yet, it is noteworthy that he remains chaste and so does not express carnal passion. It must also be emphasised that Hippolytus is the product of Theseus' virility as a king known for his many female captors and lovers, one of which was Hippolytus' mother, Queen of the Amazons. With Theseus embodying the bull to win over the Amazon queen and conceive a child, we start to understand why Aphrodite may overshadow his family.
The Amazons are of a class of mythological woman that we may assume would naturally be enemies of Aphrodite; they hated men, they did not live with them, though they may have used them, and so they were antithetical to Aphrodite as an image of love and marriage. As a result, the Amazons embodied a Greek female archetype of the 'other', of masculine and female, female without the masculine, and the unnatural, a little like Artemis.
The Artemis-Aphrodite dichotomy is one that seemingly represents two female idols; the lover and the virgin. There are many female lovers and virgins in Greek mythology, and so often are they punished, like Persephone or Medusa, for their naivety. (Euripides continues this tradition). However, whilst Artemis is pure, she is also a hunter; she can protect herself and so, like the Amazons, is alien to men, but not prey. Aphrodite seems to represent a more classical order in which women remain idols, but, with duty to procreation and family, do not remain chaste and truly pure. It is because this order is flipped by the Amazons and Artemis alike that they appear incompatible with men, however idolised. This issue arises in Hippolytus - in fact, it is the most central issue of the narrative. The Amazons and Artemis, who both Theseus and Hippolytus are aligned with (Theseus only in the creation of Hippolytus; the Amazon Queen who mothered him died not long after, and then Theseus married Phaedra), are bound to high virtue. To re-introduce the symbol of the bull, it is by embodying this pure image of virulence that both Hippolytus and Theseus conquer nature, yet remain virtuous, that they come closer to Artemis and the Amazons respectively. To rephrase, they act with virtue - power seemingly being a Grecian virtue - by conquering. However, in exhibiting their power, in capturing an Amazon queen or honouring Artemis, both Theseus and Hippolytus aren't necessarily showcasing the virtue of compassion. One could argue that Theseus does in marrying the Amazon, but that Hippolytus doesn't - which is what enrages Aphrodite. And so I believe the conflict of Euripides' narrative is born here. It is because Hippolytus aims for virtue in purity and conquest that he disregards the virtues Aphrodite represents. She sees Hippolytus' quest for virtue, for chastity before Artemis, to be arrogant. This arrogance is born of the shadow-denying individual; he who thinks they are perfectly moral and incorruptible. Theseus is not entirely shadow-denying like Hippolytus, but Aphrodite seems to want to test this, to see if he can believe that his wife could be as impure as he - he who is a murderer and womaniser, yet also considered a good king and father - to test if he could see his son as the virgin he claims to be. In this is a task put to Theseus that asks him to see imperfection with compassion; to see his wife as a liar and son as a virgin (a quality that does not necessarily make a virtuous man - especially if he is to be king; he must have an heir). For Theseus to see his wife as a liar, to either believe that she lies in her suicide letter condemning Hippolytus or believe that she loved Hippolytus, would be to see imperfection in himself; to see that he had a wife that could not speak the truth to him or that his son was more attractive than him. Such is also true in regards to Theseus' relationship to his son; to believe that he denied Phaedra would reveal that Hippolytus was possibly more honourable than he or (in a twisted sense) that Hippolytus, as a fault of character, wouldn't sleep with his wife. (Theseus' logic possibly being: You wouldn't sleep with my wife!? What is wrong with you? What have I raised?). Ultimately, in idolising his wife and condemning his son, Theseus preserves the highest virtue he can - but only to a tragic effect.
What makes Aphrodite's test is so important is that it questions the line between love and virtue; can love make us impure? This is something I believe Aphrodite embodies to a degree, she is love without the pretence of purity; purity is left to creatures such as the Amazons (maybe ironically) who deny men live with them, and gods such as Artemis who commit to chastity. In inducing this tragedy, in having Phaedra fall for Hippolytus, Aphrodite tests Theseus' conception of this, punishing his son and wife who seek purity only, not love, and in turn call out his purity (which manifests as tyranny) and not love. To rephrase, what Aphrodite does in this narrative is attempt to reveal the compassion that may emerge from and embody impurity; the tragedy of the matter is the unmoving, unchanging virtue that characters try to embody, that only becomes more intensely incessant until it emerges as a tyrannical force; Aphrodite shows how an attempt to be pure can only lead to needless suffering.
What we then see play out from after Aphrodite explains her plan to tear apart Theseus' family is Phaedra attempt to remain pure - even if it will kill her, she will not act on her lust and sleep with Hippolytus. In keeping his own chastity, the, what you might call, goody-two-shoes son that is Hippolytus also keeps his purity. Yet he denies Phaedra compassion in doing this, he drives her to suicide (we can return to how later), and so divorces himself from a form of love towards his step-mother. In denying Phaedra compassion because he is so virtuous, he calls out her wrath, which in turn calls out the 'virtuous wrath' of Theseus. Phaedra then writes a letter that condemns Hippolytus before killing herself, which leads Theseus to send his own son into exile where he dies. This is only to Theseus' own pain, however. He acted without compassion towards his son, only sought virtue for himself, and so all that is left is for the pure to weep with Artemis.
The crucial element to emphasise here is that Aphrodite now seems to be representing the truth used well. In being loving, yet impure, Aphrodite has a shadow. Euripides portrays the moral make-up of Aphrodite to be higher than the moral make-up of Artemis, Theseus and Hippolytus. Whilst one could argue against this with their own interpretation of Greek myth and see Artemis and the superior moral power, it stands that Artemis, Theseus and Hippolytus are shown to be fools by Euripides, betrayed by hubris, Theseus and Hippolytus blinded to compassion for others and in turn inviting malice unto themselves. And what ignites this all is a character we have not yet discussed: the Nurse.
Phaedra's Nurse is the most compassionate character in all of the play - at some points, I may have even risked being mistaken in believing she was an incarnation of Aphrodite herself. She cares for Phaedra as she wastes away, refusing to eat, and she wants to find out why. After much pressing, the Nurse is finally told the truth that Phaedra is starving herself to death so that she does not act upon the lust that she feels for Hippolytus. In realising the complexity of the situation and Phaedra's foolhardy sense of love and virtue, she attempts to resolve it, to have Phaedra place love above virtue instead of virtue above love and not kill herself, instead, open up to Hippolytus. She then, against Phaedra's will, who wants to waste away without effect, gets Hippolytus and informs him of the situation, holding him to a vow that he cannot speak to anyone of what she will tell him. (Because of this, Hippolytus, bound by the honour of his word, cannot later tell his father that the Nurse knows that Phaedra never actually slept with him, hence proving his innocence). In meeting Phaedra, Hippolytus laments the entire existence of women, wishing there could only be men in the world and that they could just buy embryos and raise children themselves (this notion is a turning point for his character towards absurdity). He then savagely denies Phaedra when she herself doesn't even want to act on her lust. Furthermore, he vows to bring his father to her and her Nurse and see the two react now that the truth is out. It is this that drives Phaedra to suicide. The Nurse unleashes truth out of compassion - so that Phaedra does not kill herself. However, one act of compassion does not lead to another as Hippolytus is unwilling to make a return, to become impure by keeping the secret of Phaedra's love - even if that means not acing upon it. And so we now see why Euripides holds Aphrodite in highest moral regard; she is willing to be impure, to be proud and even lustful, yet remain compassionate as to not only act out the truth, but promote it. If Phaedra was to follow in Aphrodite footsteps, she would release the truth. If Hippolytus was to follow in her footsteps he would take on the secret of Phaedra's love with compassion and help her live - this is what the Nurse attempts, and for this, she is allowed to exit the tragedy, though a failure, relatively untouched by the chaos. And if Theseus imitated Aphrodite, all would be resolved whenever the truth emerged. One may then have faith in Aphrodite's compassion and hope she reverse Phaedra's affliction.
Alas, what occurs to Hippolytus before the Nurse occurs to Theseus before his son. He does not mimic Aphrodite (as he would have done many times before), and instead of expressing compassion when confronted with his dead wife's body (he doesn't get too choked up about this sight, it must be noted), he decides to act with blind virtue. He then believes his wife's word and will not hear his son; he follows duty without a sign of compassion, and betrays his son without mind; Hippolytus had just done the same thing to Phaedra let us not forget - and just as she died because of this, so does Hippolytus. Theseus curses his son by invoking Poseidon, whose favour Theseus is assumed to have won. He calls for Poseidon to kill his son for betraying his father's virtue as a husband. And so when Hippolytus is sent away and reaches the coast, a bull emerges from the water, scares Hippolytus' horses, who runs, off dragging him, smashing his body against rocks and opening up his skin. What this moment seemingly symbolises is the virtue of the bull, of kingly virulence becoming tyranny: Theseus becomes Minos. Theseus becomes Minos in that he betrays Poseidon, unknowingly using his gift for wickedness. Furthermore, just as Minos probably believed he was doing justice through tyranny by sending Athenian children into the labyrinth to be killed by the Minotaur, so does Theseus think he is doing justice through tyranny by condemning his son to death.
Ultimately, it seems that through Theseus, there comes Aphrodite's punishment of purity. To unpack this, it must be recognised that, throughout this play, purity is linked to naivety; to virginity, to mistakes and unknowing, to animals. We see purity's connection stressed most through the horse. The horse is an animal, and thus it is naive and pure (something that Jung discusses further in The Phenomenology of the Spirit In Fairytales - specifically in the section on Theriomorphic Spirit Symbolism). Particularly bound to the horse are Artemis, the Amazons and Hippolytus - and this is through their characteristic hunting/battle. The horse for these figures represents their strength in connection to their virtuous abstraction from relationships. It then becomes ironic, yet natural that, just as Hippolytus' naivety betrays him, so does his horse - and in spite of the fact that the Amazons are always close to their horses and that Artemis is the goddess of the hunt. The fact that horses kill Hippolytus and the fact that his name is interpreted as meaning, "destroyed by horses," makes the cycle between a lack of compassion and an abundance of virtue producing damning naivety complete.
Bringing his narrative to a close, Euripides inserts some of his greatest irony. Hippolytus, on the brink of death, is brought to Theseus, and there emerges Artemis who explains all. Son and father then console one another, wallowing in the tragedy whilst Artemis tries to provide some consolation - primary of which is her vow to kill he who loves Aphrodite most, hence furthering the cycle of virtuous tyranny. Alas, because Artemis is so pure, she cannot be there at the final moment of death for Hippolytus; her purity has her leave. This lack of compassion from Artemis, her refusal to be tainted by impurity and death, that is embedded into her power as a god says most about this narrative as it is, in many respects, all about not being there for someone as they die. In such, almost all deaths occur out of sight, almost no one willing or able to prevent them, or to make the transition into the other world smoother (all but the Nurse). It is only Hippolytus that dies before his father, though, not before Artemis - but, by the end, Theseus has realised the necessity for compassion, the necessity of imitating Aphrodite above Artemis.
What emerges from this narrative is a ritual. It is said that virgins who are to be married cut off a lock of their hair in the name of Hippolytus. This consolation for the woes of Hippolytus bears a reminder to all of those entangled in compassion as they wed that one looses a part of what is pure and seemingly whole in them when they follow love. Yet losing one's purity, one's virginity and naivety, is not a tragedy as, in losing part of ourselves through compassion, we gain more in the form of another person.
To conclude, I can only say that Euripides' Hippolytus is a simple narrative made difficult by its symbolic place in Greek mythology. However, in trying to come to terms with this symbolic place as we have today, there emerges a definitive story about sacrifice and love through a rather meandering, sometimes ironic and comedic, tragedy. But, I do not want to imply that all to be said about this play has been said. So, have you read Hippolytus? What are your thoughts?
Previous post:
End Of The Week Shorts #63
Next post:
The Harder They Come - Crime, Punishment & Insight
More from me:
aamazon.com/author/danielslack
Phaedra, wife of Theseus, kills herself for having fallen in love with her step-son, yet condemns him for condemning her, leaving Theseus to curse his son to death.
Hippolytus is a play by Ancient Greek playwrite, Euripides. Often noted as a tragedy, Hippolytus tells a tale of desire, honour and death, but is difficult to pin down as a tragedy because of the relationship between theme and drama. Thematically and in terms of plot, this is a serious story that sees Aphrodite, god of love and pleasure, and Artemis, god of virginity and hunting, attempt to hold influence over a family. Pushing directly into the subtext of the narrative, this is about a family who face a difficult truth that tears them between the sophrosyne and the hedonistic, between moderation and expression, between chastity and pleasure. Aphrodite represents hedonism; Artemis sophrosynity. Aphrodite takes possession of the second wife of Theseus (he who slayed the Minotaur), Phaedra, and has her fall in live with a devotee to Artemis, Hippolytus, who is Theseus' son (he was conceived with an Amazon). There are two other characters who play key parts in this narrative: Phaedra's Nurse and Theseus himself. Both of these characters are tasked with confronting the truth of the love between Phaedra and Hippolytus, of making decisions in face of it, whilst Phaedra and Hippolytus, despite being the primary pillars of the dramatic truth, have to harbour and conceal it; Phaedra is ashamed, willing to die before acting on the lust that Aphrodite put within her and Hippolytus is disgusted, entirely unwilling to engage Phaedra by virtue of his chastity, yet also obliged to not reveal how he learned of the truth for fear of betraying his vow of silence to the Nurse, who reveals the secret.
The plot, with such a description, may seem muddled, but we shall return to a clearer explanation. Before this, it must be noted that, whilst the theme is of a serious nature in this play, the drama is not. Undoubtedly melodramatic, yet possibly satirical, maybe comedic, the action of characters in this narrative is highly contrived so that the characters themselves become symbols, objects possessed by themes so explicitly that one does not feel their humanity. At least, I believe this to be the case with Hippolytus and Theseus in particular. Both of these figures act with incredible hubris, with very basic reasoning, before a character in Phaedra who very much so seems trapped and, though irrationally depressed, rationally fearful. Because Phaedra has more logical reasoning build her character and influence her place in the general drama, she welcomes empathy where Theseus and Hippolytus do not; we understand her actions as she reasons them, yet we see Theseus' and Hippolytus' actions through their misguided sophrosynity; they become the fools who stumble over their own feet once tripped by deception whilst Phaedra is a victim of her own impulse (or, if we read the play literally, of Aphrodite). And it does not help that Euripides opens his narrative with exposition from Aphrodite herself, who speaks with a truthful tone of the gods' pridefullness, yet also of the arrogance of Hippolytus, who is constantly selling himself as one of the most virtuous men who has ever existed. It then becomes easy to lean towards Aphrodite's view and see Hippolytus as more the fool than the tragic hero, the victim of his own arrogance, less of a fate and the gods; furthermore, it is easy to agree with Aphrodite's philosophy over Artemis', to see the value in family and little virtue in simply remaining chaste. Because there is this discord in the drama, because it does not play seriously, and because there is further discord between theme and drama, this does not feel particularly tragic, instead, it feels particularly messy - more funny than catastrophic. And the difference between a tragic mess and a comedic mess is simple: one would rather clean up a comedic mess. So, rather than feel the endless impasse of a true tragedy, one feels that the mess that Hippolytus becomes could have been avoided and sorted through at many points.
To take a step back and look at the plot in better detail, we start again with Aphrodite. She, enraged by Hippolytus' constant hunting, his pride and arrogance, his chastity, his abhoration of family - his lack of honour in her name - has his father's second wife fall in love with him. Why Aphrodite chooses to do this, to destroy a whole family and victimise Phaedra, is difficult to decipher--is probably the most complicated element of the play. However, I believe the answer resides in Theseus and the fact that Aphrodite is not just punishing Hippolytus, but Hippolytus as an ideological offspring of Theseus, who, in connection to the symbol of the bull, is a character that is in significant tangles with his own nature.
To make things more clear, it must be noted that Euripides gives this story many subtle links to Theseus' famous ordeal against the Minotaur and his bond with King Minos of Crete, who, to frame things simply, was considered a 'bad king'. Not only are there then allusions to the Pallentides, but Phaedra also features in this play. The Pallentides were nobles of Attica, which encompasses Athens (which Theseus was prince, later king, of). They wanted to rule Athens and so made many ploys to take the throne. One ploy involved befriending one of Minos' sons, Androgeos, who was killed by Theseus' father to prevent the Pallentides allying with Minos. (It is noteworthy that some stories suggest that Androgeos was killed by the Marathonian Bull ). Another Pallentide ploy involved a battle that Theseus prevented by slaying all fifty of the Pallentide brothers. It is for this that Theseus is said to have been exiled from Athens by Euripides in Hippolytus - how much later Theseus chooses to go into exile is very difficult to tell, but it must have been years or decades after the actual event - and reasons for this, I have not come across. Alas, it is because of the Pallentides that Euripides' play takes place in Troezen and not Athens. So, whilst there is one tie to Minos there, as subtle as it is, there is a far more concrete one in the fact that Phaedra is King Minos' daughter that Theseus encountered (abducted) during his ordeal with the Minotaur, which is the son of Minos' wife, born of a white bull that was gifted to Minos for the slaughter by Poseidon. Because Minos chose to not slaughter the bull, his wife was made to fall in love with it and conceive the Minotaur - which was put in a labyrinth. The Minotaur, symbolic of Minos' greed and power, was used to terrorise the citizens of Athens. For it was because Minos' son, Androgeos, was killed by Theseus' father for his connection to the Pallentides that King Minos decreed that Athens had to give seven of their girls and boys to Crete. These children were sent into the labyrinth and killed by the Minotaur until Theseus one day slew it. Other stories suggest that it was because Theseus captured and sacrificed the bull that Poseidon sent to Minos, and then lost a battle to him over it, that Athenian children had to be sent into the labyrinth. (Sidenote: it is this very bull, the Marathonian bull, that is said to have killed Minos' son after Theseus' father sent him to battle it. Moreover, Heracles also fought this bull as one of his labours).
What one gets from this picture of Theseus' relationship with Minos is that, whilst his kingdom is intimidated and oppressed by Minos', he remains the better king; he who is smarter, who fulfils Poseidon's wish (in a way; Theseus sacrificed the bull to Athena and Apollo, not to Poseidon) and is more just and good. This idea is marked over and over by the image of a bull, which, for Minos seems to be a symbol of virility, and a king's power. However, whilst Minos abuses this power and has his son destroyed by it, in being the better king, Theseus is far more careful with it - at least, before Euripides' tale. After all, it is Theseus who corrects Minos' mistakes in sacrificing the bull sent by Poseidon and in ending Minos' rule of terror by slaying the Minotaur. And it is for this that Theseus seemingly won the love of Minos' daughters, Phaedra being one of them, the one he later married. The bull, to Theseus, then is a marker of his kingly virility that can potentially become tyranny. This is so important to recognise as it is the story of Hippolytus that sees the symbol of the bull become tyranny again; after it all, Poseidon, at the wish of Theseus, uses the bull to kill Hippolytus in the end of the narrative.
To delve a little deeper into the symbology of the bull, it would be important to make account of the story of Zeus and Europa. Europa was a Phoenician princess descendent of Io and Zeus (Poseidon is also in the family lineage; he ravaged Zeus and Io's granddaughter, Libya). Zeus, however, falls in love with Europa upon seeing her, and so decides to disguise himself as a white bull. Europa touches the cow and eventually climbs on its back, at which point it bolts into the ocean and swims away to Crete. On land, Zeus transforms again and sleeps with Europa, making her mother to three children: Rhadamanthus, Sarpedon and Minos.
What we see here is Zeus himself placing the symbol of the bull at the very top our expanded story; it is the bull that conceives Minos, it is the bull that Poseidon sends to Minos to confirm he is king, it is the bull that Minos' wife mates with, it is the bull that one of Minos' sons becomes, that kills another of his sons; it is the bull that Theseus tames and sacrifices in Marathon, it is the bull, the Minotaur, that Theseus destroys in Crete, but it is the bull that kills Theseus' son. The bull in this symbolic lineage remains an image of kingly decision and virility. It is then bound to sexuality, Zeus himself seducing and abducting Europa, yet is also a signifier of compassion, purity and the king, Zeus as the white bull. More than complicated, this symbol bears a dichotomy between tyranny, Zeus abducting Europa, and compassion, Zeus' love for Europa. It then seems to encompass the ancient Greek concept of what a king was; he took what he wanted to posses (most commonly women; this is how Theseus acquires Phaedra), yet could only do so because he was perceived as virtuous. The king as the good bull is loved by his captors. And in the case of Zeus and Europa, this seems to be a comment on Zeus representing the heavens and light and "Europa" being a name connoting the earth and darkness. The bull in respect to this is an agent mediating between light and dark, yin and yang, male and female; if the bull is good, it is pure and loved and brings men and women together, if it is tyrannous, like Minos and his wife's son, the Minotaur, it is dark and feared and so tears families apart. In this, purity lies in a Grecian celebration of the light of the patriarch and a warning of the darkness in the corruption of females - in females aligning with he who is bad. This seems to be why Europa's son, Minos, is initially considered to be good (he is the product of a union between a light patriarch and the obliging, nurturing wife), but, once he becomes bad, produces the Minotaur by turning his wife away from him. The same can be said in regards to Theseus; he is the good bull until he believes that his son slept with his wife, and then a bull emerges to act out his tyranny and kill Hippolytus.
The bull is the punisher and the saviour; he saves women when he initially manifests, but punishes men through women when he is called upon and betrayed. This is true in the case of Minos and, as is seen in Hippolytus, this is true for Theseus too. And so the bull is ultimately an embodiment of both compassion and tyranny; it reveals the nature of a king, good when he is, destructive when he is.
In Euripides' tale Theseus is the good bull to Minos, the bad bull. Theseus' virtue is bestowed upon Hippolytus and so he acts out the virtues of a king in being a great hunter, master of animals - yet, it is noteworthy that he remains chaste and so does not express carnal passion. It must also be emphasised that Hippolytus is the product of Theseus' virility as a king known for his many female captors and lovers, one of which was Hippolytus' mother, Queen of the Amazons. With Theseus embodying the bull to win over the Amazon queen and conceive a child, we start to understand why Aphrodite may overshadow his family.
The Amazons are of a class of mythological woman that we may assume would naturally be enemies of Aphrodite; they hated men, they did not live with them, though they may have used them, and so they were antithetical to Aphrodite as an image of love and marriage. As a result, the Amazons embodied a Greek female archetype of the 'other', of masculine and female, female without the masculine, and the unnatural, a little like Artemis.
The Artemis-Aphrodite dichotomy is one that seemingly represents two female idols; the lover and the virgin. There are many female lovers and virgins in Greek mythology, and so often are they punished, like Persephone or Medusa, for their naivety. (Euripides continues this tradition). However, whilst Artemis is pure, she is also a hunter; she can protect herself and so, like the Amazons, is alien to men, but not prey. Aphrodite seems to represent a more classical order in which women remain idols, but, with duty to procreation and family, do not remain chaste and truly pure. It is because this order is flipped by the Amazons and Artemis alike that they appear incompatible with men, however idolised. This issue arises in Hippolytus - in fact, it is the most central issue of the narrative. The Amazons and Artemis, who both Theseus and Hippolytus are aligned with (Theseus only in the creation of Hippolytus; the Amazon Queen who mothered him died not long after, and then Theseus married Phaedra), are bound to high virtue. To re-introduce the symbol of the bull, it is by embodying this pure image of virulence that both Hippolytus and Theseus conquer nature, yet remain virtuous, that they come closer to Artemis and the Amazons respectively. To rephrase, they act with virtue - power seemingly being a Grecian virtue - by conquering. However, in exhibiting their power, in capturing an Amazon queen or honouring Artemis, both Theseus and Hippolytus aren't necessarily showcasing the virtue of compassion. One could argue that Theseus does in marrying the Amazon, but that Hippolytus doesn't - which is what enrages Aphrodite. And so I believe the conflict of Euripides' narrative is born here. It is because Hippolytus aims for virtue in purity and conquest that he disregards the virtues Aphrodite represents. She sees Hippolytus' quest for virtue, for chastity before Artemis, to be arrogant. This arrogance is born of the shadow-denying individual; he who thinks they are perfectly moral and incorruptible. Theseus is not entirely shadow-denying like Hippolytus, but Aphrodite seems to want to test this, to see if he can believe that his wife could be as impure as he - he who is a murderer and womaniser, yet also considered a good king and father - to test if he could see his son as the virgin he claims to be. In this is a task put to Theseus that asks him to see imperfection with compassion; to see his wife as a liar and son as a virgin (a quality that does not necessarily make a virtuous man - especially if he is to be king; he must have an heir). For Theseus to see his wife as a liar, to either believe that she lies in her suicide letter condemning Hippolytus or believe that she loved Hippolytus, would be to see imperfection in himself; to see that he had a wife that could not speak the truth to him or that his son was more attractive than him. Such is also true in regards to Theseus' relationship to his son; to believe that he denied Phaedra would reveal that Hippolytus was possibly more honourable than he or (in a twisted sense) that Hippolytus, as a fault of character, wouldn't sleep with his wife. (Theseus' logic possibly being: You wouldn't sleep with my wife!? What is wrong with you? What have I raised?). Ultimately, in idolising his wife and condemning his son, Theseus preserves the highest virtue he can - but only to a tragic effect.
What makes Aphrodite's test is so important is that it questions the line between love and virtue; can love make us impure? This is something I believe Aphrodite embodies to a degree, she is love without the pretence of purity; purity is left to creatures such as the Amazons (maybe ironically) who deny men live with them, and gods such as Artemis who commit to chastity. In inducing this tragedy, in having Phaedra fall for Hippolytus, Aphrodite tests Theseus' conception of this, punishing his son and wife who seek purity only, not love, and in turn call out his purity (which manifests as tyranny) and not love. To rephrase, what Aphrodite does in this narrative is attempt to reveal the compassion that may emerge from and embody impurity; the tragedy of the matter is the unmoving, unchanging virtue that characters try to embody, that only becomes more intensely incessant until it emerges as a tyrannical force; Aphrodite shows how an attempt to be pure can only lead to needless suffering.
What we then see play out from after Aphrodite explains her plan to tear apart Theseus' family is Phaedra attempt to remain pure - even if it will kill her, she will not act on her lust and sleep with Hippolytus. In keeping his own chastity, the, what you might call, goody-two-shoes son that is Hippolytus also keeps his purity. Yet he denies Phaedra compassion in doing this, he drives her to suicide (we can return to how later), and so divorces himself from a form of love towards his step-mother. In denying Phaedra compassion because he is so virtuous, he calls out her wrath, which in turn calls out the 'virtuous wrath' of Theseus. Phaedra then writes a letter that condemns Hippolytus before killing herself, which leads Theseus to send his own son into exile where he dies. This is only to Theseus' own pain, however. He acted without compassion towards his son, only sought virtue for himself, and so all that is left is for the pure to weep with Artemis.
The crucial element to emphasise here is that Aphrodite now seems to be representing the truth used well. In being loving, yet impure, Aphrodite has a shadow. Euripides portrays the moral make-up of Aphrodite to be higher than the moral make-up of Artemis, Theseus and Hippolytus. Whilst one could argue against this with their own interpretation of Greek myth and see Artemis and the superior moral power, it stands that Artemis, Theseus and Hippolytus are shown to be fools by Euripides, betrayed by hubris, Theseus and Hippolytus blinded to compassion for others and in turn inviting malice unto themselves. And what ignites this all is a character we have not yet discussed: the Nurse.
Phaedra's Nurse is the most compassionate character in all of the play - at some points, I may have even risked being mistaken in believing she was an incarnation of Aphrodite herself. She cares for Phaedra as she wastes away, refusing to eat, and she wants to find out why. After much pressing, the Nurse is finally told the truth that Phaedra is starving herself to death so that she does not act upon the lust that she feels for Hippolytus. In realising the complexity of the situation and Phaedra's foolhardy sense of love and virtue, she attempts to resolve it, to have Phaedra place love above virtue instead of virtue above love and not kill herself, instead, open up to Hippolytus. She then, against Phaedra's will, who wants to waste away without effect, gets Hippolytus and informs him of the situation, holding him to a vow that he cannot speak to anyone of what she will tell him. (Because of this, Hippolytus, bound by the honour of his word, cannot later tell his father that the Nurse knows that Phaedra never actually slept with him, hence proving his innocence). In meeting Phaedra, Hippolytus laments the entire existence of women, wishing there could only be men in the world and that they could just buy embryos and raise children themselves (this notion is a turning point for his character towards absurdity). He then savagely denies Phaedra when she herself doesn't even want to act on her lust. Furthermore, he vows to bring his father to her and her Nurse and see the two react now that the truth is out. It is this that drives Phaedra to suicide. The Nurse unleashes truth out of compassion - so that Phaedra does not kill herself. However, one act of compassion does not lead to another as Hippolytus is unwilling to make a return, to become impure by keeping the secret of Phaedra's love - even if that means not acing upon it. And so we now see why Euripides holds Aphrodite in highest moral regard; she is willing to be impure, to be proud and even lustful, yet remain compassionate as to not only act out the truth, but promote it. If Phaedra was to follow in Aphrodite footsteps, she would release the truth. If Hippolytus was to follow in her footsteps he would take on the secret of Phaedra's love with compassion and help her live - this is what the Nurse attempts, and for this, she is allowed to exit the tragedy, though a failure, relatively untouched by the chaos. And if Theseus imitated Aphrodite, all would be resolved whenever the truth emerged. One may then have faith in Aphrodite's compassion and hope she reverse Phaedra's affliction.
Alas, what occurs to Hippolytus before the Nurse occurs to Theseus before his son. He does not mimic Aphrodite (as he would have done many times before), and instead of expressing compassion when confronted with his dead wife's body (he doesn't get too choked up about this sight, it must be noted), he decides to act with blind virtue. He then believes his wife's word and will not hear his son; he follows duty without a sign of compassion, and betrays his son without mind; Hippolytus had just done the same thing to Phaedra let us not forget - and just as she died because of this, so does Hippolytus. Theseus curses his son by invoking Poseidon, whose favour Theseus is assumed to have won. He calls for Poseidon to kill his son for betraying his father's virtue as a husband. And so when Hippolytus is sent away and reaches the coast, a bull emerges from the water, scares Hippolytus' horses, who runs, off dragging him, smashing his body against rocks and opening up his skin. What this moment seemingly symbolises is the virtue of the bull, of kingly virulence becoming tyranny: Theseus becomes Minos. Theseus becomes Minos in that he betrays Poseidon, unknowingly using his gift for wickedness. Furthermore, just as Minos probably believed he was doing justice through tyranny by sending Athenian children into the labyrinth to be killed by the Minotaur, so does Theseus think he is doing justice through tyranny by condemning his son to death.
Ultimately, it seems that through Theseus, there comes Aphrodite's punishment of purity. To unpack this, it must be recognised that, throughout this play, purity is linked to naivety; to virginity, to mistakes and unknowing, to animals. We see purity's connection stressed most through the horse. The horse is an animal, and thus it is naive and pure (something that Jung discusses further in The Phenomenology of the Spirit In Fairytales - specifically in the section on Theriomorphic Spirit Symbolism). Particularly bound to the horse are Artemis, the Amazons and Hippolytus - and this is through their characteristic hunting/battle. The horse for these figures represents their strength in connection to their virtuous abstraction from relationships. It then becomes ironic, yet natural that, just as Hippolytus' naivety betrays him, so does his horse - and in spite of the fact that the Amazons are always close to their horses and that Artemis is the goddess of the hunt. The fact that horses kill Hippolytus and the fact that his name is interpreted as meaning, "destroyed by horses," makes the cycle between a lack of compassion and an abundance of virtue producing damning naivety complete.
Bringing his narrative to a close, Euripides inserts some of his greatest irony. Hippolytus, on the brink of death, is brought to Theseus, and there emerges Artemis who explains all. Son and father then console one another, wallowing in the tragedy whilst Artemis tries to provide some consolation - primary of which is her vow to kill he who loves Aphrodite most, hence furthering the cycle of virtuous tyranny. Alas, because Artemis is so pure, she cannot be there at the final moment of death for Hippolytus; her purity has her leave. This lack of compassion from Artemis, her refusal to be tainted by impurity and death, that is embedded into her power as a god says most about this narrative as it is, in many respects, all about not being there for someone as they die. In such, almost all deaths occur out of sight, almost no one willing or able to prevent them, or to make the transition into the other world smoother (all but the Nurse). It is only Hippolytus that dies before his father, though, not before Artemis - but, by the end, Theseus has realised the necessity for compassion, the necessity of imitating Aphrodite above Artemis.
What emerges from this narrative is a ritual. It is said that virgins who are to be married cut off a lock of their hair in the name of Hippolytus. This consolation for the woes of Hippolytus bears a reminder to all of those entangled in compassion as they wed that one looses a part of what is pure and seemingly whole in them when they follow love. Yet losing one's purity, one's virginity and naivety, is not a tragedy as, in losing part of ourselves through compassion, we gain more in the form of another person.
To conclude, I can only say that Euripides' Hippolytus is a simple narrative made difficult by its symbolic place in Greek mythology. However, in trying to come to terms with this symbolic place as we have today, there emerges a definitive story about sacrifice and love through a rather meandering, sometimes ironic and comedic, tragedy. But, I do not want to imply that all to be said about this play has been said. So, have you read Hippolytus? What are your thoughts?
Previous post:
End Of The Week Shorts #63
Next post:
The Harder They Come - Crime, Punishment & Insight
More from me:
aamazon.com/author/danielslack
