{"product_id":"2940012444844","title":"THE MEDEA OF EURIPIDES","description":"The _Medea_, in spite of its background of wonder and enchantment, is\u003cbr\u003enot a romantic play but a tragedy of character and situation. It deals,\u003cbr\u003eso to speak, not with the romance itself, but with the end of the\u003cbr\u003eromance, a thing which is so terribly often the reverse of romantic. For\u003cbr\u003eall but the very highest of romances are apt to have just one flaw\u003cbr\u003esomewhere, and in the story of Jason and Medea the flaw was of a fatal\u003cbr\u003ekind.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe wildness and beauty of the Argo legend run through all Greek\u003cbr\u003eliterature, from the mass of Corinthian lays older than our present\u003cbr\u003eIliad, which later writers vaguely associate with the name of Eumêlus,\u003cbr\u003eto the Fourth Pythian Ode of Pindar and the beautiful Argonautica of\u003cbr\u003eApollonius Rhodius. Our poet knows the wildness and the beauty; but it\u003cbr\u003eis not these qualities that he specially seeks. He takes them almost for\u003cbr\u003egranted, and pierces through them to the sheer tragedy that lies below.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eJason, son of Aeson, King of Iôlcos, in Thessaly, began his life in\u003cbr\u003eexile. His uncle Pelias had seized his father's kingdom, and Jason was\u003cbr\u003eborne away to the mountains by night and given, wrapped in a purple\u003cbr\u003erobe, to Chiron, the Centaur. When he reached manhood he came down to\u003cbr\u003eIôlcos to demand, as Pindar tells us, his ancestral honour, and stood in\u003cbr\u003ethe market-place, a world-famous figure, one-sandalled, with his\u003cbr\u003epard-skin, his two spears and his long hair, gentle and wild and\u003cbr\u003efearless, as the Wise Beast had reared him. Pelias, cowed but loath to\u003cbr\u003eyield, promised to give up the kingdom if Jason would make his way to\u003cbr\u003ethe unknown land of Colchis and perform a double quest. First, if I read\u003cbr\u003ePindar aright, he must fetch back the soul of his kinsman Phrixus, who\u003cbr\u003ehad died there far from home; and, secondly, find the fleece of the\u003cbr\u003eGolden Ram which Phrixus had sacrificed. Jason undertook the quest:\u003cbr\u003egathered the most daring heroes from all parts of Hellas; built the\u003cbr\u003efirst ship, Argo, and set to sea. After all manner of desperate\u003cbr\u003eadventures he reached the land of Aiêtês, king of the Colchians, and\u003cbr\u003ethere hope failed him. By policy, by tact, by sheer courage he did all\u003cbr\u003ethat man could do. But Aiêtês was both hostile and treacherous. The\u003cbr\u003eArgonauts were surrounded, and their destruction seemed only a question\u003cbr\u003eof days when, suddenly, unasked, and by the mercy of Heaven, Aiêtês'\u003cbr\u003edaughter, Mêdêa, an enchantress as well as a princess, fell in love with\u003cbr\u003eJason. She helped him through all his trials; slew for him her own\u003cbr\u003esleepless serpent, who guarded the fleece; deceived her father, and\u003cbr\u003esecured both the fleece and the soul of Phrixus. At the last moment it\u003cbr\u003eappeared that her brother, Absyrtus, was about to lay an ambush for\u003cbr\u003eJason. She invited Absyrtus to her room, stabbed him dead, and fled with\u003cbr\u003eJason over the seas. She had given up all, and expected in return a\u003cbr\u003eperfect love.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd what of Jason? He could not possibly avoid taking Medea with him. He\u003cbr\u003eprobably rather loved her. She formed at the least a brilliant addition\u003cbr\u003eto the glory of his enterprise. Not many heroes could produce a\u003cbr\u003ebarbarian princess ready to leave all and follow them in blind trust.\u003cbr\u003eFor of course, as every one knew without the telling in fifth-century\u003cbr\u003eAthens, no legal marriage was possible between a Greek and a barbarian\u003cbr\u003efrom Colchis.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAll through the voyage home, a world-wide baffled voyage by the Ister\u003cbr\u003eand the Eridanus and the African Syrtes, Medea was still in her element,\u003cbr\u003eand proved a constant help and counsellor to the Argonauts. When they\u003cbr\u003ereached Jason's home, where Pelias was still king, things began to be\u003cbr\u003edifferent. An ordered and law-abiding Greek state was scarcely the place\u003cbr\u003efor the untamed Colchian. We only know the catastrophe. She saw with\u003cbr\u003esmothered rage how Pelias hated Jason and was bent on keeping the\u003cbr\u003ekingdom from him, and she determined to do her lover another act of\u003cbr\u003esplendid service. Making the most of her fame as an enchantress, she\u003cbr\u003epersuaded Pelias that he could, by a certain process, regain his youth.\u003cbr\u003eHe eagerly caught at the hope. His daughters tried the process upon him,\u003cbr\u003eand Pelias died in agony. Surely Jason would be grateful now!\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe real result was what it was sure to be in a civilised country. Medea\u003cbr\u003eand her lover had to fly for their lives, and Jason was debarred for\u003cbr\u003eever from succeeding to the throne of Iôlcos. Probably there was another\u003cbr\u003eresult also in Jason's mind: the conclusion that at all costs he must\u003cbr\u003esomehow separate himself from this wild beast of a woman who was ruining\u003cbr\u003ehis life. He directed their flight to Corinth, governed at the time by a\u003cbr\u003eruler of some sort, whether \"tyrant\" or king, who was growing old and\u003cbr\u003ehad an only daughter.","brand":"SAP","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47073459208432,"sku":"2940012444844","price":0.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940012444844_p0.jpg?v=1763568774","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940012444844","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}