Alright, I know, all this Greek tragedy might be getting boring for most of you. But once again, I have been persuaded to make an interesting comparison, this time between two different tragic characters. Yesterday, I saw the play Hecuba by Euripides performed here at BYU. It was tragic, naturally, and haunting to say the least. So I decided it might be fun to compare Hecuba (the fallen queen of Troy) with Oedipus (the cursed king of Thebes).
I think that these two have something in common, at least in the fact that they are doomed to misery. But, I wouldn't say that they have any other common ground beyond that. Hecuba is the victim of war, cruelty, injustice, and betrayal, and longs for revenge and even her own death. There is no clear hamartia here--she is just the victim of suffering. So naturally, she wants to make things at least a little bit more right by dealing out her own vengeful justice. The true tragedy is just us watching this once-noble woman reduced to a pitiable creature that loathes life itself.
Oedipus, by contrast, brought his doom upon his own head. His hamartia was essential to producing tragedy in the first place. In fact, without his interference, there would be nothing tragic at all. So he was very much so the instrument of destruction and suffering, both for himself and the whole cast of characters. Very different, yet still tragic. In both cases, we are quite helpless to stop the pain.
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