Tragic Ways of Killing a WomanIn ordinary life an Athenian woman was allowed no accomplishments beyond leading a quiet and exemplary existence as wife and mother. Her glory was to have no glory. In Greek tragedy, however, women die violently and, through violence, master their own fate. It is a genre that delights in blurring the formal frontier between masculine and feminine. Through the subtlety of her reading of these powerful and ambiguous texts, Nicole Loraux elicits an array of insights into Greek attitudes toward death, sexuality, and gender. |
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Achilles Aeschylus Agamemnon aiōra Ajax Alcestis Andromache Antigone Aristodamus Athenian Athens battle Belles Lettres blood blow body bosom breast Casabona Cassandra Choephoroe choice chorus Clytemnestra courage Creon d'Eschyle Danaids daughter dead death of women Deianira Electra epitaph Erechtheus Eumenides Euripides Eurydice Evadne father feminine funeral genre glory grecques Greek Hades Haemon hanging Hecuba heifer Helen Heracles Heraclidae hero Hippolytus human sacrifice husband Iliad immolation Iphigenia in Aulis Jocasta killed knife laimos language liver Loraux Macaria male man's manly marriage meaning Medea Menelaus Menoeceus metaphor mother mourning murder neck Neoptolemus noble death noose Oedipus Tyrannus Orestes Paris parthenos Phaedra Phoenissae Polynices Polyxena ripides rope sacrificed sacrificial victim sons of Oedipus Sophocles spectators sphage sphazō sternon strike suicide Suppliant Women Supplices sword Tauris thalamos Thanatos Thebes throat tion Trachiniae tragic translation Troades verb Vernant virgin Vocabulaire warrior wife wives woman woman's death women in tragedy words wound young girl