Euripides Medea Quotes

Stronger than lover's love is lover's hate. Incurable, in each, the wounds they make.

The fiercest anger of all, the most incurable, Is that which rages in the place of dearest love.

Hate is a bottomless cup; I will pour and pour

Of all creatures that can feel and think, we women are the worst treated things alive

Let no one think of me that I am humble or weak or passive; let them understand I am of a different kind: dangerous to my enemies, loyal to my friends. To such a life glory belongs.

My love for you was greater than my wisdom.

tell me how does it feel with my teeth in your heart!

I'd three times sooner go to war than suffer childbirth once.

Arm yourself, my heart: the thing that you must do is fearful, yet inevitable.

I know indeed what evil I intend to do, but stronger than all my afterthoughts is my fury, fury that brings upon mortals the greatest evils.

For in other ways a woman is full of fear, defenseless, dreads the sight of cold steel; but, when once she is wronged in the matter of love, no other soul can hold so many thoughts of blood.

It's human; we all put self interest first.

Mortal fate is hard. You'd best get used to it.

death is the only water to wash away this dirt

I understand too well the dreadful act I'm going to commit, but my judgement can't check my anger, and that incites the greatest evils human beings do.

Do not grieve so much for a husband lost that it wastes away your life.

She came into the world fierce and stubborn and then she learned to hate.

She sings a dark destructive song.

I will storm the Gods and shake the Universe

Who then will dare to say I'm weak or timid? No, they'll say I'm loyal as a friend, ruthless as a foe, so much like a hero destined for glory.

Better a humble heart, a lowly life. Untouched by greatness let me live - and live. Not too little, not too much: there safety lies.

Old loves are dropped when new ones come

Since I am wise, some people envy me, some think I'm idle, some the opposite, and some feel threatened. Yet I'm not all that wise.

Who can stop grief's avalanche once it starts to roll.

What other creatures are bred so exquisitely and purposefully for mistreatment as women are?

Gods often contradict our fondest expectations. What we anticipate does not come to pass. What we don't expect some god finds a way to make it happen. So with this story

We must not think too much: people go mad if they think too much.

In childbirth grief begins.

O what will she do, a soul bitten into with wrong?

No one who goes against her can win.

Not too little, not too much: there safety lies.

Let no one think me a weak one, feeble-spirited, A stay-at-home, but rather just the opposite, One who can hurt my enemies and help my friends; For the lives of such persons are most remembered.

Surely, of all creatures that have life and will, we women are the most wretched. When, for an extravagant sum, we have bought a husband, we must then accept him as possessor of our body.

Not yet do you feel it. Wait for the future.

Pay special attention to their agony so I might take some pleasure.

Amongst mortals no man is happy; wealth may pour in and make one luckier than another, but none can happy be.

You have the skill. What is more, you were born a woman, And women, though most helpless in doing good deeds, Are of every evil the cleverest of contrivers.

And so my thoughts have lead me to believe that childless men and women lead lives more fortunate than those with sons and daughters.

Why long for death's marriage bed which human beings all shun? Death comes soon enough and brings an end to everything.

All of us judge by sight and not by knowledge.

What heavenly power lends an ear To a breaker of oaths, a deceiver?

MEDEA: The gods know who was the author of this sorrow. JASON: Yes, the gods know indeed, they know your loathsome heart. MEDEA: Hate me. But I tire of your barking bitterness.

A woman like me! What am I like that's different from you or any man

We'll see how the sky catches fire. We'll see how she feeds the flames with her implacable hate.

It would have been better far for men To have got their children in some other way, and women Not to have existed. Then life would have been good. CHORUS

power and alliance for them, slavery and conquest over us.

But my pain’s a fair price, to take away your smile.

O Zeus! Why have you given us clear signs to tell True gold from counterfeit; but when we need to know Bad men from good, the flesh bears no revealing mark?

The mind of a queen Is a thing to fear. A queen is used To giving commands, not obeying them; And her rage once roused is hard to appease.

The pain is good, as long as you're not laughing.

Terrible things breed in broken hearts. And I see in my mistress' eyes a fury that wont be calmed… It can’t be long before her sorrow turns, as sorrow always does, into rage.

or else I would have sung a song in response to what the male sex sings. For our lengthy past has much to say about men's lives as well as ours

And, they tell us, we at home Live free from danger, they go out to battle: fools! I’d rather stand three times in the front line than bear One child.

And I'm a woman made of sorrow.

Yes, I can endure guilt, however horrible; The laughter of my enemies I will not endure. Now

And I do not fear to say that those who are held Wise among men and who search the reasons of things Are those who bring the most sorrow on themselves.

What's strange in that? Have you only just discovered That everyone loves himself more than his neighbor?

Anger, The spring of all life's horror. - Medea

So, friends, what method should we use? Hard to choose. I could torch them in their love nest or butcher them in their fragrant bed.

Try refusing the arrangement, or later petition for divorce -- the first is impossible while the second is like admitting you're a whore.

Ruthless is the temper of royalty; How much better to live among the equals.Let me decline in a safe old age. The very name of the "middle way".

It is the thoughts of men that are deceitful, Their pledges that are loose.

The final end of death comes fast. No need to pray for that.

O Zeus, why is it you have given men clear ways of testing whether gold is counterfeit but, when it comes to men, the body carries no stamp of nature for distinguishing bad from good.

Hast thou ice that thou shalt bind it To thy breast, and make thee dead To thy children, to thine own spirit's pain? When the hand knows what it dares, When thine eyes look into theirs, Shalt thou keep by tears unblinded Thy dividing of the slain? These be deeds Not for thee: These be things that cannot be!

everybody loves himself more than his neighbor.

MEDEA: The children are dead. I say this to make you suffer.

What's more, we are born women. It mat be we're unqualified for deeds of virtue: yet as the architects of every kind of mischief, we are supremely skilled.

To me, a wicked man who is also eloquent seems the most guilty of them all. He´ll cut your throat as bold as brass, because he knows he can dress up murder in handsome words.

I am a curse upon your house as well.

Go home to your wife. Go bury her.

Not for the first time I find our lives are a shadow, and I am not afraid to say that people who think they have everything figured out and are masters of logic - they are responsible for the greatest folly. No human being is happy. Strike it rich and you are luckier than your neighbor - but happy, never.

O Zeus! why hast thou granted unto man clear signs to know the sham in gold, while on man's brow no brand is stamped whereby to gauge the villain's heart?

There is no justice in the world's censorious eyes. They will not wait to learn a man's true character; Though no wrong has been done them, one look - and they hate. - Medea

A woman of hot temper - and a man the same - Is a less dangerous enemy than one quiet and clever.

If women didn't exist, human life would be rid of all its miseries.

Terrible things breed in broken hearts. And I see in my mistress' eyes a fury that wont be calmed.

What man’s not guilty? It’s taken you a long time to learn That everybody loves himself more than his neighbour.

Nurse: "Yet he is found to be treacherous towards his friends". Tutor: "And what man is not? dost thou only now know this, that every one lives himself dearer than his neighbour, some indeed with justice, but others even for the sake of gain.

Gone is the trust to be placed in oaths; I cannot understand if the gods you swore by then no longer rule, or men live by new standards of what is right.

Old ties give place to new ones.

Oh, say, how call ye this, To face, and smile, the comrade whom his kiss Betrayed? Scorn? Insult? Courage? None of these: 'Tis but of all man's inward sicknesses The vilest, that he knoweth not of shame Nor pity! Yet I praise him that he came . . . To me it shall bring comfort, once to clear My heart on thee, and thou shalt wince to hear.

We are not subject to our own wills, our own desires. But to the fates and the fortunes that the gods hand to us. The future is turned before our eyes into wrenching heartache, into ashes and to splinters. From today I know that truly hope is dead. I ask you again, you who watch, how can there ever be any ending than this? First silence. Then darkness.

Besides, you are a born woman: feeble when it comes to the sublime, marvelously inventive over crime.

MEDEA: Tell me, How does it feel with my teeth in your heart?

Give me your hand; I'll hold you....Then wipe off on me all your uncleanness, all; I do not shrink from it.

Dire and beyond all healing is the hate When hearts that loved are turned to enmity.

Indeed it is not usual for the young to grieve.

Agamemnon, if you help this man, you help an impious, perjured, and polluted traitor, and by upholding evil soil you own fair name.

In your grief, too, I weep, mother of little children, You who will murder your own, In vengeance for the loss of married love

If any man thinks wealth or power of greater worth To him who has them, than a good friend- he is mad.

Greek tragedy operates through the ear. It is through the ear primarily that it enters the eyes, the senses, the mind, the heart. It must be spoken aloud. It is designed for that. And until that is done these plays have not been read, have not been used, have not been born.

See, how strong love overwhelms us. See, how it wounds and destroys and yet when Aphrodite wants to soothe, nothing cures as love cures. So, my love, shoot me gently, barely break my skin with your terrible arrows.

Streams of the sacred rivers flow uphill; Tradition, order, all things are reversed: Deceit is men's device now, Men's oaths are gods' dishonour. Legend will now reverse our reputation; A time comes when the female sex is honoured; That old discordant slander Shall no more hold us subject.

But can you have the heart to kill your flesh and blood? MEDEA Yes, for this is the best way to wound my husband. CHORUS And you, too. Of women you will be most unhappy. MEDEA So it must be. No compromise is possible. (

To have learnt to live on the common level Is better. No grand life for me, Just peace and quiet as I grow old. The middle way, neither great nor mean, Is best by far, in name and practice. To be rich and powerful brings no blessing; Only more utterly Is the prosperous house destroyed, when gods are angry.

Any pleasure I took in life I now renounce; it’s death I want.

For of mortals there is no one who is happy. If wealth flows in upon one, one may be perhaps Luckier than one’s neighbor, but still not happy.

If your enemy is a man of honour (...), yield to him; you may touch his heart, Perhaps win generous terms. If he´s a rat - beware!

Is love so small a pain for a woman?

And for thee, who didst me all that evil, I prophesy an evil doom.

But this is ruin! New waves breaking in To wreck us, ere we are righted from the old!

Blood-guilty wretch

Go home: your wife waits to be buried.

Perish, abhorred, the man who never brings himself to unbolt his heart in frankness to some honored friends!

Would God no Argo e'er

This is no display of courage or daring, to confront your philoi after injuring them, but the worst of all human diseases: being without shame.

She had given up all, and expected in return a perfect love.

Let innocence, the god´s loveliest gift, chose me for her own; Never may the dread Cyprian craze my heart to leave old love for new, sending to assault me angry disputes and feuds unending;

Want ik zweer bij de meesteres die ík bovenal eer, bij wie ik steun heb gevonden, Hekate, godin van de maan, die woont in het hart van mijn huis: niemand van hen pijnigt ongestraft mijn ziel.

No cowardice, and no remembering your children, how they were your dears, or how you gave them birth. Instead for this one fleeting day forget that they are yours, and afterward take time to grieve. Although it's you who's killing them they were your lovely babes. And I'm a woman made of sorrow.

What they say of us is that we have a peaceful time Living at home, while they do the fighting in war. How wrong they are! I would very much rather stand Three times in the front of battle than bear one child.

How strange, that bad soil, if the gods send rain and sun, Bears a rich crop, while good soil, starved of what it needs, Is Barren; but man´s nature is ingrained - the bad Is never anything but bad, and the good man Is good: misfortune cannot warp his character, His goodness will endure.

Both stupid and lacking in foresight those poets of old who wrote songs for revels and dinners and banquets - pleasant sounds for men living at ease; but none of them all has discovered how to put to an end with their singing or musical instrument - grief, bitter grief from which death and disaster cheat the hopes of a house

NURSE: I wish he were...no, not dead - he is my master still - but, oh, what an enemy he's proven to those he should have loved! TUTOR: What human being is not? Is this news to you, that every person's dearest neighbor is himself: some rightly so, some out of greed and selfishness. This father does not love his sons; he loves his new wedding bed.

NURSE: I wish he were ... no, not dead - he is my master will - but, oh, what an enemy he's proven for those he should have loved! TUTOR: What human being is not? Is this news to you, that every person's dearest neighbor is himself: some rightly so, some out of greed and selfishness. This father does not love his sons; he loves his new wedding bed.

Is love so small a pain,do you think, for a woman?

نیک‌بختی هیچ میرایی پایدار نیست. اگر بخت یار باشد، شاید که دارایی تو از همسایه‌ات بیشتر باشد، اما هرگز از او نیک‌بخت‌تر نیستی.

Because you suffer, why should you so arrogantly include all women in one general reproach?

The stamp of royal birth is an unmistakable Miracle; and when those who bear a noble name Are worthy of it, the mircable is greater still.

O Zeus, perché hai dato ai mortali indizi chiari dell'oro che risulti falso, mentre nel corpo degli uomini non vi è impresso alcun segno con cui riconoscere il malvagio?

Je sais combien la pauvreté met les amis en fuite.

no man, is ever happy, no one.

And women, though most helpless in doing good deeds, Are of every evil the cleverest of contrivers.

Any man of good sense should never have his children taught to be unusually clever.

Medea. Loathe on. . . . But, Oh, thy voice. It hurts me sore. Jason. Aye, and thine me. Wouldst hear me then no more?

Bloodthirsty bitches

Many matters the gods bring to surprising ends. The things we thought would happen do not happen; The unexpected God makes possible; And such is the conclusion of this story.

می‌دانم که فخرفروشی بُتانی معمول است که به یکسان به گوشه‌گیر و پُرکار می‌زنند. و گوشه‌گیر که زندگی آرام را برمی‌گزیند، بدنام‌تر می‌شود: آنها کم‌نیرو و کم‌دل‌اند.

Haydi yüreğim, silahlan! Kaçınılmaz cinayeti işlemekte neden kararsız duruyorsun böyle? Haydi zavallı elim, kılıcı kavrayıp aşıver hayatının bu acı dönüm noktasını.

Seni hak ettiğin şekilde cezalandırdım ya, artık bana dişi aslan ya da Tyrheneli Skylla desen de hiç umurumda değil!

JASON: O children, what a wicked mother Fate gave you! MEDEA: O sons, your father’s treachery cost you your lives.

NURSE: My mistress' rage will stop at nothing Before it plays itself out.

MEDEA: [to herself] Besides, you are a woman: feeble when it comes to the sublime, marvelously inventive over crime.

Aegeus, my husband’s the most evil man alive.

They say we live a life at home, without danger, while they do battle with spears. Those fools: I would prefer to stand three times behind a shield then give birth once.

Surely, of all creatures that have life and will, we women Are the most wretched. When, for an extravagant sum, We have bought a husband, we must then accept him as Possessor of our body. This is to aggravate Wrong with worse wrong. Then the great question: will the man We get be bad or good? For women, divorce is not Respectable; to repel the man, not possible.

It is deplorable, Agamemnon, that men's words should ever seem to speak more loudly than their deeds. Good deeds alone should make the doer eloquent, and bad deeds dress themselves in rotten arguments, not gloze their foulness with fair colours. There are men who make this practice a fine art. Their cleverness, so-called, cannot last long; they all, without exception, come to a bad end.

Çekinme, hatırlama ne kadar çok sevdiğini ve nasıl doğurduğunu çocuklarını. Bugün, sadece bugün unut, sonra tutarsın yaslarını. Öldürmüş de olsan çok sevmiştin onları ve mutsuz bir kadınsın şimdi.

O God, you have given to mortals a sure method Of telling the gold that is pure from the counterfeit; Why is there no mark engraved upon men's bodies, By which we could know the true ones from the false ones?

What incompetent fools they were, Those composers of old: making music for life and joy, for grand celebrations and groaning boards, but, oh, nothing for sorrow and pain: No music or song on hand-plucked lyre For the world's travail And the death and destruction of many a home. Oh, what solace is missed By having no music for this! What a waste of it, then, by singing in vain, When fullness at feasts is its own joy and gain.

Medeia — (...) Dizem de nós que vivemos uma existência sem perigos, dentro de casa, ao passo que eles combatem com a lança. Pobre raciocínio! Antes queria lutar três vezes debaixo do broquel que dar à luz uma única vez.

The truth is that in this play Medea herself is the dea ex machinâ. The woman whom Jason and Creon intended simply to crush has been transformed by her injuries from an individual human being into a sort of living Curse. She is inspired with superhuman force. Her wrongs and her hate fill all the sky. And the judgment pronounced on Jason comes not from any disinterested or peace-making God, but from his own victim transfigured into a devil.

Tanrıların tanıklığına başvuruyorum, çocuklarımı öldürdüğün yetmiyormuş gibi, onlara dokunmama ve cenazelerini kaldırmama da izin vermiyorsun. Ah, keşke hiç doğmasalardı ve hiç görmeseydim bu şekilde vahşice öldürüldüklerini.

What the spirit of man can aim at achieving is a dignity which remains when the gods have withdrawn or joined the side of evil, a serene despair which knows that the world contains no higher hope than the human spirit can find within itself.

the mercy of Heaven, Aiêtês' daughter, Mêdêa, an enchantress as well as a princess, fell in love with Jason. She helped him through all his trials; slew for him her own sleepless serpent, who guarded the fleece; deceived her father, and secured both the fleece and the soul of Phrixus.

The men of old times had little sense;/If you called them fools you wouldn't be far wrong./They invented songs, and all the sweetness of music,/To perform at feasts, banquets, and celebrations;/But no one thought of using/Songs and stringed instruments/To banish the bitterness and pain of life.

Both stupid and lacking in foresight those poets of old who wrote songs for revels and dinners and banquets - pleasant sounds for men living at ease; but none of them all has discovered how to put to and end with their singing or musical instrument - grief, bitter grief from which death and disaster cheat the hopes of a house.

When a man becomes dissatisfied with married life, he goes outdoors and finds relief for his frustrations. But we are bound to love one partner and look no further. They say we live sheltered lives in the home, free from danger, while they wield 250       their spears in battle – what fools they are! I would rather face the enemy three times over than bear a child once.

Resta strano e quasi inesplicabile il fatto che nella città di Atene, dove le donne erano tenute in reclusione quasi orientale, come odalische o serve, il teatro abbia ugualmente prodotto figure come Clitemnestra e Cassandra, Atossa e Antigone, Fedra e Medea, e tutte le altre eroine che dominano i drammi del "misogino" Euripide. Ma il paradosso di questo mondo, in cui nella vita reale una donna rispettabile non poteva quasi farsi vedere sola per strada, e tuttavia sulla scena, la donna uguaglia e supera l'uomo, non è stato mai spiegato in modo soddisfacente. Nella tragedia moderna esiste lo stesso prodominio. Ad ogni modo, una scorsa all'opera di Shakespeare (e anche a quella di Webster, ma non di Marlowe o Jonson) basta a dimostrare che questo preodominio, questa iniziativa delle donne, persiste da Rosalind a Lady Macbeth. E' così anche in Racine; se delle sue tragedia portano il nome dell'eroina; e quale dei suoi personaggi maschili possiamo contrapporre ad Ermione e ad Andromaca, a Berenice e a Rossana, a Fedra e ad Atalia? Così di nuovo con Ibsen, quale uomo possiamo paragonare a Solveig e Nora, Hedda e Hilda Wangel e Rebecca West?

De todas las criaturas que tienen mente y alma no hay especie más mísera que la de las mujeres. Primero han de acopiar dinero con que compren un marido que en amo se torne de sus cuerpos, lo cual es ya la cosa más dolorosa que hay. Y en ello es capital el hecho de que sea buena o mala la compra, porque honroso el divorcio no es para las mujeres ni el rehuir al cónyuge. Llega una, pues, a nuevas leyes y usos y debe trocarse en adivina, pues nada de soltera aprendió sobre cómo con su esposo portarse. Si, tras tantos esfuerzos, se aviene el hombre y no protesta contra el yugo, vida envidiable es ésta; pero, si tal no ocurre, morirse vale más. El varón, si se aburre de estar con la familia, en la calle al hastío de su humor pone fin; nosotras nadie más a quien mirar tenemos. Y dicen que vivimos en casa una existencia segura mientras ellos con la lanza combaten, mas sin razón: tres veces formar con el escudo preferiría yo antes que parir una sola. Pero el mismo lenguaje no me cuadra que a ti: tienes esta ciudad, la casa de tus padres, los goces de la vida, trato con los amigos, y en cambio yo el ultraje padezco de mi esposo, que de mi tierra bárbara me raptó, abandonada, sin patria, madre, hermanos, parientes en los cuales pudiera echar el ancla frente a tal infortunio.

But it’s on me that this unexpected disaster has fallen and sapped my psūkhē. I am ruined, and having lost the pleasure [kharis] of life I long to die, philai. For the man on whom I was utterly dependant, as I well recognize, has turned out to be the most kakos of men, my own husband. Of all things that have psūkhē and intelligence, we women are the most wretched creatures: first we must buy a husband at too high a price, and then acquire a master of our bodies—an evil thing [kakon] yet more evil [kakon]. But in this lies the most important ordeal [agōn], whether our choice is good or bad [kakon]. For divorce is not a thing of good kleos to women, nor can we refuse our husbands. Next the wife, having reached her new house with its unfamiliar ways and customs [nomoi], must be a seer [mantis]—if she has not learned the lesson in the oikos—to divine what kind of bedmate she will have. If we perform these tasks with thoroughness and tact, and if the husband lives with us, bearing the yoke without violence [biā], our life is a happy one. If not, it’s best to die. The man, when he is vexed with what he finds indoors, goes forth and rids his soul of its disgust, turning to some philos or fellow of like age, while we must of necessity look to his psūkhē alone. They say we live secure in our households [oikoi], while they are off at war—how worthlessly [kakōs] they think! How gladly would I three times over take my stand behind a shield rather than once give birth!

What is more, you were born a woman, And women, though most helpless in doing good deeds, Are of every evil the cleverest of contrivers

MEDEA: Monster - an epithet too good for you... so you come to me, do you, you byword of aversion both in heaven and on earth, to me your own worst enemy? This is not courage. This is not being brave: to look a victim in the eyes whom you've betrayed - somebody you loved - this is a disease and the foulest that a man can have. You are shameless. But you have done well to come. I can unload some venom from my heart and you can smart to hear it. To begin at the beginning, yes, first things first, I saved your life - as every son of Greece who stepped on board the Argo knows. Your mission was to yoke the fire-breathing bulls and so the death-bearing plot of dragons' teeth. I came to your rescue, lit up life for you, slew the guardian of the Golden Fleece - that giant snake that hugged it sleepless coil on coil. I deserted my father and my home to come away with you to Iolcus by Mount Pelion, full of zeal and very little sense. I killed King Pelias - a horrid death, perpetrated through his daughters - and overturned their home. All this for you. I bore your sons, you reprobate man, just to be discarded for a new bride. Had you been childless, this craving for another bedmate might have been forgiven. But no: faith in vows was simply shattered. I am baffled. Do you suppose the gods of old no longer rule? Or is it that mankind now has different principles? Because your every vow to me, you surely know, is null and void. Curse this right hand of mine, so often held in yours, and these knees of mine sullied to no purpose by the grasp of a rotten man. You have turned my hopes to lies. Come now, tell me frankly, as if we were two friends, as if you really were prepared to help (I hope the question makes you wince): where do I go from here? [With a bitter laugh.] Home to my father, perhaps, and my native land, both of whom I sacrificed for you? Or to the poor deprived daughters of Pelias? They would be overjoyed to entertain their father's murderer. So this is how things stand. Among my loved ones at home I am execrated woman. There was no call for me to hurt them but now I have a death feud on my hands - and all for you. What a reward! What a heroine you have made me among the daughters of Hellas! Lucky Medea, having you! Such a wonderful husband, and so loyal! I leave this land displaced, expelled, deprived of friends, only my children with me and alone. What a charming record for our new bridegroom this: 'His own sons and the wife who saved him are wayside beggars.' [She breaks off and looks upward.] O Zeus, what made you give us clear signs for telling mere glitter from true gold, but when we need to know the base metal of a man no stamp upon his flesh for telling counterfeit?

In Euripides’ famous play, produced at Athens in the fifth century BC, Medea resolves to kill her sons, then goes back on her resolve when she sees them. Sending them away, she steels herself to do the deed, and speaks words which were to become famous: I know that what I am about to do is bad, but anger is master of my plans, which is the source of the greatest troubles for humankind. She recognizes two things going on in her: her plans and her anger or thumos. She also recognizes that her anger is ‘master of’ the plans she has rationally deliberated on carrying out.