Euripides, Iphigenia at Aulis

Questions and Projects

-Outline the play, paying particular attention to places where a decision is made or reversed concerning the sacrifice of the girl.

-List the causes of the war as given by the characters, paying special attention to shifts in perception of the war by the same character.

-List reasons for the sacrifice.

-Find three or more extended passages in which characters talk about the past (hint: Tyndarean oath, Agamemnon's political campaign, Clytemnestra's first husband). Find passages that talk about the future.

-What is the use of the chorus in this play? What is the meaning of the long description of the fleet in the parodos? Consider it in relation to the scenes before it and after it. Think about all the choral odes in this way.

-Where does the "glory of Greece" as a motive for war first come up? Consider the source. Find two other references to it.

Does the gathered army have any effect on Agamemnon's decision? Look in the play for the answer to this: what are the men said to be doing in the parodos? What does Achilles talk about in his first speech: does he give any reason for us to believe that the army will attack Agamemnon if he abandons the expedition? When does it become clear that the army is discontented and likely to turn to violence. Do a careful study of the army in the play.

-Compare this play to the parodos of the Agamemnon. Consider such things as the cause of the war, the decision to sacrifice, Agamemnon's fear of the girl. Does Euripides change the story at all?

-Freedom and compulsion: Agamemnon sees himself as a victim and slave (to the army); Iphigenia, though she really has no choice, sees herself as free.

-Throughout the play we are allowed to hope that somehow the girl will be saved: by the letter, by Menelaus' decision to remarry; by Clytemnestra's hopes in Achilles, by Achilles' proposal of marriage. Consider the irony of these oxymoronic hopes in light of the well-known end. To hope for this is to hope that the Trojan War will not take place.

-Aristotle considered the IA a paradigm of anomaly, because the Iphigenia who begs for her life is "nothing like" the Iphigenia who goes bravely to a heroic death. Is this a fault of construction or is there a method to Euripides' anomaly?

-Iphigenia heleptolis: What becomes of Iphigenia at the end of the play? To whom does she compare herself? (Heleptolis: "sacker of the city": who is called by this name in Aeschylus' Agamemnon?)

Consider the uses of name by Achilles and Iphigenia. Achilles at first sees himself almost only as a name. How does he develop from name to hero?

Consider the use of possessives (mine and yours by Menelaus and Agamemnon and by Achilles in his first speech).

-Can Iphigenia be thought of as an artist taking over her life (i.e. the drama) as Clytemnestra does in the red carpet scene?

-Consider the contradiction in the tradition of the Trojan War: as a war fought (at how great cost) to bring back a runaway wife (in this play there is little doubt that Helen wanted to go) and as the greatest event in early Greek history (subject of song and story) in which heroic men fought and died for glory against a barbarian aggressor. Can there be any connection between this contradiction and the anomaly in characterization of Iphigenia?

-Greek/Barbarian: Are the Trojans pictured as any different from the Greeks? What is the Trojans' crime? How did Agamemnon treat Clytemnestra and her first husband and their child? How does the chorus picture the Trojan people and landscape? What was the wording of the original oath of Tyndareos? How was Agamemnon saved from Clytemnestra's brothers?

Other Questions:

Other themes to consider: