Second Episode (446-626)
This is not the first time, but over and over again, I have seenJason
Medea
Oh you utterly vile...this is the worst charge I have 465
to say against your total lack of manliness.
You have come to me, you who are most hateful
[to the gods and to me and to the whole human race (1)]?
This is not daring; this is not courage,
to abuse your loved ones and look them in the face, 470
but the greatest of all human diseases
shamelessness. Still you have done me a favor in coming.
I will lighten my grief by reviling you
and you will feel the sting in hearing it.
I will begin to speak from the beginning. 475
I saved your skin, as all the Greeks know
who boarded the Argo with you,
sent to master the fire-breathing bulls
with yokes and to sow the deadly field;
and the dragon which guarded the golden fleece 480
and, sleepless, protected it with its many coils,
I killed it and held up for you the light of safety.
As for me, after betraying my father and my home
I came to Iolcus near Pelion
with you, eager more than smart. 485
Then I killed Pelias, so that he would die most tragically
at the hands of his own children and I confounded their whole house.
And you, after receiving this from me, you, the vilest man alive,
you have betrayed me, and you have taken a new marriage,
though you already have children. If you were still childless 490
it would be excusable for you to have a craving for another marriage
bed.
Gone is the faith of oaths. I cannot understand
whether you believe the old gods no longer are in power
or that new covenants are established for men today,
since you must know that you have not kept your oath to me. 495
Ah, right hand how fervently you were taken
and these knees how futilely we were clung to in supplication
by an evil man. But I have lost my hopes.
Come. I will share with you as if you were a friend.
What will I get out of it? 500
Still... under questioning you will appear more shameless.
Now where will I turn? To my father’s house
which I betrayed for you along with my native land, when I came here?
Or to the unhappy daughters of Pelias? They would be happy
to take me in. I murdered their father. 505
This is how it is. I have made myself an enemy
to my loved ones at home, whom I should not have
hurt, in helping you I have enemies.
And for this you have made me an object of admiration
among the women of Greece: I have in you a wonderful 510
husband and faithful to me— oh, the pity of it
if I must go into exile, cast out of this country
without friends, a lonely mother with two lonely children,
a fine reproach to the new bridegroom
that your children are homeless beggars, with the woman who saved your life. 515
Oh Zeus! Why have you given us a clear test
of gold to tell which is counterfeit
but of men — where to identify an evil one is a must—
there is no such mark on his body?
Chorus
The rage is terrible and hard to heal 520
when loved ones join in strife with loved ones.
Jason
I must, it seems, not be a weak orator
but like the skillful captain of a ship
reefing my sails, outrun
the blasts of your tongue-lashing, woman. 525
And, since you make such a mountain of it
I think that Kupris, god of love, was the savior
of my expedition, and she alone of gods or men.
You have a subtle mind, but it would be tedious
to go through every detail of the story, how with his inescapable arrows 530
Love compelled you to save me.
Still, I will not put too fine a point on it.
However much you have benefitted me, all well and good.(2)
And you certainly got more out of saving me
than you put in, as I will demonstrate. 535
First you make your home in Greece instead of
an alien land and you experience justice
and the rule of laws, not merely force.
All the Greeks are aware that you are a wise woman
and you have fame. But if you still lived 540
at the ends of the earth no one would know your story.
Let me have no gold in my home;
give me no song to sing sweeter than Orpheus’
if my fate should be insignificant.
This much I had to say about my labors. 545
For you are the one who turned our discussion into a contest.
Now the reproaches you heap on my royal marriage,
here I will prove first that I am wise
and then sensible and finally a great benefactor to you
and my children. Let me finish.(3) 550
When I arrived here from the land of Iolcus
dragging with me many useless encumbrances,
what luckier opportunity could I have found
than, though a refugee, to marry the king’s daughter?
It is not the thing that is eating you, because I hated my marriage to you 555
and was infatuated by desire of my new bride,
nor because I had a craving for more and more children
— the ones I have are enough and I am satisfied with them —
but so that — and this is important — we might live well
and not be in need. I am well aware that 560
even a friend shuns a poor man and stays out of his way,
and so that I might bring up my children worthily of my house,
and father brothers to your children
and put them on an equal footing and join the families
so that we could live well. What do you need with children? (4)
565
It’s in my interest to help my living children
with future offspring. Have I made bad plans?
You would not say so if the marriage bed did not gnaw at you.
But you have reached such a point, you women,
that if your marriage is in good order you think you 570
have it all, but if anything goes wrong in your marriage
the best and finest things you count
as their opposite. There should be some other way
for men to produce children. Women would not have to exist at all.
And then there would be no more troubles for mankind. 575
Chorus
Jason, you have given a very effective speech.
But still to me — even if I speak out beyond my custom–
you seem, in abandoning your wife, not to be doing the right thing.
Medea In many ways I am different from most people.
For in my estimation anyone who is dishonest 580
but speaks well deserves the greatest censure.
In his confidence that he can conceal his injustice with rhetoric,
he has the heart for any wrong. But he is not so very clever.
And you, then, do not try your specious argument
on me. For one word will lay you flat: 585
you should, if you were not vile, have made this marriage
only after convincing me, and not in secret from your loved ones.
Jason
Yes of course you would have been a fine confederate in this plan,
if I had told you of the marriage, when even now you do not
have the mettle to put aside the great anger in your heart. 590
Medea
That is not what stopped you, but your foreign marriage
was not turning out illustrious enough for you as you approach old age.
Jason Be assured of this: it was not because of the woman
that I made the marriage into the royal family which I now have,
but just as I said before, wanting to give you 595
security and to father royal brothers
for my children, a support for my house.
Medea
I pray never to have a happy life that is painful to me
nor wealth that gnaws at my heart.
Jason
Do you know how to change your prayer and appear wiser? 600
Pray that good things should never seem painful to you
and being well off not to think that you are suffering misfortune.
Medea
Carry on with your abuse, since you have a way out,
but I, abandoned, am exiled from this country.
Jason
It is your own choice. Don’t blame anyone else. 605
Medea
And what did I do? Get married and abandon you?
Jason
You disrespectfully uttered curses against the royal house.
Medea
Yes, I really am a curse to your house.
Jason
I will not carry on this quarrel any longer.
But if you want to take me up on my offer 610
of money for the children or your own exile
say so. I am ready to be generous to you
and to send letters to friends abroad who will take care of you.
And you are a fool, if you refuse my offer, woman.
Put aside your venom and you might get somewhere. 615
Medea
We will not be making use of your friends;
I would not take anything from you; don’t give me anything.
The gift of a bad man brings no pleasure.
Jason
I call the gods to witness
that I want to help you and the children in every way I can. 620
My kindness is not enough for you, but through self-will
you push your friends away. You just hurt yourself more.
Medea
Go. Desire for your new bride overcomes you
if you spend too much time away from that house.
Go on with your marriage. Perhaps with gods’ help it will be said 625
you have made such a marriage that you will regret it.