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Example research essay topic: Wife And Children Absolute Power - 1,006 words

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... ing, and he actively ignores many warnings that he shouldnt continue to pursue the murderer. Tieresias warns him, Jocasta warns him, and the old shepherd warns him, but he brashly ignores them all. It is not that he is a bad man; his motive is both self-less and selfish. He wants to save his city, but he also wants glory and vindication. He believes that he, one man, can be everything.

Sophocles is pointing out that this isnt true. No king, no matter how hard he tries, can be a perfect ruler. The gods will not have any one man become so powerful, and the nature of power itself is to corrupt. Oedipus fall is terrible. He exposes himself as his fathers murderer and his mothers lover. He has committed two of the sins which the gods consider the worst.

Guilt-stricken, he gouges out his eyes: To this guilt I bore witness against myself- with what eyes shall I look upon my people? (1384 - 1385). His wife and mother, Jocasta, hangs herself. He is cast out and his children, the products of incest, will be shunned. He has lost his kingdom completely. He is punished by the gods because he tries to achieve perfection, which is not for man to do.

He is so full of himself that he believes he can be like a god. Sophocles felt that no one man should or could aspire to be so powerful, and he presented the story of Oedipus in a way that makes the idea of a king seem very foolish. A king is more preoccupied with his own status than the general good of the people, and the people suffer because of his weakness. At the end of the book, Creon takes over, but the Greek audience, who is familiar with the story in Sophocles trilogy, knows that he too will become arrogant and corrupt.

It is another reminder of human weakness, and why an individual shouldnt hold absolute power. Great peoples tempers are terrible, always having their own way, seldom checked, dangerous they shift from mood to mood. How much better to have been accustomed to live on equal terms with ones neighbors... Greatness brings no profit to people. God indeed, when in anger, brings greater ruin to peoples houses, says the nurse in the beginning of Euripides play Medea (119 - 130). She is foreshadowing the theme of the story and Euripides is voicing his message plainly through her.

He uses the play to show that when men attempt to become powerful, or in Jasons case, attempt to become heir to a throne, they forget what is truly important and will suffer loss because of it. As the nurse so bluntly put it, the gods punish those who aspire to individual greatness. The bulk of the play deals with the consequences of Jasons ambition to be great. He has abandoned his wife and children in order to marry Creon's daughter and join the royal family.

His first wife, Medea, is a powerful woman who has no place to go, so she becomes desperate. She immediately begins plotting against the lives of her husband, his bride, and his father-in-law the king. Her reactions illustrate how easy it is to upset a nations stability when its entire system of rule can be overthrown by the deaths of a king and his children. In this way, because it is much less stable, monarchy is presented as obviously inferior to democracy. Creon, hearing rumors that she is talking about killing him, approaches her and threatens to banish her.

She begs for one more day, and is given it, and thus an opportunity to follow through with her plans, by Creon, who doesnt want to look like a cruel king. There is nothing tyrannical about my nature, and by showing mercy I have often been the loser. Even now I know that I am making a mistake, he says (Euripides, The Medea, 332 - 330). A king must worry about appearances, and Creon is forced to make a poor decision so that he doesnt appear to lack concern for common people. Jason comes after Creon, and displays many more human weaknesses. He lies and says that he is remarrying for the good of Medea and the children, so that they too may be royalty.

His excuses are obvious, even to the chorus. Medea in her anger kills Creon and his daughter, and then kills her own children, only to cause Jason more pain. The people are left without a ruler, and Jason has lost both his family and his aspirations of greatness. Jason brought all of this upon himself because he loved the idea of become royalty more than he loved his wife and children.

This is a major flaw of a system of monarchy. In a democracy, individuals cant assume absolute power, and so the people arent preoccupied and distracted by the idea of becoming king themselves. They dont strive for control and plot against one another, forgetting their responsibilities. All these intrigues or a monarchy are left behind in the democratic system. Humans cant be perfect, and therefore no one person should have power over an entire nation. Greek dramas showed that even great heroes have weaknesses, and inevitably fall from power, often having a negative impact on the lives of their people as well.

The characters of Agamemnon, Oedipus, and Jason, all remarkable and once-great men, each fall from their power into death or despair. They had become too powerful, too arrogant, and too ambitious, and so the gods cut them down. This pattern of kings falling from power because of weaknesses and character flaws is very common in Greek dramas. The Greeks were proud of their democratic system, and their dramas reflected their belief that their society, ruled jointly by representatives of the people, was best in a world full of unstable and dangerous monarchies. The gods despise men who rise too high and seek to become too great. So do the Greeks.


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Research essay sample on Wife And Children Absolute Power

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