Dependence and Control: Conflicted Images of the Self in Euripides’ Medea

Abstract

The paper is an interpretation of Euripides’ Medea inspired by psychoanalytic methodology, especially by the school of object relations according to which emotional life is understood in terms of affective links between images of the self (the subject or the “I”) and the object (the other). From this perspective, the central conflict of the play is a conflict between two sets of object relations. In the first set the self is omnipotent, aggressive, and controls all the weak, poor and devaluated objects, while in the other – the self is dependent, vulnerable and loving, whereas the object is indifferent and cruel. The second self image is represented in the play by Medea’s children, whereas the first – primarily by Medea herself. The only moment in which those contradictory self and object images are combined is Medea’s “Great Monologue”. From this point of view, the necessity to kill the children can be understood as a way to avoid dependence along with the painful conflict involved in it by restoring a defensive image of the omnipotent, destructive self, which is represented in the final image of Medea on the dragon-chariot.