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MEDEA's EXIT Brad Levett Interest in the Staging of the Deus Ex Machina of Euripides' Medea Has Typically Focused on The

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MEDEA's EXIT Brad Levett Interest in the Staging of the Deus Ex Machina of Euripides' Medea Has Typically Focused on The MEDEA’S EXIT Brad Levett Interest in the staging of the deus ex machina of Euripides’ Medea has typically focused on the impressive revelation of Medea as something more than mortal as she appears on high in the chariot of the Sun to mock her husband and former oppressor, Jason.1 However, in this paper I am interested in a small, but I think important, detail of the staging of the deus ex machina scene, the precise moment of Medea’s departure. Medea’s final words of the play come at , when she responds to Jason’s repeated request for the bodies of their children with the dismissive “Impossible. This word is hurled in vain”κ ( Cστι· μτην Cπς Cρριπται). In an article in Donald Mastronarde suggested two possibilities.2 The first possibility is that Medea departs immediately after these words, leaving the stage to Jason and his final prayer to Zeus to witness his suffering at her hands. Although Jason directly addresses Medea in this speech in lines and , this need not decide the issue, since characters in Athenian tragedy do at times address characters who are not on stage at the moment. The other possibility is that Medea remains on scene while Jason makes his final prayer, and then both she and Jason exit, in different directions and in different manners, during or after the final words of the Chorus (–).3 In his recent commentary Mastronarde argues for the first possibility, citing the ends of Hippolytus and Bacchae as supporting evidence.4 In this paper I argue for the viability of the second possible staging of the ending of the play that has Medea remain on stage while Jason makes his final prayer.5 I briefly argue that there is no reason that necessitates the first reading or 1 E.g. Cunningham . 2 Mastronarde : . 3 Sometimes termed a “cancelled exit.” Mastronarde : : “the play simply ends with actors in place, and subsequent movements are not part of the dramatic performance.” This seems to depend on Mastronarde’s view that the final lines of the play are an interpolation (see Mastronarde b on –), since if they are retained, Medea and Jason can depart separately while they sing their final lines. 4 Mastronarde on . 5 Kovacs presumes this staging. See his edition of the play, and : . brad levett forbids the second, before supplying a new thesis about the end of the play that gives positive support for the second staging. Taplin has shown that there is a strong tendency for the departing character to have the final words of a scene.6 When two characters depart at, or roughly at, the same time, the tendency is for the dramatically dominant character to speak last.7 There are clear examples of this for a deus ex machina scene,suchasinIphigenia among the Taurians, when Athena has the last words of the play before all exit, and she is clearly the dominant figure since the only other speaking character present isthe barbarian Thoas.8 In some cases, the god leaves well before the ending of the play and has the final word before his or her departure, as in Hippolytus and Bacchae.9 But a counter example does exist as well. Ion has the last word in Ion () as Athena escorts Ion and Creusa offstage (). In a number of plays, including Medea,itishardtoseeamethod by which to decide whether the god departs separately or at the same time as the characters.10 One way to think about the question is to consider the purpose, rather thanthesimplefact,ofthistendency,anditisobviousthatfinalwordsare a way of marking or emphasizing the dominance of a character. However, Taplin also notes that the silence of a dominant character upon departure, when it does occur, can be explained by the fact that this silence is itself dramatically relevant.11 Thus the tendency should be understood in light of the dramatic purpose of expressing something about the relative status 6 Taplin : . 7 Taplin : . 8 Cf. also Or., with Apollo having the last words of the play, before the choral tag (if genuine), and El., with Castor having the final words before a general exeunt. 9 Pace Mastronarde, precisely because there is extended interaction between human characters after the exit of the god in Hipp. and Bacch., these plays are less than ideal analogies to Med. 10 In Hel., if Castor and Pollux remain until the words of the chorus, then Theocly- menushasthefinalword.Iftheyleavebeforethesewords,thenagainwehaveacharacter, Theoclymenus, addressing directly characters who are not on stage. The case is the same in Andr. (Thetis leaving first with final word, or on stage for Peleus’ final words), Supp. (Athena leaving first with final word, or on stage for Theseus’ final words), and Sophocles’ Phil. (Heracles departing with last words before the human characters, or staying on stage for Philoctetes’ final words). The similarity of these works could be used to argue the case either way, although all of these works may not have been staged in the same manner. 11 Taplin : –. Thus, in the case of Ion,wecansuggestthatIongetsthelast word as a reflection that, due to the less than omnipotent control of affairs on the partof Apollo (represented here in the deus ex machina scene by Athena), Ion is the “dominant” character, even in comparison with the gods, since it has been his own actions that have driven the plot and forced the early revelation of his true patrimony..
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