Redefining destruction: The liberation of the Medea figure in western literature

The Medea figure, based on the character of Medea in Euripides' play, may be encountered in modern literature in four representative examples: Medea, by Jean Anouilh; Hedda Gabler, by Henrik Ibsen; Beloved, by Toni Morrison; Mercy, by Andrea Dworkin. Heretofore, the Medea figure has been seen as a paradigm of the destructive woman, a negative example of womanhood. This study provides a radical transformation in our understanding of these figures, justifying their behavior as a response to the oppression of a patriarchal society that renders them silent, and redeeming them as courageous heroines to whom violence and death, the only alternatives to suffocation, become an act of rebirth rather than destruction. An examination of each character outside of the blind, destructive principle that has condemned her as an abomination, clarifies the motivational field of context from which her violence comes.