Medea

Revenge. Revenge. Revenge. A very powerful word and a common theme in literature film song and life its self throughout history.

 Romeo seeks revenge for the death of Mercutio and kills Tybalt.

 Harry and Marv seek revenge on Kevin McCallister for spoiling their reign as the “wet bandits.”

 The play hamlet is referred to as a ‘revenge tragedy,’ yet the protagonist is unable to commit revenge. 

Anakin Skywalker seeks revenge for those who killed his mother and those acts of revenge lead him down the path to become Darth Vader.

 The British looked for revenge on the Americans in the War of 1812.

 Seeking revenge for Pearl Harbor, the United States declared war on Japan and eventually dropped two atomic bombs on them.

 Revenge is ever present in Medea as well. Medea also addresses the value of revenge versus the grievances that cause one to act in a revengeful manner. Medea feels that Jason’s suffering for her killings outweighs the guilt of killing her own children (as well as Jason’s new wife and father in law.) This is the true conflict in any revenge plot, does the satisfaction of the revenge outweigh the guilt of committing such an act as well as the suffering of those who the revenge is acted upon. Most rational people need to be severely provoked to seriously think about acting upon revenge. And once reaching that stage I feel it is difficult to act in a way that deep down makes you feel better.  Revenge is playing down to the competition. Success is the only all encompassing revenge.