Trojan Women - Research Paper Example

Trojan women Introduction Following a plot based on real life occurrences, the play Women of Troy as produced by the UTSC depicts the sufferings of women in the pre medieval Greek. Coincidentally, the play was produced during the great Peloponnesian war and has thus far been referred to as a commentary of the war. The play opens up with war, mayhem, Troy has come under the greatest attack in the history of the war, and the men slaughtered while the rest captured as slaves in the war. The women of Troy therefore remain destitute in their own communities and in a quest to find justice and reconstruct their lives afresh, the women face a number of humiliating experiences most of which portray great disregard to their human rights (Euripides, MacEwen, Niko and Giannēs 12). The society back then had rudimentary beliefs in gods. The play therefore begins with the gods discussing sufficient punishment for the Greek armies after they permit the raping of a royalty’s daughter one Cassandra a daughter of King Priam and Queen Hecuba. Rape is the most common yet the gravest form of abuse that the women in the warring times suffered. The soldiers showed no regard to the value of humanity in the women of Troy. While the armies killed their husbands and maimed their children, the soldiers raped and wounded the women. The rape of the daughter of the queen is the height of the disrespect to the value of the woman's life that draws the wrath of the gods. They therefore plan an effective punishment for the soldiers who condone Ajax the Lesser even after he abuses the daughter of the royal family which indeed was a taboo punishable by death. During the war and animosity, women suffer the greatest brunt of the subsequent mayhem. The same is applicable in the play as the women of Troy including the royalties all fall to the mercies of the attackers Greek. Additionally, women suffer sexual abuse, which is always the greatest form of abuse leveled against women. The women of Troy suffer different levels of abuses from their attackers but the conspicuous sexual abuse if evident. Queen Hecuba, a serving queen of Troy is prophesied to serve a Greek general soon after her husband dies and the same applied to yet another royal woman, one Cassandra who is destined to become a concubine for the Agamemnon a Greek army general. The play communicates a number of themes key among which portray the suffering of women in both the pre medieval society and the modern day society. Women still suffer because of their physique (Euripides 33). The play merely depicts the difference in the societies of the differing times but indicate the basic forms of abuses suffered by women in every society. One of such themes is historical narrative. This comes out evidently not only as a theme but also as a literary stylistic device. The entire play is a historical account of an actual occurrence in the modern day Troy. The author gives a systematic point-to-point account of the warring times. To achieve efficacy and validity of his account, he picks an angle just as any other professional writer would. His account is the plight of the Trojan women. It is by the sufferings of the women that he builds a play, which does not primarily convey the sufferings of the women but also depicts the power struggles of the time, the weak political systems in the societies at the time and the ramifications of war and lack of peace in the development process of societies. Before the invasion, Troy had been just a society like any other. People enjoyed peace and went about their businesses as usual thereby building a peaceful society in which through their political system, everyone had his or her place. The women indeed performed subordinate roles to the men and the ruling class never safeguarded the rights of women but at least there was peace and everyone including the women was happy. However, with the inversion causes an impulsive disturbance to the peace thereby disorienting the society as everyone begins to panic. The Greek soldiers overthrow the Trojan Kingdom and capture the King; this paves way for lack of order and mayhem as women suffer the atrocities from their oppressors. The historical narration fuses a number of stylistic devices and additional themes to achieve effectiveness (Euripides, MacEwen, Niko and Giannēs 12). One such style is the use of flashback, this is a scene or two depicts the past thoughts of a character. Flashbacks are useful in developing cases thereby justifying the present occurrences. Throughout the play the Trojan women dirge the loss of land taken from them when their men fell to the Greek soldiers. Through this, it becomes evident that the Trojan society had alienated women in the distribution of land and that land is the greatest resource that a society can ever depend on. Through their lamentations, the gravity of the matter becomes evident since they lack shelter and any source of food. The author fusses the use of flashback to witchcraft and the existence of other supernatural beings. Cassandra is partially mad, in addition to her madness she has the ability to see into the future. Logically such claims are illusions and may not attract any seriousness from the society. However, the author uses this delusional mindset to build an effective case and justify the conduct of most of her characters (Euripides 21). When Cassandra tells her vision to the people around her, they fail to believe her owing to a curse, which drove her mad, a clever style that the author uses to resent the ideas of a person possibly having the ability to see into the future. Such claims are not realistic and the author therefore determines a bright way of evading the propagation of such thoughts by asserting that the people failed to listen to Cassandra owing to the curse. Curses are more realistic even in the modern day societies. It thus becomes possible to persuade a readership with the use of familiar facts than alluding to impossibilities. Through the historical narration, the author finds an effective way of comparing the different societies by using the women in the play. In one of her visions, Cassandra sees her new master’s wife killing both her and her master. This is a clear indication to the fact that women maltreatment cut across all the societies. Her new master is a Greek, and their new home is in Greece, however, in this region too, women are subordinate to men. The regular maltreatment that the old lady had suffered at the hands of her master whom thereafter come home with yet another concubine compel her to plot a plan to kill both her husband and his new concubine, Cassandra. Another theme that is self-evident from the play is the literary bridges between eras. The series of conflicts in the play are evident of the changing eras. During transition from one era to another, conflicts are naturally rampant since different people present different interests thereby leading to conflict. A common phenomenon during era transitions of the time was the expansion of territories. Stronger states invaded weaker states and subdued them before taking over the governance of the regions thereby expanding their territories. The Greek were therefore no exception. The Greek is among the earliest civilization of humankind, a kingdom that had an effective army, sound governance and the political will to expand her territories. Greek soldiers therefore attacked her neighbors, subduing more and expanding her territories more thereby expressing her political and military might. Greek attacks Troy as an expansion plan and all the terrors her soldiers rein on the poor people of Troy including their women is motivated by the desire to increase territorial boundaries thereby increase in size and political might within the region. The weak Troy lacked the apparatus for an effective self-defense thereby making the kingdom more susceptible for the inversion. The easy fall of Troy is an indication of the weak political system in the region prior to the inversion. The Greeks therefore take over the Kingdom and everything that once belonged to it, it was natural for soldiers to take war slaves most of who included the defeated soldiers. They also took women from the new region as sex slaves. The same is applicable to Troy where the Greek soldiers take husbands as war slaves and abuse the Trojan women. They take the Trojan queen and her maidens to serve as concubines to the Greek army generals. This is the greatest extent of disregard and a show of political power as the king fails to protect his beloved wife. Another clear literary bridge of eras arises naturally when the Trojan women seek to claim their equal and rightful position especially after the collapse of their kingdom. The society has previously neglected the plight of women. Throughout the play, Trojan women lament at the loss of their land. Through these lamentations, women come out clearly to demand a piece of the land a piece of treasure that women had previously never owned. This is therefore an integral point in the life of the Trojan women who for the first time begin contemplating the idea of owning land. Most of the women do not have families, they therefore seek to fend for themselves and they recognize the role of land in doing so. Unfortunately, the oppressive male chauvinistic society had not allowed them to own land. Now that their husbands are long dead, they realize the essence of women owning land, among other resources. In retelling the account suffered by the Trojan women in the play, the UTSC employs a number of literary and a film styles some of which are controversial. Among such is the intense use of explicit images and adult content. The film is a true representation and account to most of the predicaments that faced women in Troy during the Greek inversion. It therefore strives to relay the truth as it was, however, in doing this; the producers manipulate a number of sales techniques thereby breaching a number of ethical concerns in the production of the film (Hooper 41). The Trojan society upheld high religious standards and as the play begins, the gods discuss possible punishments for sexual offenses. This implies that the society upheld higher moral standards and sex could not have featured majorly as it does in the play. The producers of the play driven by the desire to maximize sales employ the understanding that sex sells especially in the modern society. The more sex they portray in their play the more they are likely to sell. They therefore incorporate as many sex scenes as possible. Additionally, the play makes use of many vulgar words. This coupled with the numerous sex scenes depicted through the numerous rape scenes and the subsequent sex trade draws decency from the play there by rating it differently. These are marketing techniques used deliberately to maximize profitability of the play while denying the play its actual originality and the actual account of the events of the war. Additionally, the timing of the play denies it the objectivity to give an actual account of the period of the war. The play lasts about one hundred and twenty minutes, which is the standard time for a movie (Hooper 17). It is obvious that it is impossible for the producers to include the detail account of the war and the serial tragedies that befell the Trojan society during the times. Most of such epic accounts use series, which give the producers more time to build up conflicts and narrate their occurrence to the end. Works cited Euripides. The Trojan Women. The Plays of Euripides. Trans. E. P. Coleridge. Vol. 1. London: George Bell and Sons, 1891. N. Page. The Perseus Project. Ed. Gregory Crane. Tufts U. Web. [date accessed].  Euripides, , Gwendolyn MacEwen, Nikos Tsingos, and Giannēs Ritsos. Trojan Women: The Trojan Women by Euripedes. and Helen, and Orestes by Ritsos. Toronto: Exile Editions, 1981. Print. Hooper, Brad. Writing Reviews for Readers' Advisory. Chicago: American Library Association, 2010. Print. Read More