The Agamemnon
Seneca
Seneca’s Agamemnon is a multi-faceted tale of revenge. These acts of revenge range from the personal level, such as Clytemnestra’s rage towards her husband for their daughter’s sacrifice and his infidelity – to the socio-political level, as Cassandra’s foresees and cheers on the collapse of Argos as retribution for the fall of Troy. While these two women, who are in direct conflict with each other, seem to have opposite goals, Clytemnestra is unaware that her rage and vengefulness is the key to Cassandra’s retribution. Clytemnestra’s total ignorance to the role she plays in her own demise is what makes the Agamemnon a ‘revenge tragedy’.
Cassandra’s desire for revenge and justice must be fully explored before Clytemnestra’s unwilling compliance in achieving it may be understood. As a former princess of Troy, Cassandra lost even more than the atypical Trojan woman. Seneca’s chorus is comprised entirely of the imprisoned Trojan women, who lament their situation and capture. Cassandra is anything but sympathetic, silencing her countrywomen – the fall of Troy meant the personal destruction of her family and lineage, a burden that she alone bears. [2] The ruling family and the city are one in the same to her, so Cassandra’s desire to avenge Troy is as much a personal vendetta as a political strategy.
Enter Clytemnestra. Despite her affair with Agamemnon’s cousin Aegisthus, she feels wronged by her husband’s capture of Cassandra as a mistress and a prize. The anger she feels is legitimate, but it also needless compounded by guilt for her own adultery. [3] In reality, Cltemnestra’s only real grievance is her daughter’s sacrifice by Agamemnon at the dawn of the Trojan War. This combination of anger, jealousy, and guilt made the queen susceptible to scheme with her lover, to plot the murder of her husband. In Clytemnestra’s mind, it is the perfect vengeance against her husband. Cassandra’s execution is the next logical step, as the Queen must also take vengeance against the ‘other woman’. For Cassandra, who foresees both her and Agamemnon’s death – it is the final piece in her larger puzzle.
Before his untimely murder, Cassandra tells her captor “For me, death is security”. [4] Cassandra is painfully aware of her coming demise, but rationalizes it and accepts it as the key to avenging her fallen city-state. The passion for revenge is so strong that she manifests “…an unyielding spirit in the face of authority and its arbitrary control over life and death”. [5] This is clear in both her sarcastic and disrespectful conversation with Agamemnon [6], and her compliance to walk to her own execution after the judgment of murderous Clytemnestra. [7]
After being used and abused for her prophecies (and the insanity that most people saw instead), Cassandra finally achieves agency for herself, and takes her power into her own hands. Her divine power allowed her to think on a larger scale than Clytemnestra ever could. While the Queen murdered her adulterous husband, she simultaneously brings justice to the Trojans by killing Agamemnon and destabilizing her entire kingdom, now without their warrior king. As the perfect pawn for Cassandra’s true objective, Clytemnestra provided more closure to her enemy than herself. Cassandra now had the closure to face her death with serenity, and could greet her fallen Trojans in the afterlife with the glorious news of Agamemnon’s fall. [8]