Medea and Othello
Two tragedies from two different time period, Medea and Othello show similarities and differences in their characters, story plots and settings. Euripedes’ Medea written in the classical period and Shakespeare’s Othello written in the romantic era, the two tragedies shows different feel of what tragedies are.
First of all, the most obvious difference between these two play is how Medea shows unities (time, place and action) whilst Othello has none. It’s clearly shown in the first scene, as soon as the characters come out, that in the Medea, it’s a set place, and there would be no movement. The staging is nice and clear and throughout the whole story, the characters are in one place, and there is a unity between the time, place and action; this it to say that the characters are in one place, throughout the entire play. Whereas in Othello, it’s more Hollywood-like as in that, it’s out in the real world, and not set in a theatre like place. Therefore the play seems more realistic to the contemporary audience, however there is a loss of unity between the three categories – time place and action. However since the contemporary audience are used to these settings, they can easily catch on with the complexity of the story without getting too confused.
A minor difference that the audience can see in the play is the fact that violence is shown one play while violence isn’t showed in the other. In Medea, because people back in those days believed in the reasoning instead of emotions they didn’t focus too much on the violent part of the play. Instead, they kept the play nice and clean so that it kept a nice and simple feel to the overall play. So for example, in Medea, when Medea had to kill her children, it was done when the doors were closed, and we found out that she has done it when Jason goes into the room and storms out in fury blaming Medea for the death of their children. Likewise, the audience only hear about the burning of Creosa through the nurse when she comes
First of all, the most obvious difference between these two play is how Medea shows unities (time, place and action) whilst Othello has none. It’s clearly shown in the first scene, as soon as the characters come out, that in the Medea, it’s a set place, and there would be no movement. The staging is nice and clear and throughout the whole story, the characters are in one place, and there is a unity between the time, place and action; this it to say that the characters are in one place, throughout the entire play. Whereas in Othello, it’s more Hollywood-like as in that, it’s out in the real world, and not set in a theatre like place. Therefore the play seems more realistic to the contemporary audience, however there is a loss of unity between the three categories – time place and action. However since the contemporary audience are used to these settings, they can easily catch on with the complexity of the story without getting too confused.
A minor difference that the audience can see in the play is the fact that violence is shown one play while violence isn’t showed in the other. In Medea, because people back in those days believed in the reasoning instead of emotions they didn’t focus too much on the violent part of the play. Instead, they kept the play nice and clean so that it kept a nice and simple feel to the overall play. So for example, in Medea, when Medea had to kill her children, it was done when the doors were closed, and we found out that she has done it when Jason goes into the room and storms out in fury blaming Medea for the death of their children. Likewise, the audience only hear about the burning of Creosa through the nurse when she comes