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A review by namelyreed
Phaedra by Lucius Annaeus Seneca
dark
emotional
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Reflected on it. Wrote the below:
Hippolytus rejects the wealth and luster of his birthright, and thinks instead it is a “joy to taste fresh water from naked hands”, to sleep rough and live off the land. But at the core of his condemnation of society, wealth, property, and militarism, is a condemnation of women as “the root of all evil.” Men, he implies, are naturally innocent creatures, manipulated into evil by womens’ scheming. He doesn’t make any specific reference, but that perspective, in my view, harkens images of Eve and the Snake.
If you consider when Seneca wrote “Phaedra”, it makes sense for this character, specifically, to have a potentially Christian viewpoint. Seneca was mentor to Nero, the emperor who organized a persectution of Christians in Rome. And in this text, written some fifteen years prior, Seneca gives us a Christianized character, and literally tears him apart. It’s a wise use of theatre’s intrinsic symbolism. A christian, an Incel, any American man really, might read or watch “Phaedra” and see in Hippolytus an innocent man, manipulated by his stepmother, falsely accused of rape, and essentially murdered. But I think Seneca was using the character to demonstrate a fallacy of Christian thought; I think it was intentional to have Hippolytus condemn women before interacting with Phaedra. The nurse urges him to enjoy life by drinking, playing, and having sex. He denies it all, and when his stepmother entreats him to her bed, he runs away to nature, hoping it will purify him.
Seneca chose to make Hippolytus’ beauty immediate, physical, and arresting. He chose to give him Christian values. And he chose to mangle Hippolytus to badly that all the pieces of him could not be recovered. I think he meant to tie Christianity to beauty as a theatrical choice, to best engage audiences with Christian thought, before destroying it. Hippolytus’ shunning of status and women compels me in that thought. And I think that our culture today contains groups of people, maybe not Christian specifically, but idolators of what what they might call beautiful men, who could stand to be reminded once in awhile that they are like Hippolytus. You may have some spark of Beauty, but chase too far and you will die for it.
“Seldom has beauty come to men unpunished.”
Hippolytus rejects the wealth and luster of his birthright, and thinks instead it is a “joy to taste fresh water from naked hands”, to sleep rough and live off the land. But at the core of his condemnation of society, wealth, property, and militarism, is a condemnation of women as “the root of all evil.” Men, he implies, are naturally innocent creatures, manipulated into evil by womens’ scheming. He doesn’t make any specific reference, but that perspective, in my view, harkens images of Eve and the Snake.
If you consider when Seneca wrote “Phaedra”, it makes sense for this character, specifically, to have a potentially Christian viewpoint. Seneca was mentor to Nero, the emperor who organized a persectution of Christians in Rome. And in this text, written some fifteen years prior, Seneca gives us a Christianized character, and literally tears him apart. It’s a wise use of theatre’s intrinsic symbolism. A christian, an Incel, any American man really, might read or watch “Phaedra” and see in Hippolytus an innocent man, manipulated by his stepmother, falsely accused of rape, and essentially murdered. But I think Seneca was using the character to demonstrate a fallacy of Christian thought; I think it was intentional to have Hippolytus condemn women before interacting with Phaedra. The nurse urges him to enjoy life by drinking, playing, and having sex. He denies it all, and when his stepmother entreats him to her bed, he runs away to nature, hoping it will purify him.
Seneca chose to make Hippolytus’ beauty immediate, physical, and arresting. He chose to give him Christian values. And he chose to mangle Hippolytus to badly that all the pieces of him could not be recovered. I think he meant to tie Christianity to beauty as a theatrical choice, to best engage audiences with Christian thought, before destroying it. Hippolytus’ shunning of status and women compels me in that thought. And I think that our culture today contains groups of people, maybe not Christian specifically, but idolators of what what they might call beautiful men, who could stand to be reminded once in awhile that they are like Hippolytus. You may have some spark of Beauty, but chase too far and you will die for it.
“Seldom has beauty come to men unpunished.”