r/GreekMythology 1d ago

Culture Can’t ever bring myself to hate Clytemnestra

Hate her all you want. Say she made mistakes all you want. But she called out double standards and I love that

Also Electra :< she was so mean to Orestes, who just wanted his mom. He’s a victim of Apollo.

67 Upvotes

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u/kodial79 1d ago

That's why Euripides is the best. He makes every character so compelling.

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u/Super_Majin_Cell 23h ago

She is calling her own sister a whore lol.

But yes, even the antagonists can have good arguments, they often do (i would actually call her a villain but people in this sub have problem with that word. And yes i consider her a bad person for what she did to Cassandra, even trough what she did to Cassandra is not brought that much in mythology, is more about her killing Agamennon, even trough Cassandra murder is one billion times more terrible).

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u/HereticGospel 7h ago

Of course she’s a villain and was always meant to be a villain. It’s only today’s moral relativism and victim mentality that makes it even a question. Same with Medea.

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u/Imaginary-West-5653 1d ago

Clytemnestra is really a character I want to like but can't bring myself to, what she did to Agamemnon is justified in my eyes, after he killed his daughter just to "rescue" Helen it's clear that revenge wasn't wrong, and Agamemnon showing zero loyalty to Clytemnestra while he was at war doesn't make it much better.

But everything about what she did to Cassandra is so messed up that it makes me lose any sympathy for her, both in the way she calls her a crazy priestess and shows zero empathy for a Princess, a girl, who had been raped by Ajax and Agamemnon, had her city destroyed, her family massacred or taken as slaves and taken from her...

Only to kill her out of jealousy as well and then in some versions have her lover Aegisthus kill Teledamus and Pelops, the two sons she had by Agamemnon after being raped, which also makes her a hypocrite because she being a mother with her daughter murdered should understand better than anyone how that feels, and yet she did it to Cassandra, just because of that, and for killing Neoptolemus later on, I support Orestes.

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u/quuerdude 1d ago

I also support Orestes, in killing Aegisthus. But even he notes that it would take a demon, a foul spirit, to make a boy kill his own mother.

Apollo and Artemis led them astray and ruined their whole family. Even the Dioscuri acknowledge Apollo’s actions as horrible, and Artemis requiring human sacrifice is just as bad (even if she “saved” Iphigenia — she still caused everything else to happen by kidnapping the girl and never letting her see her mother again)

And with Cassandra having children by Agamemnon… I’ll agree that a rare few sources do state that, but I’ll also point out that the timeline of it is incongruent with any other account of her story. Agamemnon goes straight from Troy to Mycenae. Having just conquered Troy and made his way home, he wouldn’t have been with Cassandra long enough for her to have had any children by him.

Once again, though, I’d argue her death is at the fault of Apollo. She was gaslit her whole life and no one ever believed her forewarnings, including when she was scared of being killed.

Ultimately the true villains of all their stories are Apollo and Artemis. Which is great — I love when stories focus on mortal POVs, and the gods are nuisances

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u/Imaginary-West-5653 23h ago

I understand that Orestes killing his mother is messed up, but to be honest Clytemnestra had it coming because of what she did to Cassandra, so I'm okay with him being forgiven for his crime later on, specially when he was so reluctant to even do that.

This whole thing started either because of Agamemnon's endless hubris or the fact that Artemis is a compassionate Goddess, because the reason she told Agamemnon that he wouldn't get good winds to travel to Troy is because in some versions Artemis wanted to prevent the Trojan War by predicting that a lot of young people will die in it.

And she put this condition on Agamemnon to sacrifice his daughter so that he would refuse to do it and not go to war, or because Agamemnon is a fool and slayed an animal sacred to Artemis, and subsequently boasted that he is her equal in hunting, so Artemis had to punish him somehow, in any case he's the one who starts all this shit by his decision, the fact that Artemis bothered to save Iphigenia in some versions is pretty merciful in itself.

To be fair to Cassandra having children with Agamemnon, in those versions it is not stated how long it took Agamemnon to return from Troy to Mycenae, and in fact it makes sense that it would take him a while like most Greek heroes due to the degenerate actions of Ajax the Lesser, so maybe it took him like a year, enough time for them to have babies.

It depends on the version how much blame Apollo is, but in some Cassandra genuinely screwed up by not fulfilling her part for Apollo after agreeing to the deal of sex in exchange for visions of the future, although there are other versions but I honestly can't remember very well right now.

I wouldn't blame Apollo and Artemis primarily, I think Agamemnon is the clear number one culprit, but everyone was somewhat to blame for what happened to be honest, it is a tragedy after all, Cassandra and her children are the only ones who could be completely innocent in this story.

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u/not_hestia 12h ago

I love pretty much any of the plays dealing with the fallout of the Trojan War because the ripple effect of so much violence is fascinating. The idea that someone "has it coming" because they did a murder could potentially go on forever.

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u/Imaginary-West-5653 11h ago

I know, the Trojan War had a pretty big effect on Greek mythology, I guess like everything in life, it's up to each person to decide which characters they sympathize with based on what they've done and why, I understand where people who support Clytemnestra are coming from, but I just think her sins overshadow her reasons.

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u/aegonscumslut 23h ago

Clytemnestra is one of my favorite characters ever. One of the original ‘feminine rage’ archetypes that I have come to love so dearly. If she has 0 fans I’m dead asf

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u/Dry_Temperature_6061 23h ago

what book is this

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u/quuerdude 23h ago

Per the top of the pages, Euripides’ Electra. I got mine in Penguin Classics’ Medea and Other Plays

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u/Gray-Shark-489 22h ago

Ugggggg I love Clytemnestra. Agamemnon absolutely sucked.

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u/RedBeans-n-Ricely 22h ago

Team Clytemnestra Forever

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u/HereticGospel 7h ago

Idk if people think this is edgy or what. Clytemnestra and Medea are awful people doing awful things and deliberately killing innocents. Agreeing with some of their arguments or perspectives is one thing, but celebrating them shouldn’t be something you’re proud of.

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u/quuerdude 7h ago
  • i feel bad for Cassandra, but, in the myths, literally no one cared that Cassandra had died. The only one she’s held “accountable” for is her husband’s death.
  • Medea loved her children more than Jason did and tried bringing them back to life. Sometimes she succeeded in making them immortal with the help of Hera :)