Sophocles Electra 610-11 Again

Author(s): Charles Segal

Source: Classical Philology, Vol. 77, No. 2 (Apr., 1982), pp. 133-136
Published by: The University of Chicago Press
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 NOTES AND DISCUSSIONS
SOPHOCLES ELECTRA 610-11 AGAIN

Xo. OpCi) /voq iv6ovo-av- El 8E criV iK,q 610

OVVECTt, TOV8C 4pOVrl OVKgT 8LOOpCO.

KX. iroiaq 6' 84'oi _6c iE-pO6S yc T7vc 4povri5oq,

~TvS Tortara TrV TrcKOvcav if3ptcev,
Kai TaiTa TT1XLKOtYTO'; ap& 00L OKCl
xctpetv av ES i-av spyov ataxvC1S aTEp; 615

Recent discussion of these lines has brought consensus on one point, namely, that
both irv9ovo-av and e15VVcrT refer to the same person.' Whether that person is
Electra or Clytemnestra or whether 610-11 are spoken by the chorus (MSS,
followed by Jebb and Pearson), Electra (Fitton Brown),2 or Clytemnestra (Lilley)
is still disputed. Of those who have attacked the question in the past few years,
Kells and Kamerbeek follow the manuscripts in assigning the lines to the chorus
but argue that they refer to Clytemnestra.3 Lilley believes that the lines refer to
Electra but are spoken by Clytemnestra. Booth in 1977 defended the manuscripts'
attribution to the chorus and the reference to Electra.4 Booth and Jebb seem right,
but neither cited the necessary evidence to prove his case nor adequately refuted
the arguments on the other side.
One of the chief objections to referring the lines to Electra has been the chorus'
sympathy for her in the play. Kamerbeek's endorsement of this view is represen-
tative: while granting that Op(i 1kvoq irv9ovo-av might refer to Electra and especially
to her last words, he "cannot imagine the Chorus calling into question Electra's
concern for justice."5 Jebb had already cited Electra 213-20 as evidence that the
chorus could be critical of Electra. Strictly speaking, Kamerbeek is right, for the
chorus in 213-20 criticizes not her concern for justice but her excessive speech,
self-pity, and persistence in a hopeless conflict. Not cited in recent discussions are
369-71:

p'q&Ev -Tp6'q O6pyi)v Tp6 i-p ov- ft TOPS X6yovq

kVEJ-TtV a'4O0V KgP6o5E, Sti o-i) /19V 1160OoL'
TOri T068 Xp7o-OaL, ToZq &9 uoZ aiTrq 7O rXlv.

These lines come at the end of Electra's sharp criticism of her sister for collab-
oration with their father's killers. Although addressed to both women, they refer

1. See D. J. Lilley, "Sophocles, Electra 610-11," CQ 25 (1975): 309. For a tally of the various positions,
see N. B. Booth, "Sophocles, Electra 610-11," CQ 27 (1977): 466-67.
2. "Notes on Sophocles' Electra," CQ 6 (1956): 38.
3. J. H. Kells (ed.), Sophocles "Electra" (Cambridge, 1973), and J. C. Kamerbeek, The Plays of
Sophocles: Commentaries, part 5: The "Electra" (Leyden, 1974), ad loc. This is also the view of L.
Campbell (ed.), Sophocles, vol. 2 (Oxford, 1882), ad loc.; G. Kaibel (ed.), Sophokles "Elektra" (Leipzig,
1896), ad loc.; D. B. Gregor, "Sophocles Electra 610-11," CR 64 (1950): 87-88.
4. "Sophocles, Electra 610-11," pp. 466-67.
5. The "Electra," ad loc.; so also Kaibel, Sophokles "Elektra," p. 168.

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133

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 134 NOTES AND DISCUSSIONS

more immediately to Electra, whose tone, far more than her sister's, is 1Tp6OS oipyiv
(341-69).6 Just before the admonition of 369 Electra has ungratefully rejected a
sister's concern for her safety; just before 610 she threatens a mother and throws
shame to the winds. Although clearly on her side (cf. 251-53, 464-65), the chorus
is not blind to the harsh features of her character.
As to the form of this choral interposition, Lilley objected that Jebb's parallel
with Antigone 471-72 was inexact. Attempting to begin Clytemnestra's reply with
610, he cited a number of examples of altercations without choral intrusion.7 But
neither of his parallels (Antig. 988-90 and Phil. 1222-23) corresponds to the
situation of this scene. He objected also that the chorus should speak directly to,
rather than about, Electra.8 But consider a passage like Antigone 724-25:

&vav, oCE ' 8LKO'S, E] TL KaLpLOV X8yet,

gaOEiv, o- r' aiV roV'' *E y&p eLp7rtpL 6AnXJ.

The two agonists, Creon and Haemon, have each, as here, delivered a long
speech. The chorus' reply describes the last speaker in the third person. The first
speaker, Creon, like Clytemnestra in Electra 612-15, then comments on the
chorus' remark, describing his antagonist also in the third person (Antig. 726-2 7):

oF rqXtLKO686 Kai 88ae6glOa0 a

0pov_Lv 1Tp6q a'v8pO6S fT7XLKov8K-6E TV 0n3o-W;

The first speaker (Haemon, like Electra in 616-21) then replies, and the debate
continues in the second person between the two antagonists. The only difference
from our passage is that the chorus of Electra does not directly address the first
speaker. That difference may be explained by the fact that, although momentarily
critical of Electra, the chorus is hostile to Clytemnestra and does not wish to
associate itself with her more than it has to.9 By demurring at Electra's "justice"
and yet not directly addressing Clytemnestra, the members of the chorus are able
to maintain a precarious balance between both sides. Compare 310-16 for their
caution about allying themselves too overtly with Electra. This modest chorus,
although clearly committed to Electra, is not likely to risk so pointed a challenge
to the queen as a direct questioning of her concern for justice. Is this caution on
the chorus' part possibly responsible for the abruptness of 610 and the surprising
absence of a personal pronoun there?
Other parallels to this movement between third and second persons in &utXXat
X6yAov, although somewhat less exact, are Oedipus Tyrannus 616-21 and Phil-
octetes 1045-46. In the former the chorus comments on Creon's speech in the
third person. Oedipus replies, still speaking of Creon in the third person (618-21).
Creon answers him with a direct second-person question (622), leading into sti-
chomythic altercation, until Jocasta's arrival (analogous in function to Clytem-
nestra's sacrifice at El. 634) ends the quarrel. Likewise in Philoctetes 1045-69 the

6. Kaibel, Sophokles "Elektra," p. 168, cites line 369 as an example of the chorus giving the answer
of the character under attack but does not see the further relevance of the lines to this scene, i.e., the
chorus' willingness to criticize Electra's anger.
7. "Sophocles, Electra 610-11," p. 310.
8. Ibid., p. 311.
9. In rejecting Blaydes' emendation, et U asoi 8LKT) . . . , Kaibel, Sophokles "Elektra," p. 169, touches
on this problem but does not develop its implications; similarly, M. A. Bayfield, The "Elektra" of
Sophokles (London, 1901), ad loc.

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 NOTES AND DISCUSSIONS 135

chorus' two-line interposition describes the hero's powerful indictment in the third
person, although here Odysseus (rather strangely at a loss for words) has no real
counter-speech. In any case, these examples, taken together with those cited by
Jebb and Lilley, show that the Sophoclean pattern of such debates is flexible and
varied. The particular variation in our passage (i.e., the chorus' withholding
direct address to the first agonist) is due, as suggested above, to the delicate
position in which the chorus is placed vis-a-vis the two figures on the stage.
A third, and recurrent, objection to Jebb's view of the passage is that the phrase
EL ... o)VV &LK-) %vsccTr must refer to Clytemnestra, who accused Electra of going
"beyond dike" and defended the dike of Agamemnon's murder (528-29; cf. 538,
551). Kells takes the phrase as a sarcastic reference to Clytemnestra's claim to
have dike on her side (528). '? Similarly, Lilley argues that Clytemnestra puts more
stress than Electra on dike. He compares Clytemnestra's confident line, - yap
ALK1 VwV E'XEV . . . (528), with Electra's apparent lack of interest in dike in 560,
BET' OVV 5tKaiwS cEiT g.11 To this point there are two objections. First, dike has
in fact figured prominently in Electra's speech: compare 561, 583; note also 564
i7-otvw, 592 avr-rowva; compare 210. It is just as likely that the chorus would be
referring to the dike of the speech immediately preceding as to the remoter speech.
Second and more important, Electra's apparent neglect of dike in 560 is not just
a neutral quality. Previously the chorus had placed Dike firmly on Electra's side
and assured her, in the ode preceding the debate, of Dike's imminent and forceful
arrival (475-78). Taken aback by Electra's surprising indifference to Clytemnes-
tra's "acting justly" (560), the chorus in 610-11 is reacting not to Clytemnestra's
claims (questionable in any case) to dike, but to the heroine's unexpected dismissal
of dike.
The word OVKCTL iS further evidence for the chorus' reference to Electra in
610-11. Electra, previously a champion of dike against compromise, as she will
be later (1041-42), now seems in 560 "no longer" to show concern for justice.'2
The closing portion of her speech, too, seems to leave justice behind and indulge
in a bitter personal tirade against Clytemnestra (595-609). "No longer concerned
with justice" is far less apt for Clytemnestra, to whom justice has never been a
dominant issue. Dike is conspicuously absent from her prayer soon after (634-59),
where her desired "association" is not with "justice" (610-1 1), but with the "dear
ones with whom [she] now associates" (652 fiXoto-i Ts evvof'o-av olt evVcu viv).
Very different is the moral concern of Electra's prayers in 110-20 and 1376-83,
where the problem of justice is either stated or implicit (113, 1382-83; cf. 247-50).
Although Clytemnestra begins her speech of self-defense by subordinating her-
self to the Dike that "took" Agamemnon (528 - yap ?IiK- V1L CLXV, OVK 'yc6 6v),
she reverses that relation ten lines later (537-38): "Killing what is mine, was he
not going to pay me back dike for them [or, for these things]?" (KTavdV / Tr&4' OVK
e,teXXe TcLrw5 /,OL 60eLzV 6LK?71V; cf. also 536 riv y' E v, 542 T6W E4t6w, 544-45 T6W
g,v E E/LO' / I iaiov).
Discussing the question of dike in 1950, Gregor emphasized the calm tone of
Electra's speech, a calmness which could only infuriate Clytemnestra all the

10. Sophocles "Electra," ad loc.

11. "Sophocles, Electra 610-11," p. 311.
12. The "pseudo-problem" of Clytemnestra's taking up OpovriS' in 611 as if it referred to her is
adequately removed by Booth, "Sophocles, Electra 610-15" p. 466.

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136 NOTES AND DISCUSSIONS

more. '3 Is Electra's speech really so calm? Fortunately, we do not have her words
only as evidence, for Clytemnestra tells us clearly enough: to her it is an act of
wanton outrage, insult against a mother: TrrV TrcKofo-av i3pwcev (613). It is also an
act of utter shamelessness (615). Nor, as Gregor suggests, is Clytemnestra here
responding to the infuriating effect of a calm statement. She is echoing Electra's
own closing lines about "shamelessness" (605-9), which are Electra's grim com-
mentary on her readiness to "raise up an avenger" against her mother if she had
the strength to do it (604-5). A daughter's implicit threat against a mother's life
in an angry face-to-face encounter is hardly a calm statement.
The chorus, too, on this view of the passage, is shocked and adds to its two
previous warnings about Electra's excessive emotional reactions (213-20, 369-71)
a third, lines 610-11. Driving herself to the pitch of hatred where she implicitly
wishes a son's vengeance upon a mother, Electra does indeed "breathe forth
anger."
Fitton Brown cited J. E. Harry's protest that this phrase, g9voq i7v9ovo-av, was
unsuitable for a Greek maiden.'4 Indeed it is, and Electra is fully aware of how
unmaidenly her words and attitudes are. Clytemnestra in the next scene will
describe her in terms appropriate to an Erinys (784-86; cf. 1420-21; also Trach.
1050-56; Aesch. Cho. 577-78). M9voq iwvovo-a, in fact, if not suitable for a Greek
maiden, is, as Harry noted,'5 quite suitable for an Erinys: compare Aeschylus
Eumenides 840 = 873, Choephoroi 952. In our passage, as earlier, Electra ac-
knowledges that her behavior violates the norms of evio-9f3Eta, maidenly ai6s,; and
ato-Xt5rnv (607-8; cf. 307-9). As interpreted here, lines 610-11 suggest that Electra's
position is not so free of moral problems as has sometimes been thought.'6
In their immediate context lines 610-11 have still another function. They show
Electra as increasingly isolated in her defense of dike, or of such dike as she
possesses. In Clytemnestra's absence the chorus places Dike unambiguously with
Electra (472-78). Like Chrysothemis, however, it balks at open defiance of the
rulers and retreats, prudently, to questioning (not unreasonably) Electra's hold
on dike on a point of moral conflict that, in Aeschylus' trilogy, required a divinely
appointed tribunal for its resolution. Electra's momentary abandonment by her
ineffectual allies becomes suddenly bleaker in the next scene as the Paedagogus
announces Orestes' death (cf. 812-22). Later, when she is abandoned by her one
remaining ally, she is prepared to take the vengeance implied in 604-5 into her
own hands (1017-20).'7
CHARLES SEGAL
Brown University
13. "Sophocles Electra 610-11," p. 87.
14. "Notes," p. 38, paraphrasing J. E. Harry, "OPf MENOI fNEOYXAN (Soph. El. 610)," CQ 5 (1911):
178.
15. "OPfl MENOX [INEOYXAN," p. 178. For the importance of the Erinyes in the play, see now R. P.
Winnington-Ingram, Sophocles: An Interpretation (Cambridge, 1980), pp. 218, 231-33, 238-39.
16. This view of the moral problem of the matricide, put forth by J. T. Sheppard, "The Tragedy of
Electra, According to Sophocles," CQ 12 (1918): 80-88, has been developed more recently by R. P.
Winnington-Ingram, "The 'Electra' of Sophocles: Prolegomenon to an Interpretation," PCPS 183 (1954):
20-26, and now his Sophocles, ch. 10; H.-F. Johansen, "Die Elektra des Sophokles: Versuch einer neuen
Deutung," C&M 25 (1964): 8-32; H.-J. Newiger, "Hofmannsthals Elektra und die griechische Tragodie,"
Arcadia 4 (1969): 138-63; G. H. Gellie, Sophocles: A Reading (Melbourne, 1972), pp. 106-30; Kamerbeek,
Commentaries, pp. 17-20, and others. The older view (unproblematic and "Homeric" treatment of the
matricide) is restated, unsuccessfully in my opinion, by P. T. Stevens, "Sophocles' Electra, Doom or
Triumph?" G&R 25 (1978): 111-19.
17. I thank CP's anonymous reader for several helpful suggestions.

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