Greek Tragedy Countdown, #6: When The War Is Over, Where Does The Violence Go?

In honor of my adaptation of the Greek tragedy Antigone, which releases in 6 days (actually five, because I’m behind on my posts LOL), here’s my sixth favorite Greek tragedy: Sophocles’ Ajax.

The story of Ajax goes like this: during the Trojan War, the Greek hero Ajax was a killing machine. He was among the foremost of the Greek warriors (behind Achilles, of course, who was “the best of the Achaeans”), known for his towering physique and his huge, seven-layered shield. After Achilles’ death, Ajax competed with Odysseus for the honor of receiving Achilles’ divinely-wrought armor. Unfortunately for Ajax, it was a contest of persuasion rather than physical prowess, and, as a result, the man famed for his wily intelligence – Odysseus – won. Ashamed of losing such a glorious prize to someone whom he considered fundamentally unworthy (a man of cunning rather than competence), Ajax killed himself.

The tension between Ajax and Odysseus is central to Ajax’s story. Indeed, in Book 11 of Homer’s Odyssey, Odysseus goes to the underworld, and there he sees (among many other things) Ajax’s sullen ghost. Moved to tears by the sight, Odysseus apologizes for his role in Ajax’s demise. If he’d known that contest would lead to his friend’s death, he laments, he never would have entered it. But Ajax wordlessly turns and walks away.

Sophocles’ Ajax, my sixth favorite Greek tragedy, homes in on the moments before and after Ajax chooses to kill himself, adding depth and detail to this pivotal moment. In Sophocles’ version, Ajax is so furious about his loss to Odysseus that he initially sets out to kill Odysseus, but the goddess Athena inflicts him with a temporary madness that causes him to turn his sword against a flock of animals instead. When Ajax realizes what he has done (and what he would have done, had he been in his right mind), his shame threatens to swallow him whole. His concubine Tecmessa tries to soothe him, but her efforts are in vain. Halfway through the play, Ajax kills himself on stage. The rest of the play pits the grieving Tecmessa and Ajax’s half-brother Teucer against the Greek kings Agamemnon and Menelaus, who want to deny Ajax’s burial because of his shameful behavior. The argument is resolved by Odysseus, who – perhaps surprisingly – sides with Tecmessa and Teucer, insisting that even one’s enemies deserve a proper burial.

This proper burial motif, by the way, is also central to the plot of both Homer’s Iliad and Sophocles’ Antigone (which is the play I’m publishing soon and which will appear later on this list).

OK, so here’s why I love the play Ajax: first, it is a haunting illustration of a dilemma that any warlike society faces. In war, Ajax was a celebrated killing machine. But what does a killing machine do when the war is over? If your self-worth is completely tied up in your ability to do violence, what happens when violence is no longer necessary, no longer condoned? Sophocles treats Ajax’s pride, shame, and rage with remarkable sympathy. Tecmessa was never an important part of Ajax’s story in other versions, but in Sophocles’ play, it is Tecmessa who allows us to empathize with the great warrior. She sees Ajax’s distress and tries her damndest to pull him away from the brink again and again, begging him not to leave her and to prioritize her and their son over his feelings of anger and shame. But despite her best efforts, Ajax slips through her fingers. And we watch it happen helplessly.

Second, the staging of this play was revolutionary for its time. As a rule, deaths don’t happen on stage in Greek tragedy. So when Ajax stands in the middle of the stage and falls on his sword halfway through the play, the audience must have gasped with shock. AND THEN Ajax’s body remains on the stage for the remainder of the play. In other tragedies, dead bodies tend to be brought on stage for a brief, powerful moment. In Ajax, the body is a constant reminder of the consequences of shame, pride, rage, and violence that STAYS on the stage while the other characters deal with the aftermath. One can only imagine the effect this would have had. And just from a logistical standpoint…did the actor who played Ajax lie there the whole time???

Come back tomorrow for #5 on the list!

In Proximum, Regina Vestra