Exile Theme Analysis

In Euripides' Medea, exile is a past reality, an impending threat, and an internal state. Medea and Jason are exiles before the action of Euripides' play begins. In the play's backstory, Medea was forced to flee from her homeland of Clochis for helping Jason to secure the Golden Fleece. Then Jason and she together were exiled as murderers from Jason's homeland of Iolcus because of Medea's attempt to wrest ruling power for her and Jason from the corrupt king, Pelias.

Euripides' Medea begins with Medea's Nurse lamenting that Jason ever came to Clochis. The threat of the sentence of a third exile for Medea is quickly presented by the children's Tutor, who has just come from the castle where he has overheard "That Creon, the ruler of the land, intends to drive/ These children and their mother in exile from Corinth." Exile, or Medea's impending exile, is one of the main driver's of the play's plot. Medea begs Creon to give her one day in which to consider where she should go with her children, and, though Creon grants Medea her request, he recognizes, "Even now I know I am making some mistake." Later, Medea's pretended attempt to relieve the sentence of exile from her children allows her to poison the Princess and results in the Princess and Creon's deaths.

But exile, beyond being a physical condition for Medea, Jason, and their household, is also an emotional and spiritual state. We see this in various lamentations, like the Nurse's, "There is no home. It's over and done with," and Medea's "Oh, my father! Oh, my country! In what dishonor/ I left you…" and "I have no land, no home, no refuge from my pain." Both Medea and Jason invoke their exiled status in their arguments, and Jason even tries to convince Medea that she should "consider/ [Herself] most lucky that exile is [her] punishment" rather than death. For both Jason and Medea the pain of present exile coupled with the fear of future ones serve as motivations and justifications for their actions in the play.