Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Alcestis, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Mortality and Happiness
Obligation, Limitations, and Fate
Hospitality and Friendship
Loyalty
Summary
Analysis
The chorus sings in memory of Alcestis, whose life was “the noblest […] the sunlight ever shone upon.” Therefore, “wherever there is light […] / Death shall not eclipse the glory of your shining.” The chorus laments being too old to strive with Death and bring Alcestis back. They also charge Admetos’s elderly parents with cowardice for refusing to die. Instead, Alcestis has died “in the fresh morning” of her life.
Alcestis is directly associated with light, the symbol of life; her “shining” is so bright that death can’t quench it. The chorus’s powerless age contrasts with Herakles’s youthful strength, soon to appear. Admetos’s parents’ age likewise contrasts with Alcestis’s youth, suggesting that Alcestis’s premature death is unnatural.
Themes
Just then Herakles enters and greets the chorus. The chorus leader asks what business brings him to Thessaly. Herakles explains that he has a labor to perform for his master, Eurystheus, whose commands he obeys. He must journey to Thrace and capture Diomedes’ horses. The chorus leader is aghast—those killer horses can’t be broken without a fight. Herakles replies, “Fighting’s what I do. / […] I can’t refuse.”
The appearance of Herakles (Hercules), the greatest hero of ancient Greece, contrasts with the sorrowful helplessness just voiced by the chorus. Herakles is compelled to perform various labors and toils for Eurystheus, a king in Argos. Therefore, even this powerful figure is subject to obligations—something he accepts, and something Admetos, by contrast, has yet to fully accept in his own life. Diomedes was a son of the god Ares; he was the king of Thrace and commander of its “golden cavalry.”
Themes
The chorus leader explains that Diomedes is Ares’ fierce son, and Herakles says that this is just another example of “my labors and my life / […] rough, uphill / all the way.” But he’s never “[flinched] from a fight,” and he won’t now.
Herakles didn’t know the full story of Diomedes and his deadly horses, but it doesn’t matter to him. As far as he’s concerned, hardship and struggle are expected in life, and he doesn’t back down from them—again contrasting with Admetos’s “flinching” from the trial of death.
Themes
Admetos enters, dressed in mourning, and welcomes Herakles. When Herakles asks about his appearance, Admetos explains that there’s a funeral today. When pressed, Admetos haltingly denies that anything has happened to Alcestis. Herakles knows about Alcestis’s doom, so Admetos lets him believe that he’s mourning her in advance: “those who are doomed are as good as dead.” Then he claims that he is mourning the death of an orphaned woman who’d taken refuge in their house.
In contrast to the arrival of the chorus leader, who was welcomed by the maid as someone who’s ready to support the household in mourning, Herakles is welcomed on a dishonest basis. He’s kept in ignorance of household mourning, so he’s not given the chance to join it. Admetos’s desire to preserve the appearance of hospitality is creating an entanglement for the bonds of friendship.
Themes
Get the entire Alcestis LitChart as a printable PDF.
At this, Herakles turns to leave, but Admetos takes his arm and forcibly detains him. Herakles resists, saying that one can’t mourn and entertain friends at the same time. But Admetos prevails, insisting that Herakles be housed in the guest quarters and generously served.
Admetos’s gesture of force and compulsion, seizing the reluctant Herakles’s arm, will be repeated by Herakles later, at the climax of the play. This scene also illustrates the fact that Admetos is used to getting his own way.
Themes
After Herakles is escorted into the palace, the chorus leader asks if Admetos is crazy. Admetos says he can’t turn away a friend. He has “pain enough,” he says, “without the pain / of having my house called inhospitable and rude.” But if Herakles is Admetos’s friend, the leader replies, “then why conceal your sorrow?” Admetos says that his house has never been discourteous to guests and must not show “less than due regard / for those with claims upon my honor and my love.”
The chorus leader, fulfilling his role of appealing to Admetos’s conscience, perceptively asks why Admetos denies Herakles the chance to be a true friend. Admetos is genuinely hospitable and understands something of friendship’s “claims” upon honor and love. However, these traits are still rather confused and undeveloped, stunted by Admetos’s refusal to fully submit to fate.
Themes
