House of Atreus. His interpretation is as follows:
The close of the Eumenides is anything but an anticlimax.
It is closely knit to the body of the whole trilogy, showing the manner in which the playwright supposes the necessary reconciliation between Zeus and the Furies to be made possible and acceptable.
The King of Heaven is mystically identified now and forever with Fate. The joyful procession is the sign not only that the moral government of the world has been set at last upon a sure basis, but also that this government is alreadt in operation and sanctifying human institutions.
This is what Owen means when he says:
The story is not the poet's subject; his artistic purpose goes beyond the dramatic development of the legend; that is why his play does not end with the story.5 In each play we have pointed out that Aeschylus was not primarily concerned with the legend, and here, it seems, is sufficient evidence to support our contention. What Owen maintains is the subject of the Oresteia is as follows:
The subject of the Oresteia is the creation of a new moral order; Aeschylus depicts the vast chain of events which the death of Agamemnon started in heaven and earth, how it and its results shook the
4
5 Norwood, PP• 114-116.
Owen, The Oresteia, P• 442. universe to its foundations and altered the spiritual history of the world; he presents the legend as a turning-point in the destinies of mankind.6
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If this interpretation is true, which is most probable, than it .is futile for us to look for any similarity between this play ~~d Aristotle's formula.
Here is tragedy, yet fund~~entally different from that implied in the definition of Aristotle. Aeschylus was not trying to write a tragedy of pity and fear. As Owen says:
•••Aeschylus was not led to his shaping of the
Orestes story by the simple desire to bring out the fearful and pitiable possibilities of the theme. He found pity and fear along the route he was following and used them for all they were worth, but they were not his goal.7
Here the Chorus is as much the protagonist as in the Supplices "and Orestes and his story drop out of sight as Olympians and Chthonians face one another in their final struggle for the soul of the world." 8 The invisible world has become visible and what we see is the invisible world torn asunder. This is more than a human problem.
The story of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra and Orestes is the sign and cause of a vaster struggle, a vaster problem. The ends ~~d purposes of the world are at stake. The acquittal of Orestes is the natural denoument of the trilogy~ It but brings the issue it has raised to a head.