Medea

Throughout the play, it is very clear that Medea feels that she has been wronged and is in search of a way to repay Jason with equally vengeful acts.  It seems that Medea will stop at nothing to see that Jason feels the same pain, if not worse pain, that she felt when he left her for another woman.  Medea does not recognize, however, that her actions may come back to get her in the end.  With that being said, the point of this play could very easily be that intentionally harming those who have harmed you does not always work out in your favor.

In the following passage (lines 1334-1347) there are several instances in which the point can both be seen and debated.

        Medea: I too, as I had to, have taken hold of your heart.

        Jason: You feel the pain yourself. You share in my sorrow

        Medea: Yes, and my grief is gain when you cannot mock it

        Jason: O children, what a wicked mother she was to you!

       Medea: They died from a disease they caught from their father 

       Jason: I tell you it was not my hand that destroyed them

       Medea: But it was your insolence, and your virgin wedding

       Jason: And just for the sake of that you chose to kill them

       Medea: Is love so small a pain, do you think, for a woman?

       Jason: For a wise one, certainly. But you are wholly evil

      Medea: The children are dead. I say this to make you suffer

      Jason: The children, I think, will bring down the curses on you

      Medea: The gods know who was the author of this sorrow

      Jason: Yes, the gods know indeed, they know your loathsome heart

This passage presents several words that help support the point statement that says that in doing harm to someone else you may end up doing harm to yourself.  Jason tells Medea that shes "share(s) in [his] sorrow."  This is a prime example of how Medea's actions to hurt Jason reflect on her.  While she was focused on making Jason miserable she ended up doing long term harm to herself by killing her own children.  Medea puts an emphasis on the grief that is a product of losing their children. The grief she is referring to is Jason's but in the midst of her actions she is still missing the fact that at some point she is going to reap the effects of her actions.  The word "wicked" is picked out of this passage to highlight the nature of Medea, especially at the time she commits the murder of her children.  Jason refers to her as wicked because she has committed the murder of her own children and does not seem effected by it at all.  It is from this that we can draw a contradiction from our previously stated point. 

As readers, it is our hope that at some point after the play is over Medea will come to her senses and grief for the children she has killed.  We hope that she will at some point realize what she has done and properly mourn for her children.  Jason uses the word "wicked" to describe Medea and her nature.  If Medea does not come around and truly is a wicked person who does things simply out of spite, we will then see a contradiction in our point.  If Medea is truly wicked she will have not done harm to herself, or at least she will not feel that she has done any harm to herself because her wicked nature will prevent her from caring about what she has done.