Electra: Lines 1398-1510 Summary & Analysis

In Aeschylus’s The Libation Bearers, Electra disappears during the murder of Clytemnestra, but Sophocles has Electra play a more active role, which supports his central argument that women, too, are capable of revenge and murder. Electra is cold and unforgiving, and even seems excited by the sounds of her mother’s screams. This again upsets gender stereotypes, and instead of being tender and nurturing as a stereotypical female character might be, Electra is hateful and bloodthirsty.

Through Orestes’s comment that “all is well if Apollo prophesized well,” Sophocles implies that perhaps Apollo didn’t prophesize well, or, at least, that Orestes may have misinterpreted his prophecy. In this way, Sophocles again implies that there is no justification for matricide, not even revenge that seems to be sanctioned by the gods. 

Electra’s claim that she “can look after” things and the italicized “I” again imply that Electra is just as capable as any man and doesn’t need Orestes’s help to trap Aegisthus and guide him to his untimely death. Electra’s behavior again upends popular stereotypes of female gender roles. She is sarcastic and mocking in her approach to Aegisthus, which again portrays her as hateful and bloodthirsty rather than reserved and demure. 

Clytemnestra’s shrouded body is another example of deceit and disguise, as Aegisthus is made to believe that it is Orestes’s body under the sheet. Aegisthus’s comment that “kinship requires some mourning, even from [him]” reflects Aegisthus’s identity as a biological relative of Orestes’s, beyond being his stepfather. Aegisthus’s father and Orestes’s father were brothers, which makes the men first cousins.  

Instead of telling Aegisthus who he is directly, Orestes speaks in a riddle, much like the Delphic oracle, which reflect the deception that Orestes has relied on throughout the play. Even in this final moments of his life, Aegisthus can’t be sure that those around him are speaking truthfully. Additionally, Electra’s interruption further disrupts popular gender stereotypes. Instead of showing kindness and mercy, as society expects her to do as a woman, Electra encourages Orestes to kill Aegisthus and dispose of his body in the most disrespectful, gruesome way.

Aegisthus’s reference to “the curse of Pelops’s house” refers to the curse of the royal house of Atreus, which began with Pelops, Atreus’s father and Agamemnon’s grandfather. Through this reference, Sophocles implies that Orestes’s impending murder of Aegisthus is further proof of this age-old curse. This passage also draws attention to the never-ending and shortsighted nature of the “blood for blood” system of justice. By killing Aegisthus, Orestes opens himself up for murder via revenge, continuing a cycle which, in theory, can go on indefinitely. “Crime would not be so rife” under such a system precisely because everyone would be dead, which makes Orestes’s claim here somewhat ironic.

As Sophocles’s play focuses on Electra’s forceful disruption of gender roles, he aptly ends with Electra on stage after most of the others have departed. The chorus claims that Electra is now free of her suffering, presumably because her mother and stepfather are dead, but Sophocles also implies that Electra is free in part because she has chosen to go against the sexist expectations of Greek society, which assume that she is weak and ineffectual simply because she is woman.