'kleos' in ʹεὐκλεοῦςʹ (illustrious) appears here again and the view that no-one would die simply out of love conveys the Greek obsession with glory. However, the irony for a modern audience might be how ʹἀποθανεῖνʹ (to die) is equivalent to ʹἀθάνατονʹ (immortality): a word which Plato repeats three times in this short passage to emphasize the reward which Alcestis was supposedly pursuing. The brevity of the final clause is a sharp attack against Alcestis; she was in love with immortality, not Admetus. Nevertheless, it is controversy like this regarding motives for dying in the ancient world which enables Euripides to make Alcestis such a complex character through the ambiguity of her motives. L. H. G. Greenwood believes that Euripides 'refrains so completely from pronouncing judgement . . . that we really cannot tell what he thinks.' Whether Alcestis died out of love for Admetus or love for fame is another one of these characteristic Euripidean obscurities. Alcestis' inability to speak in the final scene of the play further extends this ambiguity to the end. Despite the questions surrounding the integrity of Alcestis' motives, Euripides still links her in some ways to a goddess as Admetus declares that ʹσοφῇ δὲ χειρὶ τεκτόνων δέμας τὸ σὸν / εἰκασθὲν ἐν λέκτροισιν ἐκταθήσεται, / ᾧ προσπεσοῦμαιʹ (I shall bid a cunning sculptor carve your image in stone, / And it shall lie stretched on our bed, and I shall kneel / Beside it.) 12 Admetus seems to have no doubts that his wife is selflessly motivated, although it is impossible to know whether Alcestis' longing for 'kleos' being known would have produced a different reaction from him. Alcestis' image as a goddess is later restated by the chorus when they sing ' τυʆ μβος σ ᾶ ς ἀ λοʆ χου , θεο ῖ σι δ ᾽ ὁ μοιʆ ως / τιμαʆ σθω ' (Let her tomb be honoured like a god's). 13 Although hero cults were common place in the ancient Greek world, being worshipped in a similar way to the gods would have represented a higher status, particularly for women who tended not be classified as heroes. This demonstrates how greatly Alcestis is admired for the glory of her action. In a lecture delivered by James Morwood about Sophocles Trachiniae , 14 he said that ‘In Greek tragedy, love is rarely life-enhancing’. To a great extent this assertion is true, with Euripidean examples including Hippolytus and Medea . However, Alcestis appears as an exception, as Alcestis' love for Admetus, in conjunction with the heroic deed of Heracles, acts not as a death-bringer but as a life- saver for Admetus and for herself, if we choose to ignore the opinion of Diotima from Plato's Symposium and embrace Alcestis' decision to die as an act of love. Alcestis is furthermore apparent in the play as a loving mother; a trait not as often found in Greek tragic women as a modern audience would expect with mothers such as Medea and Clytemnestra. By ensuring that Admetus does not take another wife and bestow a stepmother on her children, Alcestis attempts to secure their futures. Stepmothers, as Euripides reveals in Hippolytus , are dangerous figures in tragedy. When Alcestis foresees that ʹοὐ γάρ σε μήτηρ οὔτε νυμφεύσει ποτὲ / οὔτ᾽ ἐν τόκοισι σοῖσι θαρσυνεῖ, τέκνον, / παροῦσ᾽, ἵν᾽ οὐδὲν μητρὸς εὐμενέστερον,ʹ (Your own mother never will / Arrange your bridal veil, be there to hold your hand / In childbirth, when her comfort is your deepest need), 15 Euripides conveys a profound sense of the female bound between mother and daughter which is about to be shattered. Although only present on stage for a short time, Euripides' Alcestis both questions and accepts the male-dominated Greek society by valuing her husband's life more than her own in a way which must have been unsettling for the male audience at the Dionysia. The ambiguity inherent in Alcestis' character continues as the audience examines whether only love could have motivated her decision to die, or whether Alcestis is not as altruistic as she might appear. Although only present on stage for a short time, Alcestis deserves her place in the pantheon of extraordinary Greek characters through the multiple ambiguities of purpose she forces audiences to confront.
12 Eur. Alc. 348-50 (trans. Philip Vellacott) 13 Eur. Alc. 996-7 (trans. Philip Vellacott) 14 At Bryanston school on 07/07/2014 15 Eur. Alc. 317-9 (trans. Philip Vellacott)
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