Injustice In The House Of The Spirits

Often, when someone commits evil deeds, it causes the victim to take action. This, however, may simply escalate the situation to the point where the characters forget about morals and beliefs for retribution. In the novel, The House of the Spirits, by Isabel Allende, and the play, Medea, by Euripides, the characters from both works react intensely to get revenge on others. Although Allende mainly uses effective diction, and Euripides the power of the chorus, both authors challenge the view that when faced with injustice, defiance is the solution. In The House of the Spirits, Allende’s use of diction enhances the injustice that Esteban Garcia ll must confront, but also to emphasize the consequences of such confrontation. To begin, he loathes
Evidently, Esteban García has passionate contempt for his grandfather, rooted by the transgression he commits by raping Garcías grandmother. Allende emphasizes his hatred by using harsh diction, such as: “dreadful, reproached, dark, forged, [and] punished”. This depicts the extent to which García regards such actions as injustice. Later in the novel, the consequences of getting revenge on Esteban Trueba are revealed. As Alba writes about her family history with Esteban Trueba, she discusses,
“[Alba] wrote in [her] mind that one day Colonel García would stand before [her] in defeat and that [she] would avenge [her]self on all those who need to be avenged. But now [she has] begun to question [her] own hatred… Afterward the grandson of the woman who was raped repeats the gesture with the granddaughter of the rapist, and perhaps forty years from now [Alba’s] grandson will knock García’s granddaughter down among the rushes, and so on through the centuries in an unending tale of sorrow, blood, and love”
To begin, the chorus is used to depict the injustice that Medea is faced with. When Creon banishes Medea from the city of Corinth, the chorus sympathizes for Medea by saying, “[h]apless woman! Overwhelmed by sorrow! Where will you turn? What stranger will afford you hospitality?” (Euripides, 45.359-360). Clearly, the chorus is feeling sympathy toward Medea, as they exclaim her feelings and worry about her future. In the ancient Greek setting of this play, the audience would confirm what their feelings toward the play should be through the chorus. This would therefore cause the audience to feel sympathy for Medea as well, and Euripides would succeed in making the audience realize the injustice that Medea faces. The use of the two rhetorical questions also emphasizes this feeling. If the all-knowing chorus cannot even answer these questions, there must not be any answer, and Medea must really have nowhere to go. Further into the play, however, the chorus’s opinion on Medea changes when she reveals her plot to get revenge on Jason for causing her misery. When she announces her intention of killing Jason’s new family, the chorus asks. “Whence you got the hardihood to conceive such a plan? And in the horrible act, as you bring death on your own children, how will you steel your heart and hand? When you cast your