Electra – From The Myth Of The Character To The Characters Of The Myth
Electra – From The Myth Of The Character To The Characters Of The Myth

Summary/Abstract: The mythical hero modifies his status, becoming a literary character, owing the writers’ contribution, which reinterpret, contextualize and adapt the fundamental themes, reported to the social, hystorical, political or religious context of their own contemporaneity. The image of Electra appears changed in time, still framed in the same picture. Intertextuality allows the character to differ from a well-established route, maintaining however certain constant pillars through which one may establish links between the works of different authors that variously write on the same subject. As a consequence, the mythical protagonist is constantly reinvented, as it happens in the case of the supporting role of Electra from the Greek tragedy of Orestia, by Eschil, who becomes Lavinia Mannon, central part of the modern drama Mourning becomes Electra, by Eugen O’Neill. Although there are obvious resemblances between the two texts, in matter of form and substance, the modern époque brings a “filter” to the character, when it comes to the special emphasis of the psychological aspect of its structure. The individual becomes solely important, being capable of acting on its own, free and responsible, obtaining a certain independence in the detriment of divine intervention which both saves and dons the character from its own freedom.

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