Born from Myth, Built Anew: Seneca’s Medea as a Stoic Cautionary Tale

In Seneca’s Medea, there are two distinct “Medeas” to be examined – Medea the character, who has been built up out of mythical and literary tradition, and Medea as a human individual. By dividing her in this way Seneca opens the door to reimagine an already extant figure through a Stoic lens. He exaggerates the negative portrayal of Medea in her traditional role to draw in the audience and to emphasize the disastrous outcome of the individual Medea’s failure to moderate her human passions – in so doing, he first engages the audience with a familiar character and then challenges them to question what the outcome might have been if the individual Medea were truly separate from her traditional role