Electra

For other uses, see Electra (disambiguation).

Orestes, Electra and Hermes at the tomb of Agamemnon, lucanian red-figure pelike, ca. 380 – 370 BC, Louvre (K 544)

Electra at the Tomb of Agamemnon, Frederic Leighton c.1869

Electra and Orestes, from an 1897 Stories from the Greek Tragedians, by Alfred Church

In Greek mythology, Electra (Greek:Ηλέκτρα) was daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra.

Electra was absent from Mycenae when her father, King Agamemnon, returned from the Trojan War to be murdered by Aegisthus, Clytemnestra's lover, and/or by Clytemnestra herself. Aegisthus and Clytemnestra also killed Cassandra, Agamemnon's war prize, a prophet priestess of Troy. Eight years later Electra was brought from Athens with her brother, Orestes. (Odyssey, iii. 306; X. 542).

According to Pindar (Pythia, xi. 25), Orestes was saved by his old nurse or by Electra, and was taken to Phanote on Mount Parnassus, where King Strophius took charge of him. In his twentieth year, Orestes was urged by Electra to return home and avenge his father's death.

In Iphigeneia in Tauris, Euripides tells the tale somewhat differently. He claims that Orestes was led by the Furies to Tauris on the Black Sea, where his sister Iphigeneia was being held. The two met when Orestes and Pylades were brought to Iphigeneia to be prepared for sacrifice to Artemis. Iphigeneia, Orestes and Pylades escaped from Tauris, and the Furies, sated by the reunion of the family, abated their persecution.

Later, Pylades and Electra fell in love and married. Pylades was the son of King Strophius (who had cared for Orestes while he hid from his mother and her lover), and had helped Orestes and Electra kill Clytemnestra and Aegisthus.

According to Euripides, Clytemnestra and Aegisthus had previously given Electra in marriage to a peasant, believing that her children would be less likely to take revenge if they were not of noble birth, but the peasant respected her and declined to consummate the marriage.

Psychology

The psychological concept of the Electra complex is named after her.

Adaptations of the Electra story

• The Oresteia, a trilogy of plays by Aeschylus
• Electra, play by Sophocles
• Electra, play by Euripides
• Electra, play by Jean Giraudoux
• Electra, drama by Danilo Kiš
• The Flies, a play by Jean-Paul Sartre, modernizing the Electra myth around the theme of existentialism.
• Elektra, a play by Hugo von Hofmannsthal, based on the Sophocles play.
• Mourning Becomes Electra, play by Eugene O'Neill, based on Aeschylus
• Electra, film by Michael Cacoyannis, starring Irene Papas, based on Euripides.
• Elektra, opera by composer Richard Strauss, with libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal, based on his own play.
• Elektra, opera by Mikis Theodorakis.
• Ellie (movie), B-movie which transfers the story to a Southern U.S. locale.
• Szerelmem, Elektra (aka Elektra, My Love), film by Miklós Jancsó, starring Mari Törõcsik.
• Electricidad, play by Luis Alfaro, modern adaptation of Electra based in the Chicano barrio
• Mourning Becomes Electra, opera by Marvin David Levy, based on Eugene O'Neill's play
• Infamante Electra (2005) a play by Benjamín Galemiri