Ancient critics, as well as the German romantics and several scholars from the past two centuries, have identified certain characteristic in Euripides’s work that later became essential to the comic genre. Helen is one of the tragedies that this critics frequently cite in order to defend this positi... Full description

Ancient critics, as well as the German romantics and several scholars from the past two centuries, have identified certain characteristic in Euripides’s work that later became essential to the comic genre. Helen is one of the tragedies that this critics frequently cite in order to defend this position, and this has led to the idea that the work does not really fit within the tragic genre. My intention is to highlight the tragic character of Helen by means of a comparison with Medea. In order to accomplish this, I offer some criteria for classifying what is to be considered tragic in Euripides’s work