Dionysus Character Analysis

In Euripides The Bacchae, Dionysus has a lot of different powers and can take variety of forms.  In the play, we see that Dionysus models all of the dualities throughout the story which take place of his numerous forms. Dionysus is presented as being inside and outside of the play’s action due to the dualities of the way he was born, by his origin of Greek and Asiatic.

One of the dualities in this play is how Dionysus represents both human and god. He is half god and half human because of his parents. Dionysus is the son of Zeus, but his mother, Semele, is a mortal. Dionysus states, “I am Dionysus, son of Zeus / come to Thebes, where my mother gave me birth / in a firestorm, struck by lightning.” (1-3). When he was born, Hera, was so angry at Semele, she ordered Zeus to send a thunder bolt down. Semele died by the struck of thunder. The people didn’t believe that Dionysus was a demi-god because Semele was accused of being seduced by another man and blamed it on Zeus for her mistakes, that is why Zeus supposedly killed her. Dionysus says, “They said Semele was seduced by some man or other and / put the blame on Zeus(as Cadmus cunningly advised her) / for her mistake in bed, and Zeus killed her - they yawped everywhere - because she pretended to be his wife.” (29-32). I believe that Hera manipulated Zeus to send the thunderbolt down to kill Semele because she was jealous of her, and she was pregnant. After Zeus killed Semele, he took Dionysus and hid him by sewing him in his thigh. I don’t understand the reason for Zeus to hide Dionysus unless he was being manipulated by Hera. The chorus states, “For a womb, Zeus took him straight into the cavern of his thigh / and sewed him up secretly / with golden fasteners / to hide from Hera.” (95-98). I believe that Hera wanted to kill Dionysus as well but when Zeus hid him from her he tricked Hera into believing that he was dead. The chorus states, “Hera wanted to throw him down from heaven. / But Zeus contrived a defense worthy of a god: / he broke off a piece from the sky that circles the earth / and made a surrogate to give as a hostage.” (290-292).  

The second duality of Dionysus is his origin of Greek and Asiatic. Dionysus was born in Thebes, which is a town in Greece but his religion forms first in Asia. Though Dionysus has returned to where he was born, he is technically a foreigner because he hasn’t been home in so long. Dionysus comes back to Thebes to share his religion and to make sure mortals see him clearly as divine. He also came back to defend his mother so people could see him as an actual god. Dionysus says, “This city must fully learn its lesson, like it / or not, since its my initiated in my religion. / Besides, I must defend my mother, Semele, / and make people see I am a god, born to her by Zeus.” (39-42). Dionysus is surrounded by a chorus, also known as Maenads. They always respond to what he is saying, they are always following him. Dionysus says, “But if Thebes reacts in anger, sends military / I’ll lead my Maenads like an army into battle. It’s to do this that I have taken human form and changed myself into a man.” (51-54). Along with his religion, even his mortal followers are Asian and not Greek.

I believe that Euripides connected Dionysus to all of the different dualities because he was trying to get at the real world. That humans as a whole are contradicted and so was Dionysus. He was half god half human, they both contradict each other but still made Dionysus. The same thing goes with his origin. He was from Greece but had an origin from Asia. Just like in the world today, you can be from one place but have a completely different origin and feel like a foreigner to the original area. Euripides wrote how Dionysus has many different dualities that reflect back on the way humans are.