Citation

Konst JWH. Spiegel der Letteren 2006; 48(3): 281-302.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2006)

DOI

10.2143/SDL.48.3.2020212

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

This article discusses the relatively unknown Dutch seventeenth-century tragedy, Myrrha (1688) by the minor poet Abraham Bogaert (1663-1727). The protagonist of this drama, which is based on Ovid's Metamorphoses (Book X, vs. 298-518), is the mythological figure Myrrha, a young woman who desperately falls in love with her father Cinyras. Bogaert's Myrrha is a remarkable drama because of the fact that at the end of the play all seven main characters are dead. Four of them commit suicide, the other three are murdered or die because of an accident. In this article, it is shown that the suicides and murders are to be seen in light of the didactic function of Bogaert's tragedy. All of the main characters can be considered as persons driven solely by self-interest and willing to break every possible ethical law. In the end their deaths should be seen as a means by which the moral order is restored. © 2006 by Spiegel der Letteren.

Language: nl