I had been feeling sorry for Dido. Her first husband was murdered by her brother; she was made to fall in love against her will, and the man she loved eventually left her. Dido faced some hard situations. But this was no excuse for some of her actions. Aeneas had to leave; neither one of them could disregard the will of the gods. But, out of selfish love, she demanded that Aeneas stay with her. When he insisted that he had to go, she insulted him. When it became evident that he wasn't coming back, she got her sister to unknowingly make preparations for suicide. The sister was forced to watch Dido kill herself. These are not loving actions. Dido did feel genuinely hurt, but some of her actions were just selfish.
I commented on emilylaforce's post.
When I read through all the parts with Dido and Aeneas, I honestly had a hard time completely simpathizing with either side. I just got back from iWomen and Manversations so maybe I have a biased or overly emotional view of this right now. Still, I would find it hard to justify the way either he or her acted. Acting completely out of lust and spur of the moment passion, the situation ended up horribly. I can't say that sort of situation doesn't usually result in any different way in real life either.
ReplyDeleteI can see both sides of the argument, but the real question for me is how marriage was defined at that time. Being a woman I naturally feel sympathy for Dido. She was brokenhearted and it was technically not her fault. But Aeneas was fated to leave and found Italy. Both Dido and Aeneas are in difficult positions. I wonder what would have happened if Aeneas had stayed. Would he have founded Italy at all?
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