Introduction
"Anyone heard of Medea?" I ask.
"Me!" My student clears her throat. "I know tae kwon do," she says in a voice tinged with arrogance. Then she switches characters, cocking her head and sneering in a voice dripping with attitude, "Well, I know whoop yo' a**."
The class erupts in laughter, including me.
"No, no, not that one! The one I'm talking about is crazy! Euripides' Medea." I smile. I see them glance at each other with a look that says, "She's making up words again."
"Aguada, have you ever seen a Madea movie? That's crazy!" And we all laugh again.
Then I tell them the story of one of my favorite literary characters. By the time I finish, the white board is filled with names and boxes and arrows leading every which way, mapping the journey Medea has taken to arrive in Corinth at the time Euripides drops us into the play. My students are abuzz, fidgeting in their seats. They want to meet this crazy lady whose love for a man is so all-consuming that she leaves home and family and a trail of dead bodies in her wake. And that is when I know I have won the debate they didn't know we were having: my Medea is crazier than theirs.
By the end of the play, they are confused by, angry at, and sympathetic to Medea—all at the same time. We discuss what has transpired. They want to know what happens to her after she escapes. They feel uneasy that an egregious crime has been committed and no one has been punished. It is this energy, this passion, this sense of outrage over this perceived injustice that I hope to harness and channel by providing a forum to express those emotions in a way both instructive and engaging: a criminal trial.
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