Orestes, in turn, reacts with a defiance, a kind of grandeur that lifts him above the common mortal. Instead of indulging in self-pity, he prepares to kill himself on the bodies of Pyrrhus and Hermione, to find in the physical unity of the three warring individuals a semblance of victory over a destiny which pitted them against one another.
A truer victory over fate is implicit in the triumph of Andromache, who has been recognized as a legitimate ruler and whose reign promises to endure. That too is characteristic of tragedy. For whatever the havoc wreaked in the play, the final vision is that of order, expressed originally in a pattern of death and rebirth in the ritualistic nature of primitive drama.
Racine, however, does not dwell on the reassuring element. The play ends on the harrowing note of Orestes' madness and its prospect of endless suffering.
