History Literature / BookOfEsther

* WifeHusbandry: Subverted as Mordecai doesn't marry Esther, even though he's supposed to as a kinsman redeemer who raised Esther as his own daughter. She marries King Ahasuerus instead.

* Mordecai pleads with Esther to speak to King Xerxes (Esther chapter 4; Catholic Bibles include both Mordecai and Esther's prayers to God)
* Esther invites King Xerxes to a feast (Esther chapter 5; Catholic Bibles replace the first few verses of this chapter with a Greek addition)

* Haman exposed by Esther to King Xerxes (Esther chapter 7)
* King Xerxes lets Esther write new orders to counter Haman's pogrom (Esther chapter 8; Catholic Bibles include the letter ordering the countermand)

* ArentYouForgettingSomeone: King Xerxes/Ahasuerus asks Haman how he should honor somebody who's done a great service to him. Being the king's (arrogant) right-hand man, Haman thinks Xerxes means him. So he goes nuts describing all the great things that should happen to this 'unnamed hero'. Then he finds out that the honor is meant for his greatest enemy, Mordecai.

* BeautyContest: Xerxes has a very elaborate one to choose the new queen. No surprises: the winner is Esther.

* GenocideBackfire: How Xerxes gets around the fact that he [[ForgotICouldChangeTheRules can't alter the law authorizing the pogrom]]: He adds an amendment saying that it's perfectly legal for the Jews to ''fight back'' against anyone who wants to kill them. Cue ass-kicking of anti-semites.

* HeelRealization: King Xerxes, after being scorned by his consort Queen Vashti and in a drunken state orders for her to be removed from her position as queen, even going so far as to have a law put in place that all wives of his empire must give respect unto their husbands, realizes what he had done after he recovers from the wine and his anger. Unfortunately, he also realizes that the law of the Medes and Persians states that any decree of the king that is made into official law cannot be revoked (which is later stated in Esther's plea to the king to have Haman's plan to exterminate the Jews revoked), so he has his servants go and find ten beautiful maidens that he could choose his next queen from, which eventually leads to Esther being that queen.

* InformedJudaism: Esther's Jewishness is a major plot point, but she apparently passed for a non-Jew well enough that her own husband was surprised to find out her ethnicity/religion. However, hiding her Jewishness from Xerxes before they get married is also part of Mordecai's plan. Possibly a more accurate example of this trope in the story would be the scholarly suggestion that Esther and Mordecai are secular Jews, rather than religious ones. See YMMV.

* IrrevocableOrder: Xerxes informs Esther that the previous royal order to kill all the Jews in the Persian Empire cannot be rescinded once issued, necessitating the LoopholeAbuse method of issuing a second order allowing the Jews to defend themselves on the designated day.
* IOweYouMyLife: Mordecai reveals the plot to kill Xerxes, and the king later decides to reward him.

* NiceJobFixingItVillain: Haman goes to ask the king for a death warrant for Mordecai, but gets sidetracked when Xerxes asks him what a good reward would be for a man who has done great service to the king. Haman, assuming that he's the honoree, proposes an elaborate public ceremony. Turns out the king was asking about Mordecai, and Haman is ordered to carry out his own plan to honor his hated rival. HumiliationConga ensues.

* OneDialogueTwoConversations: Xerxes calls in Haman to discuss how he should reward a man who has done a great service to the king. Haman assumes ''he's'' the one implied, only to find to his horror that the king actually meant Haman's hated rival Mordecai.

* PleaseSpareHimMyLiege: Esther pleads with Xerxes to cancel Haman's plans for genocide of her people. Xerxes tells her that nothing that is signed and sealed with the king's signet ring can be revoked, but also allows her to have new orders written that allow the Jews to defend themselves on the day the genocide would take place.

* ReplacementGoldfish: Xerxes holds a competition to find himself a beautiful wife to replace his divorced one Vashti.

* ThroughHisStomach: Esther prepares two banquets for King Xerxes in order to gain his favor and listen to her petition to spare her people. It is at the second banquet that Esther exposes Haman as the adversary responsible for the plot against the Jews.

* VillainsWantMercy: Haman begs Esther to save his life. It backfires when Xerxes catches him throwing himself at her while on her bed.
* WifeHusbandry: Subverted as Mordecai doesn't marry Esther, even though he's supposed to as a kinsman redeemer who raised Esther as his own daughter. She marries King Xerxes instead.
* WorldsMostBeautifulWoman: Esther is declared to be this by Xerxes.
* YouCanLeaveYourHatOn: A literal case, at least implied. The previous queen, Vashti, is asked to parade before Xerxes' drunken party guests wearing her royal crown -- the insinuation being, ''[[MsFanservice only]]'' her crown. Her refusal sets the story in motion.

* AncientPersia: Esther becomes Queen of Persia after marrying King Ahasuerus. Additionally, the whole reason Haman tries to kill all the Jews is because [[DisproportionateRetribution Mordechai, a Jew, refused to follow the Persian costume of]] ''[[KneelBeforeZod proskynesis]]''.

* ToiletSeatDivorce: The king divorces Vashti because she refused to appear in public.

* ArentYouForgettingSomeone: King Xerxes/Ahasueres asks Haman how he should honor somebody who's done a great service to him. Being the king's (arrogant) right-hand man, Haman thinks Xerxes means him. So he goes nuts describing all the great things that should happen to this 'unnamed hero'. Then he finds out that the honor is meant for his greatest enemy, Mordecai.

* HumiliationConga: Boy does Haman ever get his comeuppance! First is a Hitler-to-Jesse-Owens mission -- he has to publicly honor his hated rival Mordecai, with an elaborate parade that Haman came up with when thinking he'd be the honoree. Then his fancy dinner with the king and queen turns out to be a set-up to expose him as the villain. When he tries to plead with the queen for his life, the king [[NotWhatItLooksLike thinks he's trying to assault or rape her]] and sentences him to death right then and there. He winds up literally HoistByHisOwnPetard on the gallows he built himself for Mordecai. Every detail of Haman's luck is really [[FromBadToWorse spiraling downhill]]. You almost feel sorry for the guy. '''Almost'''.

* InternalReveal: A dramatic high point occurs when Esther reveals her Jewish identity to the King and Haman, which of course the readers have known all along.

* HateSink: [[SmugSnake Haman the Agagite]], the Emperor’s [[EvilChancellor vizier]], possibly [[TropeCodifier lays the groundwork]] for characters who are designed to be loathed as much as possible, considering his [[ItsAllAboutMe narcissism]], [[AmbitionIsEvil ambition]] and [[PoliticallyIncorrectVillain anti-Semitism]]. Haman forces citizens to bow to him, and is suggested to have embroidered a graven image into his clothing, essentially forcing them to worship an idol. When his fellow courtesan, Mordecai the Judean, refuses to bow for this reason, Haman plots a genocide against the Jewish people, as well as personally building a gallows for Mordecai when the latter still refuses to bow. It is telling that a near-universal custom when reading Megillat Ester (the Hebrew name of the work) during the Jewish festival of Purim is to jeer and make noise when Haman’s name is mentioned, making him an odd religiously significant version of a character meant to draw ire from the audience.

!!Examples:

The Book of Esther tells the story of the titular heroine, a young woman who was taken to become a Persian Queen, while her cousin works in his court. While there, a plot is made by the official Haman to murder all the Jews.

* {{Bowdlerise}}: Many people hear the search for a queen portrayed as a beauty contest. While physical beauty ''was'' part of it, it was really more about who could "please the king" the most... ''[[SexTropes in bed]]''. In other words, it was more of a CastingCouch than a BeautyContest. [[FridgeHorror Also]], these girls had [[SexualHarassmentAndRapeTropes little to no say]] in whether or not they actually joined the RoyalHarem.

* HateSink: [[SmugSnake Haman the Agagite]], the Emperor’s [[EvilChancellor vizier]], possibly [[TropeCodifier lays the groundwork]] for characters who are designed to be loathed as much as possible, considering his [[ItsAllAboutMe narcissism]], [[AmbitionIsEvil ambition]] and [[PoliticallyIncorrectVillain anti-Semitism]]. Haman forces citizens to bow to him, and is suggested to have embroidered a graven image into his clothing, essentially forcing them to worship an idol. When his fellow courtesan, Mordecai the Judean, refuses to bow for this reason, Haman plots a genocide against the Jewish people, as well as personally building a gallows for Mordecai when the latter still refuses to bow. It is telling that a near-universal custom when reading Megillat Ester (the Hebrew name of the work) during the Jewish festival of Purim is to jeer and make noise when Haman’s name is first and last mentioned, making him an odd religiously significant version of a character meant to draw ire from the audience.

The Protestant canon version of Esther is ten chapters long, with the tenth chapter ending at verse 3. The Vulgate version (which is based on the Greek) extended the story to about sixteen chapters, though these additions are interspersed into the original story in Catholic editions, bringing the chapter count back down to ten. It also changes the Persian king's name from Xerxes/Ahasuerus to Artaxerxes.