Oedipus Rex | Play Summary | Sophocles Neb English Notes

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Oedipus Rex | Play Summary | Sophocles Neb English Notes

Oedipus Rex by Sophocles

Oedipus Rex (translated by Dudley Fitts and Rober Fitzerland from Greek to English)

PROLOGUE

Thebans are facing a great plague problem due to the curse given by God. Many people in Thebes, including priests, go to their king, Oedipus, to seek help because they think he is the most powerful and clever king. They are very hopeful for Oedipus because once he has saved them from the sphinx, the priest in the prologue reminds Oedipus of the past act and says, "You save from the sphinx."

The priest wants him to do something immediately to protect Thebes. He informs him of the bad impact of the plague:

"The herds are sick; children die unborn and labour in vain."

Actually, King Oedipus was already aware of the problems of his people. So, he has already sent Creon to the oracle of Delphi to know the reason for the plague. When the priest and Oedipus were talking, in the meantime, Creon, coming from Delphi, informed Oedipus that to remove the plague, the murderer of Laius should be punished. Now, Oedipus starts investigating Laius's murderer. He asks Creon about the place of Laius's death. From Creon, he knows that King Laius was killed by highwaymen (robbers). Then the king promised Creon that he would search those highwaymen and give punishment.

Scene I

King Oedipus also takes the help of all of Theban to find the murderer of King Laius. Then Oedipus calls a blind seer, Teiresias, to solve that problem.

Teiresias knows the cause of Thebes' suffering, but he refuses to help the king by telling the murderer's name. When Teiresias shows his unwillingness to help him, Oedipus mocks and doubts Teiresias's work (prophecy). Now Teiresias loses his control, and in anger, he speaks the truth:

"You yourself are the pollution of this country."

"I say that you are the murderer whom you seek."

"You are the mad man."

But Oedipus thinks that what the Teiresias told was guided by Creon.

For him, Creon, to be king of Thebes, he ordered Teiresias to say that. He also thinks that Creon killed Laius to be the king of Thebes, but his desire remained unfulfilled due to his presence in Thebes. But Tiresias replies to him:

"Creon is no threat. You weave your own doom."

Later, Teiresias mocks Oedipus, saying:

"You have mock blindness, do you? But I say that you, with both your eyes, are blind."

Here he ridicules Oedipus, who has both eyes but cannot see reality, as a blind man. Teiresias sees all of Oedipus's past "crime (lrony)

Scene II

Creon defends himself against the accusation made by King Oedipus that he had participated in the murder of King Laius: Initially, in scene 2, he narrates his accusation to Choragus. Creon says:

"Men of Thebes,

"I am told that there is a heavy accusation."

"I have been brought against me by King Oedipus."

Choragus, consoling Creon, says:

"He (Oedipus) has spoken in anger, not from his mind."

When Creon and Oedipus go on debating, Queen Jocasta comes between them and asks about the reasoning for quarrelling with each other. Oedipus tells her everything, including Teiresias's prophecy to him.

Jocasta, to console Oedipus, says that Oedipus will not be the murderer of Laius if he believes in Teiresias' prophecy because it was prophesized that King Laius would be killed by his own son, but Laius had already left his son to die on a lonely mountain. And she also adds that the king, Laius, was killed by strangers at a three-way meeting place. Now, Oedipus gets great shock by the revelation of Laius's death in three high ways meeting place because he finds here similarity that when he escaped from Corinth with the fear of killing Polybus and Merope (whom he thinks his real parents) and he had also killed a man on such a place where three high ways meet. He here remembers his past. Actually, Oedipus had left Corinth because the oracle had said to him that he would kill his father and sleep with his own mother. For him. The Corinthian king and queen, Polybus and Merope, were real parents, so he escaped rejecting the Oracle's forecast.

Now Oedipus wants to talk with an old shepherd whom Laius had ordered to kill his son by leaving on the mountain, but that shepherd in the present time has gone somewhere far from Thebes.

Scene III

In scene 3, a messenger comes from Corinth to Thebes to deliver the Corinthian king Polybus's death. Oedipus seems very happy about the death of Polybus, thinking that his father Polybus died and the prophecy of the oracle proved wrong. But the messenger reveals that he was just the adopted son of King Polybus. The messenger himself claims that he gave him to Polybus as a gift many years ago.

Furthermore, he makes it clear to Oedipus that when he had come to Kithairon Mountain many years ago, he met a shepherd, and the shepherd gave him a baby, Oedipus. Later, Messenger gave that baby to the Corinthian childless king and queen, Polybus and Merope, respectively.

Now Oedipus has great eagerness to talk with the shepherd. But Jocasta asks Oedipus to stop his investigation. But Oedipus is determined in his investigation.

Scene IV

Oedipus, up to this point, does not know his real identity, even after hearing the messenger's revelation that he is not the real son of Polybus and Merope.

Oedipus still thinks that he was born to slave parents. In this scene, the only eyewitness to Oedipus's reality, the shepherd, also comes to Thebes, and the messenger of Corinth easily recognises him. The messenger tries to remember the shepherd about the past, in which he had handed baby Oedipus to him. Now, the shepherd remembers the past incident, but he refuses to say that Oedipus was the son of Lious, whom he had given to the messenger.

Now Oedipus threatens to kill him if he does not tell the truth.

Oedipus: "You will die now unless you speak the truth."

Shepherd: "If I speak the truth, I am worse than dead."

Now, Oedipus starts asking many questions to Shepherd:

Oedipus: "Where did you get him? From your house? From somewhere else?"

Oedipus asks Shepherd if the baby (Oedipus) he gave the messenger was his own or others. Shepherd replies that (Oedipus) he was not his son but the king's son. So, he says:

 

Shepherd: "Not from mine. A man gave me."

Oedipus: "Whose house did he (Oedipus) belong to?

Shepherd: "For God's love, my king."

Up to here, Shepherd just says he belongs to the king but does not want to particularize. Then Oedipus again threatens

Oedipus: "You are a dead man if I have to ask you again."

Shepherd now knows the reality. He says:

"Then the child was born in the palace of Laius."

Now, Oedipus again asks the shepherd if he was born from a slave of Laius or from the king Laious. The shepherd now reveals every minute detail to King Oedipus. He also tells him the reason for leaving him on the mountain. He also confessed that he gave baby Oedipus to the Corinthian Messenger.

Shepherd: "It was said that the boy would kill his own father."

Oedipus: "Then why did you give him (Oedipus) over to this old man (Messenger)?"

Shepherd: "I pitied the baby."

At the end of scene four, Oedipus seems to be damning his birth and marriage. So, he says:

"dammed in his birth, in his marriage" (him means here my)

Exodus (concluding part)

In this concluding part of the play, the second messenger of Thebes tells Theban that queen Jokasta committed suicide and king Oedipus blinded himself. Then King Oedipus appears himself among the Theban people and asserts that whatever he did was not his intention but the guilt of his fate. After addressing the Theban People, he asks Creon to banish him into an isolated place where no human being finding him can respect him. He also requests that Creon take care of his two daughters, Antigone and Ismene.

CHARACTERIZATION

Oedipus Rex

Oedipus:

He is the Theban king who killed his own father, Laius, and married his own mother, Jocasta. What he did was not his intention, but he did it according to his fate. But in the play, he is unaware of his past sin. Actually, after killing the king, Laius, he successfully ruled Thebes until the plague problem. Later, he finds the cause of the plague in his past sins.

Then he blinds himself and is banished from Thebes.

Jocasta:

She is, or was, the queen of Thebes. She is also guided by her terrible fate, comes to sleep with her own son, Oedipus, and bears four children from Oedipus. (Polynices, Eteocles, Ismene, and Antigone) Later, knowing the reality, she kills herself.

 

Creon:

He is Jocasta's brother and Oedipus' real uncle. Creon is loyal and rational and does not seem to participate in such a terrible fate. In the end, Oedipus requests that he care for his daughters in his absence.

 

Teiresias:

He is a blind, immortal prophet. Whenever Thebes Palace fell into trouble, he always prophesied. His prophecy always comes true. In the play, Teiresias, appearing in front of Oedipus, tells him the reality that he was the real cause of the plague. Later on, his prophecy proves right.

Chorus:

The chorus plays an active role in Greek tragedies. They narrate difficult and complex scenes to be performed on stage, and sometimes they also comment on characters' behaviours. In the play, Sophocles' chorus represents the Theban people. It means they were made by a Theban citizen. The chorus is here linked between the actors and audience because they narrate the difficult scene to be performed on the stage.

 

Laius:

He is the former dead king of Thebes. He was the father of Oedipus and the husband of Jocasta. He had ordered his shepherd to leave his baby son, Oedipus, on Kitharion Mountain to get rid of the prophecy of the oracle of Delphi. The prophecy of the oracle was that Laius would be killed by his own son, and his son would also sleep with his wife, Jocasta. But no matter how hard Laius tried to escape from it, he and his wife, Jocasta, ultimately shared the same fate that Oracle had announced.

 

Messenger:

He is the Corinthian old shepherd who brings news of the death of the Corinthian king, Polybus, to Oedipus. He also reveals to Oedipus that he was the adopted child of Polybus, whom he had given him as a gift.

He informs Oedipus that many years ago, he met a Theban Shepherd on Kitharion Mountain, where Theban Shepherd had given him a baby.

(Oedipus), and later, he gave him (Oedipus) to Polybus and Merope.

Shepherd:

He is a Theban old and kind shepherd. In the past, when the shepherd defied Laius's order to leave the baby on the mountain, he gave the baby (Oedipus) to a Corinthian shepherd. In the play, he is such a character who determines the king's' fate. Later, his spoken reality of Oedipus's birth made Oedipus blind and self-exiled from Theban. Polybus/Merope: They are offstage characters who were Oedipus's foster parents, but Oedipus thinks that they are his real parents. At the end of the play, Oedipus knows his true relationship with Polybus and Merope when the Corinthian Shepherd comes to Thebes to deliver the news of Polybus's death and reveals that he is their adopted son, whom he gave them as a gift many years ago.

 

Antigone and Ismene:

They are two daughters of Oedipus. In the play, Sophocles has not given them any dialogue to them.

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