OEDIPUS REX(OEDIPUS THE KING)ENG 273: World Literature

Greek Theater• Theater was very popular in

Ancient Greek culture

• Drama competitions held at religious festivals (Dionysus)

• Genres:• Tragedy• Comedy• Satire

• Components• Story taken from Greek Mythology• Action takes place outside• Includes chorus

• Comment on the action of the play

Sophocles• Lived c. 497 – c 405 B.C.

• Athenian Playwright

• Plays actually survived• Ajax, Antigone, The Women of

Trachis, Oedipus the King, Electra, Philoctetes, Oedipus at Colonus

• Innovative techniques, deep character development,

The Play• Based on well known Greek Myth

• Tragedy

• Told and retold in Oral Tradition

• First performed in 486 B.C.

• Audience would have been very familiar with the story

• Impact on Western literature and culture• Sigmund Freud

• Pyschoanalysis• “Oedipal Complex”

The Plot• Oedipus is King of Thebes

• Became King after solving the Sphinx’s riddle

• Thebes is wracked with plague

• Oedipus sent Creon to the Oracle to find out how to rid the city of the plague

• Answer: Find Lauis’ murderer and punish him (execute or banish)

• Prophesies• Laius would be murdered by his son

• Preventive measure: baby son left on mountain to die

• Oedipus would kill his father and marry his mother

• Preventive measure: ran away from his “parents”

• Hidden truth: the prophesies came true

The Audience• From the beginning of the play, the

audience is aware of the knowledge that Oedipus lacks

• He killed his father and married his mother

• Scenes build on the tension between what the audience knows and what Oedipus does not know

• Aristotle• First example of “Literary Criticism” in

“Poetics”• Oedipus the King = perfect tragedy

• Plot: beginning, middle, and end• Catharsis = release of emotion• Perfect “tragic” hero

• Not fully evil• Not fully good• Allows the audience to sympathize with his

plight

Characters: On Stage• Oedipus

• Creon (brother-in-law)

• Tieresias (blind prophet)

• Jocasta (wife/mother)

• Antigone and Ismene (daughters)

• Chorus

• Leader

• Messenger

• Shepherd

Characters: Off Stage• Laius (deceased father)

• King and Queen of Corinth

Characters: Divine• Apollo (Phoebus)

• The Sphinx

• The Oracle

Key Themes• Search for Truth

• Knowledge versus Ignorance• Blindness versus Sight

• Power of Prophesy• Fate/Destiny versus Free Will• Relationship of gods to humans

• Flawed Hero• Pride• Arrogance