Oedipus Rex: A Closer Look

Oedipus Rex is a very interesting and enjoyable play to read. Throughout the play, your emotions are tossed and turned as the main character in the play, Oedipus, finds out exactly who he is and what he has done. At times we actually feel sorry for Oedipus when he finds out more about his actions.

In the beginning of the play, the Prologue, we find the people of Thebes pleading to Oedipus for an answer to their city's plight and desolation. They see him as their savior, saving them from the Sphinx. They actually call Oedipus their "master and greatest power (p. 2, line 40)," because he has "delivered us from despair (p. 2, line 36)." Oedipus appears, and characterizes himself as famous (p. 1, line 8), probably because of what he has done for Thebes. Oedipus loves the people of Thebes, however, and sees them as his own children (p. 1, line 1) and feels pity for the trouble that they're in. Oedipus says, "None of you can know the anguish that I feel (p. 3, line 61)," speaking about how he feels about the state that Thebes is in.

The first episode is when action begins and the audience finds out why Thebes in is in desolation. Creon, who is Jocasta's brother, comes with the word from a god that Thebes is suffering because of the murder of their former king. That murderer has to be banished. Teiresias, who is an ancient blind prophet, is summoned by Oedipus to find out who murdered Laius, Thebes' former king (p. 12, line 307). Unfortunately, Teiresias does not want to reveal the information because it is too terrible for him to reveal. Oedipus scorns him, telling him that he is being hostile towards his own city (p. 13, lines 322-23), and that he must tell who murdered Laius. Teiresias concedes to Oedipus, saying that Oedipus himself murdered Laius. Because of that, he predicts that Oedipus will be banished from the land and that his "eyes will only see darkness (p 17, lines 418-19)."

The second episode opens with a heated discussion between Creon and Oedipus. Oedipus accuses Creon of conspiring with Teiresias because he says that Creon wants to steal his power (p. 22, line 535). Their heated discussion turns into an argument with that accusation, and Jocasta enters the picture to try to break the quarrel up. She is successful; Creon ends up leaving and going home. However, she tries to calm Oedipus down by telling him that human soothsayers are not always correct in their prophecies. She said that an oracle once told Laius that he would die at the hands of his own son (p. 30, line 713), but he died instead at the hands of several strangers (p. 31, line 715). However, she did not really succeed at this, because her news only makes Oedipus scared because he admits that he murdered someone in the exact spot that Laius was said to have been murdered (p. 34, line 813). However, he does take comfort in the fact that a slave had told Jocasta that Laius was murdered by several people, instead of only one (p 35, lines 842-43). Oedipus has hope that it was not him who murdered Laius because he himself was traveling alone.

In the second stasimon, which is the Chorus' role, the Chorus talks and sings about Oedipus' fate. Oedipus is truly guilty of hubris. The Chorus says that "hubris grows from tyranny (p. 36, line 873)," and in this play, Oedipus is the tyrant. He also has great pride and is stubborn in his quest for knowledge. First, he left his hometown of Corinth, in secret, to seek out the truth to find out who his parents really were (p. 33, lines 787-89). Also, among other things, he had accused Creon of being jealous, saying that he had conspired against him to take his power. Furthermore, the Chorus says that because Oedipus is guilty of hubris, "then may his efforts be wasted, and may there be no shield to save his mind from blows (p. 37, lines 892-93)." What they are saying is that even though Oedipus is trying in vain to find out who murdered Laius, in the end his efforts will come to nothing because he'll find out the ugly truths about his origins and his own actions.

The third episode brings the Messenger to Oedipus and Thebes. The Messenger brings the news that Polybus is dead and Corinth wants to make Oedipus king (p. 39, lines 940-42). However, this really is not good news for Oedipus for two reasons. First, he finds out that the prophecy of him killing his father did not come true. But then, he ends up finding out the Polybus was not really his father (p. 42, line 1016).

The Herdsman was summoned mainly to confirm that Oedipus was the child that Jocasta and Laius had sent away to be destroyed (p. 51, lines 1180-81). But of course, Oedipus wasn't destroyed, but was saved and given to Polybus in Corinth. That means that he really did kill his own father, Laius, and make children with his own mother, Jocasta, as Apollo originally revealed to him. Because all of this was revealed, Jocasta could not bear it and ended up a victim of suicide. Oedipus, ashamed at what he had done and of who he was, blinded himself (p. 54, lines 1268-70).

In the fourth stasimon, the Chorus says that that Oedipus' misery teaches them "to call no mortal blessed (p.52, lines 1195-96)," meaning that even though someone may look blessed (like Oedipus), they really may not be. They also call Oedipus' marriage to Jocasta a catastrophe and not really a marriage because she was his own mother (pp. 52-53, lines 1206 and 1214). Finally, the Chorus mentions that you can never say that a man is truly happy until he has died, free from grief (p. 63, lines 1528-30). You never know when grief and tragedy will strike, as in Oedipus' life. Generally, the Chorus does little to affect the play, but instead acts as a voice for the common people of Thebes, which was shown throughout all of their comments throughout the play.

Source:
Book: Oedipus Tyrannus. Sophocles. Hackett Publishing Company. March 2000.