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Denial In Oedipus The King

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Everyone tries to convince themselves that it is all lies when you receive bad news about anything that you don’t believe in. In the play Oedipus the King, written by Sophocles in 430 BC, Oedipus is in denial about who killed the previous king, Laius. The town has asked Oedipus to save them from the disease that has spread killing all the life in town by finding the person who killed Lauis. Oedipus tells the people he will find the culprit and do whatever he needs to do to punish them. When he is given the truth, he is unwilling to accept the truth. Therefore, he will have to punish himself as he promised the people of the town. When Oedipus learns that he is the one who killed Laius, he is angry and unaccepting. He turns to blame the person closest to him, Creon, but, Tiresias says, “Creon is not your enemy. You are your own” (Episode 1). In this quotation, Oedipus turns to other people to place the blame because he does not want to be the culprit. Oedipus has been blaming others …show more content…

When he does not believe the truth, the consequence later in the play is that he punishes himself as he promised the townspeople. He promises everyone that he will punish the murderer so he can save the town. They will also wear “the badge of shame, the brand of infamy on the very skin” (Episode 1). This is another way that Oedipus promises to punish the killer (himself) and he did this by blinding himself before going to the mountains to punish himself. Oedipus denies the truth and faces the consequences later on in the play. He gets furious when everyone is blaming him for killing Laius. As he is blaming others, hubris appears within his personality. Oedipus becomes blinder as hubris takes over him. If someone tells you a truth that you do not want to accept, gather evidence before blaming others and accept the truth whether it is hard or

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