When the people of Thebes find out Oedipus is the killer of Laius, the former king, Oedipus goes through his tragic downfall of great suffering. Oedipus boosts himself up and degrades others, but it turn he ends up suffering greatly and pitying himself for it. Oedipus’ display of pride throughout the story causes him to feel great pity for himself as he suffers his ultimate downfall.
With the realization of his demise, Oedipus tries to protect himself from punishment and shame by gouging out his own eyes and exiling himself out to die in the place destiny prevented him from dying originally. After many years of luxurious living, Oedipus’s predestined fate tears his life apart and returns him to the place he should have died as an infant, the mountain. Through the use of, departure, initiation, and return, Sophocles displays the journey of Oedipus. Not only is Oedipus the King evidence of the use of the hero’s journey throughout many famous plays, movies, and books across all cultures and time periods, but it also seen as a perfect tragedy, in which the audience experiences both pity and fear for the main
In Sophocles' Oedipus the King, the themes of fate and agency are very strong throughout the play. Both sides of the argument can be greatly supported. The attributes of a person have either a positive or negative affect on the choices that they make. For Oedipus, his main attribute was the desire for knowledge and understanding about his own life. Because of this strong will and desire, this was Oedipus’ driving force in the play to lead him to the truth of his beginnings.
Sophocles portrays Oedipus as a tragic hero which develops his tragical life from the King of Thebes to a fragile man by a series of “happenstances”, or it can be argued as destiny. By the end of the play, he will revealed as a character to be pitied his arrogance at believing that he is above the law of the land and that he can somehow escape his own fate, contributing to his downfall. This passage will focus on three main points that Oedipus is shown a boastful king, he is short tempered and he blames his fate to gods which lead Oedipus’ decline. Oedipus is highly respected and feared as a boastful king. The metaphor, “I was not sleeping, you are not waking me.”
Oedipus was granted king for only solving a riddle, and was removed from the throne by his own self. This story goes from high to low very drastically, and that formally shows how the whole mood and feel of the story is revealed to be a tragedy. Tragedy affects the main idea in Oedipus Rex because of the extreme conflicts that occur with Oedipus’ family and royal connections. Starting off with the beginning of the story, Oedipus’ birth parents, Laius and Jocasta, were told a prophecy that their son would at sometime in his life strike down his father to take his place as king of Thebes and marry his mother. This eventually came true, where Oedipus killed a group of people he passed in the desert, which the leader of the group was king Laius, his father.
Throughout the story of “Oedipus the King” there is mainly one lesson, one purpose that explains how people’s predetermined fate is inevitable and they cannot avoid it. As Greek philosopher Citium Zeno tells us “Fate is the endless chain of causation, whereby things are; the reason or formula by which the world goes on.” This simply says that the way things are in the world is because of how people follow their fates, and that is why the world works altogether. Sophocles, the author of “Oedipus the King” tells a story that explains how a man, Oedipus, was born with a fate of killing his father and marrying his mother. And he was sent away to be killed so that fate could never be true, but he survives and is adopted by the king and queen of
Throughout the tragedy of Oedipus the King, Oedipus displays his imperfectly noble being for all to see. While Oedipus had saved the Thebans from the Sphinx’s riddle, Oedipus’s nobel pride and anger lead to his destruction as he attempted to find Laios’s murderer. In his mistreatment of Teiresias, and his false allegations towards Creon being a usurper, Oedipus shows his imperfectly noble character as he foolishly attempts to fight fate and the gods will. Oedipus and his imperfectly noble nature appear again and again as he attempts to solve the murder of the previous King.
Sophocles uses the themes of fate and free will to showcase some of the consequences of not accepting one’s own fate. Oedipus discovers that he has killed his father, and slept with his mother, neither of which he know about at the time. The king makes it his objective to find the killer of the previous king in order to save his city. On the surface Oedipus is a vile human being but, if his crimes are disregarded he becomes a much more respectable and honest human being. He is judged, even by himself, for the things he has done but not for who he really is.
Tragic playwright, Sophocles, in his play, Oedipus the King, relates the tale of the downfall of the King of Thebes, Oedipus. Sophocles’ purpose is to show his audience the eventual product of hubris. He adopts a sympathetic tone in order to convey to his audience that, although it seems unfair, it is of no matter how many virtues one possesses if one is arrogant and defies the gods. Sophocles utilizes the ongoing theme of light and darkness to enlighten moral issues and create a sense of irony and foreboding.
Oedipus the King is a tragedy that was written by Sophocles that emphasizes the irony of an irony of a man who was determined to trace down, expose and punish an assassin who in turn became him. Oedipus the King is also known as Oedipus Rex or Oedipus Tyrannus. The art is an Athenian play that was performed in ages approximated to be 429 BC. Oedipus the King would later in the play fulfill the prophecy that he would kill his father and later on marry his mother. There is a twist of an event in the play where Oedipus is looking for the murderer of his father to bring to a halt the series of plagues that are befalling Thebes but only to find he is in search of himself (Rado, 1956).
The classic tragedy written by Sophocles, known as Oedipus Rex, is a story of a man with a more than unfavorable destiny. Oedipus’ misfortunate life not only affects himself, but the lives of the people around him. The distress that is brought by Oedipus impacts the citizens of Thebes as well as his family. As a tragic hero, Oedipus has a fate that conducts the suffering of others regardless of his good-willed actions. The tragic truths of Oedipus’ life unravel as the drama progresses, revealing the extent of his agonizing fortune and furthermore bringing anguish to those around him.
Oedipus solved the riddle of the sphinx which ultimately saved the Kingdom of Thebes from the plague. This made Oedipus a respected ruler that was well liked in Thebes. His time as ruler eventually came to an unexpected end. Although Oedipus could not control his fate, his confidence in himself, determination and stubbornness to find out who killed Laius led to his downfall. Throughout the play Oedipus struggles with not being able to solve this murder.
Oedipus Rex Henry Rollins once stated, “Weakness is what brings ignorance, cruelty, and pride, all these things that will keep a society chained to the ground, one foot nailed to the floor.” In Sophocles play Oedipus Rex, Oedipus, the king of Thebes, weakness is his fate. Throughout the play, Oedipus is trying to outrun his fate because he feels the gods are subordinate to his powerful figure. Oedipus is seen as a god throughout Thebes because he defeated the mighty Sphinx, who was once haunting over the city. After defeating the Sphinx, Oedipus took over as king by killing his father and coupling his mother as his hubris blinded him from reality.
The Freedom of Oedipus is the Freedom of Thebes: Why Oedipus Cannot be Free Until the Truth is Exposed In Sophocles’ Oedipus Tyrannus, the theme of human fate versus free will is explored in the age-old tale of the king of Thebes who inadvertently murdered his father and married his mother. The play opens with Oedipus, a strong man and compassionate leader whom the audience can easily admire. By the closing of the play, a journey of self-discovery has lead Oedipus to his fall from kingship and exile from the city he loves, as well as the suicide of his wife and his self-blinding.
The plot is thoroughly integrated with the characterization of Oedipus, for it is he who impels the action forward in his concern for Thebes, his personal rashness, and his ignorance of his past. His flaws are a hot temper and impulsiveness, but without those traits his heroic course of self-discovery would never occur. Fate for Sophocles is not something essentially external to human beings but
