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discuss (oedipus rex ) as a tragedy

[M.o_o.N]

'Oedipus Rex' a tragedy



'Oedipus Rex' a tragedy. First, Theban King Oedipus is a hero, because he does great deeds and has great powers or strength. For example, he delivers Thebes from the beastly, bullying Sphinx. He alone knows the answer to the Sphinx's unanswerable riddle.

Second, Oedipus is noble. He's the biological son of Theban royal rulers. On both his parents' sides of the family, he descends from Cadmus, Thebes' founder and first king around 2000 B.C.E. Additionally, he's raised as the royal heir apparent by adoptive/foster royal parents.

Third, Oedipus is tripped up by tragically fatal flaws within his own character and personality. For example, he's so proud that he thinks that he can beat the gods and escape his horrific fate. But the more he tries to flee from his fate, the closer his flight takes him to it because of his own flawed decision making. He's warned that he'll kill his father and marry his mother.

So Oedipus flees what he thinks is his hometown, and the royal couple that he believes to be his biological parents. He then goes on to kill a man old enough to be his father and marry a woman old enough to be his mother. And so the prophecy is fulfilled. An inescapable fate becomes inescapable through the hero's free will in making bad choices and decisions. What Oedipus takes to be biological parents are his adoptive/foster parents, Corinthian King Polybus and Corinthian Queen Merope. What he takes to be strangers are in fact his true parents, Theban King Laius and Theban Queen Jocasta.

Fourth, a pestilence descends upon the city of Thebes. Harvests go bad, livestock die, and more Thebans die than are born. The reason is the unsolved killing of Laius by Oedipus, who is the victim's son and subject. Oedipus needs to be purified of his unknowing but nevertheless heinous crimes. He doesn't go through ritual purification after the killing of father and sovereign. So Oedipus' pollution becomes the pollution of all Thebes.

Fifth, there's a purification of the hero and therefore of his environment. That purification comes about through the hero's death, destruction or downfall. The hero commits an offense against the gods. All offenses must be punished be they the result of deliberate intent or unknowing action. Oedipus' cleansing by being identified and punished as the killer likewise becomes the cleansing of all Thebes.

Sixth, the hero's story is told in verse. That verse doesn't have to rhyme. Socrates [496 B.C.E.-406 B.C.E.] sets his play up as lines of verse. The lines don't rhyme. But the play is clearly a work of poetry, odes and music.

[M.o_o.N]

The Tragic Hero of "Oedipus Rex"



Summary: King Oedipus in Sophocles's "Oedipus Rex" is a tragic hero who received an unjust punishment from the Greek gods. The king had character flaws, but he was punished for crimes he did not commit. The text shows that the king would not have purposefully killed his father and had sex with his mother.


In the Greek Tragedy Oedipus Rex by Sophocles, the main character (King Oedipus) is a tragic hero; he did not deserve the unjust punishments that he receives because he was unaware of the moral wrongs that he was committing.


A tragic hero is a hero whose fate is an undeserved punishment or unhappy ending. Oedipus fits this description because even though he was a good ruler, saved the people of Thebes from the Sphinx & always had the people's best interest in mind he was punished for a crime that he did not commit. King Oedipus was not perfect but the punishment he received for his petty flaws was more than what he deserved. Character flaws make us human, Oedipus was boastful, short tempered and proud



Why is Oedipus a tragic hero?


Theban King Oedipus is the hero of 'Oedipus Rex', because he does great deeds and shows great power or strength. For example, he saves his people from an oppressive tax burden. He rules so well and wisely that Thebans respect him personally and professionally.

But Oedipus also is tragic, because he undergoes a miserable reversal of fortune. That reversal results from a fatally flawed character that's responsible for his own downfall, destruction, and death. His foremost character flaw is pride. He thinks that he can escape the horrendous fate that the gods have in store for him. But according to the culture and religious beliefs of the ancient Greeks, there's no hiding from god preordained lives, god managed fates, and god foredoomed deaths.

Oedipus' fate is particularly ironic for him. He prides himself on his role model family and professional life. He sees himself as the dedicated head of his family, the royal household, and the entire city of Thebes. He ends up realizing that his royal powers and his personal happiness owe their existence to criminal means. He becomes a beloved king, because he unknowingly kills the previous king. In other words, he becomes a king by being a king killer or traitor. He becomes a beloved husband and father, because he unknowingly weds and beds his own mother. In other words, he becomes a spouse and parent by being a sex offender.



Oedipus - The Tragic Hero


In the play Oedipus Rex by Sophocles, Oedipus is a classic tragic hero. According to Aristotle's definition, Oedipus is a tragic hero because he is a king whose life falls apart when he finds out his life story. There are a number of characteristics described by Aristotle that identify a tragic hero. For example, a tragic hero must cause his own downfall; his fate is not deserved, and his punishment exceeds the crime; he also must be of noble stature and have greatness. Oedipus is in love with his idealized self, but neither the grandiose nor the depressive Narcissus can really love himself (Miller 67). All of the above characteristics make Oedipus a tragic hero according to Aristotle's ideas about tragedy, and a narcissist. Using Oedipus as an ideal model, Aristotle says that a tragic hero must be an important or influential man who makes an error in judgment, and who must then suffer the consequences of his actions. Those actions are seen when Oedipus forces Teiresias to reveal his destiny and his father's name. When Teiresias tries to warn him by saying I say that you and your most dearly loved are wrapped together in a hideous sin, blind to the horror of it (Sophocles 428). Oedipus still does not care and proceeds with his questioning as if he did not understand what Teiresias was talking about. The tragic hero must learn a lesson from his errors in judgment and become an example to the audience of what happens when great men fall from their lofty social or political positions. According to Miller, a person who is great, who is admired everywhere, and needs this admiration to survive, has one of the extreme forms of narcissism, which is grandiosity. Grandiosity can be seen when a person admires himself, his qualities, such as beauty, cleverness, and talents, and his success and achievements greatly. If one of these happens to fail, then the catastrophe of a severe depression is near (Miller 34). Those actions happen when the Herdsman tells Oedipus who his mother is, and Oedipus replies Oh, oh, then everything has come out true. Light, I shall not look on you Again. I have been born where I should not be born, I have been married where I should not marry, I have killed whom I should not kill; now all is clear (Sophocles 1144). Oedipus's decision to pursue his questioning is wrong; his grandiosity blinded him and, therefore, his fate is not deserved, but it is far beyond his control. A prophecy is foretold to Laius, the father of Oedipus, that the destiny of Oedipus is a terrible one beyond his control. But when it is prophesized to Oedipus, he sets forth from the city of his foster parents in order to prevent this terrible fate from occurring. Oedipus's destiny is not deserved because he is being punished for his parent's actions. His birth parents seek the advice of the Delphi Oracle, who recommends that they should not have any children. When the boy is born, Laius is overcome with terror when he remembers the oracle. Oedipus is abandoned by his birth parents and is denied their love, which is what results in what Miller calls Depression as Denial of the Self. Depression results from a denial of one's own emotional reactions, and we cannot really love if we deny our truth, the truth about our parents and caregivers as, well as about ourselves (Miller 43). The birth of Oedipus presets his destiny to result in tragedy even though he is of noble birth. In tragedies, protagonists are usually of the nobility that makes their falls seem greater. Oedipus just happens to be born a prince, and he has saved a kingdom that is rightfully his from the Sphinx. His destiny is to be of noble stature from birth, which is denied to him by his parents, but given back by the Sphinx. His nobility deceived him as well as his reflection, since it shows only his perfect, wonderful face and not his inner world, his pain, his history (Miller 66). When he relies on his status, he is blind, not physically, but emotionally. He is blind in his actions; therefore he does not see that the questioning would bring him only misery. Later, after his self- inflicted blinding, Oedipus sees his actions as wrongdoing when he says What use are my eyes to me, who could never - See anything pleasant again? (Sophocles 1293) and that blindness does not necessarily have to be physical as we can se when he says, If I had sight, I know not with what eyes I would have looked (Sophocles 1325). In the play Oedipus Rex, Sophocles portrays the main character, Oedipus, as a good- natured person who has bad judgment and is frail. Oedipus makes a few fatal decisions and is condemned to profound suffering because of them. Agreeing with Aristotle that Oedipus' misfortune happens because of his tragic flaw. If he hadn't been so judgmental or narcissistic, as Miller would characterize a personality like Oedipus, he would never have killed King Laius and called Teiresias a liar. In the beginning, Teiresias is simply trying to ease him slowly into the truth; but Oedipus is too proud to see any truths, and he refuses to believe that he could have been responsible for such a horrible crime. He learns a lesson about life and how there is more to it than just one person's fate.




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