I’m 99.9% sure that everything that can be said about Sophocles’ “King Oedipus” has already been said by people who are smarter and better acquainted with classical Greek Literature. In fact, if you have access to iTunes, you can download three excellent lectures by Stanford Professor Marsh McCall, recorded as part of his lecture series “IHUM 55: The Literature of Crisis.”The question that I am confronted with becomes, in light of so many brilliant minds analyzing “King Oedipus,” what do I have to add or why ramble at all? Not to feed my own ego, but perhaps someone unfamiliar with the play will read my words and decide to read this important work, which I believe informs the majority of the western world’s literature.
“King Oedipus” as detective. One of the reasons that I enjoy teaching Oedipus is that I spend six weeks trying to convince my students that the devil is in the details. I try to move my students beyond liking-and-disliking opinions to supported, textually informed points of view. Oedipus relentlessly peruses facts to uncover the murderer of King Laius. He will not, cannot rest, until he has heard testimony beyond the raving blind prophet, Teiresias.
First Clue, Oedipus hears the story of King Laius’ murder second had from Creon. Creon is relating the eyewitness account of the sole survivor from King Laius’ traveling party.
Creon: His story was that robbers – not one but many –
Fell in with the King’s party and put them to death (29).
Not being satisfied with second hand information, Oedipus “…will start afresh; and bring everything into the light” (29). He will be the hero and savior of Thebes a second time, by uncovering the murderer of Laius and so lifting the gods’ curse of plague. He did defeat the Sphinx through his own metal power where other, stronger and wiser men had failed. Bringing the murderer into light out of the darkness should be such a trivial task for such a man as Oedipus.
To this end, Oedipus uses all that is at his disposal, the office of King of Thebes, to decree that anyone who helps in his search for truth will be blessed and anyone who dares stand in the way of justice will be cursed, banished, or even put to death (31 - 32).
Second Clue, on the advice of the chorus (composed of elders, priests, and statesmen), Oedipus, like any good god fearing Greek, calls on the wise prophet Teiresias. Creon had also recommended that Oedipus seek Teiresias’ advice in uncovering a path that might lead Thebes back into favor with the gods. Oedipus posses a deep suspicion of oracles and prophets, rooted in an unfilled prophesy uttered to him by the Oracle at Delphi. Instead, Oedipus believes in man’s Free Will.Side Note on the Greek idea behind the forces of Free Will vs. Fate:
Professor Marsh McCall, in his lecture proposes the idea that Fate and Free Will can both be active in the same instance rather than separate and independent. I like this idea a lot. It allows the play “King Oedipus” to remain a human tragedy driven by Oedipus’ tragic flaw as well as his fated, prophesized agony.
Back to Teiresias, who is blind but sees the full extent of Oedipus’ misfortune (34-38). Again, Oedipus is not satisfied with a second hand witness; however, this time a divinely inspired witness who has the audacity to accuse Oedipus that the murderer that he is seeking is none other than Oedipus, himself. Oedipus refuses this idea still under the false assumption that prophets, oracles, and the gods who inspire their visions are fallible.
Teiresias’ inspired mumblings intensify and complicate Oedipus’ sleuthing in two profound ways. First, Oedipus believes that Creon has been plotting to dethrone him and has enlisted Teiresias to that end (40 - 42). Oedipus has always been quick to anger and to act on his own accord without seeking advice. Only his wife and queen, Jocasta, is able to tame Oedipus wild and impulsive anger, seeking exile rather than death for Creon (44). Second, Teiresias says,
And do you not see what company you keep?
Whose son are you? I tell you, you have sinned –
And so not know it – against your own on earth
And in the grave (37).
These lines refer to a painful, unresolved mystery, and prophesy that Oedipus fears may one day come true. In a bar, all great adventure stories start in bars, a drunkard referred to Oedipus as a bastard child, and not the son of Merope and Polybus (47). Now, Oedipus has two mysteries to solve that seem frighteningly interwoven, that of the murderer of Laius and that of his own birth.
The Third Clue brings Oedipus ever closer to solving both mysteries. His queen, Jocasta, and he are discussing the source of Oedipus’ quarrel with her brother Creon. Their discussion takes turn for the worse when Oedipus learns of the dead King Laius’ appearance, mode of transport, and the exact location of the attack (45 - 46). However, he is somewhat reassured by Jocasta’s assertion that it was prophesized that Laius would be killed by hand of his son. To this end, King Laius and Jocasta tossed the baby boy upon a mountainside to die (45).
However, Oedipus still must hear the expert and eyewitness testimony. He must know if King Laius was mugged and killed by a band of robbers or by a lone wanderer (47 - 49). If the known testimony stands, Oedipus can rest assured that he is not the murderer that he is seeking, among other unspeakable things. Jocasta seeing that nothing short of speaking to this witness himself will see him through this ordeal, she sends for the shepherd.
Fourth Clue, an unexpected visitor arrives bearing news. He is a messenger from Corinth, and he is seeking the house of Oedipus. He has come to tell Oedipus that Polybus is dead and that the people of Corinth wish Oedipus’ return so they may crown him king (51). Unknown to the messenger, Oedipus is trying to solve the mystery of his birth. Oedipus is still under the assumption that he is the blood son of Polybus and Merope. Oedipus will not return home while Merope still lives out of fear that part of the prophesy will still come true.
To the messenger’s delight, he can reassure Oedipus that he has nothing to fear. Merope and Polybus are not Oedipus’ real parents (53). This new knowledge is more horrible than the messenger can ever know. It seems that Oedipus is again his own prime suspect in the murder of Laius, and something far, far worse.
The messenger just so happens to be the man who gave the baby Oedipus to Polybus and Merope, but he does not know from what house was born into (54). He only knows that Oedipus was named for the markings around his ankles cause by tightly bound restraints. Oedipus will have to ask someone else about his true origins.
At this point, Jocasta has put the clues together and knows what is unfolding will come to no good. She requests that Oedipus desist in his pursuit to understand his birth and the murderer of Laius (55). Surely, the plague will run it course without such knowledge and the pleasure of the gods. She exits back into the estate where she hangs herself so that, in my mind at least, she will no longer have to play a part in the unfolding of the tragedies to come.
The Fifth and Final Clue is gleaned through the tortured testimony of the shepherd. Oedipus learns that the messenger received a baby from the shepherd. The shepherd was given a baby by Jocasta. The messenger, knowing that Merope and Polybus could not bear a child wanted one, gave the baby over to them to raise as their own (58).
Oedipus now has all the clues to solve both mysteries. He has in fact married his mother, Jocasta and four children with her. He has also learned that the messenger, having found Oedipus the hero of Thebes, defeater of the Sphinx, married to Jocasta, decided it prudent to tell a story of robbers than accuse the new king of murdering the old one. With a new appreciation of his ancestry and his sin, Oedipus flees into the darkness.
What still amazes me is the linear way in which “King Oedipus” unfolds. The events are in order and require no flashbacks. If this same story were written today, no doubt, the author would have started somewhere else and flopped around like a fish on dry land, believing that such a straightforward approach to story telling simple and unsophisticated. Just look at the modern detective dramas like CSI. They start with a murder. The case unfolds in the present, but the action shifts into unnecessary scenes set in the past.
Before I call it quits, I would like to revisit the idea of Fate in “King Oedipus.” Oedipus was fated to kill his father and marry his mother. It was fated. There was nothing that Oedipus could have done to escape his fate. The larger design of life was completely controlled by the gods. The line of Laius was cursed before Oedipus’ birth. However, the individual moments in Oedipus’ life were his own. Free Will and Fate combine like fibers in the tapestry of life to create art, albeit, in Oedipus’ case tragedy.
There are many other angles to attack Sophocles’ play beyond that of detective, Free Will and Fate, in Oedipus, but I will leave those for others to flesh out. I will simple propose some ideas for further thought.
A few other possible themes in “King Oedipus:”
1. King vs. State – Oedipus does not head the warnings given by the chorus. He is determined to solve the murder himself.
2. “King Oedipus” as Fable – curiosity killed the cat.
3. Oedipus as a Christ figure – Oedipus must sacrificed to the gods for his people to lift the plague so that Thebes may once again thrive.
Those are just a few among so many more.
Okay, final pitch. “King Oedipus” is one of the most important works of fiction upon which much of western literature is based. You must read it.
Sophocles. “King Oedipus.” The Theban Plays. England: Penguin, 1974. p. 25 - 68
