Oedipus King Of Sophocles

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Oedipus King of Sophocles

Introduction

Oedipus is king in the city of Thebes, the plague is ravanding the city and the town goes to the king to find out the reason for the plague and look for a solution to the epidemic. King Oedipus sends his brother -in -law to the Oracle of Delphi so that he tells him what is the cause of the plague. Creon is the brother of his wife Yocasta when Creon returns from the Oracle of Delphi tells Oedipus and the people that the cause of the plague is the murder of the former king of Thebes Layo. The former king is called Layo, as a consequence of the Oracle Oedipus orders to investigate and find out who has been Layo’s murderer and also orders that he be punished.

Following the advice of his brother -in -law Creon, Oedipus calls before him to the fortuneseveral children. Oedipus is convinced that he is the son of Pólibo King of Corinth and Mériba Reina de Doria, however he is wrong although he does not know, for this reason he gets angry with his brother -inof Thebes.

Oedipus and Creon are engaged in an argument and Oedipus’ wife appears. Yocasta who tells Oedipus that Layo died murdered by some bandits at a crossroads, which is why Oedipus cannot be the murderer, so the prophecy of the Oracle of Delphi was not true. This prophecy of the Oracle of Delphi said that from Yocasta and Layo a son would be born who would kill his father and also lay with his mother Yocasta. Another prophecy had received Oedipus while in the city of Corinth who said that he would kill his father, which is why he was exiled from Corinth in order to avoid killing his father that he thought it was Pólibo.

After what Yocasta had said, Oedipus begins to suspect that he is King Layo’s murderer, because King Layo’s death occurred at a confluence of three paths and he had killed a person in a similar place. To undo this doubt, Oedipus commands the only witness who survived the death of King Layo and accompanied him at that time. Meanwhile arrives a Corinth Messenger who announces the death of his father Pólibo and that Corinth has chosen him as king of that city.

For the messenger who has come from Corinth Oedipus he discovers that he is the son of Layo who frightened by the prophecy of the Oracle of Delphi. Layo decided to give his son still pastor to leave him on the mountain and die. However, this pastor was pity on him and handed it to the messenger to take care of him and take him away from that place. However, the messenger, like King Pólibo de Corinto had no children, gave the child to this king who took care of him and raised him if he were his son. Total that Oedipus realizes that he is also also the son of King Layo and Yocasta.

Upon discovering Oedipus that he had killed his father and who was living in an incestuously with his mother, with whom he had several children, the outcome of the work is produced and YocastCreon that becomes the new king of Thebes to take away all the rights and honors and read exile of the city.

Developing

The main theme of the Oedipo Rey is that fate exists, in a way they do what men do in the end will end up fulfilling their destiny. An important but secondary issue is that the crimes and immoral actions of men never run out of punishment.

STRUCTURE

 An act that is divided into 8 episodes, one of which is a prologue.

The choir participates in 8 different moments. In 4 we are (choral song between 2 episodes) and also 4 other occasions. And the Corifeo (a person who directed the choir) intervenes in 11 different moments. The introduction is composed of the complaints of the town for the plague, the arrival of Creon with the Oracle of Delphi, the revelations of Tiresias (the fortune teller), and the search for the ancient pastor of Layo de Layo de Layo de Layo. The knot of the work is composed of the arrival of the Corinthian emissary and the revelations made about Oedipus’ parents. It is also constituted by the revelations made by the old pastor of Layo.

The outcome of the work takes place since Yocasta enters the palace desperately, suicide hanging up is his rooms and Oedipus takes his sight with the brooches of Yocasta’s dress and concludes the outcome with the banishment of Oedipus and his request for Creon, which is constituted as the new king, that protects his daughters and they extend him.

CHARACTERS

Oedipus, Yocasta, Creon, the Choir of Nursing.

  • Oedipus is the main character is the one who suffers the consequences of the oracle and who is punished for his actions. Yocasta is the mother and wife of Oedipus also suffers the consequences of the oracle and represents a position of not looking for the truth of what happened to avoid what her relationship with Oedipus. Creon is Yocasta’s brother and is the one who serves in the work to launch the plot of the tragedy. The choir intervenes giving strength to the oracle and expressing the enormous tragedy that is triggered on Oedipus and Yocasta.
  • ANALYSIS: Some of the characters have a definite evolution. Thus, Oedipus starts at the beginning of the work of a full conviction of being able its terrible sins.
  • Yocasta part of an absolute security of Oedipus’s innocence in the death of Layo and absolute tranquility for having mocked the oracle to fall into a state of alienation after verifying that Oedipus was his son with whom he had married after killing Layo. He takes his life in an act of rebellion against his own destiny while Oedipus accepts the punishment that is a consequence of the death of Layo and the incest.

 

Space and time

  • The action occurs in Thebes, city state of Greece.
  • The space that passes is the Agora, in front of the Royal Palace of Oedipus and in the Royal Palace of Oedipus itself. Reference is made to these places in the work itself describes the place where the action takes place.
  • It is not possible to set the time in which the action takes place because the work does not detach. In spite of all the action could be developed in the sixth century or V a.C., Because the play was released around 429 to.C, and at that time Thebes maintained a good alliance with Corinth. The time when Sophocles places the work has no significant value in the development of the plot. The action lasts a single day if we stick to the work but this is impossible because Oedipus’ servants are going to look for a shepherd to the field (the old Layo servant) so we are facing a theatrical fiction.

 

LANGUAGE

  • The language used is mostly formal, high, where stylistic resources such as metaphors, personifications … irony and ambiguity are characteristic;While the language of the choir, more poetic, is full of exclamations, interrogations, invocations to the gods, etc.
  • Understanding has seemed very difficult for me to read are some of the choir’s interventions.

 

REPRESENTATION

  • Yes there are dimensions in the work.
  • It is the dimensions that can help you imagine the representation of the work, such as the dimension of the principle: in front of the Oedipus Palace, in Thebes. A group of elders and young people is sitting in the altar stands, in pleading attitude, carrying olive branches. The priest of Zeus advances only to the palace. Oedipus is followed by two assistants and contemplates the group in silence. Then he directs the word).  Or as for example at the end of the prologue of the work there is a dimension that says: they leave the scene and, then, the Teban Choir enters it.

 

CONTEXT

  • Oedipus Rey was written in the 5th century.C. By Sophocles and released in the year 429 to.C.It is the era of greatest splendor of classical Greece. Immediately after its decline would begin because the Peloponnese war began. At this time we find great characters such as Pericles, (Athenian statesman), Fidias (sculptor), Esquilo and Euripides (playwrights) and Herodotus and Xenophon. (Historians). It is the time of a large increase in population and the adoption of writing and literacy forms. It is also a time when the creation of plays, especially dramatic.
  • The work Oedipus Rey appears at a time when tragic competitions were frequent. This work only won a second prize in one of these competitions, although Aristotle said that the best tragedy that had been written. At this time, the usual thing was that there were only 2 main actors and a small scenography on stage while what sophocles increases the number of main actors to 3 I include a more complex scenography. It is a time when the theater and especially tragedies were highly valued. It belongs to classical Greek literature.
  • Some authors have compared the figure of Oedipus with that of Segismundo, the protagonist of life is a dream, by Calderón de la Barca. They establish comparisons between both characters for the character of the two and why both ignore their identity.

 

conclusion

For Aristotle, the tragedies of Sophocles and Oedipus Rey in particular were a model that they had to write and consider Oedipus as the best of dramas. For Aristotle it was the perfect tragedy. Subsequently it has been considered one of the obas of the most important Greek tragedy, if not the most important of all. It has been a very represented work throughout history. 

The dramatic situations through which their characters go through have resulted in many studies and comments to the point that Sigmund Freud elaborated based on this work the known as Oedipus complex. For modern criticism. (Richard Claver House and Cedric Whitman) Oedipus Rey is the masterpiece of the Attic tragedy for the excellent development of the plot and the drawing of the characters.

In addition to reading it I have had the opportunity to see her represented a few years ago at the Roman Theater in Colunia. Staging the play is wonderful. The characters have a very large tragic force and the argument puts in light the enormous misfortune through which the characters pass. It seems to me a very good play, so critics who say it is the best tragedy of classical literature are right.

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