View source for Template:Sophokles' Oidipous Rex

==Prologue to Oidipous Rex==
[[Character::Zeus]] gets [[character::Antiope]] pregnant. Her father, Nyktues, exiles her and she marries Epopeus, who is killed by Nykteus' brother Lykos, and captures Antiope. She gives birth to twins and they are left exposed to die but are found by a herdsman who names them [[character::Amphion]] and [[character::Zethos]].

Lykos and his wife Dirke treat Antiope badly. She tried to escape but his recaptured but only after the herdsman recognizes her. Amphion and Zethos find Antiope and tie Dirke to a bull and she is thrown in to ariver. Lykos is also killed and takes control of [[place::Thebes]] and expels [[character::Laios]] who then becomes the first mortal to have homosexual sex and Zeus decrees that Laios will be killed by his son. [[character::Hera]], goddess of childbirth feels dishonored and sends a Sphinx to Thebes.

Amphion and Zethos marry. [[character::Niobe]] had many children with Amphion and boasts that she is superior to [[character::Latona]], but her sons [[character::Artemis]] and [[character::Apollo]] kill Amphion and Zethos while hunting. This allows Laios to retake the throne and marry [[character::Iokaste]].

They remain childless and consult the [[Delphic Oracle]] who tells him his son will murder him. He abstains from sex but Iokaste has a baby who is left to expose with the legs pinned. A herdsman finds the child and gives it to the childless [[character::Polybus]] and [[character::Merope]] and call him [[character::Oidipous]] or ''swollen foot''.

As he gows up he hears a chance remark that he is not the real son of the king and queen and goes to see the Delphic Oracle to learn the truth. He does not find out but told that if he returns to his native land he will kill his father and marry his mother. Thinking this means [[place::Korinth]] he goes another way back and has a chance encounter with Laois on a three way crossroads. He kills Laios without learning his identity. [[character::Kreon]] takes over from Laios but at the same time the [[character::Sphinx]] is terrorizing Thebans with a riddle, which if not answered correctly leads to the death of the inquisitor.

The riddle is:
''What is that which has one voice, and yet becomes four footed and two footed and three-footed''

Kreon's son Haimon becomes a victim and Kreon decrees that whoever solves the riddle will become king of Thebes. Oidipous correctly answers and marries Iokaste.

[[File:Oidipous_sphinx.jpg|Oidipous and the Sphinx]]

==Oidipous Tyrannos by [[author::Sophokles]]==
The play starts with a devestating plague. Oidipous has sent Kreon to the Delphic Oracle to find out the cause. Kreon returns to say that the plague will only disappear when the murderer of Laios is punished. Oidipous says that he will punish and exile the killer when he finds out.

[[character::Teiresias]] the blind seer is summoned by Oidipous. He would rather not say what he knows but is forced to accuse Oidipous of the murder and hints darkly at blindness, incest, infamy and wanderings. Oidipos then accuses Teiresias and Kreon of trying to overthrow him. He argues loudly with Kreon which causes Iokaste to come out and find out what is happening. She dismisses the forebodings out of hand saying that Laios was supposed to be killed by his son yet was killed by robbers. This jogs Oidipous' memory and remembers killing three people at the same place. He thinks that he might be the killer of Laios and calls the only surviving witness to see him.

At the same time a messenger from Korinth arrives to say that Polybus has died of old age. Oidipous is relieved but still doesn't want to go back to see Merope. The messenger seeks to allay his fears saying that it was he who gave Oidipous to Polybus and Merope. Oidipous wants to know more so he seeks the shepherd who gave the child to the messenger. The penny drops for Iokaste and pleads with Oidipous not find out more and runs distraught to the palace. Oidipous misinterprets her anguish and finds the shepherd, who is forced to admit that the boy was the son of Laios and Iokaste. The penny now drops for Oidipous who runs to the palace to find Iokaste hanged and he stabs his eyes out.

The final scene is a blood soaked blinded Oidipous beckoning to his daughters and asking for Kreon to exile or kill him. Kreon tells Oidipous he is humiliated and in no position to start dictating what others should do.

==Oidipous' Fate and Responsibility== 
There has been much debate concerning the responsibility of Oedipus and the "fairness" of his punishment. In Greek tragedy and myth in general, it is the norm that someone will suffer some terrible fate as punishment for wrongdoing or some sacrilege. However, it seems as though Oidipous himself has done nothing to warrant the punishment of his awful fate. In fact, the citizens of Thebes in Sophokles' Oidipous the King revere him as the most intelligent of men and as a good ruler, even referring to him as a father. As a result, this story has often been read as a comment on the indiscriminate nature of fate, and that even the best of men can be cursed with an unfair fate, which even the gods are unable to divert. This suggestion would imply that Oidipous himself is not to blame for his actions, and thus deserves no punishment for them. An alternative explanation has already been given above, that it was not Oidipous himself who was cursed, but rather the entire line of Laios as payment for his rape . Still others suggest that Oedipus is allotted his fate as a pre-emptive penalty for the crimes proscribed in the prophecy, implying that he would have committed these atrocities whether they were fated or not, and thus the realisation he has committed them is fitting punishment for him. It can be agreed that Oidipous is not being punished for a simple, tangible crime as is the case with many tragic heroes of Greek myth.

===The notion of guilt and shame and Oidipous===
Generally speaking we can say that guilt is an internal emotion which has the capacity for atonement, whereas shame is derision heaped on the victim by others. Whilst guilt can be seen as more of a modern and Christian phenomena becuase of the potential for atonement, shame is much more prevalent theme in classical literature. Oidipous is shamed for sleeping with his mother and killing his father. The shame is not lessened by the fact that he did not explicitly and knowingly do these acts yet it is still shameful. The shamed person's personal recourse is to hide away, (he is banished) which is exactly what Oidipous does. Also there is a less focus on atoning for what has happened and more on accepting punishment for the acts.

==Oidipous the Scapegoat==
The myth of Oidipous is a metaphor for the ancient scapegoat ritual. The scapegoat ritual was practiced when a community was in a state of emergency e.g. in the grip of a plague or famine, and it involved expelling a [[term::Pharmakos]] (human scapegoat) from the town. The pharmakos was often a person of little consequence, such as a criminal or a cripple. The pharmakos would be led like a sacrificial animal to a sacred precinct and either killed or beaten and then ejected from the city, taking with it the evils and sins of the community and, thus, purifying the town. The Oidipous story parallels this practice quite closely, as he (technically a cripple) would normally be of little consequence to the city of Thebes. Furthermore, he is physically harmed, albeit by himself, and exiled from the city. It has been said (in Sophokles' version of the story) that when Laios' killer has been removed from Thebes the plague will abate, thus implying that Oidipous is taking with him the sins of the community, filling the role of the pharmakos and ending the crisis in the town.

==Aristotle: Oidipous and the role of Recognition and Reversal==
{{#ask: [[text::+]]

}}

''From the article [[Aristotle#Aristotle Poetics|Aristotle Poetics]]''
In order for a plot to function, for instance in a tragedy there should be Catharsis through Reversal peripeteia and Recognition leading to a feeling of catharsis. Recoginition is the state by which we move from ignorance to knowledge, which leads to a reversal. The objective of the tragedy to engender of catharsis by exercising fear and pity through the agency of the play. If we take the examaple of Oidipous Rex the recognition and reversal are deployed in various ways. The recognition that he is the son of Laius and Jocasta leadsd to the plot reversal of gouging his eyes out, losing his kingdom and being banished. For the audience the Reversal is the reversal of expectations. We expect that when the messenger comes with news that he was the son Laius and a noble person in his own right the expectation of the messenger is that it is good news. But for us and Oidipous and ourselves the penny drops. Both he and ourselves are flawed. He is falwed becuase he has unknowingly brough shame to his family. We are flawed becuase we were causght out by the plot twist. We exorcise our feat and pity through Oidipous' actions and subsequent events. Aristotle does not mean for fear and pity to no longer be part of our psyche (as future analysts may have sought to do) He sees the feelings as inate and useful However, cartharsis allows us to better manage those emotons through the depiction in others (like plays). Aristotle is careful to explain that the plot twist should have a shock value in itself but as a consequence of the actions that cime before it and actions that will lead on from it.

==Psychoanalysis and Oidipous Rex==
Taking up the ideas above we can argue that
*Oidipous knew the truth all along
*He was a helpless puppet devoid of free will
*The play has so many improbable ciincidences that we do not need to fear the same fate
*Use [[author::Freud|Sigmund Freud's]] analysis of the play

The Sphinx and Oidipous are powerful symbols for him. The Sphinx is scary and sexy. The red vase from Kiel around 450BCE shows her as an alluring woman playing erotically with a young man while tearing him apart. She has a tripart nature - woman's face, lion's body and bird's wings which represents the passions, creativity and superego. She asks riddles and she is a riddle. Sphinx is close to the Greek word for ''repressor'' symbolizing man trying to repress his instincts.

Ingres's Oidipous (above)and the Sphinx 1908 has a heroic Oidipous naked outside the lair. The bestial elements are relegated in favor of her breasts.


Gustave Moreau produced an interpetation has her claws either side of her genitals

[[File:oidipous_moreau.jpg|Moreau Oidipous and the Sphinx]]

















[[author::Plato]] also discusses the tripartite human soul which he see as bodily appetites, emotions, and controlling intelligence. He uses the [[character::Kerebos]] - the multi-headed dog as a model

In the swollen foot we could see a castration symbol. ''Laios'' means left in Greek. Labdakos mmay be connected to the letter lamda
- all meaning a limp or one leg longer than the other.

In Freud's The Interpretation of Dreams he asserted the Oidipous complex stems from a child's repression of erotic feelings for the parents of the opposite sex. He also suggests that folk tales and myths and manefestation of dreams. There are two parts to the mind the conscious and the subconscious. Dreams are the disguised fulfillment of of suppressed desires and myths are smiliar as they retell ideas that would otherwise would not be socially acceptable. The imaages produced in the dreamwork are symbols and are private - only the dreamer can account for them or they are universal.

Accoording to Freud boys mature in four stages
*1. Infant has the [[term::''pleasure principle'']] dominated by the [[term::''id'']]
*2. Oedipal stage. 3 ans 7 the child has his mother as an erotic object and the father feels threatened
*3. Latency. Child suppresses his sexuality with the formation od a [[term::''Superego'']] that keeps ''id'' other control
*4. Maturity. Reconciles with his father and chooses another sexual object

''If'' societies are like individuals then the same analysis can be applied to collective myths.

Some examples
*Kings and Queens = Mothers and Fathers
*Enclosed Spaces = Female body
*Gates, doors, ovens = Female genitals
*Anything longer than it is wide, the number three = Male genitals
*Falling into = Birth
*Journey = Death
*Climbing stairs = Intercourse

==Psychoanalytical perspectives on Oidipous==
===Oidipous did not actually kill Laios===
He did it!

  
*It was prophesised. Although the Delphic Oracle gave ambiguous answers it was prophesized that Laios would be killed by his son and that Oidipous would kill his father. Iokaste ironically retells the story as if to disprove the prophesy. Oidipous took the prophesy seriously and never returned (ironically again) to Korinth. Given that Iokaste hangs herself, she is obviously in no doubt as to who killed Laios

  
''JOCASTA: .
It said Laius was fated to be killed
by a child conceived by him and me.''

  
''OIDIPOUS: it was my fate to defile my mother’s bed,
to bring forth to men a human family
that people could not bear to look upon,
to murder the father who engendered me''

  
*The Plague. The plague has been visited on Thebes, which will only be lifted when the murderer of Laios is exiled

  
''CREON
Laius was killed. And now the god is clear:
those murderers, he tells us, must be punished,
whoever they may be''

  
*The blind seer corroborates the prophesy. Teiresais is summoned to Oidipous but would rather not say that he knows Oidipous to be the son of Laios and Iokaste and by inference the prophesy has come true.

  
''TEIRESIAS: Is that so? Then I would ask you to stand by [350]
the very words which you yourself proclaimed
and from now on not speak to me or these men. 420
For the accursed polluter of this land is you.''

  

  
*Iokaste gives a description of Laios. Iokaste describes what Laios looked like and who he was with the day he was murdered. Oidipous realises this is the person he killed at the same crossroads

  
''OEDIPUS: Did Laius have a small escort with him [750]
or a troop of soldiers, like a royal king?

  
JOCASTA: Five men, including a herald, went with him.
A carriage carried Laius. ''

  
''OEDIPUS: Alas! Alas!
It’s all too clear! Lady, who told you this?

  
JOCASTA: A servant—the only one who got away.
He came back here.''
  
The servant lied. The servant said that Laios was set upon by a band of robbers but would he have been truthful and said that Laois and the others were killed by one man? He disappears shortly afterwards and does not return to explain his story to Oidipous
  
''CREON
He told us it was robbers who attacked them—
not just a single man, a gang of them—
they came on with force and killed him.''

  
In all probability, Oidipous unknowingly killed Laios. However, Oidipous jumps to a lot of wrongful conclusions during the play and it’s just possible he jumped to the wrong conclusion about his own guilt. Creon offers some bitter words of advice that come to haunt Oidipous later.

  
''CREON: I do not know. And when I don’t know something,
I like to keep my mouth shut''


===Oidipous knew all along===
The evidence in the play seems to lead us in different directions. At times Oidipous seems very inquisitive and his powers of reasoning are very strong. He visits the Delphic Oracle on the premise of chance remark about his parentage by a drunk and he solves the Sphinx’s riddle

At other times he fails to join the dots 

*         Why did he never enquire as to Jocasta’s husband’s death?

*         Why did Iokaste or Oidipous never have a conversation about his scarred feet? His name is “swollen feet” after all

*         When Creon returns from Apollo’s shrine he tells Oidipous about the servant who was with Laios at the time of his death but does not send for him yet he says he wants to find Laios’s murderers. He only summons the servant later when Iokaste describes the events at the crossroads?

His self-mutilation upon hearing from the old servant that he is Laois’ son is swift. He does not ask for further or contradictory proof. Did he therefore subconsciously know and as Brian says just repress his thoughts?

One critic <ref>http://www.janushead.org/9-1/Carel.pdf pg12</ref> suggested that Tiresias and Oidipous embody "two halves of a single psyche", so that Iodipous unconscious knowledge is express by Tiresias. The blind Tiresias knows the truth and the seeing Oidipous suppresses it

I'll say that subconsciously he did know but consciously did not and the unfolding events brought that realisation to the surface

===How Helpful is a Psychological Model for Understanding Oidipous Rex and Greek Mythology?===

With regards to Oedipus trying to avoid the prophecy, one could gain from this story that the harder we try to thwart fate, the more we bring it on. Is this a statement or a question about life? I would pursue the later.

Can we run from our fate as did Oedipus? Can we change our fate? Perhaps the answer isn't in this play, but in the heart of those who can learn from this story.

Let us remember that we are brought into this story when it is essentially over. Oedipus has already killed his father  and has already slept with his mother. Why the chronology in which it is presented? I believe because we are placed in the presence of difficult moral questions, without the ability to change the course of action before it happens. It is Oedipus's predicament that is so difficult, and causes us to question responsibility and fate if such exists.

Freud didn't interpret the myth of Oedipus or of Medusa. He interpreted themes he saw in the myths to help explain some of his ideas about the mind. And I think it is important to know the difference.The 'castration complex' could be a different way of saying 'fear of loss of control or independence'. We are involved in an 'exploration of the complexities of human nature rather than reaching a definite conclusion'. This seems to one of the things that myth.<ref>http://www.unc.edu/~plmiller/writing/Oedipus_Rex_Revisited.pdf</ref>

===Gerome's Napoleon and the Sphinx===
[[File:napoleon_sphinx.jpg]]

I think the picture initially seeks to flatter Napoleon and the flatter those who followed and aspired to be a Napoleon. Oidipous had liberated Thebes and Napoleon liberated France. I was slightly put off by the small scale of Napoleon vis-a-vis the whole painting. I would have expected him to be imposing himself on the Sphinx with a heroic expression yet he seems lost in the picture and slightly timid. I understand the alternative view that his small size would make his victory over the Sphinx even more spectacular but then again I do not think Napoleon ever saw himself as the plucky under dog.

I like the hubris angle. Oidipous figured out the Sphinx's riddle but became over confident in his powers as a great king. Napoleon, too was ultimately brought down by over reaching his abilities to make France the most powerful country in Europe. In the end Oidipous ended up in exile and died so did Napoleon.
'Not so sure about hybris' - quite right! My thoughts (A Brief Guide to Classical Civilization, p. 177) are along these lines.... Some interpreters of the play do see O's bevaviour as indicative of his hybris, a ‘fatal flaw’ or ‘transgression’ (hamartia in Greek) which justifies his fall, or at least indicates that he is the kind of person who might have committed these crimes even if they had not been fated, but that is really missing the point. A lot of confusion has been caused by Aristotle’s statement[1] that in the best tragedies the tragic action should come about through hamartia. This a word associated with missing the target in archery – it is an error, rather than a character flaw, and it is definitely not anything to do with arrogance. The influence of Shakespearean tragedy has perhaps led too many modern interpreters to see pride (hybris) as the error (hamartia). But this Christianises Greek tragedy in an unhelpful way: hybris is not just an attitude, but is generally externalised into violent or arrogant actions (it was the Greek word for GBH). Pride was an entirely appropriate feeling for an aristocratic male to display; humility was not, and in any case he has already fulfilled his destiny – hence the plague.

<references />