Tragedy &Oedipus the king

Week4段馨君 副教授國立交通大學人文社會學系

Tragedy

• Tragedy refers to a drama in which a heroic protagonist meets an unhappy or calamitous end, brought about by some fatal flaw of character, by circumstances outside his or her control, or simply by destiny.

Tragedy

• Invented and developed in ancient Greece, tragic drama has had a long but sporadic history in Western literature. Yet the great tragedies of the Greeks and of the Renaissance rank among the most compelling and most fascinating of all the works of literature.

Tragedy

• The first and still the most influential definition of tragic drama was sketched out in the Poetics of Aristotle.

• It concerns the fall of a man whose character is good but not perfect and whose is fortune is brought about not by vice or depravity but by some error or frailty -- the tragic flaw.

Types of Tragedy

• Greek tragedy • Roman tragedy• Renaissance tragedy• Neo-classical tragedy• Bourgeois tragedy • Contemporary tragedy

Examples of Tragedy

• Romeo and Juliet • Hamlet • King Lear • Macbeth• Oedipus

About Oedipus the king

• author · Sophocles• genre · tragedy• time and place written · around

430 B.C.• tone · Tragic• setting (time) · in the mythical

past of ancient Greece.• setting (place) · in Thebes

Background

• Oedipus the King, also known by the Latin title Oedipus Rex, is an Athenian tragedy by Sophocles. It was the second of Sophocles's three Theban plays to be produced, but it comes first in the internal chronology, followed by Oedipus at Colonus and then Antigone.

Character Oedipus He saved the city of Thebes and

became the king. Yet Oedipus is stubbornly blind to the truth about himself. He was taken from the house of Laius as a baby and left in the mountains with his feet bound together. On his way to Thebes, he killed his biological father, not knowing who he was, and proceeded to marry Jocasta, his biological mother.

Character Jocasta Oedipus’s wife and

mother, and Creon’s sister. Jocasta appears only in the final scenes of Oedipus the King. She attempts to make peace between Oedipus and Creon and expresses her love for her son and husband.

Character

Sphinx• Threatened anyone who

wished to enter Thebes. She killed and ate any who answered wrongly. She asked, "What has 4 legs in the morning, 2 at noon, and 3 at night?"

Character

Antigone Child of Oedipus and

Jocasta, and therefore both Oedipus’s daughter and his sister.

Ismene Oedipus’s daughter.

Character

Creon Oedipus’s brother-in-

law, Creon appears more than any other character in the three plays combined.

Character

Tiresias The blind soothsayer of

Thebes. Tiresias tells Oedipus that he is the murderer he hunts, and Oedipus does not believe him.

Plot overview

• Oedipus arrives at Thebes a stranger and finds the town under the curse of the Sphinx, who will not free the city unless her riddle is answered.

• Oedipus solves the riddle and, since the king has recently been murdered, becomes the king and marries the queen. In time, he comes to learn that he is actually a Theban, the king’s son, cast out of Thebes as a baby.

• He has killed his father and married his mother. Horrified, he blinds himself and leaves Thebes forever.

Plot

• rising action · The rising action of Oedipus the King occurs when Creon returns from the oracle with the news that the plague in Thebes will end when the murderer of Laius, the king before Oedipus, is discovered and driven out.

Plot

• climax · The climax of Oedipus the King occurs when Oedipus learns, quite contrary to his expectations, that he is the man responsible for the plague that has stricken Thebes—he is the man who killed his father and slept with his mother.

Plot

• falling action · The consequences of Oedipus’s learning of his identity as the man who killed his father and slept with his mother are the falling action. This discovery drives Jocasta to hang herself, Oedipus to poke out his own eyes, and Creon to banish Oedipus from Thebes.

Film-DVD

• Director: Pier Paolo Pasolini• Leading actor: Franco Citti• Year: 1967• Showing Part: Oedipus’s knew the

truth• From 43:00 to 45:35

Film-DVD

• Director: Pier Paolo Pasolini• Leading actor: Franco Citti• Year: 1967• Showing Part: Herald reported

the death of Jocasta • From 01:11:00 to 01:16::00

Film-clips

• Director: Claire Bloom• Leading actor: Michael Pennington• Year: 1984• Showing Part: Oedipus’s mother

said the prediction• From 00:00 to 03:19• http://

www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkVV8j4-xOs&feature=related

Film-clips

• Director: Philip Saville• Leading actor: Christopher

Plummer• Year: 1967• Showing Part: The ending of

Oedipus• From 00:00 to 01:27• http://

www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNXhC6Eqd8M&list=PL03FD0B77ECB7FFAC&index=14

Conflict• major conflict · The major conflict

of Oedipus the King arises when Tiresias tells Oedipus that Oedipus is responsible for the plague, and Oedipus refuses to believe him.

Themes, motifs and symbols

• themes · The power of unwritten law, the willingness to ignore the truth, the limits of free will

• motifs · Suicide, sight and blindness, graves and tombs

• symbols · Oedipus’s swollen foot, the three-way crossroads, Antigone’s entombment

Themes• The Power of Unwritten Law• The Willingness to Ignore the

Truth• The Limits of Free Will

Motifs• Suicide• Sight and Blindness• Graves and Tombs

Motifs• Oedipus’s Swollen Foot• The Three-way

Crossroads• Antigone’s Entombment

Important Quotations

• Fear? What should a man fear? It’s all chance, chance rules our lives. Not a man on earth can see a day ahead, groping through the dark. Better to live at random, best we can. And as for this marriage with your mother—have no fear. Many a man before you, in his dreams, has shared his mother’s bed. Take such things for shadows, nothing at all— Live, Oedipus, as if there’s no tomorrow!

Important Quotations

• People of Thebes, my countrymen, look on Oedipus. He solved the famous riddle with his brilliance, he rose to power, a man beyond all power. Who could behold his greatness without envy? Now what a black sea of terror has overwhelmed him. Now as we keep our watch and wait the final day, count no man happy till he dies, free of pain at last.

Reference

• http://www.sparknotes.com/drama/oedipus/characters.html

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oedipus_the_King

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy