Essay on Summary of Oedipus The Kings by Sophocles

The fulfillment of prophesies has enthralled ancient people since the beginning of time. Greek culture, in particular, relied predominately on Athenian religion and credited their actions to the work of gods. In Sophocles’ work, Oedipus the King, Sophocles defines an indication that men may not have accountability for their own moral sanctity because their lives are determined through fate. In fact, within Oedipus the King, Oedipus has to complete an investigation of his own self and determine his punishment regardless of who it hurts because of his willingness to comply to a god. In response to this, many believe that the title of this particular tragedy is Oedipus the King because it illustrates the conflict Oedipus has with his family and state. Although this is true, the title, Oedipus the King, also exemplifies Oedipus’ response to the idea that everything that has ever happened and ever will happen is necessary. The title and evidence that supports the title in this play comprise logic that enables one to understand how the law of necessity drives Oedipus’ decisions. It eventually claims that Oedipus does not act at random but rather in response to causality, and he ultimately does so in a dignified nature.

The play, Oedipus the King by Sophocles presents a grim hamartia caused from a terrible deed of long ago. Oedipus the protagonist is the powerful King of Thebes and held of high estate by the people of Thebes. As the terrible deed of Oedipus’s becomes apparent to both Oedipus and the City of Thebes his tragic flaw is slowly realized. The play will show “tragic power resides in human failing, hamartia, constantly underpinning any sense of the inevitable” (Walton). The play will show the author’s view of a tragic hero as seen in the play Oedipus the King does exemplifies Aristotle’s definition of a tragic hero.

Oedipus is the king of Thebes and unknown to him he is married to his mother Jocasta queen of Thebes. He does not realize that many years ago he had killed his real father without knowing it. Oedipus is seen as god like to the people of Thebes because it was him who solved the sphinxes riddles. In the play he is accused by Teiresias of killing the king and Oedipus blames his brother in law and kreon of trying to over throw him. Then his wife Jocasta comes into the scene and tells a story of how the king was killed. It is then that Oedipus learns of his childhood and becomes more suspicious then ever. He then calls a shepherd and a messenger to help answer questions. The people tell him to stop asking about the death because he may not like the answer but Oedipus makes the ultimate sacrifice and continues to

In Sophocles play Oedipus the King, Sophocles depicts the horrible fate of Oedipus, a pompous, arrogant young ruler. The story begins in the Greek town of Thebes. A plague has descended upon the Thebians causing death and famine throughout the land. Oedipus, being the heroic king, takes full responsibility to find out the cause of their aliments. While working to discover the source of the plague, Oedipus stumbles upon the tragic truth of his heritage and the horrifying implications of his appointment to the throne. Unfortunately for Oedipus, everything ends in tragedy. With the suicide of his mother/wife and the self-inflicted blindness followed by exile from Thebes, Oedipus paved the path to his own

Oedipus the King is a tragedy that displays irony throughout the play. In the play, King Laius and his wife Jocasta learn that in the prophecy their newborn son, Oedipus, will kill his father and marry his mother. In order to prevent the prophecy from occurring, they decide to bind and tie his ankles and then abandoned him. When Oedipus grew up, he eventually learned about this prophecy and decided to leave his parents. What he did not realize was that the parents who raised him were not his biological parents. On his voyage to Thebes, Oedipus ended up in a chariot accident

Many people believe that fate has planned out their lives and despite efforts on their part what was meant to happen, will eventually happen. This belief has been handed down over the centuries from some of the first civilizations, such as the Greeks. However, not all Greek citizens wanted destiny to take control of their lives. Some decided to choose freewill over the will of the gods. In Oedipus the King, Sophocles writes a cautionary tale meant to warn the doubters in Greek society that regardless of their beliefs in gods and prophecies, it is necessary to heed their warnings. Oedipus, Jocasta, and Laius are Sophocles’ characters that prove that escaping one’s fate is not possible, as each of their predicted fates is realized despite extensive efforts to thwart them.

Early on in the story, Oedipus is the proud and confident king of Thebes; he is a man that is not to be underestimated or degraded. This once undisputed fact becomes more debatable the longer the play continues, however. The conflict begins with Oedipus attempting to lift a curse that has been unleashed on the kingdom of Thebes. This curse was caused by the murder of the previous king, Laius, and the only way for it to be lifted is for the murderer to be exiled from Thebes. Oedipus works fervently to unravel the mystery behind who Laius’ killer was. However, each new discovery ends up incriminating Oedipus as the killer instead. Along the way Oedipus discovers that his supposed parents, the king and queen of Corinth, are not his true parents. This revelation pushes him to begin a new search for his biological parents, a search that eventually leads him to one of Lainus’ shepherds. It is this shepherd that reveals to King Oedipus that his mother is Jocasta, his current wife. Consequently, Oedipus falls into a fit of despair in which he stabs his own eyes out and confronts the consequences of his shameful existence. By the end of the play, Oedipus has not only lost his status as the king of Thebes, but has also been exiled from the kingdom and has become an outcast for all of society to hate. The transition Oedipus undergoes

Oedipus was the King of Thebes who is investigating to find the murder of their friend Lais. The citizens were begging Oedipus to lift the plague and save their city Thebes. Oedipus sent Creon out to try to figure out some deals on the murder of Lais, but little did Oedipus know that he himself killed Lais. If they find the man who murdered Lais this will end the plague. Oedipus then comes to find out that he is one of the suspects of Lais murder. When Oedipus was a young boy, that he is destined to kill his father and marry his own mother Oedipus’s later find out that his father is Lais. His real parents abandoned him, so the shepherd gave Oedipus to Lais and Jocasta. Oedipus then realizes he was the person to kill his father Lais. He also

Oedipus is living in a dream from which he is only just beginning to awake. In this dream, he not only believes that he is in control of his own fate but that he is in control of his own identity. He assumes that he has three virtues: wisdom, reason, and self-control. When he attempts to use these virtues, however, he discovers that he is mistaken on all three counts. His first mistake is believing that he is wise. From this wisdom he hopes to maintain control over the events around him, but true wisdom is actually surrendering to the fact that control is an illusion, a "seeming." His second mistake is believing that he is a rational man. Indeed, Oedipus has great cognitive

When Oedipus was born, he was left on a mountainside to die. The reason his parents did this was, an oracle predicted that he will grow up to be the murderer of his father the King. Oedipus parents did not kill him like they told to, instead Oedipus was found by a Sheppard and taken to the nearby city of Corinth. This is where Oedipus was adopted as the son of the King and Queen. Many years later, Oedipus seeks counsel from the same oracle that predicted his fate. The oracle does not tell him the identity of his true parents, instead tells him that he will kill his biological father and marry his birth mother. To ovoid this prophecy, Oedipus ran away from Corinth back to Thebes. Oedipus reaches a place where three roads meet. He comes across a chariot that was carrying King Laius. At the time he did not know that this man was his father and the King of Thebes. They begin to fight over who has the right to go first, and in self defense Oedipus kills King Laius; unknowingly fulfilling part of the prophecy. After unknowingly killing the King, Oedipus continues on his journey toward Thebes. When he got to the there the city in great distress. He also learned that a monster called the Sphinx was terrorizing the Thebans by devouring them when they failed to answer its riddle correctly. Oedipus not only defeated the Sphinx, which killed itself in rage, but won the throne of the dead king and the hand in marriage of the

Oedipus the King is a tale that starts out with the city of Thebes suffering from a drastic plague and their king, Oedipus wants to find out why. Creon is sent to find the reason why the plague is occurring, and sends Tiresias to tell Oedipus the oracle. The oracle says that the murderer of Laius must be found and punished. This caused Oedipus to proclaim that he would do everything so that he could to find the murderer. Tiresias says that the murderer is Oedipus, but Oedipus is quick to disagree. Oedipus came to the towns of Thebes because of a prophecy that was given to him. He was told that he was to kill his father and even sleep with his own mother. Once the story comes to an end, the

It is wise to be careful of what you look for, because you might not like what you find. This would have been excellent advice for the main character in Sophocles drama, Oedipus the King. However, the drama was written as a result of Sophocles life and the influence of the humanistic culture in which he lived. Throughout Sophocles life, he gained military knowledge as the son of a wealthy armor manufacturer and received an excellent Greek education with emphasis on Homeric poetry (textbook). Furthermore, Sophocles was very involved in politics and served as a treasurer, a general, and inevitably as a member in a group for policy formation (textbook). Although Sophocles was deeply enmeshed with the political world of his time, his true calling in life was his writing of Greek tragedy, during the Golden Age movement of 477 B.C. to 431 B.C. (Berkhofer). Unsurprisingly, it is his portrayal of the Greek culture that has led to Sophocles unofficial title of the embodiment of Greek Spirit (Whitman, 4). Now, Sophocles’ Greek culture was humanistic and focused on the achievements of individuals, primarily their moral and psychological difficulties within the human experience. Although, philosophy and religion are a part of humanism, Sophocles demonstrated the political and social characteristics of ancient Greek humanism in his drama, Oedipus the Kings (Menning). Therefore, one can understand the life and humanistic culture of Sophocles through the illustration of the

     The heart of the story unravels when Oedipus apparently begins to suffer a reversal of fortunes. At the beginning of the play, Oedipus is referred to by the priest as the “king of the land, [the city of Thebes’] greatest power” (16). Through all of Thebes he is thought of as a hero, a man who saved the city from the Sphinx and in his bravery has promised to find the killer of King Laius in order to save the city from doom and death. However, at the climax of the story Oedipus learns that he has been “cursed in [his] birth, cursed in marriage / and cursed in

Oedipus the King, a greek tragedy, is the story of a man's struggle against his fate.

Oedipus is a boy who was left on the mountains to die by his own parents, the King and Queen of Thebes, due to a tragic prophecy told by the Oracles of Delphi. The prophecy declares that the boy would be destined to murder his father, king Louis of Thebes and then incest with Louis’s wife, Jocasta, Oedipus mother. After being abandoned on the mountain by his wicked parents, a shepherd found this little child and takes him to the King and Queen. King Polybus and Queen Merope of Corinth decided that since they don't have a child of their own, it would