An Excerpt from Classic Monologue Oedipus the King

This Greek tragedy by Sophocles is based on the ancient legend of a fallen hero.  The story has several interchangeable names including  Oedipus  Tyrannus, Oedipus Rex, or the classic,  Oedipus the King.  First performed around 429 BC, the plot unfolds as a murder mystery and political thriller that refuses to reveal the truth until the end of the play. The Mythic Tragedy Although it was crafted thousands of years ago, the story of Oedipus Rex still shocks and fascinates readers and audience members alike. In the story, Oedipus rules over the kingdom of Thebes, yet all is not well. Throughout the land, there is famine and plague, and the gods are angry. Oedipus vows to find out the source of the curse. Unfortunately, it turns out that he is the abomination. Oedipus is the son of King Laius and Queen Jocasta and unknowingly marries his mother, who he ends up having four children with. In the end, it turns out that Oedipus has also murdered his father. All of this, of course, was unbeknownst to him. When Oedipus discovers the truth of his actions, he is wrought with horror and self-loathing. In this monologue, he has blinded himself after witnessing his wife’s suicide. He now devotes himself to his own punishment and plans to walk the earth as an outcast until the end of his days. What Readers Can Take Away from Oedipus the King The significance of the story surrounds the character development around Oedipus as a tragic hero. The suffering he endures as he goes on his journey in search for the truth is different from his counterparts who have killed themselves, like Antigone and Othello.  The story can also be seen as a narrative around family ideals about a  son who is competing with his father for his mothers attention. The ideals set by Greek society are challenged by the Oedipus character. For example, his personality characteristics such as  stubbornness and anger are not that of the idealized Greek man.  Of course, the theme around fate is central as the gods have willed it toward Oedipus. It is only until he is king of the land that he learns about his dark past. Although he was a model king and citizen, his complexity allows him to be labeled as a tragic hero. An Excerpt of the Classic Monologue from Oedipus the King The following excerpt from Oedipus is reprinted from Greek Dramas. I care not for thy counsel or thy praise;For with what eyes could I have eer beheldMy honoured father in the shades below,Or my unhappy mother, both destroyedBy me? This punishment is worse than death,And so it should be. Sweet had been the sightOf my dear children--them I could have wishedTo gaze upon; but I must never seeOr them, or this fair city, or the palaceWhere I was born. Deprived of every blissBy my own lips, which doomed to banishmentThe murderer of Laius, and expelledThe impious wretch, by gods and men accursed:Could I behold them after this? Oh no!Would I could now with equal ease removeMy hearing too, be deaf as well as blind,And from another entrance shut out woe!To want our senses, in the hour of ill,Is comfort to the wretched. O Cithaeron!Why didst thou eer receive me, or received,Why not destroy, that men might never knowWho gave me birth? O Polybus! O Corinth!And thou, long time believed my fathers palace,Oh! what a foul disgrace to human natureDidst thou receive b eneath a princes form!Impious myself, and from an impious race.Where is my splendor now? O Daulian path!The shady forest, and the narrow passWhere three ways meet, who drank a fathers bloodShed by these hands, do you not still rememberThe horrid deed, and what, when here I came,Followed more dreadful? Fatal nuptials, youProduced me, you returned me to the wombThat bare me; thence relations horribleOf fathers, sons, and brothers came; of wives,Sisters, and mothers, sad alliance! allThat man holds impious and detestable.But what in act is vile the modest tongueShould never name. Bury me, hide me, friends,From every eye; destroy me, cast me forthTo the wide ocean--let me perish there:Do anything to shake off hated life.Seize me; approach, my friends--you need not fear,Polluted though I am, to touch me; noneShall suffer for my crimes but I alone. Source: Greek Dramas. Ed. Bernadotte Perrin. New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1904