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Oedipus realizes with horror that the Oracle's prophecy has been fulfilled and that Jocasta and Laius were his birth parents. The old servant who brought Oedipus to the desert is called for and admits to him the truth. Jocasta commits suicide by hanging and Oedipus blinds himself.
Oedipus (UK: / ˈ iː d ɪ p ə s /, also US: / ˈ ɛ d ə-/; Ancient Greek: Οἰδίπους "swollen foot") was a mythical Greek king of Thebes.A tragic hero in Greek mythology, Oedipus fulfilled a prophecy that he would end up killing his father and marrying his mother, thereby bringing disaster to his city and family.
Prior to the start of Oedipus Rex, Oedipus has become the king of Thebes while unwittingly fulfilling a prophecy that he would kill his father, Laius (the previous king), and marry his mother, Jocasta (whom Oedipus took as his queen after solving the riddle of the Sphinx). The action of Sophocles's play concerns Oedipus's search for the ...
As yet, it would not have been revealed that Oedipus was the biological son of Laius, and hence the fragment describing the blinding refers to Oedipus as the son of Polybus. [3] [5] The blind Oedipus has a scene with Jocasta and possibly Periboea in which the fact that his biological parents are Laius and Jocasta is revealed. [3]
The play opens with a summary of the story of Oedipus and its aftermath told by Jocasta, who in this version has not committed suicide.She explains that after her husband blinded himself upon discovering that he was her son, his sons Eteocles and Polynices locked him away in hopes that the people might forget what had happened.
Jocasta is the widow of the former king Laius, wife of Oedipus and sister of Creon. Creon is Jocasta's brother, and the chief aid to Oedipus in Thebes. Tiresias is a blind prophet who is charged by Oedipus to find the killer of King Laius. Manto is the daughter of Tiresias. She is used in the play to describe Tiresias' sacrifice to him, and ...
The Creon of Oedipus Rex is in some ways different and in some ways similar to the Creon of Antigone. In Oedipus Rex, he appears to favor the will of the gods above decrees of state. Even when Oedipus says that, once dethroned, he must be exiled, Creon waits for the approval of the gods to carry out the order once he has been crowned king.
The "bombastic violence of Oedipus", as Kinsley puts it, was a "scandalous success, with the Bettertons playing Oedipus and Jocasta." [9] This play was Admirably well Acted; especially the Parts of Oedipus and Jocasta: One by Mr Betterton, the other by Mrs Betterton; it took prodigiously being Acted 10 Days together. [3]