Sophocles' Trilogy
Chronological Order of Composition:
ANTIGONE c. 442 BCE
OEDIPUS REX c. 427 BCE
OEDIPUS AT COLONUS performed in c. 402 BCE, after Sophocles' death in 406 BCE
OEDIPUS REX
“You have your eyesight, and you do not see how miserable you are.” - Teiresias
Study Guide
Synopsis
To Laius, King of Thebes, an oracle foretold that his child would kill him and wed his wife Jocasta. So when in time a son was born, Laius ordered his man to leave the infant, feet pinched together, to die on Mount Cithaeron. But a shepherd found the baby, tended him, and delivered him to another shepherd who took him to his master, Polytbus, the King of Corinth. The childless Polybus adopted the boy Oedipus, who grew up as the Prince of Corinth and, later, also learned his horrifying fate. Thinking Polybus as his father, Oedipus fled from Corinth, encountered Lauis on his way, and unwittingly killed his father in their conflict.
Arriving at Thebes, Oedipus answered the riddle of the Sphinx and was made king by the grateful Thebans. He married the widowed queen Jocasta and had four children. Thebes prospered under his rule, but a plague fell upon the city.
Oedipus sends Jocasta’s brother Creon to consult the oracle, which demands Thebes purge its blood crime. Oedipus undertakes to track down the criminal and seeks help from the blind prophet Teiresias. Step by step, despite his denial, the truths of his birth and crime become clear to him and Jocasta. In desperation, Jocasta commits suicide. After making Creon king and asking him to guard his children, Oedipus blinds himself and goes into exile away from Thebes.
ANTIGONE
“It's clear enough the spirit in this girl is passionate—her father was the same. She has no sense of compromise in times of trouble.” - Chorus
“A man who thinks that only he is wise, that he can speak and think like no one else, when such men are exposed, then all can see their emptiness inside.” - Haemon
Study Guide
Synopsis
Polyneices and Etocles killed each other in battle, fighting over Theban thrown. Creon, the present ruler of Thebes, decreed that the traitor Polyneices remain unburied. But Antigone resolves to bury her brother despite her sister Ismene’s opposition. She was caught in the act by Creon's watchmen and brought before the king.
Antigone justifies her action, asserting that it was the eternal laws of right and wrong that she obeyed rather than any human ordinance. The enraged Creon condemns her to be immured in a cave. Ismene, in attempt to save her sister, declares herself as an accomplice, but Antigone refutes Ismene’s account as Creon threatens to kill them both.
Prince Haemon, Creon’s son and Antigone’s fiancé, pleads in vain for her life and threatens to die with her. Creon condemns both of them in his tantrum; however, warned by the blind prophet Teiresias, Creon repents and hurries to release Antigone. But he is too late: Antigone has hanged herself in the cave, and Haemon has killed himself right beside her. Returning to the palace, he learns that his queen Eurydice, on learning of Haemon's death, has also stabbed herself to the heart. Creon laments his decisions, and the Chorus warns against pride and arrogance.
OEDIPUS AT COLONUS
Oedipus has come to Colonus on his endless journey in exile.
Because of his polluted being, he is an eternal outcast. Even here where he believes the gods have destined his final resting place, he is in apparent danger of expulsion. He becomes the suppliant of Theseus, king of Athens. He promises that if this sacred spot will be his resting place, he will protect the city after his death. Theseus agrees. And the king's protection is needed.
Oedipus is sought successively by Creon, the current ruler of Thebes, and by his son Polyneices. Both are aware of the power that Oedipus can wield after his death, but both intend to use Oedipus for their own political ends. Creon's violent tactics are thwarted. Polyneices is rejected out of hand.
Finally, in an extraordinary piece of theatre, the polluted body of Oedipus is received by the gods and becomes divine. The pain and suffering of his life is given a powerful vindication. In his death he becomes a force of good, even of holiness, the antithesis of a life steeped in murder and incest.
-Nick Rudall, "Introduction" of his translation of Oedipus at Colonus
Study Guide
“[There is] something lifting up, lifting up to great and easy grandeur of cadence...
“A swell; the phrases or sentences or forms gradually letting out and opening to a great roll and then folding softly back.”
– Robert Fitzgerald, 1939
"Sophocles’ style is smooth, translated into a sparse, plain, but pure and felicitous prose."
- Penelope Laurens, 1989
Extended Family Tree: the House of Cadmus
Courtesy from OEDIPUS REX at Court (2019)
This diagram traces the divine lineage of Theban kings. It ties Sophocles’s trilogy to other Greek tragedies and the immense cosmo of Greek mythology. Notice that Oedipus, in his blood, is not merely a mortal (although it didn’t exempt him from his excessive pride or horrifying fate). Can we detect a trace of divinity from the dignity and rage he preserves while in exile? The curses and blessings he confers on his enemies and benefactors? And finally, his miraculous descend into the underworld/ascension into heaven?
“Oedipus’ blinding does not undo him or destroy him; rather, it transforms him, integrating that which is bestial [and] that which is divine.”
This article tells Prince Cadmus’ journey from his home, the island of Phoenicia, to Thebes. Cadmus founded the city of Thebes five generations before Oedipus.