SOPHOCLES,
ca. 496-406 BCE (Socrates executed 399 BCE)
Aeschylus
– heroic period of Persian defeat on Greek soil
Sophocles – younger contemporary lived to see Athens advanced in power and prosperity
Prominent
in city affairs (served w/ greatest ruler Pericles) Died 2 yrs before surrender
to Sparta
Career as brilliant dramatist began 468 – 1st
prize at Dionysia
(vs
Aeschylus) à
wrote 120 plays
Did
not act much, came up w/ idea of 3rd actor
(vs
traditional 2 who change masks to repr others)
Sophocles
used 3rd actor to create complex triangular scenes like dialogue btw
Oedipus and Corinthian mess
(reveals
to listening Jocasta the ghastly truth)
Written in and for Athens – during intellectual
revolution
OEDIPUS
THE KING
– tragedy
Man of
high principles & probing intelligence follows prompting to final
consequence of true self-knowledge
-- putting
out eyes (full of significance)
STORY
well known to audience
(legend
handed down from parent to child over generations)
Implicit
wealth of meaning, learned in childhood, rooted in deep conscns of all members
of community
MYTH – authority of history (of ages), religious authority: concerned w/ relation betw humanity and gods
Power
b/c of subject matter (arouse irrational hopes and fears that lie deep and
secret in human cnsns)
Oedipus
= mysterious figure of past who broke most fund human taboo; but char like
typical 5th c Athenian
All virtues and vices typical (e.g. ATHENIAN devotion to city, conscientious and patriotic ruler)
Sudden unreasoning rage (also typical fault); confidence in human intelligence (esp his own)
Moves
though cycle of critical, rationalist movement of century to piety &
orthodoxy
Opening
scene taunts at oracles à
despairing courage to accept consequences
Knowledge
= ignorance; Clear vision = blindness
Determined
probing à
putting out his own eyes
ARISTOTLE – writes of tragic hero (Poetics): pity and terror are aroused most effectively by spectacle of man
who
is “not pre-eminent in virtue and justice, and yet on the other hand does not
fall into misfortune through vice or depravity, but falls because of some
mistake, one among the number of the highly renowned and prosperous, such as
Oedipus”
OEDIPUS FRAILTIES: anger, impiety, self-confidence; all aspects of his character lead to fall (good & bad) (see p. 390)
QUESTIONS
of FATE vs Human Action
Does
Apollo predict or determine?
FATE
fulfilled, but we feel he suffers more than he deserves in end
Example
of INADEQUACY of human intellect
Warning
of power(s) in universe humanity can’t control
Or
even fully understand
Oedipus
the man has our sympathy
(See
rest of trilogy esp Oedipus at Colonus)
Foreshadowed
in Oedipus
the King