Oedipus Character Analysis

Oedipus is motivated by his desire to know the full truth which unfortunately leads to him learning that his terrible fate has been fulfilled and he loses everything he holds dear. In the beginning of Oedipus Rex, the audience sees that Thebes is suffering a terrible plague. Oedipus, being crowned King after his defeat of the Sphinx, desires to save his city from the plague and restore it into a place of peace and stability. Creon tells Oedipus that the oracle said that Thebes is cursed because the murderer of Laos still lives in Thebes unpunished. Oedipus is determined to find the murder of Laos and He saved Thebes once from the Sphinx and he wants to be hero of Thebes again. He could go down in history as the great Oedipus who redeemed Thebes from a plague and saved the citizens from the Sphinx. At first he thinks of himself as almost equal to the gods in greatness. Jocasta tries to calm Oedipus down, telling him that her son was prophesized to kill her husband, but the child was killed so he could not. Oedipus, however, is still haunted by his fate. As a result, he seeks out the knowledge of the blind seer Teirisius and later the knowledge of the Shepherd. However, from the information from Teirisius and the Sheperd Oedipus finds that he could not outrun his fate. He had children with his mother and had murdered Laos. John Green says, "the irony is that the one who saved Thebes is the one destroying it." Oedipus goes from being a great hero and respected king to being disgraced and condemned. All his glory and honor turns into suffering and ruin. He feels "deserted by the gods" (Sophocles 71) and is weak. This is like how Caesar goes against the warnings of his own wife, the soothsayer, and Artemidoris in order to not look we...

... middle of paper ...

...his is similar to the Nurse in Romeo and Juliet. She knows that Romeo has killed Juliet's cousin Mercutio. Juliet begs Nurse to tell her and the Nurse knows that if she tells Juliet, Juliet will be heart-wrenched and will get super emotional about it but if she does not the Nurse will feel guilty and lose Juliet's trust. In the end, the Nurse tells Juliet and Juliet threatens to hang herself with a rope ladder. All of these characters reveal the truth which results in extreme action taken by the one who learns the truth.

Works Cited

Green, John, prod. Fate, Family, and Oedipus Rex: Crash Course Literature 202.
Ed. Stan Muller. YouTube. Thought Bubble, n.d. Web. 30 Mar. 2014.
.
Sophocles., et al. The Oedipus Cycle: An English Version. San Diego: Harcourt,
Brace, 1977. Print.