Fate and Freewill in Oedipus the King

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In the play Oedipus Rex, it shows many different forms of fate and freewill. Fate is a word that can be defined in many different ways. Fate can affect a person's life in many different ways. Oedipus's fate ruined his life and lead him to a horrible death. Antigone's life was also thrown out to the hand of fate. Neither one of them had any freewill in there lifetime, all of there lives were based upon the fate that the gods handed to them. Both of these elements, fate and freewill, play a large role in the telling of the story of Oedipus Rex. Was his life really left to fate or was it left up to him? In most tragic plays fate and freewill play a large role in the rise and fall of the protagonist. The protagonist in a play has to either cause the fault by his own freewill or by fate causing it. Without this there would be no fall of the protagonist in a tragic play. Ignorance of a protagonist can lead to a fall do to a mistake done by there own free will. Fate can cause the fall of a protagonist without there consent or there control. The fate of a protagonist leads to a much more horrible conclusion then the mistake of a tragic protagonist do to there own freewill. Oedipus was born with a horrible prophecy told to his parents which led his parents to believe that Oedipus would kill his father and marry his mother. They soon had Oedipus taken up to a mountain, to leave him there to die. A shepherd saved his life and raised him, Oedipus soon went back to Thebes were he was born. Oedipus believed that he was traveling away from his home town, he soon found himself at a road where three corners met. There he murdered his father without knowing it was his father. He soon then traveled to Thebes and then he... ... middle of paper ... ...that what they just did was suppose to happen and that they did not cause it by three own free will. Fate and freewill are mysterious of life that may never be solved. The conventions fate and freewill will always be needed to complete a tragic story, along with being needed for a tragic people will always have these conventions controlling there lives. These are very important aspects to ancient Greek Tragedies. Without these conventions in Greek Tragedies there would be no suspense or action to build up to the climax. These same reasons apply to fate and freewill in life, without these to aspects to bring people challenges and obstacles what would be the reason for living life. Due to all of this that is the reason why for many years to come people will always wonder wither they control there lives or if they are just living a already told story.

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