Thomas Pynchon’s The Crying of Lot 49, has characters such as Oedipa Maas, whose world is limited to the authors text. The reader is drawn into the story and also affected by the world created by the author. Both the reader and the characters have the same problems observing the chaos around them. The whole story is a fairy tale. Even while reading the story, you wonder why it is written in such a fashion. When you realize it was written in the l960's, you can basically see where the author is coming from. However, poor Oedipa gets a pretty hard deal throughout the tale. Why her problems seemed to be unclear is finally answered, but it takes a bit of figuring out. Odepia is considered the protagonist. After her ex-boyfriend, Pierce, leaves a complex estate to her, she begins to discover a harmful scheme taking place in Southern California. Like the reader, she is forced to involve herself in the discovery of clues. Pynchon asserts that the measure of the world is its entropy. He extends this metaphor to his fictional world. He keeps the reader involved by attempting to lead the reader down several of these paths in order to make this point. As a reader, we look for symbols to help find solutions to these questions. More than anything else, The Crying of Lot 49 appears to be about cultural chaos and miscommunication as seen through the eyes of a young woman who eventually finds herself hallucinating while watching the world coming down around her.
Somewhere along the way, as the story becomes even more convoluted, Oedipa becomes more confused, and so does the reader. Just what is the purpose of all these odd characters and the story plot? Does it even make sense? Oedipa says, “There was the true continuity, San Narciso ...
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...was to far fetched, none of the characters would be considered good citizens. The author did keep the reader interested and involved in these characters, even though they were out of the ordinary. At times the plot was very confusing. Oedipa’s problems were unanswerable and unsolvable. She was a character the reader felt sympathy for. The way the author wove the story together, we could not have anticipated the ending. Not all stories end with an open ending as this one did. Although I was frustrated with the ending, it was a new way to look at a piece of fiction. Was the author’s intent to torture the reader as he tortured Oedipa? Perhaps the author’s intention was to encourage a more meaningful dialogue from the readers.
Work Cited
Pynchon, Thomas. The Crying of Lot 49. New York:Harper Perennial Modern Classics (April 1,
1999). 152 pages. Print
As Homer makes it apparent, there are other underlying themes embedded in the story that would just confuse the reader if they were not there. An example of this is the emotional aspects of both characters. If one does not understand this key element, their is no way that the sequence of events would cohere. "Why didn't Telemachos look for his father earlier? Why did Penelope wait twenty years to consider remarrying? How did this affect Odysseus in his journey?".
Oedipus can be argued to be a sympathetic ruler of his people, "my heart must bear the strain of sorrow for all." (4). He shows a strong desire to rid the land of its despair. Yet as the reader captures a more in-depth glimpse into Oedipus' soul, we find him to be a jealous, stubborn, "blind", guilty, and sinful man. Oedipus' character outwardly seems to want nothing more than to find the guilty persons involved in the murder of Laius, yet when given obvious clues he turns a blind eye, not wanting to know the truth behind the prophecy.
Oedipus thinks his human powers can match anything put in front of him. He forces other characters to tell him things, which again creates his tragic ending. (O790) Oedipus by not knowing his identity seems to create his own tragedy. Throughout the entire play, he is blind to everything people are telling him. (O320) He continues to badger Teiresias to answer things that Oedipus does not believe is true. If he only stopped, asking questions his fate might have been different. (O385) Because of these answers, he begins to suspect that people are plotting against him. He feels that he is above such lowly deeds. His own conceit and blind confidence in himself helps him continue towards a tragic ending. (O452-460) While Teiresias was predicting the future of Oedipus, he should have been smart enough to listen. He should have started to change his ways before he ended up destroying himself. Oedipus' guilt was beginning to play tricks on his mind. At the beginning of the play, Oedipus was on the top of the mortal world. Now he is finding out the truth about his past and his world starts to crumble around him.
Oedipus becomes a more admirable character by the end of the play then during the prologue of the play. This is because his history is reveled and his fate seems to be less of his fault and more of something that was doomed to happen to him, also by his drive to help the city of Thebes shows that he cares for the city and his ability to accept his fate but to try and help others from suffering.
In my opinion, Oedipus does not deserve what he got and is a victim of fate. This is because all his actions were unintentional. However, some of his actions were ignorant. Right from the beginning we see how Oedipus was envisioned to kill his father and marry his mother, thus his feet being pinned together and him being left on a cliff to die. Fortunate for him and unfortunate at the same time, a shepherd found him and later, the childless king and queen of Corinth, Polybus and Merope adopted him.
Both men had tragic outcomes; however, Oedipus' ending was by far the most heartrending. The tragedy of him being a "son, And a husband, to the woman who bore him; father-killer, And father-s...
I came across this play several times from my freshman and senior year of high school and now my second year of college. I enjoyed the fact that Oedipus represents the average man, one who is trying to change his own fate; but the part I enjoyed the most from reading this piece from every session was the slow and gradual build-up to the truth, and the steady downfall of Oedipus 's psychological state to the point where he wants punishment for the atrocious actions he had committed. For example, I found myself cringing, but at the same time, amazed, when visually imagining the scene where he gouges his eyes out. Even though most people would show a bit of empathy for Oedipus, I felt no remorse for him. In my opinion, he deserved whatever punishment that was dealt to him since he committed two of the greatest taboos: murder and incest. One thing that I did not enjoyed about this piece is the style of classic English it was translated with because of the hassle of keeping track of what is going on in a specific scene. If there is a version with modern English, I think I would have enjoyed and understood the little details even more. Again, the important message of inescapable fate: the truth will always find a way to the surface no matter how hard you try to hide or deny it; the longer you run away from the truth, the more dire the consequence will be.
The play "Oedipus Rex" is a very full and lively one to say the least. Everything a reader could ask for is included in this play. There is excitement, suspense, happiness, sorrow, and much more. Truth is the main theme of the play. Oedipus cannot accept the truth as it comes to him or even where it comes from. He is blinded in his own life, trying to ignore the truth of his life. Oedipus will find out that truth is rock solid. The story is mainly about a young man named Oedipus who is trying to find out more knowledge than he can handle. The story starts off by telling us that Oedipus has seen his moira, his fate, and finds out that in the future he will end up killing his father and marrying his mother. Thinking that his mother and father were Polybos and Merope, the only parents he knew, he ran away from home and went far away so he could change his fate and not end up harming his family. Oedipus will later find out that he cannot change fate because he has no control over it, only the God's can control what happens. Oedipus is a very healthy person with a strong willed mind who will never give up until he gets what he wants. Unfortunately, in this story these will not be good trait to have.
The first criterion of a Greek tragedy is that the protagonist be a good person; doubly blessed with a good heart and noble intention. Sophocles reveals immediately at the start of the play that Oedipus is such a man. As is common in the Greek tragedy Oedipus is also an aristocrat. Born of the King and Queen of Thebes he is of true nobility. Oedipus on the other-hand believes his parents are the King and Queen of Corinth. Oedipus was abandoned as a baby and adopted by them. Because that information is known to the audience, and not to Oedipus prior to the start of the play, it is a perfect example of tragic irony because when he declares that he will find the murderer he is the man that he pursues. Here he is told by Tiresias,” I say you are the murderer you hunt” (1235). The theme of Oedipus the King is not clear-cut. The theme in this tragic play seems to be you can‘t escape your fate. Contentment leads to ignorance as Oedipus lends fate a hand in his bitter end. This trait is touched-on in these lines spoken by Creon. “Look at you, sullen in yielding, brutal in your rage- you’ll go too far. It’s perfect justice: natures like yours are hardest on themselves”(Sophocles 1242-1243). Oedipus is a true hero in the Greek tragedy. He has the fate of the community in his hands along with the noble character to take care of it himself. He announces his convictions to take this problem into his own hands and do whatever is necessary to lift the curse. Oedipus addresses the priests assembled before him, “ You can trust me; I am ready to help, I’ll do anything (Sophocles 1225). The city has this faith in him and the priest come to tell him so he will help them lift the curse. “Now we pray to you. You cannot equal the gods, your children know that...But we do rate you first of men,”(1226). He also appears to have Apollo’s ear, which makes him seem all-powerful to the audience; this is another standard of the classic Greek tragedy. Oedipus told his people, ”After painful search I found one cure: I acted at once.
The play's plot, in a nutshell, develops like this. After solving the riddle of the Sphynx, who had kept Thebes under a curse of some kind, Oedipus is invited to become king of the city. He marries Jocasta, the widow of the previous king, and they have two children. When the play begins, Thebes is again under some sort of curse, and Oedipus tries to find out its cause so that he can rescue the city. He is told that the cause of the curse is that the murderer of the previous king is still in the city and has gone unpunished. In the process of searching for the murderer, Oedipus discovers that it is he, himself, who is responsible and that he is actually the son of Jocasta and her previous husband. Horrified by his sins of incest and murder, Oedipus claws out his eyes. Jocasta commits suicide because she is so disgraced.
The play Oedipus the King by Sophocles has often been described as the story of a “tragic hero.” This story is indeed tragic; however, Oedipus is not the only character stricken by tragedy. Equally stricken may be the character of Jocasta. She, as well as Oedipus, suffers many tragedies throughout the story. Shifting the story to a different perspective quite possibly may increase how we view it. The point is not to denounce Oedipus’ role as a tragic hero, but to denounce his role as the only tragic character.
For Oedipus, prophecy is not the main source of his fall towards society; rather, his hubris blinds himself from recognizing his personal sin in the world, thus leading to his demise. Sophocles even skillfully uses a metaphor through the words “ as led by a guide” to further explain the “supernatural being” that ultimately decides the tragic fate of the family of Oedipus. In addition, through the death of Jocasta, the reader is immediately attuned of Oedipus’ raging moment of violence and will be petrified by the overwhelming power of the gods, thus realizing the importance of being cautious before making a final choice. Indeed, after an individual settles on a decision, the gods take control of the person’s fate, hurling numerous consequences to him if he makes the wrong decision. Moreover, as Oedipus suddenly becomes the unintended victim of the gods through his sinful decision to execute Laius, he is forced to relinquish his predominate impetus for pridefulness in exchange for a heart of deep realization and forgiveness. At the end of the play, Oedipus sacrifices everything in order to remove his guilt through the consequences of his atrocious actions witnessed by the gods. After Oedipus realizes the astringent fate he was destined to encounter through his sinful murder of Laius, he immediately attempts to take responsibility for his
Aristotle says the plot must be composed of “clearly defined problems for characters to solve.” The main set of clearly defined problems laid out for the character Oedipus, is that he must find a way to avoid the prophecy. His actions afterwards then spur the plot which leads to other problems down the road. The plot is to be in chronological order and have actions that happen both on and off stage. Events that happen off stage are to be passed on by using narrative. In Oedipus, a messenger is used to recount the events that have happened off stage.
Oedipus obtains pity, respect, and support from the readers of the novel. He is brave and has a strong sense of moral
.... They fear the real identity of Oedipus and they do not want him to discover it. Moreover, the pity is associated with his downfall at the end. These emotional of pity and fear lead to the emotional purgation of the audience, which is the main aim of tragedy according to Aristotle. He is very appropriate to arouse such feelings because he has all the qualities of the tragic hero.