What Are The Similarities Between The Truman Show And Allegory Of The Cave

Often times in works of literature and film, the story begins with a character not knowing the true nature of their situation, which is later on revealed to them. This occurs in Oedipus Rex by Sophocles, The Truman Show by Peter Weir, and the “Allegory of the Cave” by Plato. Although Oedipus, Truman and the Prisoners all began in a very similar situation in which they are being lied to and only seeing the shadows, the outcomes of their respective situations after being exposed to the truth and light are vastly different. Whether it be self harm, going back to try and convince others, or even just simply walking out, they all took a different approach to the situation.

In all three works, the main characters are only looking at the shadows,

whether it be literal or metaphorical. These shadows are literal for the prisoners in Plato’s Allegory of the Cave. Everyday the prisoners are forced to watch the shadows on the wall created by the fire and the people walking on the bridge in between the fire and the wall. “They see only their own shadows, or the shadows of one another, which the fire throws on the opposite wall of the cave” (Plato). They never have actually seen another person or even heard an actual voice, which is why they believe that everyone looks like the shadows and everything sounds like the distorted noises they hear (bullheadent). Since they have no notion that maybe everything doesn’t look like a shadow, or that maybe everything doesn’t sound like a weird voice they never venture to ask any questions about their situation. They simply accept everything as the truth since they don’t realize that there is an actual world outside the cave with lots of color and joy. They are satisfied with their situation which will never lead them to change anything about their lives. While the prisoners were literally viewing the shadows, the other characters like Truman and Oedipus were only figuratively looking at them. In Truman’s case, the shadow represents his everyday life. Every day that he has lived through has been staged from beginning to end. Every person he has every encountered is a paid actor who is following a script. It was like this ever since he was a baby, and the show creator Christof intended for it to be like this until Truman died. They gave Truman a fake job, a fake house, and even a fake wife. If his situation were to be compared to the prisoners, the fire would be the show creators, the people on the bridge would be the actors and fake homes, and the shadows would be everything he has ever encountered. Lastly, Oedipus’ shadow came in a different form as well. Everything around him was real but rather he himself was the one trying to only look at the shadows. He believed that he could escape his fate and be better than the gods. “Horrified, to avoid this fate [of marrying his mother and killing his father], Oedipus leaves Corinth forever, heading towards Thebes.”(Pre-reading Notes) However, this hubris of believing he can defy the gods is what led to him killing his father and marrying his mother. In this scenario, the truth of his situation is the fire, and the gods are the people on the bridge who are creating the shadows. They are leading Oedipus to believe that he is leading a noble life when he actually is leading a treacherous one. While every character was in a very different situation, they all still were looking into the shadows which is why “the unexamined life is not worth living.” None of these characters have realized that the life they are living is a lie since they never venture to ask any questions about their situations. They rather are all content which will never lead to any new discoveries.
Since they all were looking at different kinds of shadows, it is natural that they were exposed to the light or real world in different ways as well.

For the prisoners, one was simply unchained and brought outside of the cave. “First he will see the shadows best, next the reflections of men and other objects in the water, and then the objects themselves; then he will gaze upon the light of the moon and the stars and the spangled heaven” (Plato). This was like a sensory overload for the prisoner who is only used to looking at black shadows and the bland color of the cave. For Truman, he wasn’t exposed to the truth all at once. Instead it came in a couple of steps as the show makers began to make more and more mistakes. Whether it be the radio switching to a channel that is described exactly where Truman was driving, Truman’s real love ‘Lauren’ telling him that everything is fake, or even when he saw his ‘dad’ and two people promptly came to take him away. He finally understood that everything around him was staged and that everything was centered around him. This final nail in the coffin was when he was driving far away from the town and encounters a cop who he has never seen before. The cop begins the conversation by saying “Hey Truman! …”(Weir) and this set off all the alarms in his head. He finally decided he had had enough and wanted to get out so he planned his escape and went through with it. Unlike in Truman’s or the prisoners case, Oedipus’ truth is much more dark and terrifying. This is why even when he was exposed to it by the Oracle, he kept on denying and asking for more and more evidence. It wasn’t until the shepard revealed to Oedipus that “They said it was Laios’ child; But it is your wife who can tell you about that” (Sophocles 1106) and “There had been prophecies… It was said that the boy would kill his own father” (Sophocles 1110 - 1112), that he began to accept his fate and realize the terrible situation he has put himself in. To make matters

worse, he had to do something about it since he was responsible for the plague that had come upon his people. This is how all three characters were exposed to the truth, whether it be joyful, sad or ugly.
The main difference between these characters is their reactions once they were exposed to the truth. In the prisoners scenario, the released prisoner was so overjoyed that he decided to run back and tell the others of what the real world was like. Except there was a problem with this. He only appeared like a shadow to the other prisoners and his voice was also distorted. To the prisoners, he was nothing more than another person walking over the bridge. No matter how hard he tried, none of the prisoners were able to identify him or hear what he was saying.(bullheadent) In Truman’s case, once he reaches the wall of the fake town after a hard fought battle with the storm, Christof begins to plead with him to stay in the town. Truman rejects any offers and simply says “Oh and in case I don't see ya! Good afternoon, good evening and good night” (Weir). He leaves on a high note, and doesn’t seem to be to annoyed that he was lied to his entire life. Oedipus’ reaction is completely opposite of this however. Once he finds out that he completed his fate by killing his father and marrying his mother, he runs to see his mom who had already hanged herself. At this point he “ripped from [the Queen’s] gown the golden brooches That were her ornament, and raised them, and plunged them down Straight into his own eyeballs, crying, ‘No more, No more shall you look on the misery about me, The horrors of my own doing!’” (Sophocles 1218-1223). He then pleads with the chorus to lead him out of the city and let him walk around aimlessly.
Although all three characters had similar journeys to enlightenment, how they reacted and dealt with being enlightened was very different since they all had to deal with very distinct truths. Being exposed to the truth can sometimes be a very difficult thing to deal with as seen by Oedipus’ actions. This is why I believe that in the prisoner’s and Truman’s situation, the unexamined life was definitely not worth living since there is so much more to do out in the real world. However in Oedipus’ case I do not believe this applies. He could have led a much better life were he not exposed to the truth of his situation. Now he has to deal with the constant grief of killing both his father as well as inadvertently killing his mother. To top it all of, he is blind and banished from his own kingdom as well.