Literature

In the play Oedipus the King, Sophocles creates tragedy in the realization of the Oracles prophesies on the death of Laius and the origins of Sophocles, as well as the eventual  deterioration of Oedipuss power in the city of Thebes. Having arrived in the city, years before as the city still reeled from the sudden death of their beloved king, Oedipus defeats the Sphinx and her riddles. Neither knowing of his origins in Thebes or that the man Oedipus had murdered unwittingly on his road to the city was in fact their lost king. In his ascension and eventual fall from power, the tragedy of Oedipus is his destiny. Foretold as the downfall of the kingdom of Thebes, the burden of his rise and fall is a comdenation visited upon the whole of Thebes.  The complexity of the plot, with the fateful crossing of lineages and events, is the foundation for the tragedy which effects Oedipus and his family. Adding to this designation are the mechanics of the individual characters whose individual actions create a reversal of fortune, as well as the hamartia of Oedipuss pride, and spectacle of the chorus who provide insight into the broad effects of the actions of the play. Each of these components adds to the designation of Sophocles play as an Aristotelian tragedy. The cause and effect of the plot of the play, where the tragedies unfold as endings to events long forgotten, as well as the forthright characters and action show the livingbreathing nature of the tragedy of Oedipus.

When the play begins Oedipus is already king of Thebes. Having arrived a lone traveler many years prior and proven his merit in defeating the sphinx, Oedipuss ascension to the throne does not appear to be so much a matter of fate as skill. Without a king and with no way to defeat the sphinx, the people of Thebes are desperate for a  savior. The appearance of Oedipus seems an answer to their prayers. At this point in the plot, Sophocles lays the necessary groundwork for the later unraveling of this same kingdom, in developing the seemingly unrelated events which have shaped Thebes present history. When Oedipus weds Jocasta, the widowed queen, he fully assumes the role which fate has bestowed upon him because though fate was always suspected in his sudden appearance n their midst, the reversal of fortune that befalls Thebes is not the fate of the people but instead that of their king.

Further building the plot toward the eventual moment of catharsis, when all will be revealed as connected and foreseen by fate, Sophocles, through the character of Jocasta tells the story of Laius and Jocastas first born. The aversion to narrative, whereby the story of the prophesy and doom of Thebes comes to light through the recognition of individual characters and the use of the chorus, is another component which closely resembles Aristotelian tragedy. As the story is told by Jocasta, many years prior, when Laius and Jocasta were young rulers, the Oracle prophesied that Laius would eventually die at the hands of his own son. Jocastas fate was no better, finding herself doomed by the Oracle to an incestuous relationship with her then infant son. Fearful of the eventual realization of this prophesy, Jocasta takes her infant son to the wilderness and leaves him to die, his feet bound, while she returns to her husband not knowing that her actions have set in motion the fate which she fears the most..

When Laius dies, attacked by who Jocasta believes were highwaymen and not Oedipus, she does not see the wheels of fate turning against her but instead falls into the conforting arms of this new savior. The arrival and subsequent rule of Oedipus seems a God send but when we come into the play at the beginning of Sophocles tale, the city is suffering under a new threat, a plague which has brought about the need for a solution.  A good and kind ruler, Oedipus suffers the tragic flaw of pride and an inability to see past his own reality. When he asks Creon to visit the Oracle to find a solution to the current plague that grips the city, the ominous  reply,  to sever the body politic a monstrous growth that battens there. Stop feeding that which festers  (26), teamed with Oedipuss pride and belief in his ability to conquer any foe propel the actions of the plot to their eventual climax. The Oracles instructions to find the murderer of Laius reveal a divine knowledge of what the people of Thebes will soon come to realize as truth. Had the people of Thebes inquired more on the death of their king and the origins of Oedipus, all could have been avoided and the confrontation of fact would have carried less consequence.

Though fate has quietly kept to the background, as the plot progresses we can see that each circumstance is a reaction to another. Realizing he must find Laius murderer to save his city, Oedipus turns to Tiresias, the old seer. Tiresias, who understanding the full implications of the tragedy of Oedipus reign and existence, tries to shield the king from the truth. When angered by Oedipus he reveals enough to begin the unraveling of suspicion and the final climax. Refusing to understand the world in terms other than his own, Oedipus cannot see the truth in Tiresiass angry reaction which comes closest in the beginning to revealing the truth,  Im not the one who casts for your fall Apollo is enough. Its in his able hands  (39).

In his arrogance and pride, Oedipus at first judges Tiresiass words as a plot against himself, orchestrated by his brother-in-law and close friend Creon. Misguided though this assertion proves to be, this misjudgment prompts Oedipus to contemplate his own origin. As Jocasta unwittingly reveals Oedipuss guilt in the murder of Laius, the full story of Oedipuss origins and his destiny begin to unfold. Telling Oedipus the story of her abandoned child, Jocasta naively states,  So there Apollo fails to make the son ... All foreseen by fate and seers, of course, and all to be forgotten  (51). Her complete acceptance of this notion explains why, when confronted with her role in the tragedy and fulfillment of prophecy, Jocasta catharsis takes the form of suicide. Oedipus fairs the worst in many respects, unlike Jocasta he cannot bring himself to end the abomination of his life. Instead, Oedipuss fate is to live, exiled through his own choice from his children and the city he had come to love.

Viewed as the most perfect example of Aristotelian tragedy, Oedipuss as both Jocasta and Laius ill-fated son, left in the wilderness but found by a kindly couple who raised him as their own, shows perfectly the base construction of the destiny which unfolds around him. True to Aristotelian form, there is no one instance of revelation, but instead a slow unfolding of circumstance and realization as the story slowly comes together. There is a unity of action, as described by Aristotle, where the journey for the truth does in fact reveal a truth no one can accept. Oedipus is both the central character of the play and the cause of the tragedy itself, providing at once both the important notion of cause and effect at the heart of Aristotles theory and also the tragically flawed hero. The ensuing actions that take place, from the plague which has engulfed Thebes to the hunt for Laiuss murderer, the realization of the fulfillment of that early prophecy, and finally the death of Jocasta and the willing exile of the King radiate from the character of Oedipus,  My birth all sprung revealed from those it never should myself entwined with those I never could and I the killer of those I never would  (70).