Katie McAlister
Mrs. Cartier
Honors English II
10/25/12
Oedipus Rex
Sophocle’s classical Greek tragedy Oedipus Rex was written in 429 B.C. and performed
in the theater of Dionysus, which is a semicircle carved out of the stone hill with steep tiered
seating surrounding a circular elevated stage, where the actors and chorus would perform. The
actors used masks that expressed sex and emotions, and they also doubled as megaphones so
their voices could be heard in the audience. In Oedipus Rex a man’s quest for finding his true
identity is expressed through the attempt to find the murderer of King Laius and bring him to
justice, to end the plague that had overtaken Thebes. Oedipus grew up in Corinth as the son of
King Polybus. When it was prophesied that he would eventually kill his father and marry his
mother, he fled from Corinth and became the King of Thebes in the place of the recently
deceased Laius, and took his wife as his own. As the story progresses he finds that his true father
was Laius, whom he had killed in his departure from Corinth, and that the wife of Laius whom
he had taken as his own was his mother. Tormented by this fact he blinded himself, and as a man
of his word was exiled. This models the classical Greek tragedy as defined by Aristotle because
it uses a chorus, a central action, and a tragic hero with one human tragic flaw.
Oedipus Rex can be unified into one central action. This would be the Murder of King
Laius. The plague was brought on by the Gods after he was killed, and would only be lifted when
this killer was brought to justice. Creon relays the message from the Oracle to Oedipus, which
starts the hunt for King Laius’ murderer. “By exile or death, blood for blood. It was murder that
brought the plague wind on the city”(Pro.104-105). Oedipus then promised that he would find
the murderer and bring to him justice very harshly, and end the plague because of this.
Another reason Oedipus Rex is an example of a Greek tragedy, is because the hero shifts
from a state of ignorance, to that of knowledge. Oedipus realizes he may be at fault for King
Laius’ death, and he says to Jocasta in confidence, “I think that I myself may be accursed by my
own edict”(2.700). Before this point in the play he did not even consider himself as a possibility
of being the murderer, and discredited anyone who said he might have been, such as Teiresias.
Even when he considers the fact that he may have killed Laius, he does not realize that he had
fulfilled the very prophecy he had sought to avoid until scene four when he talks to the
messenger and shepherd and finds who his true family was.
Oedipus is a perfect model of a tragic hero. A tragic hero is a person of high stature, like
Oedipus being a king. A tragic hero also has a tragic flaw. In Oedipus’ case, the tragic flaw he
possesses is not always considered a flaw, but in his case his determination led him to his
downfall. This is because the murderer he was so determined to find turned out to be him. When
he heard this news he blinded himself, and was to be exiled. In doing this he accepted his fate
and was humbled by his experience. Determined to do justice he went to Choragos to accept his
punishment and carry it out saying, “Do not counsel me anymore. This punishment I have laid
upon myself is just”(Exo.1315-1316). This shows what a good man he was, determined to
always do the right thing no matter the punishment on himself.
I think that Oedipus Rex is an excellent example of the classical Greek tragedy. This was
shown through the play’s structure itself, the prologue, parados, scenes, odes, and exodos, as
well as the main central action, and a tragic hero, with a tragic flaw that leads to his downfall.