Oedipus The King as Greek Tragedy
The genre of drama is wide and contains works of varied forms and subjects.
The first drama, on which all later works are based, developed in Greece and
dealt with religious and social issues. According to AristotleÕs The Poetics, a
Greek Tragedy must deal with a serious purpose, arousing a sense of pity or
fear in the audience. The emphasis must be on plot over character
development and the playwright must utilize suspense and unity of time, place
and action. Aristotle writes that a tragic hero is a character who is renowned
and prosperous, not necessarily perfect, but not an evil person either. The
tragic hero must meet with a reversal of fortune brought about by either folly
or fate. Based on these criteria, Oedipus the King by Sophocles is considered
the prototypical Greek Tragedy. Oedipus, the playÕs main character, is also
considered the model of a Greek tragic hero. Oedipus the King deals with
several serious purposes, the greatest of which being the agnosticism
Sophocles perceived in his community. Through Iokaste who ÒÉwould not
waste a second thoughtÉÓ on oracles, Sophocles shows his audience the
perils of disbelief in the gods, since each prophecy made by oracles in the
play ended up coming true (l. 813). Sophocles uses his play to perform
serious religious functions as well as to entertain theatre-goers. The fulfillment
of the predictions made by the oracles led to the downfall of Oedipus, which
created a catharsis in the audience, brought by arousing feelings of pity and
fear for the fallen king. The Choragos gives the lesson, ÒÉlet none presume
on his good fortune until he find life, at his death, a memory without painÓ (l.
1473-5). This scene allows the audience to leave the theater feeling purged of
their pity and fear. The plot is the most important component of Oedipus the
King, as it is of every Greek Tragedy. Development of characters is
secondary, and the audience rarely Ôgets insideÕ any of the characters. Only
characters crucial to the plot are introduced; there is no extraneous action on
stage. This development of plot is a challenge. A tragedian must present a
story with which the audience is already familiar and still make it interesting
“For a brief while your strength is in bloom/ but it fades quickly; and soon there will follow/ illness or the sword to lay you low… and death will arrive, dear warrior, to sweep you away”(1761-8). Hrothgar bestows his wisdom onto Beowulf after Beowulf has defeated Grendel and his mother. Hrothgar reminds him not to let pride overcome him for everything is eventually defeated due to the power of fate. This exemplifies a theme woven throughout the story of Beowulf. Beowulf is presented as a valiant hero, slaying beasts with his mighty strength and demonstrating the importance of the balance between wisdom and strength, but as the story unfolds Beowulf slowly loses his vitality until eventually he is defeated. This shows the power of fate has on everyone; no exceptions. This paper will demonstrate the heroic qualities of Beowulf and show his gradual decline through the approaches and outcomes of his three battles with the monsters.
Oedipus as the Hero Archetype. The character Oedipus in Sophocles' Oedipus the King follows a literary pattern known as the hero archetype. The hero archetype is a pattern involved in transformation and redemption. Manifested in three stages called the quest, the initiation, and the sacrifice, Oedipus is transformed from the redeemer of the city to the cause of its downfall.
Lying is simply an act of not telling the truth, and this definition of lying will be used in future sections of this paper. There are three groups of lies t...
Shniderman, Nancy, and Sue Hurwitz. Drugs and Birth Defects. New York: Rosen Pub. Group, 1993. Print.
One reason why lying is sometimes acceptable is because it can protect others. Article 1, “It’s the Truth: Americans Conflicted About Lying,” explains how your fictional spouse asks if they look fat and you say they look fabulous because anything else would be cruel. This is considered as a white lie which is told to protect someone’s feelings. Article 3 gives an example of a more severe lie told to protect someone’s life. An excerpt from, “Brad Blanton: Honestly, Tell The Truth,” states, “We shouldn’t manipulate the truth except for rare times-if you’re hiding Anne Frank in your attic because her life is in danger.” In this case, lying was the only way to protect someone’s life. Either way, the lie protected someone more than doing any harm, therefore making it Ok.
The two writers in tragedy showed what many writers couldn’t throughout the Greek tragedian era. Sophocles, who wrote “Oedipus Rex”, portrayed Jocasta as a caring mother who soon turned into a wife of her own son, while Shakespeare, who wrote “Hamlet”, used the same Greek tragedian tools and portrayed Gertrude as a naïve mother who made one decision that separated her son, Hamlet, from her. Gertrude was similar to Jocasta in that both were naïve but protective of their own sons. However Jocasta was more aware of the actions she took, even after the prophecy was told.
For example, if you want to eat fast food but your parents don’t let you, you can tell them you're going to your friends house, but really you are going to eat fast food. That is not that bad of a lie. But lying to hurt someone's feelings is worst. We should also speak most likely the truth because you are not lying, and the people can change up. It matters because you don’t want someone to get hurt and harm themselves. If you hurt someone’s feelings badly, there's a chance that they will choose to go away or keep living there life. So, lie less and speak the truth more. I want to leave you guys thinking about that to lies less and to speak the truth more. Lie less because speaking the truth is the better option to make. Also, think about the person that you are lying to because if you told them a secret, they will choose to do the things you did to them. Lying to protect a loved one is very acceptable because you are saving someone’s life if they are in danger of doing something. Those are reasons when to lie ( in certain situations) and when not to lie ( in certain situations). Lying is sometimes acceptable when making others think positive about themselves, protecting people, and/or causing to harm
A little white lie can turn out to be a massive big lie. In the book of,” The Pretty Little Liars”, after the girl’s secrets have been revealed and the town knew their lies that the girls had told, people around town started adding more and more to their lies. Yes, its true people tend to add more on to people lies it might be for a bad cause but rarely for a good cause. Once the lie has been spread out in full depth with details that are too good to be true there’s no way going back because that’s what the lie leads people to believe, imagine when you tell the truth, great disappointment. So, imagine a friend of yours said that he read an article online of the new upcoming iPhone but it hasn’t been described how it’s going to look yet. So you decide to tell another friend about it and then you add to it and explain how it’s going to have its own stand case and a light up logo, you just started a lie. So now your friend believes the iPhone is going to have what you described, now your friend believes that, now one of his friends comes along and he describes the same thing you said and then adds more details to the phone, the cycle of lies goes on and on. Then it’s time the brand new IPhone comes out and all your friends are confused and disappointed because the iPhone didn’t come out as
According to Aristotle's theory of tragedy and his definition of the central character, Oedipus the hero of Sophocles is considered a classical model of the tragic hero. The tragic hero of a tragedy is essential element to arouse pity and fear of the audience to achieve the emotional purgation or catharathis. Therefore, this character must have some features or characteristics this state of purgation. In fact, Oedipus as a character has all the features of the tragic hero as demanded by Aristotle.
In the play Oedipus the King, by Sophocles, two themes appear; one that humans have little control of their lives because fate always catches up with them and the theme that when someone makes a mistake, they will have to pay for it.
According to Aristotle, a tragedy must be an imitation of life in the form of a serious story that is complete in itself among many other things. Oedipus is often portrayed as the perfect example of what a tragedy should be in terms of Aristotle’s Poetics. Reason being that Oedipus seems to include correctly all of the concepts that Aristotle describes as inherent to dramatic tragedy. These elements include: the importance of plot, reversal and recognition, unity of time, the cathartic purging and evocation of pity and fear, the presence of a fatal flaw in the “hero”, and the use of law of probability.
Oedipus the King is an excellent example of Aristotle's theory of tragedy. The play has the perfect Aristotelian tragic plot consisting of paripeteia, anagnorisis and catastrophe; it has the perfect tragic character that suffers from happiness to misery due to hamartia (tragic flaw) and the play evokes pity and fear that produces the tragic effect, catharsis (a purging of emotion).
Evil is illustrated in the form of figures and their actions. “It is the duality which poses the moral problem, and requires the struggle to solve it.” Evil is portrayed by jealousy, sibling’s rivalry, hatred, the power of the witch, the cunning queen or the beast. For a story to hold the child’s attention, it must entertain him and arouse his curiosity, For example, in Snow White, the queen has to wear hot shoes and dance till she drops dead. Djuna Barnes perceptive statement about fairy tales that the child knows something which he cannot tell, such as the idea that the child is looking forward to see the result of the punishment which satisfies him or in little red riding hood, the idea of the wolf and the girl being in bed together stimulate his imagination, helping him to develop his intellect and clarify his emotions. The evildoer is always punished for his crime and in all fairytales the “bad person” always loses out. This suggests that the hero is most attractive to the child because of the struggles he has to face, rather than good wining over evil. The child recognises the hero and believes that he also suffers with the hero in his trials and tribulations, and triumphs with him as virtue is victorious. On the contrary, fairytales can be seen as misleading for a child, for example, not all figures in fairytales are ambivalent, as we all are in reality. A child believes either you
A white lie is something everyone has done. Its when you use a small lie to protect someone from being hurt by the truth. I remember one time when my friend showed me are really ugly jacket. He said he got one and it costed like $100. When he showed it to me I didn’t want to tell him it was ugly because he would not agree with my opinion and he might even get mad at me for saying that. I just told him the jacket was nice and avoided talk about the jacket. This use of a lie protected the friendship because if I had told him it was ugly he could have gotten offended because he clearly liked
Mastering the art of lying has been a continuous development for humanity. Over the centuries, lying has become a necessity in today’s modern world. The Merriam Webster dictionary defines a lie as “to make an untrue statement with intent to deceive.” Even though lying is condemned, lying is something everyone falls victim to. For many people, lying is a widespread habit that saves both time and pain. Whether lying is necessary to escape consequences or implying a false statement to deceive or persuade, lying has become a complex form of art. If mastered carefully, it can be useful when dealing with this crazy beautiful thing we call life. Using a lie incorrectly can result in the consequences of having a negative effect on lives. Lying is found in many forms and variations depending on the situation it is used in. Lies are obstacles that make one unable to communicate with people.