Oedipus Rex

Thebes is dying of plague. A priest begs Oedipus, the king who once saved the city by answering the Sphinx, to save it again. Creon returns from the oracle at Delphi with the answer: the plague will lift when the murderer of the previous king, Laius, is driven out. Oedipus swears publicly to find him.

The chorus of Theban elders describes the plague in detail: the dead unburied, wives and mothers wailing at the altars. They pray to Apollo, Athena and Artemis. The suffering is made concrete before any of the detective work begins.

Oedipus curses the unknown killer, unknowingly cursing himself, and calls for the blind prophet Tiresias. Tiresias refuses to speak. Oedipus goads him with accusations of conspiracy until the old man says it outright: you are the pollution. Oedipus laughs it off as a plot by Creon.

The chorus is shaken. They cannot square the accusation with the king who saved them, and they decide to withhold judgement until there is proof. Their loyalty is reasonable, and it is about to become impossible.

Oedipus accuses Creon of treason and moves to have him killed. Jocasta stops the quarrel and tries to calm her husband by proving oracles are worthless: Laius was told he would die by his son's hand, and instead he was killed by robbers where three roads meet. Oedipus goes very quiet. He killed a man at a crossroads once.

The chorus prays for reverence and warns against the arrogance that breeds tyrants. They are frightened that if the oracles turn out to be false, religion itself collapses. It is a play in which being right about the gods is the worst possible outcome.

A messenger arrives with good news: Polybus of Corinth, the man Oedipus believes is his father, has died of old age. Oedipus is relieved, then says he still cannot go home because of the prophecy about his mother. To comfort him, the messenger explains he was never Polybus's son at all. He was handed over as an infant with his ankles pinned. Jocasta understands everything at that moment and begs Oedipus to stop.

The chorus, misreading the mood completely, sings a joyful song imagining Oedipus is the child of a god or a mountain nymph. It is the most cheerful passage in the play and it sits directly before the worst moment in it.

The old herdsman who was told to expose the baby is dragged in and refuses to speak until threatened with torture. He confirms it: the child came from Laius's house, Jocasta handed it over, and he could not kill it. Oedipus says he wishes never to look on the light again, and goes inside.

The chorus counts up what a human life is worth, using Oedipus as the example. He was the model of success and he is now the model of ruin, and nothing about him changed in between except what he knew.

A servant reports that Jocasta has hanged herself and that Oedipus, finding her, tore the golden brooches from her dress and drove them into his own eyes. He reappears blind and bleeding and asks to be exiled as he himself swore the killer should be. He says goodbye to his daughters. Creon takes charge, and the play ends with the warning to count no man happy until he has passed the last day of his life without pain.