Antigone

Theban King Oedipus has no brothers with whom to fight. He's the only, abandoned child of King Laius and Queen Jocasta of Thebes. He becomes the only, adoptive son of and heir apparent to King Polybus and Queen Merope of Corinth.

Instead, it's Oedipus' twin sons who fight each other. Eteocles and Polyneices inherit the throne with their mother's suicide and their father's exile. They agree to a joint power sharing arrangement whereby they alternate years of rule. But at the end of the year, Eteocles refuses to give the throne up to Polyneices. He even goes so far as to exile him from Thebes.

Answer #1 by Ginezumi Both Antigone and Creon were tragic figures. Antigone was tragic, because she died for having tried to respect the unchangeable, unchanging laws by which the gods expected Thebans to lead their lives and prepare for their deaths. Creon was tragic, because he lost everything that made his life worth living. For example, his son and his wife each committed suicide rather than continue living with him and under his laws. Answer #2 by Lexi3333 You can interpret it either way, but it seems more likely that Creon is the tragic hero. According to Aristotle, there are several requirements for a character to be a tragic hero, including:

-Hamartia, or flaw/mistake;

-Peripeteia, or reversal of fortunes;

-Catharsis, or release of emotion;

-Anagnorisis, or sudden realization of truth.

Creon goes through all these stages:

-His character flaw/mistake is his pride and stubborness.

-His fortunes are reversed after everyone starts to turn against him, and even his son and wife kill themselves.

-After learning of his son's and wife's deaths he goes through catharsis, and releases his feelings of grief.

-He realizes at the end of the play that he was wrong.

Antigone also has some of these characteristics. Her mistake is that she is too stubborn, and she goes through an outburst of fear and self-pity after she is condemned to death. It is debatable whether or not her fortunes are reversed, because she does not go from a high status to a low status as does Creon; her condition is miserable from the beginning of the play. Also, she does not undergo any fundamental realizations of the truth, and her beliefs remain consistent throughout the play.

The arrogance that leads to ineffective decision making is Oedipus' tragic flaw in Oedipus Rex by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, arrogance describes an individual who has an exaggerated sense of self and is proud. Oedipus exhibits arrogance when he leaves home, listens to the Delphic oracle, and runs away without consulting with his presumed parents. He expresses arrogance when he kills a hot-tempered senior citizen whom he resembles despite a prophesied fate of killing his father. He manifests arrogance when he neglects to carry out mandatory cleansing rituals for his crimes. He shows arrogance when he marries a beautiful older woman despite a prophesied fate of marrying his mother.

That the brooches hold Theban Queen Jocasta's dress in place is the significance of Theban King Oedipus blinding himself with them.

With vision, he knows of a rumor that he is not the biological son of those he considers his parents, King Polybus and Queen Merope of Corinth. With vision, he learns of his fate to kill his own father and marry his own mother. Yet with that very same vision, he sees and does not process that his wife's dress covers the body of a woman who is old enough to be his mother. It is only too late that he realizes he should have left the dress in place and pinned, physically and symbolically.

Their failure to identify and punish the murderers of Theban King Laius is why Theban King Oedipus berates the Theban people. A killing is an offense to the victim, the perpetrator, and the environment in which the perpetrator moves. It's an especially heinous crime if the killing is of a king.

It's necessary for the perpetrator of a crime to be found and for the cleansing procedures of purification ceremonies to be carried out. Thebans disrespected their king and their gods by failing to carry out the necessary manhunt and the required rituals. It never is good to break both divine and human laws. And yet that's what the Thebans are doing. Such disobedience and such disrespect bring on a pestilence that ruins harvests, lowers the human population, and afflicts the livestock.

On the slopes of Kithairon, a mountain range in central Greece, the three-day-old Oedipus is supposed to die.

Specifically, Oedipus' parents, King Laius and Queen Jocasta of Thebes, decide that their only child must be left on the mountainside to die from exposure to wildlife and the weather. Their motivation is preventing their child from growing up to kill his father and his sovereign. That is the prophecy that the parents are given about any son that they may have. It is far less serious in ancient Greece to kill an infant or child than to kill a parent who also happens to be one's sovereign.

But just as neither Laius nor Jocasta can bring themselves to do the deed with their own hands, neither can the faithful shepherd whom Jocasta chooses to carry out the dreadful act.

The setting of 'Oedipus Rex' is significant as the hometown and the crime scene of Theban King Oedipus. It also is significant as the location in which fateinexorably is carried out. And it therefore is significant too as a literary example of dramatic irony within a tragedy.

Oedipus doesn't know that Thebes is his birthplace. He is removed from his home when he's only three days old. The reason is a prophecy that his father, Theban King Laius, will be killed by his own son. His biological parents therefore intend for him to die instead. But through the help of two shepherds, Oedipus ultimately ends up in Corinth as the adoptive/foster son of King Polybus and Queen Merope.

As an adult, Oedipus hears a rumor that he isn't the biological son of his parents. He visits the Delphic Oracle for a second opinion. Instead, he receives the shocking news that he's fated to kill his own father and marry his own mother.

So Oedipus decides to flee from the Oracle and from Corinth. But the road meets two others, one of which leads ultimately to Thebes. At that crossroads, he is pulled into a street brawl by a churlish, surly stranger. Oedipus unknowingly kills in self defense his own father. Still ignorant of his true identity, he goes on to Thebes, which he saves from a murderous, tax crazy Sphinx. In gratitude, Thebans give him a job and a family by way of the vacant throne and the grieving widow that Laius leaves behind. The grieving widow is Theban Queen Jocasta, who is Oedipus' real mother.

Oedipus and Oedipus' parents think that a fate can be avoided. But their actions bring them to the very scene of their fates. Thebes indeed is the scene of all of the fated and committed crimes: the attempted murder of a child, the subsequent murder nearby of a king and a father, and the marriage of a mother to her own son. And so the play becomes the perfect, chilling example of the literary theme of fate, the literary technique of dramatic irony, and the literary form of the tragedy.