Oedipus Rex

No, Aeschylus did not write a play called "Oedipus Rex."

Specifically, Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.) was an ancient Greek playwright and the play's author. Aeschylus (525/524 B.C.E. - 455/456 B.C.E.) also wrote about Thebes, but in terms of Theban King Oedipus' contentious children. His play, "Seven Against Thebes," covers what happens between the death of Oedipus in "Oedipus at Colonus" and the referenced deaths of his sons Eteocles and Polyneices in "Antigone."

Yes, Oedipus is a heroic character in "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, the hero does great deeds, holds great powers and is the main character. Oedipus does the great deed of defeating the Sphinx. He is the main character around whom actions center.

Jocasta is Oedipus' real mother in "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, Theban Queen Jocasta is King Oedipus' real biological mother. But she last sees him when he is three days old. She thinks that he is dead, and Oedipus believes his mother to be someone else.

It is because Thebes suffers from a pestilence that the priest comes to see Oedipus at the opening of "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, the term pestilence describes an epidemic, such as the plague. In Thebes, its effects extend to cattle, children and crops. It most likely results from human commission or omission found offensive by the gods, such as committing crimes and neglecting mandatory cleansing rituals.

Yes, Oedipus has children with his own mother in "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, Theban King Oedipus marries Jocasta, the beautiful, older widowed queen of King Laius. The happy royal couple has four children: the twin Princes Eteocles and Polyneices, and the Princesses Antigone and Ismene. But the revelation that Oedipus is both son and husband to Jocasta, his mother and wife, destroys the royal couple's years of domestic bliss.

Conflict, climax and resolution are the three parts into which "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.) loosely may be divided.

Specifically, the term conflict denotes the main problem of ending the pestilence by finding and punishing the guilty in King Laius' murderer. The term climax describes the turning point at which Theban King Oedipus heads a murder investigation that must consider him one of the prime suspects. The term resolution refers to the ending of the conflict by Oedipus acknowledging the truth of his prophesied fate, blinding himself and waiting final punishment.

The interaction between Oedipus and the priest is the initial incident in "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, the play begins with the priest of Zeus and suppliants gathered outside the main entrance of the Theban royal palace. They have altars set up in the clearing. Then Theban King Oedipus, ever attentive to his people's needs, leaves the palace and seeks to find out what needs to be done.

That they offend the gods and mortals through their opposition to their fates, their neglect of cleansing rituals regarding Laius' death and their incestuous marriage are reasons why Oedipus and Jocasta are punished in "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, Oedipus and Jocasta each receive prophecies of unenviable fates when they are young. Each one is arrogant and blasphemous in thinking that the gods can be outwitted, the Furies outrun, and fates changed. Also, even the mistaken killingof fathers and kings is an offense against both gods and mortals. It is so serious that cleansing rituals must be carried out and the guilty must be identified and punished. Neither is done following the mysterious murder of Theban King Laius, Jocasta's first husband.

Additionally, it is possible for gods to have incestuous relations, which is how Gaia starts up life on planet Earth. But it is blasphemous for mortals to engage in these relationships. The blasphemy holds even in the case of the albeit unknowingly mother-son involvement at the base of Oedipus' and Jocasta's marriage.

The comparison of children to birds is an example of a simile in "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, the term simile describes a comparison of two different people or things by way of the words "as," "like" or "than." The description fits the figurative language in the play's choral odes. For example, about halfway through the parados, the chorus likens new-born children dying to swooping birds.

Suicide is what happens to Theban Queen Jocasta in the play "Oedipus Rex."

Specifically, Jocasta realizes that she unknowingly took as her second husband subsequent Theban King Oedipus, her own son from her first marriage. The couple has had two girls and a set of twin boys. The massive though unintended incest is more than she can handle.

The sharing of information about offstage events is the role of the messenger in "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, the dramatic ideal in ancient Greece is solving a problem that presents itself in one place during one 24-hour time period. In this case, the play's action occurs outside the main entrance to the Theban royal palace on the last day of Theban King Oedipus' reign. The Corinthian and the Theban messenger bring the respective news of the offstage death of Corinthian King Polybus and of the offstage suicide of Theban Queen Jocasta. Both thereby act to keep the action in one place and additionally to prevent the portrayal of death and violence, acts not meant to be acted out in front of a live audience in ancient Greece.

It is her most trusted servant who tells Jocasta about Laius' murder in "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, Theban Queen Jocasta's most trusted servant is one of a five-member escort party accompanying her husband, King Laius, on his way to consulting the Delphic Oracle. The party gets into a fight over the right-of-way at the Delphi-Daulia intersection in the land of Phocis. Jocasta's servant flees as the lone survivor of the bloodbath that kills all but him and the perpetrator.

Teiresias is first to say that Oedipus is his father's killer in "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, Teiresias the blind prophet says that King Oedipus is the killer of the immediately preceding Theban sovereign, Laius. Oedipus cannot believe himself to be the killer of someone whom he never remembers meeting. In response to Oedipus' insults and threats, Teiresias finally says that Oedipus is the killer of his own father, the husband of his father's wife and the half-brother of his own children.

The interpreter of ritual sacrifices, the hermitresident of the hills outside Thebes, the blind prophet of Thebes and the advisor to Theban kings is who Teiresias is in "Oedipus Rex" and "Antigone" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, the gods take away Teiresias' sight either for revealing divine secrets to humans or for seeing Athena, goddess of wisdom, in her bath. Either way, in return and in compensation, Teiresias is a storehouse of knowledge regarding all things Theban, a seer of the future of Thebans and their city, and an advisor on present events.

Walking is the way in which Oedipus gets from Corinth to Thebes in "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, Oedipus takes the road from Corinth to Delphi, where he consults the oracle. He is upset over the Delphic oracle's prophecy and decides not to return to his presumed home in Corinth. He chooses to walk along the road from Delphi, into the land of Phocis and on to Thebes.

Sophocles (c. 496 B.C.E. - c. 406 B.C.E.) wrote the tragedies "Antigone" and "Oedipus Rex."

Specifically, the ancient Greek dramatist claimed as his hometown Colonus. Nowadays, Colonus is part of the Greek capital city of Athens. But back at the time of Sophocles', Colonus was known as the place where tragic Theban King Oedipus died and was buried.

That she is a child who suffers but who is not known to do great things is the reason why Antigone is not the tragic hero of the play "Oedipus Rex."

Specifically, a person who is tragic meets with a bad end. A person who is heroic is capable of doing great deeds. The job description matches Antigone's father, Theban King Oedipus, in the play "Oedipus Rex" and herself in the play "Antigone".

That the knowledge will be revealed soon enough and that the knowledge will be devastating are what Teiresias answers when Oedipus asks for his father's identity in "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, Teiresias the blind prophet makes the shocking charge that Theban King Oedipus is the killer of his royal predecessor, King Laius. Oedipus comes up with all sorts of insults and threats in return. Teiresias then announces that his prophecies were good enough for Oedipus' parents, which shocks Oedipus but gives him none but riddling answers.

That the gods must be obeyed but feared and that divine favor must be sought but dreaded are the ways in which cosmic irony is a part of "Oedipus Rex" by Sophocles (495 B.C.E. - 405 B.C.E.).

Specifically, irony refers to something happening other than what is intended or to something else being in effect other than what is assumed. The irony is cosmic when it refers to the universe, which is under divine control according to the ancient Greeks. These cosmically ironic experiences occur in "Oedipus Rex" when the gods must be courted with sacrificial offerings and respectful speech regarding the significant personal and professional events in mortal lives. But in return, the gods release unenviable propheciesand solutions that must be carried out to the last detail and whose thwarting carries a high price. Either way, the gods are supposed to be there to guide and yet that guidance is cosmically irionic in always involving the suffering of beloved and hated mortals.