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1 Sophocles' Oedipus Tyrannus Introduced and Translated by ...

1 Sophocles' Oedipus Tyrannus Introduced and Translated by ...

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means “sin,” but fifth-century Greeks did not have this concept. In <strong>Oedipus</strong> we might say<br />

it was his hasty anger that led him to make tragic mistakes.<br />

Mythologists see man’s fears <strong>and</strong> triumphs in it. Playwrights, <strong>and</strong> composers have<br />

written their versions of it: Jean Anouilh, Igor Stravinsky, Jean Cocteau, Heiner Müller<br />

<strong>and</strong> Athol Fugard. The greatest actors have wanted the role of <strong>Oedipus</strong> for themselves,<br />

like Lawrence Olivier <strong>and</strong> John Gielgud, <strong>and</strong> Orson Welles in the film Citizen Kane has<br />

often been compared to this great hero.<br />

One thing is constant in all the interpretations. <strong>Oedipus</strong> was a great man who<br />

struggled against the terrible things that happened to him <strong>and</strong> emerged victorious in his<br />

search for his own identity. He was a man who never gave up in spite of the odds against<br />

him <strong>and</strong> his terrible suffering.<br />

Greek tragedy tells us that suffering teaches, <strong>and</strong> sometimes this is the only way<br />

we can learn. Plato says the unexamined life is not worth living. The great playwright<br />

Sophocles is telling us that life is always worth living even in the worst case. The point is<br />

never to give up. This play celebrates endurance <strong>and</strong> the will to discover the truth. The<br />

struggle for knowledge, particularly the knowledge of what is good <strong>and</strong> what constitutes<br />

ethical action, makes life worth living. This is what constitutes human happiness, <strong>and</strong> we<br />

are warned at the end of the play not to say a person is happy, until we see how she or he<br />

dies. It is only then that one can see whether they lived a life of quality, <strong>and</strong> it is only this<br />

life that deserves to be called truly happy.<br />

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