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OEDIPUS TYRANNUS
(SOPHOCLES)
,.
“Chapter Nine”
by Friedrich Nietzsche,
in The Birth of Tragedy (1872)
Introduction
In this short excerpt from his infl uential study of tragedy,
German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche contemplates the
many roles Oedipus fulfi lls in Sophocles’ The Theban Plays.
Oedipus blindly transgresses the most powerful familial
taboos—patricide and incest—and this blindness becomes his
punishment. But, as Nietzsche observes, Oedipus is a truth
seeker, an Apollonian fi gure who redeems his society. Thus
the taboo and Oedipus’ desire for knowledge constitute,
for Nietzsche, a single act against nature, an “extraordinary
counter-naturalness.” “Broken by prophetic and magical
powers,” the “spell of nature” is broken by Oedipus, and audiences
are made to “glance at the abyss.”
f
Whatever rises to the surface in the dialogue of the Apollonian part
of Greek tragedy, appears simple, transparent, beautiful. In this sense
Nietzsche, Friedrich. “Chapter Nine.” The Complete Works of Friedrich Nietzsche, Vol.
1: The Birth of Tragedy, or, Hellenism and Pessimism. 1872. Ed. Oscar Levy. Trans.
William August Hausmann. London: George Allen & Unwin, 1923. 72–75.
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