Summary
Sophocles' 'Oedipus Tyrannous' Summary
Key quotes from the entire play, colour-coded by theme, with context notes and critic's quotes at the end
[Show more]
Connected book
Book Title:
Author(s):
- Edition:
- ISBN:
- Edition:
Seller
Follow
Content preview
Key Oedipus QuotesBy theme
Piety and Impiety
‘My altar, praying before me’- hubristic undertones, especially paired with later statements
‘Apollo save us, stop the plague’ - priest
Chorus call upon Zeus, Apollo, Artemis and Dionysus in the Paradois (first choral song)
‘You pray to the gods? Let me grant you your prayers’ - biggest statement of impiety, likens
himself to a god, hubris
‘Master of all mysteries’ and later ‘my lord’ - Oedipus initially respects Tiresias
‘You scum of the earth’
‘Not your prophets trade’ - prophet in it for the profit aha
‘Seer blind in his craft’
‘Scheming quack’
‘Pious fraud’
‘Your gods - nothing’- second biggest hubristic moment
‘I stopped the Sphinx, with no help from the birds’ - Oedipus claims to have stopped the
sphinx alone wen he actually had the help of the gods
‘So much for prophecy!’ - Jocasta says this in an attempt to calm Oedipus
‘Destiny guide me always’ - chorus, submitting to fate
‘If you didn’t look so senile, the lash would teach you what scheming means!’ - the ‘being an
old man saves you’ thing
Blindness
‘Blind to misery’
‘We’ll soon see’
‘Blind to the corruption of your life, darkness shrouding your eyes that now can see the light’
‘I see it all, I see the light’
Oedipus repeats the word blind four times in his stabbing speech, visual potentially him
stabbing each time he says this ?
Incest and the killing of Laius
‘Lauis meet his bloody death’ - his death is caused by ‘his own blood’
‘Posses his bed, wife who shares our seed’
‘Why our seed might be the same, children born of the same mother’
‘I will fight for him as if he were my father’
‘Unaware of the one you live with, you are the curse the corruption of this land’ - Tiresias
reveals the truth to Oedipus
‘Blind to the corruption of your life’
‘Lusty voyage home to the fatal harbor’
‘He sowed the loins his father sowed, he spilled his fathers blood’
‘But here is his queen, his wife and mother
The benefits of buying summaries with Stuvia:
Guaranteed quality through customer reviews
Stuvia customers have reviewed more than 700,000 summaries. This how you know that you are buying the best documents.
Quick and easy check-out
You can quickly pay through credit card for the summaries. There is no membership needed.
Focus on what matters
Your fellow students write the study notes themselves, which is why the documents are always reliable and up-to-date. This ensures you quickly get to the core!
Frequently asked questions
What do I get when I buy this document?
You get a PDF, available immediately after your purchase. The purchased document is accessible anytime, anywhere and indefinitely through your profile.
Satisfaction guarantee: how does it work?
Our satisfaction guarantee ensures that you always find a study document that suits you well. You fill out a form, and our customer service team takes care of the rest.
Who am I buying these notes from?
Stuvia is a marketplace, so you are not buying this document from us, but from seller vavinki. Stuvia facilitates payment to the seller.
Will I be stuck with a subscription?
No, you only buy these notes for £5.49. You're not tied to anything after your purchase.
Can Stuvia be trusted?
4.6 stars on Google & Trustpilot (+1000 reviews)
52510 documents were sold in the last 30 days
Founded in 2010, the go-to place to buy revision notes and other study material for 14 years now