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Oedipus Trilogy

Sophocles




  OEDIPUS TRILOGY

  OEDIPUS THE KING, OEDIPUS AT COLONUS & ANTIGONE

  * * *

  SOPHOCLES

  Translated by

  F. STORR

  *

  Oedipus Trilogy

  Oedipus the King, Oedipus at Colonus & Antigone

  From a 1912 edition

  ISBN 978-1-62011-710-1

  Duke Classics

  © 2012 Duke Classics and its licensors. All rights reserved.

  While every effort has been used to ensure the accuracy and reliability of the information contained in this edition, Duke Classics does not assume liability or responsibility for any errors or omissions in this book. Duke Classics does not accept responsibility for loss suffered as a result of reliance upon the accuracy or currency of information contained in this book.

  Contents

  *

  Oedipus the King

  Oedipus at Colonus

  Antigone

  Endnotes

  *

  Translation by F. Storr, BA

  Formerly Scholar of Trinity College, Cambridge

  From the Loeb Library Edition

  Originally published by

  Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA

  and

  William Heinemann Ltd, London

  First published in 1912

  Oedipus the King

  *

  ARGUMENT

  To Laius, King of Thebes, an oracle foretold that the child born to him by his queen Jocasta would slay his father and wed his mother. So when in time a son was born the infant's feet were riveted together and he was left to die on Mount Cithaeron. But a shepherd found the babe and tended him, and delivered him to another shepherd who took him to his master, the King of Corinth. Polybus being childless adopted the boy, who grew up believing that he was indeed the King's son. Afterwards doubting his parentage he inquired of the Delphic god and heard himself the word declared before to Laius. Wherefore he fled from what he deemed his father's house and in his flight he encountered and unwillingly slew his father Laius. Arriving at Thebes he answered the riddle of the Sphinx and the grateful Thebans made their deliverer king. So he reigned in the room of Laius, and espoused the widowed queen. Children were born to them and Thebes prospered under his rule, but again a grievous plague fell upon the city. Again the oracle was consulted and it bade them purge themselves of blood-guiltiness. Oedipus denounces the crime of which he is unaware, and undertakes to track out the criminal. Step by step it is brought home to him that he is the man. The closing scene reveals Jocasta slain by her own hand and Oedipus blinded by his own act and praying for death or exile.

  DRAMATIS PERSONAE

  Oedipus.

  The Priest of Zeus.

  Creon.

  Chorus of Theban Elders.

  Teiresias.

  Jocasta.

  Messenger.

  Herd of Laius.

  Second Messenger.

  Scene: Thebes. Before the Palace of Oedipus.

  OEDIPUS THE KING

  Suppliants of all ages are seated round the altar at the palace doors, at their head a PRIEST OF ZEUS. To them enter OEDIPUS.

  OEDIPUS

  My children, latest born to Cadmus old,

  Why sit ye here as suppliants, in your hands

  Branches of olive filleted with wool?

  What means this reek of incense everywhere,

  And everywhere laments and litanies?

  Children, it were not meet that I should learn

  From others, and am hither come, myself,

  I Oedipus, your world-renowned king.

  Ho! aged sire, whose venerable locks

  Proclaim thee spokesman of this company,

  Explain your mood and purport. Is it dread

  Of ill that moves you or a boon ye crave?

  My zeal in your behalf ye cannot doubt;

  Ruthless indeed were I and obdurate

  If such petitioners as you I spurned.

  PRIEST

  Yea, Oedipus, my sovereign lord and king,

  Thou seest how both extremes of age besiege

  Thy palace altars—fledglings hardly winged,

  and greybeards bowed with years; priests, as am I

  of Zeus, and these the flower of our youth.

  Meanwhile, the common folk, with wreathed boughs

  Crowd our two market-places, or before

  Both shrines of Pallas congregate, or where

  Ismenus gives his oracles by fire.

  For, as thou seest thyself, our ship of State,

  Sore buffeted, can no more lift her head,

  Foundered beneath a weltering surge of blood.

  A blight is on our harvest in the ear,

  A blight upon the grazing flocks and herds,

  A blight on wives in travail; and withal

  Armed with his blazing torch the God of Plague

  Hath swooped upon our city emptying

  The house of Cadmus, and the murky realm

  Of Pluto is full fed with groans and tears.

  Therefore, O King, here at thy hearth we sit,

  I and these children; not as deeming thee

  A new divinity, but the first of men;

  First in the common accidents of life,

  And first in visitations of the Gods.

  Art thou not he who coming to the town

  of Cadmus freed us from the tax we paid

  To the fell songstress? Nor hadst thou received

  Prompting from us or been by others schooled;

  No, by a god inspired (so all men deem,

  And testify) didst thou renew our life.

  And now, O Oedipus, our peerless king,

  All we thy votaries beseech thee, find

  Some succor, whether by a voice from heaven

  Whispered, or haply known by human wit.

  Tried counselors, methinks, are aptest found [1]

  To furnish for the future pregnant rede.

  Upraise, O chief of men, upraise our State!

  Look to thy laurels! for thy zeal of yore

  Our country's savior thou art justly hailed:

  O never may we thus record thy reign:—

  "He raised us up only to cast us down."

  Uplift us, build our city on a rock.

  Thy happy star ascendant brought us luck,

  O let it not decline! If thou wouldst rule

  This land, as now thou reignest, better sure

  To rule a peopled than a desert realm.

  Nor battlements nor galleys aught avail,

  If men to man and guards to guard them tail.

  OEDIPUS

  Ah! my poor children, known, ah, known too well,

  The quest that brings you hither and your need.

  Ye sicken all, well wot I, yet my pain,

  How great soever yours, outtops it all.

  Your sorrow touches each man severally,

  Him and none other, but I grieve at once

  Both for the general and myself and you.

  Therefore ye rouse no sluggard from day-dreams.

  Many, my children, are the tears I've wept,

  And threaded many a maze of weary thought.

  Thus pondering one clue of hope I caught,

  And tracked it up; I have sent Menoeceus' son,

  Creon, my consort's brother, to inquire

  Of Pythian Phoebus at his Delphic shrine,

  How I might save the State by act or word.

  And now I reckon up the tale of days

  Since he set forth, and marvel how he fares.

  'Tis strange, this endless tarrying, passing strange.

  But when he comes, then I were base indeed,

  If I perform not all the god declares.

  PR
IEST

  Thy words are well timed; even as thou speakest

  That shouting tells me Creon is at hand.

  OEDIPUS

  O King Apollo! may his joyous looks

  Be presage of the joyous news he brings!

  PRIEST

  As I surmise, 'tis welcome; else his head

  Had scarce been crowned with berry-laden bays.

  OEDIPUS

  We soon shall know; he's now in earshot range.

  (Enter CREON)

  My royal cousin, say, Menoeceus' child,

  What message hast thou brought us from the god?

  CREON

  Good news, for e'en intolerable ills,

  Finding right issue, tend to naught but good.

  OEDIPUS

  How runs the oracle? thus far thy words

  Give me no ground for confidence or fear.

  CREON

  If thou wouldst hear my message publicly,

  I'll tell thee straight, or with thee pass within.

  OEDIPUS

  Speak before all; the burden that I bear

  Is more for these my subjects than myself.

  CREON

  Let me report then all the god declared.

  King Phoebus bids us straitly extirpate

  A fell pollution that infests the land,

  And no more harbor an inveterate sore.

  OEDIPUS

  What expiation means he? What's amiss?

  CREON

  Banishment, or the shedding blood for blood.

  This stain of blood makes shipwreck of our state.

  OEDIPUS

  Whom can he mean, the miscreant thus denounced?

  CREON

  Before thou didst assume the helm of State,

  The sovereign of this land was Laius.

  OEDIPUS

  I heard as much, but never saw the man.

  CREON

  He fell; and now the god's command is plain:

  Punish his takers-off, whoe'er they be.

  OEDIPUS

  Where are they? Where in the wide world to find

  The far, faint traces of a bygone crime?

  CREON

  In this land, said the god; "who seeks shall find;

  Who sits with folded hands or sleeps is blind."

  OEDIPUS

  Was he within his palace, or afield,

  Or traveling, when Laius met his fate?

  CREON

  Abroad; he started, so he told us, bound

  For Delphi, but he never thence returned.

  OEDIPUS

  Came there no news, no fellow-traveler

  To give some clue that might be followed up?

  CREON

  But one escape, who flying for dear life,

  Could tell of all he saw but one thing sure.

  OEDIPUS

  And what was that? One clue might lead us far,

  With but a spark of hope to guide our quest.

  CREON

  Robbers, he told us, not one bandit but

  A troop of knaves, attacked and murdered him.

  OEDIPUS

  Did any bandit dare so bold a stroke,

  Unless indeed he were suborned from Thebes?

  CREON

  So 'twas surmised, but none was found to avenge

  His murder mid the trouble that ensued.

  OEDIPUS

  What trouble can have hindered a full quest,

  When royalty had fallen thus miserably?

  CREON

  The riddling Sphinx compelled us to let slide

  The dim past and attend to instant needs.

  OEDIPUS

  Well, I will start afresh and once again

  Make dark things clear. Right worthy the concern

  Of Phoebus, worthy thine too, for the dead;

  I also, as is meet, will lend my aid

  To avenge this wrong to Thebes and to the god.

  Not for some far-off kinsman, but myself,

  Shall I expel this poison in the blood;

  For whoso slew that king might have a mind

  To strike me too with his assassin hand.

  Therefore in righting him I serve myself.

  Up, children, haste ye, quit these altar stairs,

  Take hence your suppliant wands, go summon hither

  The Theban commons. With the god's good help

  Success is sure; 'tis ruin if we fail.

  (Exeunt OEDIPUS and CREON)

  PRIEST

  Come, children, let us hence; these gracious words

  Forestall the very purpose of our suit.

  And may the god who sent this oracle

  Save us withal and rid us of this pest.

  (Exeunt PRIEST and SUPPLIANTS)

  CHORUS

  (Str. 1)

  Sweet-voiced daughter of Zeus from thy gold-paved Pythian shrine

  Wafted to Thebes divine,

  What dost thou bring me? My soul is racked and shivers with fear.

  (Healer of Delos, hear!)

  Hast thou some pain unknown before,

  Or with the circling years renewest a penance of yore?

  Offspring of golden Hope, thou voice immortal, O tell me.

  (Ant. 1)

  First on Athene I call; O Zeus-born goddess, defend!

  Goddess and sister, befriend,

  Artemis, Lady of Thebes, high-throned in the midst of our mart!

  Lord of the death-winged dart!

  Your threefold aid I crave

  From death and ruin our city to save.

  If in the days of old when we nigh had perished, ye drave

  From our land the fiery plague, be near us now and defend us!

  (Str. 2)

  Ah me, what countless woes are mine!

  All our host is in decline;

  Weaponless my spirit lies.

  Earth her gracious fruits denies;

  Women wail in barren throes;

  Life on life downstriken goes,

  Swifter than the wind bird's flight,

  Swifter than the Fire-God's might,

  To the westering shores of Night.

  (Ant. 2)

  Wasted thus by death on death

  All our city perisheth.

  Corpses spread infection round;

  None to tend or mourn is found.

  Wailing on the altar stair

  Wives and grandams rend the air—

  Long-drawn moans and piercing cries

  Blent with prayers and litanies.

  Golden child of Zeus, O hear

  Let thine angel face appear!

  (Str. 3)

  And grant that Ares whose hot breath I feel,

  Though without targe or steel

  He stalks, whose voice is as the battle shout,

  May turn in sudden rout,

  To the unharbored Thracian waters sped,

  Or Amphitrite's bed.

  For what night leaves undone,

  Smit by the morrow's sun

  Perisheth. Father Zeus, whose hand

  Doth wield the lightning brand,

  Slay him beneath thy levin bold, we pray,

  Slay him, O slay!

  (Ant. 3)

  O that thine arrows too, Lycean King,

  From that taut bow's gold string,

  Might fly abroad, the champions of our rights;

  Yea, and the flashing lights

  Of Artemis, wherewith the huntress sweeps

  Across the Lycian steeps.

  Thee too I call with golden-snooded hair,

  Whose name our land doth bear,

  Bacchus to whom thy Maenads Evoe shout;

  Come with thy bright torch, rout,

  Blithe god whom we adore,

  The god whom gods abhor.

  (Enter OEDIPUS.)

  OEDIPUS

  Ye pray; 'tis well, but would ye hear my words

  And heed them and apply the remedy,

  Ye might perchance find comfort and relief.

  Mind you, I
speak as one who comes a stranger

  To this report, no less than to the crime;

  For how unaided could I track it far

  Without a clue? Which lacking (for too late

  Was I enrolled a citizen of Thebes)

  This proclamation I address to all:—

  Thebans, if any knows the man by whom

  Laius, son of Labdacus, was slain,

  I summon him to make clean shrift to me.

  And if he shrinks, let him reflect that thus

  Confessing he shall 'scape the capital charge;

  For the worst penalty that shall befall him

  Is banishment—unscathed he shall depart.

  But if an alien from a foreign land

  Be known to any as the murderer,

  Let him who knows speak out, and he shall have

  Due recompense from me and thanks to boot.

  But if ye still keep silence, if through fear

  For self or friends ye disregard my hest,

  Hear what I then resolve; I lay my ban

  On the assassin whosoe'er he be.

  Let no man in this land, whereof I hold

  The sovereign rule, harbor or speak to him;

  Give him no part in prayer or sacrifice

  Or lustral rites, but hound him from your homes.

  For this is our defilement, so the god

  Hath lately shown to me by oracles.

  Thus as their champion I maintain the cause

  Both of the god and of the murdered King.

  And on the murderer this curse I lay

  (On him and all the partners in his guilt):—

  Wretch, may he pine in utter wretchedness!

  And for myself, if with my privity

  He gain admittance to my hearth, I pray

  The curse I laid on others fall on me.

  See that ye give effect to all my hest,

  For my sake and the god's and for our land,

  A desert blasted by the wrath of heaven.

  For, let alone the god's express command,

  It were a scandal ye should leave unpurged

  The murder of a great man and your king,

  Nor track it home. And now that I am lord,

  Successor to his throne, his bed, his wife,

  (And had he not been frustrate in the hope

  Of issue, common children of one womb

  Had forced a closer bond twixt him and me,

  But Fate swooped down upon him), therefore I

  His blood-avenger will maintain his cause

  As though he were my sire, and leave no stone

  Unturned to track the assassin or avenge

  The son of Labdacus, of Polydore,

  Of Cadmus, and Agenor first of the race.