oedipus the king

This week we are reading oedipus the king and I think that this story is much easier to read than Beowulf. The words used in Oedipus the king are more modern words and are easy to understand. The story begins by stating that there is a plague in the city of Thebes and the citizens are dying because of the plague and they are asking their king, Oedipus,  for help. Oedipus is married to Jocasta, the queen of Thebes and Creon is Jocasta's brother. Oedipus sends a messenger to the oracle for advice on how to rid the city of Thebes of the plague. The oracle tells the messenger that the killer of Laius is the one responsible for the plague and that he is living in Thebes and until the murderer leaves, the plague will persist. Oedipus hears the message and threatens and promises that he will find the killer of Laius and will punish him to the full extent even if the murderer is living in his own house. Laius was the king of Thebes before Oedipus became king and he was murdered by a group of robbers, but they never searched for the killer until now. I think that it is good to point out that when Oedipus says that he will punish whoever the killer of Laius is even if he is family he is actually foretelling the future without knowing it because he is Laius killer. Oedipus calls Tiresias, a blind prophet to assure what the oracle had told him. Oedipus threatens Tiresias into telling him who the murderer is even though Tiresias doesn't want to tell him because he says that you rather not know what I know. Oedipus insists and Tiresias tells him that Oedipus is the murderer. Oedipus immediately suspects that Creon, his brother in law, and Tiresias were trying to overthrow him and he says that he will kill Creon for betraying the king. Creon denies Oedipus' accusation and says that there is no reason that he would like to be king because he would have to work and have responsibilities if he was king and he didn't want that. Oedipus insists in killing Creon, but Jocasta tries to calm Oedipus down. Oedipus then gets news that his father, the king of Corinth had died. Oedipus fled from Corinth because he had heard about a prophecy that he was going to kill his father and sleep with his mother. Later in the story, Oedipus calls in a man that was with Laius at the time of his death and he confirmed that Oedipus was the killer and that Oedipus' real father was Laius. They explain that Laius heard about the prophecy of Oedipus when he was born so they sent him to die at a deserted area. So Oedipus' real parents are Jocasta and Laius.

I now believe that back then people really believed in fate because in both stories, Oedipus the king and Beowulf, the main characters believed in fate. Oedipus tried to fight fate, but no matter what he did he still fulfilled his prophecy and slept with his mother and killed his father. I am confused on what is a sphinx, the story talks about Oedipus being the only one to be able to solve the riddle of the sphinx and thus relieve Thebes from a plague. was the sphinx a god? did it cast a spell on the city? was it normal back then to be solving riddles?


Word count: 581