Oedipus Trilogy

by Sophocles

  My son, O king, my hateful son, whose words

  Of all men's most would jar upon my ears.

  THESEUS

  Thou sure mightest listen. If his suit offend,

  No need to grant it. Why so loth to hear him?

  OEDIPUS

  That voice, O king, grates on a father's ears;

  I have come to loathe it. Force me not to yield.

  THESEUS

  But he hath found asylum. O beware,

  And fail not in due reverence to the god.

  ANTIGONE

  O heed me, father, though I am young in years.

  Let the prince have his will and pay withal

  What in his eyes is service to the god;

  For our sake also let our brother come.

  If what he urges tend not to thy good

  He cannot surely wrest perforce thy will.

  To hear him then, what harm? By open words

  A scheme of villainy is soon bewrayed.

  Thou art his father, therefore canst not pay

  In kind a son's most impious outrages.

  O listen to him; other men like thee

  Have thankless children and are choleric,

  But yielding to persuasion's gentle spell

  They let their savage mood be exorcised.

  Look thou to the past, forget the present, think

  On all the woe thy sire and mother brought thee;

  Thence wilt thou draw this lesson without fail,

  Of evil passion evil is the end.

  Thou hast, alas, to prick thy memory,

  Stern monitors, these ever-sightless orbs.

  O yield to us; just suitors should not need

  To be importunate, nor he that takes

  A favor lack the grace to make return.

  OEDIPUS

  Grievous to me, my child, the boon ye win

  By pleading. Let it be then; have your way

  Only if come he must, I beg thee, friend,

  Let none have power to dispose of me.

  THESEUS

  No need, Sir, to appeal a second time.

  It likes me not to boast, but be assured

  Thy life is safe while any god saves mine.

  (Exit THESEUS)

  CHORUS

  (Str.)

  Who craves excess of days,

  Scorning the common span

  Of life, I judge that man

  A giddy wight who walks in folly's ways.

  For the long years heap up a grievous load,

  Scant pleasures, heavier pains,

  Till not one joy remains

  For him who lingers on life's weary road

  And come it slow or fast,

  One doom of fate

  Doth all await,

  For dance and marriage bell,

  The dirge and funeral knell.

  Death the deliverer freeth all at last.

  (Ant.)

  Not to be born at all

  Is best, far best that can befall,

  Next best, when born, with least delay

  To trace the backward way.

  For when youth passes with its giddy train,

  Troubles on troubles follow, toils on toils,

  Pain, pain for ever pain;

  And none escapes life's coils.

  Envy, sedition, strife,

  Carnage and war, make up the tale of life.

  Last comes the worst and most abhorred stage

  Of unregarded age,

  Joyless, companionless and slow,

  Of woes the crowning woe.

  (Epode)

  Such ills not I alone,

  He too our guest hath known,

  E'en as some headland on an iron-bound shore,

  Lashed by the wintry blasts and surge's roar,

  So is he buffeted on every side

  By drear misfortune's whelming tide,

  By every wind of heaven o'erborne

  Some from the sunset, some from orient morn,

  Some from the noonday glow.

  Some from Rhipean gloom of everlasting snow.

  ANTIGONE

  Father, methinks I see the stranger coming,

  Alone he comes and weeping plenteous tears.

  OEDIPUS

  Who may he be?

  ANTIGONE

  The same that we surmised.

  From the outset—Polyneices. He is here.

  (Enter POLYNEICES)

  POLYNEICES

  Ah me, my sisters, shall I first lament

  My own afflictions, or my aged sire's,

  Whom here I find a castaway, with you,

  In a strange land, an ancient beggar clad

  In antic tatters, marring all his frame,

  While o'er the sightless orbs his unkept locks

  Float in the breeze; and, as it were to match,

  He bears a wallet against hunger's pinch.

  All this too late I learn, wretch that I am,

  Alas! I own it, and am proved most vile

  In my neglect of thee: I scorn myself.

  But as almighty Zeus in all he doth

  Hath Mercy for co-partner of this throne,

  Let Mercy, father, also sit enthroned

  In thy heart likewise. For transgressions past

  May be amended, cannot be made worse.

  Why silent? Father, speak, nor turn away,

  Hast thou no word, wilt thou dismiss me then

  In mute disdain, nor tell me why thou art wrath?

  O ye his daughters, sisters mine, do ye

  This sullen, obstinate silence try to move.

  Let him not spurn, without a single word

  Of answer, me the suppliant of the god.

  ANTIGONE

  Tell him thyself, unhappy one, thine errand;

  For large discourse may send a thrill of joy,

  Or stir a chord of wrath or tenderness,

  And to the tongue-tied somehow give a tongue.

  POLYNEICES

  Well dost thou counsel, and I will speak out.

  First will I call in aid the god himself,

  Poseidon, from whose altar I was raised,

  With warrant from the monarch of this land,

  To parley with you, and depart unscathed.

  These pledges, strangers, I would see observed

  By you and by my sisters and my sire.

  Now, father, let me tell thee why I came.

  I have been banished from my native land

  Because by right of primogeniture

  I claimed possession of thy sovereign throne

  Wherefrom Etocles, my younger brother,

  Ousted me, not by weight of precedent,

  Nor by the last arbitrament of war,

  But by his popular acts; and the prime cause

  Of this I deem the curse that rests on thee.

  So likewise hold the soothsayers, for when

  I came to Argos in the Dorian land

  And took the king Adrastus' child to wife,

  Under my standard I enlisted all

  The foremost captains of the Apian isle,

  To levy with their aid that sevenfold host

  Of spearmen against Thebes, determining

  To oust my foes or die in a just cause.

  Why then, thou askest, am I here today?

  Father, I come a suppliant to thee

  Both for myself and my allies who now

  With squadrons seven beneath their seven spears

  Beleaguer all the plain that circles Thebes.

  Foremost the peerless warrior, peerless seer,

  Amphiaraiis with his lightning lance;

  Next an Aetolian, Tydeus, Oeneus' son;

  Eteoclus of Argive birth the third;

  The fourth Hippomedon, sent to the war

  By his sire Talaos; Capaneus, the fifth,

  Vaunts he will fire and raze the town; the sixth

  Parthenopaeus, an Arcadian born

  Named of that maid, longtime a maid and late


  Espoused, Atalanta's true-born child;

  Last I thy son, or thine at least in name,

  If but the bastard of an evil fate,

  Lead against Thebes the fearless Argive host.

  Thus by thy children and thy life, my sire,

  We all adjure thee to remit thy wrath

  And favor one who seeks a just revenge

  Against a brother who has banned and robbed him.

  For victory, if oracles speak true,

  Will fall to those who have thee for ally.

  So, by our fountains and familiar gods

  I pray thee, yield and hear; a beggar I

  And exile, thou an exile likewise; both

  Involved in one misfortune find a home

  As pensioners, while he, the lord of Thebes,

  O agony! makes a mock of thee and me.

  I'll scatter with a breath the upstart's might,

  And bring thee home again and stablish thee,

  And stablish, having cast him out, myself.

  This will thy goodwill I will undertake,

  Without it I can scare return alive.

  CHORUS

  For the king's sake who sent him, Oedipus,

  Dismiss him not without a meet reply.

  OEDIPUS

  Nay, worthy seniors, but for Theseus' sake

  Who sent him hither to have word of me.

  Never again would he have heard my voice;

  But now he shall obtain this parting grace,

  An answer that will bring him little joy.

  O villain, when thou hadst the sovereignty

  That now thy brother holdeth in thy stead,

  Didst thou not drive me, thine own father, out,

  An exile, cityless, and make we wear

  This beggar's garb thou weepest to behold,

  Now thou art come thyself to my sad plight?

  Nothing is here for tears; it must be borne

  By me till death, and I shall think of thee

  As of my murderer; thou didst thrust me out;

  'Tis thou hast made me conversant with woe,

  Through thee I beg my bread in a strange land;

  And had not these my daughters tended me

  I had been dead for aught of aid from thee.

  They tend me, they preserve me, they are men

  Not women in true service to their sire;

  But ye are bastards, and no sons of mine.

  Therefore just Heaven hath an eye on thee;

  Howbeit not yet with aspect so austere

  As thou shalt soon experience, if indeed

  These banded hosts are moving against Thebes.

  That city thou canst never storm, but first

  Shall fall, thou and thy brother, blood-imbrued.

  Such curse I lately launched against you twain,

  Such curse I now invoke to fight for me,

  That ye may learn to honor those who bear thee

  Nor flout a sightless father who begat

  Degenerate sons—these maidens did not so.

  Therefore my curse is stronger than thy "throne,"

  Thy "suppliance," if by right of laws eterne

  Primeval Justice sits enthroned with Zeus.

  Begone, abhorred, disowned, no son of mine,

  Thou vilest of the vile! and take with thee

  This curse I leave thee as my last bequest:—

  Never to win by arms thy native land,

  No, nor return to Argos in the Vale,

  But by a kinsman's hand to die and slay

  Him who expelled thee. So I pray and call

  On the ancestral gloom of Tartarus

  To snatch thee hence, on these dread goddesses

  I call, and Ares who incensed you both

  To mortal enmity. Go now proclaim

  What thou hast heard to the Cadmeians all,

  Thy staunch confederates—this the heritage

  that Oedipus divideth to his sons.

  CHORUS

  Thy errand, Polyneices, liked me not

  From the beginning; now go back with speed.

  POLYNEICES

  Woe worth my journey and my baffled hopes!

  Woe worth my comrades! What a desperate end

  To that glad march from Argos! Woe is me!

  I dare not whisper it to my allies

  Or turn them back, but mute must meet my doom.

  My sisters, ye his daughters, ye have heard

  The prayers of our stern father, if his curse

  Should come to pass and ye some day return

  To Thebes, O then disown me not, I pray,

  But grant me burial and due funeral rites.

  So shall the praise your filial care now wins

  Be doubled for the service wrought for me.

  ANTIGONE

  One boon, O Polyneices, let me crave.

  POLYNEICES

  What would'st thou, sweet Antigone? Say on.

  ANTIGONE

  Turn back thy host to Argos with all speed,

  And ruin not thyself and Thebes as well.

  POLYNEICES

  That cannot be. How could I lead again

  An army that had seen their leader quail?

  ANTIGONE

  But, brother, why shouldst thou be wroth again?

  What profit from thy country's ruin comes?

  POLYNEICES

  'Tis shame to live in exile, and shall I

  The elder bear a younger brother's flouts?

  ANTIGONE

  Wilt thou then bring to pass his prophecies

  Who threatens mutual slaughter to you both?

  POLYNEICES

  Aye, so he wishes:—but I must not yield.

  ANTIGONE

  O woe is me! but say, will any dare,

  Hearing his prophecy, to follow thee?

  POLYNEICES

  I shall not tell it; a good general

  Reports successes and conceals mishaps.

  ANTIGONE

  Misguided youth, thy purpose then stands fast!

  POLYNEICES

  'Tis so, and stay me not. The road I choose,

  Dogged by my sire and his avenging spirit,

  Leads me to ruin; but for you may Zeus

  Make your path bright if ye fulfill my hest

  When dead; in life ye cannot serve me more.

  Now let me go, farewell, a long farewell!

  Ye ne'er shall see my living face again.

  ANTIGONE

  Ah me!

  POLYNEICES

  Bewail me not.

  ANTIGONE

  Who would not mourn

  Thee, brother, hurrying to an open pit!

  POLYNEICES

  If I must die, I must.

  ANTIGONE

  Nay, hear me plead.

  POLYNEICES

  It may not be; forbear.

  ANTIGONE

  Then woe is me,

  If I must lose thee.

  POLYNEICES

  Nay, that rests with fate,

  Whether I live or die; but for you both

  I pray to heaven ye may escape all ill;

  For ye are blameless in the eyes of all.

  (Exit POLYNEICES)

  CHORUS

  (Str. 1)

  Ills on ills! no pause or rest!

  Come they from our sightless guest?

  Or haply now we see fulfilled

  What fate long time hath willed?

  For ne'er have I proved vain

  Aught that the heavenly powers ordain.

  Time with never sleeping eye

  Watches what is writ on high,

  Overthrowing now the great,

  Raising now from low estate.

  Hark! How the thunder rumbles! Zeus defend us!

  OEDIPUS

  Children, my children! will no messenger

  Go summon hither Theseus my best friend?

  ANTIGONE

  And wherefore, father, dost thou summon him?

  OEDIPUS
r />   This winged thunder of the god must bear me

  Anon to Hades. Send and tarry not.

  CHORUS

  (Ant. 1)

  Hark! with louder, nearer roar

  The bolt of Zeus descends once more.

  My spirit quails and cowers: my hair

  Bristles for fear. Again that flare!

  What doth the lightning-flash portend?

  Ever it points to issues grave.

  Dread powers of air! Save, Zeus, O save!

  OEDIPUS

  Daughters, upon me the predestined end

  Has come; no turning from it any more.

  ANTIGONE

  How knowest thou? What sign convinces thee?

  OEDIPUS

  I know full well. Let some one with all speed

  Go summon hither the Athenian prince.

  CHORUS

  (Str. 2)

  Ha! once more the deafening sound

  Peals yet louder all around

  If thou darkenest our land,

  Lightly, lightly lay thy hand;

  Grace, not anger, let me win,

  If upon a man of sin

  I have looked with pitying eye,

  Zeus, our king, to thee I cry!

  OEDIPUS

  Is the prince coming? Will he when he comes

  Find me yet living and my senses clear!

  ANTIGONE

  What solemn charge would'st thou impress on him?

  OEDIPUS

  For all his benefits I would perform

  The promise made when I received them first.

  CHORUS

  (Ant. 2)

  Hither haste, my son, arise,

  Altar leave and sacrifice,

  If haply to Poseidon now

  In the far glade thou pay'st thy vow.

  For our guest to thee would bring

  And thy folk and offering,

  Thy due guerdon. Haste, O King!

  (Enter THESEUS)

  THESEUS

  Wherefore again this general din? at once

  My people call me and the stranger calls.

  Is it a thunderbolt of Zeus or sleet

  Of arrowy hail? a storm so fierce as this

  Would warrant all surmises of mischance.

  OEDIPUS

  Thou com'st much wished for, Prince, and sure some god

  Hath bid good luck attend thee on thy way.

  THESEUS

  What, son of Laius, hath chanced of new?

  OEDIPUS

  My life hath turned the scale. I would do all

  I promised thee and thine before I die.

  THESEUS

  What sign assures thee that thine end is near?

  OEDIPUS

  The gods themselves are heralds of my fate;

  Of their appointed warnings nothing fails.

  THESEUS

  How sayest thou they signify their will?

  OEDIPUS

  This thunder, peal on peal, this lightning hurled

  Flash upon flash, from the unconquered hand.

  THESEUS

  I must believe thee, having found thee oft

  A prophet true; then speak what must be done.

  OEDIPUS

  O son of Aegeus, for this state will I