Oedipus Tyrannus
Sophocles
Sophocles the plays and fragments, Part 1: The Oedipus Tyrannus. Jebb, Richard Claverhouse, Sir, translator. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1887.
- Great, I know. But my fear is of her who lives.
- And who is the woman about whom you fear?
- Merope, old man, the consort of Polybus.
- And what is it in her that moves your fear?
- A divine oracle of dread import, stranger.
- Proper, or improper, for another to know?
- Proper, surely. Loxias once said that I was
- doomed to marry my own mother, and to shed with my own hands my father’s blood. For which reasons I long shirked my home in Corinth—with a happy outcome, to be sure, but still it is sweet to see the face of one’s parents.
- Was it really for fear of this that you became an exile from that city?
- And because I did not wish, old man, to be the murderer of my father.
- Why have I not relieved you of this second fear, my lord, since I came to give you pleasure?
- And indeed you will have worthy thanks from me.
- And indeed I came specially for this, that
- I might profit from your returning home.
- But by no means will I ever go near my parents again.
- My son, it is crystal clear that you do not know what you are doing.
- How so, old man? In the name of the gods, tell me.
- If on account of this you are fleeing from returning home.
- Fearing indeed lest Apollo’s prophecy come true in me.
- Lest you acquire some pollution from your parents?