Original subtitles

My children, you are the modern descendants of King Cadmus who founded

our city.

Why do you come here with these laurel branches, ritually dressed, and all the

signs of desperate people begging for help?

In the city I hear prayers for the sick and the sound of weeping.

The air is heavy with incense and tears. What more do you want?

I can't rely on second-hand reports. I have come to find out for myself.

I am Oedipus the King.

Everyone knows my name.

You, sir, you are a priest, a man old enough to be wise and entitled to speak

first. A sudden panic, is it, or a demand for action?

Anything I can do, I will do, of course. I would have to be a man without pity to

close my eyes and stop my ears to a petition from everyone such as this.

King Oedipus, Lord of Thebes.

You see us, many hundreds, crowding to your palace, youngsters like birds still

in the nest, old men whose eyes have seen everything, priests of Zeus like me

and of other gods, and the very best of our young men.

We have all come here.

There are thousands more sitting in the marketplace carrying emblems like these,

others at the two altars of Pallas Athene.

and at Ismena's shrine by the riverbank, where the future can be read in the

ashes. And we are all offering desperate prayers.

You've seen yourself what's happening here. This city is like a warship

defeated in battle, wallowing aimlessly in a sea of blood.

The crops are rotting in the fields, disease is killing all the cattle.

Babies are born dead.

will decay in the womb.

And as if that wasn't enough, some god has sent plague like a fire demon to

scorch our people.

The courtyard Cadmus built will soon be empty.

The underworld is already crowded with Thebans weeping in the darkness for

themselves and their kin.

If we choose to come here to beg for help, it's not because we think of you

as a god, but because we know you to be the best of men, not only in the daily

business of the state, but in those deeper mysteries of life, where the mind

of man touches eternity.

We haven't forgotten that it was you, a young man, newly arrived here who solved

the riddle of the Sphinx, that monstrous perversion of woman-lion.

and bird, and freed us from her magical tyranny.

We could do nothing to help you then.

And I think, we all think, some god helped

you.

That's why, world famous Oedipus, we're asking for your help again. Find us some

remedy!

either from your own experience or by calling on supernatural powers.

You've solved terrible problems in the past, and that gives us confidence

in your abilities now.

Indeed, you have a reputation to live up to. Your genius has saved us once.

It would be ridiculous to preserve this then, only to see us wasted now.

Save us again as you did before.

Sail under that same lucky star and guide us,

as a real prince should, into the harbor of good fortune and peace.

An unmanned ship needs no captain.

A city that is empty because its people are dead has no further use for

a king.

My children, believe me when I say I know everything you're suffering.

Why you come here and what you ask of me. I suffer as much, perhaps more than

you do.

You carry your personal burdens of sorrow.

I carry them too, and my own, and the city's.

I have not been sleeping, my eyes like yours, a bloodshot with two frequent

tears. I've walked every corridor in the palace and all the secret galleries of

my mind, searching and searching what best to do.

And this much I have done, because I haven't been idle, the one thing that

seems sensible.

My brother-in-law, Creon, the son of Monoichius, I have sent to the Oracle of

Apollo at Delphi to ask the Pythia, the sacred priestess, what action or word of

mine might help.

He ought to be here. His mission has taken far longer than it should, and I

begin to wonder what keeps him so long.

When he arrives, whatever the Oracle demands, you have my word, will be

meticulously performed.

No man can say better than that, nor on a better cue.

Look, there's the signal.

Prion himself is approaching.

Whatever the message, he's certainly smiling.

Apollo, god of healing, let the news be good. It must be good.

He moves like a man confident of his success.

He can hear us now.

Dear brother-in-law, son of Menoitus.

What is the god's message? What does the oracle say? It's good news.

Or perhaps I should say it will be good news if all turns out well, though.

Perhaps painful to begin with. And what does that mean?

As such an answer, I don't know if I should laugh or cry.

Do you want me to say it all here in public, or shall we go in? In public, of

course. While these people suffer, I suffer too. Their life concerns me more

than my own.

The answer is straightforward, and the command's simple.

There is something unclean in our city. Born here, living here.

It pollutes everything.

We harbor it. We must drive it out.

How can it be purified? The pollution of this unclean thing. What is it? By

banishment or by blood for blood.

It was bloodshed the Oracle said that whipped up this storm that's destroying

us. Whose blood was shed?

What sort of man?

There was a king here, sir, before you came. His name was Laius. I know the

name. I never saw the man. The man was killed.

And the Oracle's meaning is clear enough.

The murderers of Laius must be found and the unknown killers brought to justice.

But where are they? The trail's gone cold. It's an old story now. Where

should we begin?

Here.

The gods said here.

Search and you won't be disappointed.

No evidence is ever found if you don't look for it. Where did it happen, this

unexplained murder?

Was it here in the palace or in the country or while he was traveling

abroad? He left the city to make a pilgrimage and he never returned except

in a coffin. And who was with him?

Didn't anyone see it? There must be evidence, some scrap, some rumor. One of

the servants escaped. He ran so fast he could only remember one thing. What

thing? Tell me.

The smallest clue might lead to others. He said that robbers, not one man, a

whole band of them met them on the road and they murdered the king. Robbers?

Would they dare attack a king?

Perhaps they were bought. Feeb and money and political ambition, the murder. We

thought that too at first, but the crisis blew up almost at once. We had

other problems. Lias was dead. No one pursued him.

What crisis could be greater than a murdered king?

So there never was a full investigation?

The voice of the Sphinx seemed to mesmerize us.

She drained all our energies with her riddling. It was a question of survival.

No time for unsolved mysteries, even regicide.

Then I shall begin it.

There's time enough now.

We'll shine a fresh light into every corner of the whole dark and musty

business. Thanks to the Lord Apollo and our gratitude to you, Crayon, for

reminding us what we had forgotten.

Our duty to the dead.

I am determined to do everything I can to help our city and to show the gods

justice.

It's in my interest, too, to avenge this crime, not only for Laius' sake, but for

my own protection. This unknown killer might strike at me.

Justice for Laius and my own safety go hand in hand.

So go to your homes.

Dear people, my children, pick up your sad sprays of laurel, call the Theban

counselors here, and tell them that I shall do everything a man can do.

With a god's help, we shall find out the truth and save our city.

We must all be destroyed.

Go home now, good people.

The king has promised everything we came to ask for.

Apollo, the healer whose priestess gave us good answers, may come himself to

cure this sickness of man and beast.

Let us pray for that.

With a voice sweet as music from the house of gold, the priestess speaks

through sunlit thieves, and the god speaks through her, but his meanings

obscure. My hands are shaking, my heart is cold, on the rack with fear.

From your island of Delos, supreme physician, send us your antidote to ease

these plagues. Is this torture unique?

For the old condition of suffering man through the centuries. The golden child

of hope never dies.

And we live by her prophecies.

Ever living Athene, wise daughter of Zeus, we sing first to you.

And your chaste sister Artemis, the deerslayer queen, whose stony eyes watch

in the marketplace.

from her marble throne.

And Borman Apollo, infallible marksman. Trinity of deities, show us your power.

Purge our diseases and save our nation.

If ever you saved us in the days of disaster, when the plague enforced its

reign of terror. And the fire consumed us that no man could master.

Our agonies are beyond telling.

A whole city.

Lowly dying.

From an enemy no man can fight.

Slime and fungus on orchard and meadow.

Death in the womb.

And birth in the shadow of death.

And in the mother's sight.

Men die without number.

Like birds flying.

Like fire consuming.

Despairing. Cry.

As they pass to the shadows of night.

The smell of the dead. The street stinking.

Breeds death and more death.

Beyond all counting.

No tears as her children die.

From the girl-wife and the grey-haired mother.

Tearing their nails at the crowded altar.

accusing the implacable sky.

Hear, Apollo, Athene all-knowing! Can you not hear

the whole city screaming?

Will you not answer our cry?

Now let the bloodstained god of war Though savage music I hear Though no

sword's clash or shield's ring Be driven from our city For the only song is the

groan of the dying The quimper of fear Wrote him the manslayer Let him fly

in disorder Let him hide his head in some bleak Thracian bay Or ease himself

in Amphitrite's bed Now, whoever survives the night

dies at first light.

Break Father Zeus!

You who punish with fire, incinerate the god of war!

Before we all lie dead!

Stand by us now, wolfish god-king!

Pull torch your golden bowstring, and let fire your shaft that never misses!

And hard-riding Artemis, whose torches flare on the Lycian slopes!

Trailing sparks as you pass! And god of ecstasy, back us above all!

whose drowsy peace inspires and protects our city. God of the golden turban and

flushed face.

By your resinous torchlight we stamp and cry.

As your menads sweep by from the frenzied east.

Fly to us wielding ecstatic fire.

To earth is killing God, whom the gods themselves despise.

You have prayed to the gods.

Now listen to me.

If you act as I tell you to act, follow my instructions in every detail, those

prayers will soon be answered.

I speak as an outsider.

I know nothing of this story, the murder or the murderer.

So without your help, and hardly a clue to go on alone, what trail can I follow?

When the crime was committed, I wasn't even a citizen of thieves.

So first, I'll make a public proclamation.

If any man here knows the killer's name, he must speak out now in public to me.

Perhaps one of you is the guilty man.

If that man is here and gives himself up now, it will be easier for him. There

will be no capital charge.

The severest sentence I shall pronounce will be exile.

No greater...

punishment than that.

Or maybe one of you has inside knowledge that some foreigner was the killer.

If you turn informer, you will be well paid. I shall see to that.

But my gratitude will be the truest, most satisfying reward.

If, however, that man is here and refuses to speak,

Or if anyone, out of fear for himself, his friends or his family, ignores these

offers and then is discovered to be sheltering someone or himself, on that

man I pass sentence already.

It doesn't matter who he is.

I, Oedipus, forbid any man to speak with or give shelter to that man in this city

or in the country under my rule.

No one may play with him, make sacrifices with him, or even allow him

to wash in his house.

Everyone will throw him out of doors as the perpetrator of this horrible crime

that brings such suffering on our city. According to the prophetic word of

Apollo, as revealed to me by the Delphic Oracle, I stand here as the champion of

the god.

And of the dead king, too.

The man himself?

The murderer?

With all solemnity I curse him, whether he acted alone or with others, to bear

the mark of this crime for the rest of his life, without friends, homeless, and

in misery. I'll go further. I don't even exclude myself.

If knowingly I should shelter this criminal in any house or hearth, or any

place of mine, let the curse I have uttered fall on me too as fiercely as on

anyone.

That is my sentence.

And it's up to you to see it fully carried out.

For the God's sake, for my sake, and the sake of our plague-ridden, God-deserted

city.

To be honest with you, I am surprised that no purification ceremonies or

investigations were undertaken when so excellent a king as Laius was

inexplicably murdered.

Even without the God's command, that should have been looked into. I should

have fought.

Now, however, I am king.

I enjoy Laius' title, his bed, and his wife.

She is a kind of common ground between us, and his children, indeed, if he had

had any, would be another bond, sharing a mother with mine.

And he was the sad victim of this tragedy.

These links between us and my feeling for the man make me determined to fight

for him now as if he were my own father.

Nothing will be too much trouble to ferret him out, this destroyer of Laius,

the heir to Labracus, and all the ancient kings of Thebes, back to Cadmus

himself and Aeginor his father.

And if any man dares to disobey these orders, let the gods' curses fall on him

too.

barren cattle, a barren wife, and all the horrors this suffering city daily

endures without mercy till the end of his life.

For the honest people of Thebes, who follow me in intention and action,

justice be ours, and the gods' help today and every day.

That curse will frighten any man great king of Thebes, and it terrifies me! I

am not the killer, let me say that at once. And I can't point him out or tell

you his name. The god Apollo asked this question. He, if anyone, should tell us

the answer. I don't doubt that, but if you can tell me how a man persuades a

god to speak when the god doesn't want to, I shall thank you for it. One other

thing might be worth saying. Second best, admittedly. Second best, third

best. Say what you think. Any man's opinion is worth hearing at a time like

this. The prophet and astrologer, Tiresias, has studied the mysteries of

men and gods. He has knowledge.

and experience and insights.

Ye more than anyone could help us now. Which is why I've sent for him already.

Nothing, my friends, has been overlooked.

Crayon suggested it. I've sent for him twice and expected him here some time

ago. There were rumours, of course.

Gossip in the marketplace.

Rumours? What rumours? You must tell me everything.

That travellers killed him. Somewhere on the road. I've heard that already. There

are no witnesses.

But when your curse has been made public, someone may come forward hearing

that. It would take a brave man to keep silent. No murderer fears words if he

can stomach murder.

Here comes the man to tease out the truth.

The blind man.

The shaman, Tiresias.

He sees into the heart of things.

That has solved more mysteries than any man living.

How is this?

You have made yourself master of all the arts of understanding, both mystic

symbolism and practical wisdom.

The highest spiritual truths and the most down-to-earth material realities

are equally your province.

You see the state of our city, not with your eyes, I know, but with your

intellect.

We rely on you as our spiritual champion.

We sent to the Oracle, you'll have heard that already, and the answer we were

given? Find out the killers of the old king, execute them or banish them, and

only then will your city be clean. So, maestro, we need your talents now.

We know that in the formations of birds, in flight, and many other omens, you can

read the future.

For your own sake, for the sake of the city, and for me, help us to end this

pestilence.

A dead man walks in our streets, blinds us with his shadow. We are in your

hands. The gifted man puts his gifts to best use in the service of his fellow

men. Mine is a terrifying gift.

What use is wisdom when it only leads to suffering?

I knew this before I came and foolishly forgot it.

I should have stayed at home.

That's a gloomy answer. What's it supposed to mean?

Please let me go home.

Things will be best that way.

You will bear your burden.

I will bear mine.

Do you refuse to answer my question?

This is Thebes, your country.

You were born here.

I've heard your proclamation.

It's misconceived.

So it's best for me to keep silent.

Dear gods, you mean that you know and won't say?

Look! Look around at us, the whole city. We're all imploring you to speak.

That is because you are all blind to what I can see.

I can't tell you.

The truth is painful.

My secret and yours.

You do know it, don't you?

And you're holding back.

Are you prepared to watch the whole country die?

I'm saving you from agony and myself.

Don't ask me again. Don't waste your time. I shall tell you nothing.

Nothing?

What kind of a monster are you?

A stone statue would be moved to fury, much less a man. Do you mean this?

Are you determined to say nothing?

You lose your temper, make me your scapegoat.

When it's your own anger you should blame.

Do you hear him?

What this man is saying, this is an insult to the state. Every decent

citizen will be outraged.

I can't change the future, only describe it.

What will happen will happen, whatever I say. It's your duty to say what you

know. If it must come, you must tell me.

Lose your temper.

Shout stamp if that pleases you. I shall say nothing more.

Yes, I shall be angry.

And more than angry, I understand this much.

I understand that you were implicated.

Maybe even planned this murder, did everything but act it, and would have

done that too, in my opinion, if you'd had eyes to see a victim.

Would I indeed?

You compel me to speak.

The curse you proclaimed is now upon your head.

From today, never to speak to me or anyone.

You are the man, the unclean thing, the dirt that breeds disease.

Do you dare to accuse me?

Do you slander me in public and think your fortune-telling gives you some kind

of immunity?

I don't need it. The truth is its own protector.

Someone's behind this.

Who told you to say that? There's more to this than fortune-telling.

You did.

You made me say it against my will. Say it again, so there will be no doubt.

Didn't you hear?

Or do you want me to elaborate?

I heard, but I didn't believe my ears.

Say it again, aloud to everybody.

You are the murderer of the murdered king. Twice to my face. You will regret

this, old man.

Null your anger if it pleases you.

I could say more to make you angrier still. Why not? More and more lunacy.

Let's have it all.

I know, but you do not.

That the woman you love is not the woman you love.

That the relationship is disgusting.

Table! And then your ignorance will destroy you. Do you expect to say such

things and not be punished?

The truth protects me if I tell it honestly. The truth wants the truth to

you.

You're blind all over.

Ears, mind as well as eyes. I pity you.

People will scream the same insults at you before long.

Everyone will despise you. You live in darkness permanently.

You see nothing of the real world. My eyes are open. You can't hurt me.

How could I, an old man?

It's not my business.

Apollo will do it. It's in his hands.

Crayon. Of course, he went to the Oracle. This plot is his doing, not

yours. Creon isn't your enemy.

You are. Political rank, wealth and power, and men's ambitions clawing at

each other till life becomes a battleground and envy everyone's motive.

Creon is and has been my friend.

I trusted him completely.

This crown was given to me freely by the people I didn't ask for it, and this

man, my friend, is secretly plotting to overthrow me with a spiritual quack, a

charlatan, a paranormal stuntman, whose eyes are stone blind when it comes to

prophecy, but where money's concerned, very sharp then.

Wide open then.

Astrology. Fortune telling.

Forecasting the future. Where was all that when we needed it? There was a

monster here. Do you remember? I'm sure you do. With the face of a woman and the

body of a dog. Who terrorized our city.

Where were you then?

What was your advice to save this country?

She set a riddle which no ordinary man could solve.

Someone special was required. What else are prophets for? But you!

You hadn't a clue, had you?

Not a word. Not the slightest suggestion.

And then I came along.

A young man, quite ignorant, knowing nothing, with only the wit my mother

gave me. But I stopped her mouth. I did it.

Oedipus, I guessed her riddle without any gobbledygook about birds. And I,

Oedipus, I am the man you hope to depose, you and Creon, so that he will

be king and you his guru. Well, you will regret it. You will both regret this

attempt to turn me into a scapegoat. If you weren't an old man, punishment would

teach you the difference between prophecy and submission. Be king!

To speak in anger as both of you have done helps none of us, as far as I can

judge, when our city is dying. We must consider the God's command and how to

obey it. You may be king, but I am a free man and I have the right to answer.

I serve Apollo the God, not you nor Crayon.

You sneer at my blindness.

You have eyes, but cannot see your own corruption, nor who

she is you love the most, nor even whose son you are.

In your ignorance, you have committed terrible crimes against those closest to

you, the living and the dead.

A double curse like a two-edged sword.

Father and mother will drive you from this city into exile forever.

And what a cripple you'll be then.

Those bright eyes, that perfect vision you were so proud of, will become

dark like mine.

There will be no place on earth that has not heard the sound of your pain.

The wildest heathland of Cithaeron.

Even its cliffs and ravines will echo to your bellowing when you understand

how those melodious married songs deceived you when they led you to that

safe harbor you imagined here.

Then unaccountable miseries, sufferings you cannot guess at, will

become familiar both to you and to your children as you pile your agonies upon

their heads.

accuse Crayon of every crime, slander him, despise what I say.

Every man in the world will despise you.

And no man has committed crimes like yours.

I don't have to listen to you.

Why should I?

Get him out of my sight now, at once. Take him back where he came from. Yes,

I'll go.

You. Brought me here.

Remember that. I didn't want to come.

If I'd known what I'd have to listen to.

The ravings of a lunatic!

Believe me, I'd have left you in peace.

You think I was born a fool?

Your parents wouldn't think so.

Why this continual harping upon my parents?

Who fathered me?

Today, you will father your own destruction.

Conceive the truth of your birth and death.

Speak plainly. Don't talk in riddles.

Why not?

You have a genius for solving them.

Yes.

I'm famous for it.

And your sneers and insults won't make me any the less incisive.

That fame is your misfortune.

I saved the state with my genius.

What does it matter to me what you choose to call it?

Now I shall go.

Give me your hand, boy.

Take me home. Yes, take him, and good riddance.

We can do without you.

Rave in your own house and spare mine.

I'll go.

I've said what I came to say, and I've said it to your face.

Why should I be frightened?

You no longer have the power to hurt me.

But I will say one thing more.

The man you're looking for, the man you cursed and threatened, the murderer of

liars, is here!

He passes for a foreigner who lives in Thebes, but he was born here and will

learn that to his cost.

He could see when he came here, he will leave blind.

He's a rich man now.

He will go as a beggar, groping with a stick in his hand, tapping his way.

He will leave this city into endless exile.

To his children whom he loves, he is brother and

father.

To the woman who bore him, lover and son.

To his father, a killer.

and the man who supplants him.

Go in, set your genius to solve those riddles.

Call me a blind man when you've proved them untrue.

Who is this man whose terrible crime the unearthly voice of Apollo's vessel

intones from the rock of Delphi?

Far let that man fly, for his hand's trail of blood from a sinly oracle

blushes to whisper.

Faster than the storm, his horse must run outstrip the wind.

Thundering Zeus' son gallops behind, grasping his fist the lethal lightning.

And the hounds of the gods, the unsleeping fates, close in.

like a circle tightening.

From the snow-bound crest of Parnassus, the word was transmitted to thieves.

You must find this killer.

Mark him like a thief in the night.

Rank him in the light.

Like a mountain bull where the forests are thicker, the caves bleaker, he

creeps. Barred from the company of men.

Hopelessly flies the voice of those bleak prophecies. Let that bowser not

stink at his face.

No dis... from Earth's center point.

Delphi's sacred summit is too far for Apollo's vengeance.

Tiresias has spread fear and confusion.

Should we believe him or not? For us, best to keep quiet. I'm like jelly,

uncertain what's happening or will happen.

Was there ever a row in the past?

Or is there now? Between Polybus' son and the ruling line of thieves, the

house of Labdicus. Not that I ever heard.

What could be more absurd than to blacken? With no proof.

Oedipus' name. By pinning this unsolved murder on him.

secrets of man.

All the mysteries of his nature are known to Zeus and Apollo.

No one can claim a monopoly of wisdom.

One teacher is as good as another, perhaps no better than any of us.

Some may see deeper, and some may not, because wisdom is a juncture

unequally shared among men.

But what was done must be known beyond doubt.

Oedipus saved our state. He publicly outwitted the Sphinx. Like gold, he was

tested and found true.

We must see his guilt proved.

Citizens, members of the council, they tell me the king has charged me with

subversion. I am innocent of any such charge.

The city is on its knees.

Does he imagine at a time like this I would injure him by any word or action?

I'd rather die than be smeared like that.

It is a smear to be accused of treason before you and my friends and my

countrymen. He lost his temper and made wild accusations.

I think he spoke without thought. Did he say that the old prophet lied under my

instructions? Who gave him that idea?

He did say it.

But why he said it, or whether he meant it, is a matter of opinion. Is he right

in the head?

Did he speak rationally and look you in the eye, or has he gone mad? I've got

more common sense than to make judgments like that on a king's actions. Here he

comes from the palace.

He'll speak for himself.

Spoiler! What have you come for? I hardly imagined you'd be thick-skinned

enough to come knocking at my doors again when you're planning to murder me

and take my power.

Do you imagine I'm afraid of you? Or stupid?

Or am I just too blind to notice a conspiracy to overthrow me? Or not

bright enough to do anything about it? Man, what a conspiracy!

You need plenty of friends and financial backing to capture a throne.

Revolutions are made with men and the money to pay them or buy them. And I

speak in my own defense.

Judge me when you've heard my answer, not before. Crayon, you've always been a

brilliant talker, but talk cuts no ice with me. I've seen the evidence of your

actions. Betrayal, sedition. Will you let me speak? Say what you like, but

don't protest your innocence. That would be too much. Do you really think that

closing your mind, a boneheaded refusal to listen is a sensible way of

proceeding? Do you really think that I can allow you to plot a palace

revolution and do nothing about it because you're my brother-in-law? Only a

fool would allow that, I agree, if it were happening.

There is no revolution in the palace or anywhere. No conspiracy!

What am I supposed to have done? Now, was you who advised me to send for that

canting prophet? Yes, it was. Good advice. I'd give it again. Tell me.

How long ago did Laius... Did Laius what? I don't follow you.

He died mysteriously. How long ago was that? Years and years. I can hardly

remember. Yeah, and this fortune teller?

He was here then already in the prophecy business?

Respected then as now for his still and integrity. And did he mention me when

the murder happened?

Not in my hearing. And did you not hold an inquest or some kind of

investigation? There was an inquiry but it revealed nothing. And this respected

prophet, why did he say nothing then of what he has said today? I have no idea.

I never say anything unless I'm in full possession of the facts. But one thing

you do know and you'd be wise to tell me. What can I say?

Everything I know, I'll tell you. I'll keep nothing back. You know this much.

Without your prompting, the fortune teller would never have dared to accuse

me of the murder of Laius.

Did he say that?

Then you must know whether he's lying or telling the truth, not I.

Am I permitted to interrogate you? Why not?

I've got nothing to hide. You will never pin this murder on me.

Are you married to my sister?

What kind of a question is that? I can hardly deny it, can I? I do have that

honor. She shares the throne, both title and revenue.

Of course she does. What's mine is hers. And I am the third partner.

I have my share of power and responsibility. You've always had it.

All the more disgusting to conspire against me behind my back. But I haven't

conspired against you.

Ask yourself, as I ask myself, whether any sane man would willingly exchange a

quiet life within the ruling family for the wear and tear, the grueling

responsibility of government.

It has never crossed my mind.

I have no ambition to be king in name or in fact.

I live like a king. Sometimes I hope I act like one. And that's enough.

No sensible man would want more than that.

If I had your job, there'd be too many things I wouldn't like doing. And no

more satisfaction from the kingship itself than I get now from royal rank

without royal obligations.

I'm not so drunk with the prospect of power as to envy a position that yields

no profit.

Look at me now.

Everyone knows me.

Everyone loves me.

I think.

Anyone who seeks to get your attention first prize for mine because my

influence guarantees success.

Why should I change such a favorable situation?

Is it likely I'd be such a fool as to break with you in such conditions as far

as to commit treason?

As a political policy, it has nothing to recommend it.

It's not mine nor the policy of any of my friends.

Not if I know them.

If you want proof, send to the priestess at the oracle, check the message I

brought if it was true, produce some evidence of conspiracy between the blind

man and me, prove that, and condemn me to death out of hand.

My verdict in those conditions will be as merciless as any man's.

But to condemn me like this, without any evidence, I cannot endure that.

If mere supposition unsupported is all your evidence, you can call bad men

honest and decent citizens crooks and villains, and justice will be done to

none of them.

A reliable friend is a precious possession worth a man's life.

Throw friendship away, you destroy something living and irreplaceable.

The truth of this will emerge in time. Time!

is the one incorruptible judge.

One minute is long enough to accuse a man.

To prove his innocence takes longer.

If you weigh his words, they make good sense. Well worth a prudent man's

consideration. Quick judgments are not always the wisest. Conspiracies don't

take their time.

I keep on the move.

And counterintelligence must move fast too or be caught napping. Shall I sit

and do nothing while he takes power?

and my own sluggishness destroys me. What, you want then to have me banished?

Banished? Oh, no.

I want you dead.

What have I done to revoke such jealousy? Are you still so obstinate?

Still pretending? Yes, I am, because you're not thinking straight. I know

where my best interests lie. And what about mine? You are a traitor. And you

are mistaken. Kings must take decisions. Not wrong decisions.

Oh, Thebes, my city. Thebes is my city as well as yours. Stop this brawling.

Queen, Jocasta is coming from the palace.

She will help us to put an end to this quarrel.

What is all this shouting?

From inside the palace I heard angry voices like a quarrel.

Aren't you ashamed?

Indulging yourself in private arguments, squabbling like boys while the city dies

all around you.

Go inside, my husband.

And you too.

Crayon, go back to your own house before you turn a private row into a public

spectacle. Sister, we are blood relations.

But your husband has condemned me unheard to the choice of death or exile.

Certainly I have, and that, dear wife, is the least I can do.

May all the gods curse me forever if I was even remotely guilty.

Oedipus. You must believe him. An oath like that can't be taken lightly.

Believe him, for my sake and for the sake of these reliable counsellors. They

heard it all.

Great king, be prepared to change your mind. Are you asking me to break my

word? No man ever questioned his integrity.

He confirms it by oath. Show some leniency. Do you know what you're

asking? Certainly we do. Say it openly, then. Let everyone know.

He's your long-tested friend.

Above suspicion.

Don't condemn him by hearsay.

And in spite of it all, don't you understand your own implications? Spare

him, and you demand my banishment or death.

By the life-giving sun, that necessary power by whose warmth we live, such a

terrible thought never crossed my mind. I had far rather be an outcast, godless,

friendless, despised, and distraught, than abate such a destiny.

Our city is in anguish.

What greater blow could fall on us in our misery than anger and hatred between

you two? Then let him go!

Even if my death, exile, or disgrace is the price of his mercy, your voice buys

his pardon, not his. Wherever he hides his face, then my back-breaking hatred

bears burden.

Your apology's as graceless as your anger's insane.

An unforgiving nature breeds misery in its own heart, not that of its enemy.

Leave me alone! I want you gone! Yes, I'll go.

They respect my integrity.

I am misjudged by you alone.

Take the king inside, madam. Speak to him in private. What caused this

quarrel? Who began it?

Rumors were mentioned.

Unfounded suspicions. Then the anger that follows unjust accusations.

Both men were at fault then. Yes, madam, they were. Tell me all the details. You

can speak without fear.

We have troubles enough.

Best to keep silent in all our interests.

Let sleeping dogs lie.

Your intentions are honorable, but your advice is pregnant with disaster. All

the guilt falls on me.

Great king, believe me when I say again what I have said before.

We would be stark mad to counsel an action so insane as to count you out

without proof. We need your help and guidance. We all remember how, like a

pilot in that desperate storm, half-wrecked you navigated us to harbor.

You are our captain in rough weather or calm.

Please tell me.

What harm can Crayon have done to provoke such fury so suddenly I am

worthy your trust? These old men mean well, but you matter to me far more.

It's Crayon. I'm sickened with disgust at the scope of his conspiracy.

What conspiracy, and why do you accuse my brother? He says I'm responsible for

Laius' murder.

Is he any evidence, or is it hearsay? He says nothing himself. That corrupt

fortune-teller speaks for him with his bird-talk and prophecy.

And is that all?

Set your mind at rest. No one can forecast the future.

I know what I'm talking about from personal experience.

I have proof.

When Laius was alive, an oracle told him, not the god himself, but through

his mouthpiece, that he would be killed by his own son, our own child, and it

didn't happen.

Laius was killed by persons unknown, foreign robbers, according to the story,

at the place where three roads meet.

As for the child, it was abandoned on a deserted mountain before it was three

days old by a servant. Kings never commit such acts themselves.

To make doubly sure, its ankles were pierced and strapped together with

leather thongs.

So that prediction didn't come true, in spite of Apollo.

The prophecy of parricide wasn't fulfilled.

Laius was murdered, but not as he feared, by his own son.

The oracle had been unambiguous, its meaning quite plain.

So why take notice of these fortune tellers and astrologers?

The gods always get their own way without anyone's help when they're

ready. Something you said.

Jocasta, I remember...

My brain's a turmoil.

Feelings, memories.

Why do you look at me so strangely?

What's the matter?

You said, didn't you, that Laius was butchered at a place where three roads

meet? Yes, that was said at the time. It's still the common story.

Where?

What country?

Place in focus near the junction where the road to Thebes forks to Dali and

Delphi. And how long ago did all this happen? You hadn't arrived. The news

became public a short while before you became king.

Oh, Zeus.

What will you do to me?

Oedipus, you look terrified. What have I said? Not yet.

Don't ask me yet.

How old was Laius?

What kind of man was he?

A big man, hair graying, about your build? Dear God.

Without knowing it, I may have damned myself just a moment ago.

Don't look at me like that. What do you mean? Maybe Tiresias could see after

all.

Terrifying.

But possible.

Tell me one more thing.

Why are you frightening me? I'll tell you everything.

Who was with the king?

A few attendants?

Was he traveling in state with servants and armed men?

Five men all told, one of them a herald. Laius himself rode in a carriage.

Nothing could be clearer than that.

Every detail.

Where did you get this information?

There was one survivor. Eventually he got back to Thebes. And is he still here

now? No, he isn't.

By the time he got back, everything had changed in the city. You were king in

Lyre's place.

When he saw how things were, he came to me and begged me on his knees to let him

go back to the country to be a shepherd. He said he wanted to be done with

thieves, out of sight, out of mind.

So I let him go. He was a good servant. He deserved better than that. I want him

here, at once, today.

Can we find him? Of course we can.

But why are you so anxious?

Oh, my dear wife, I'm frightened.

What I've done, what I'm doing, I've already said far too much. I must see

the shepherd, ask him some questions. You will see him, will send for him, but

why are you so worried?

You must tell me. I do have a right to know. Yes, yes, you have a right to

know.

If the truth of this is what I think it is, no one has a better right to know

than you.

I'll tell you the whole story.

My father, Polybus, was Corinth-born, and Merope, my mother, came from Doris.

I was an up-and-coming fellow, very much the man to watch until one day an odd

thing happened, an astonishing thing which caused more trouble, perhaps, than

it merited, but which I took seriously.

At a banquet one day, a man who had drunk too much jeered at me and said I

was not my father's son.

I was very hurt, angry and insulted, but I kept it to myself for the rest of that

day. The next morning, I went to my parents, both father and mother

together, and asked them question after question, almost compelling them to tell

me the truth. They were very angry that anyone should dare say such a thing and

put my mind at rest as best they could. But a thing like that gets under your

skin.

I couldn't forget it.

And the story got around a good deal, as these things do. So, without telling my

parents, I went to the oracle at Delphi.

I got no answer to the question I asked.

A catalogue of horrors and miseries instead.

That I would marry my own mother and father children on her, conceived

incestuously, and become a public outcast for it, notorious throughout the

world. As if this weren't enough, I would kill my own father.

What could I do?

I ran as fast and as far from Corinth as any man could, always checking my

distance from that forbidden city by the position of the stars so that those

dreadful prophecies could not possibly come true. The route I took brought me

into that part of the country where, according to you, Laius was murdered.

Now, listen, Jocasta.

This is the truth in every detail.

I reached a place where three roads meet.

I was confronted by a herald, ahead of a carriage drawn by horses and carrying a

passenger, just as you described, grey-haired, my build.

The man in front shouted at me to clear the road, and the old man too rudely

ordered me to get out of his way.

The driver barged into me, so I hit him hard. I was furious by now,

uncontrollable, but the old man in the carriage was watching for his chance.

He waited till I passed him, and then he struck me full on the head with his two

-pronged stick, the kind you use for goading the horses to make them gallop.

I paid him back with interest and double quick. I whacked him savagely with my

staff and knocked him out of the carriage.

He fell flat in the road. The others attacked me, of course, and I killed

them, everyone.

Now, if that old man was remotely connected with Laius,

if the king's blood, Ran in his ways.

Is there any man on earth more miserable than I am?

Every god will hate me, and all men.

No one will speak to me, friend or stranger.

No one will take me into his house. I cursed the murderer, and the weight of

that curse now falls on me. These same hands that murdered him have fondled his

wife. Was I cursed from the beginning then? A filthy, corrupt... that thing

infecting the city deserving exile if anyone deserves it now i am cast out

from thebes denied the sight of my wife and children forbid never to return to

my home in corinth no never again can i go back there for fear that the oracle's

prophecies might be fulfilled and that i should somehow marry my mother and kill

my father polybus who nurtured me and gave me life the immortals i suppose

have devised this inhuman scenario to amuse themselves but listen gods as you

revel in the purity of your power over human affairs I shall do my best to

deprive you of that pleasure.

Never! Never will that day come if I can prevent it. I'd rather die with every

memory of my existence blotted out from the face of the earth than live to see

such dreadful things come true and be shamed, branded, and notorious before

humanity. Your story is terrifying, great king. Don't give up hope there was

an eyewitness. Until you've questioned him, say nothing.

The shepherd is my last chance.

I'll cling to that. Even when he gets here, what possible help can he be? One

detail, and it's crucial if his story corroborates. it's yours. I am proved

innocent. What detail?

Does it matter? What did I say? In your version of the shepherd's evidence, the

king was killed by robbers. Robbers.

Plural. Now, if he says the same, still calls them robbers, I'm in the clear.

One man is not a group of men. Plural is plural, not singular.

But if he describes a single traveler walking alone, then quite obviously

all the evidence will point to me.

Oh, but he did say that.

I'm certain.

He can't change his story now.

He spoke in public. The whole city heard him. And even if his evidence varies in

detail, by no possible stretch of the imagination can he pretend that Laius

died as predicted.

A son of mine would kill him, the oracle said, and it didn't happen.

My poor little boy killed no one.

He was the one who died years before any of this happened. That's how much

oracles are worth.

In future, whatever they say, one way or the other, I won't waste my time with

any of them. That's the truth of the matter.

But we'll speak to the shepherd.

Send someone to fetch him, now, this minute. At once. We'll get him at once.

Come inside.

I'll do nothing without your approval.

Nothing.

No man made those precepts. They never sleep nor decay with age as men decay.

They run their courses from immortal sources.

Like a pure and eternal fountain.

Arrogant self-love.

breathes absolute rule.

The tyrant who eats up money and men, he seeks absolute power and

in one foolish hour overreaches himself and ends in the gutter.

An ambitious man most honors the gods.

When his demon drives him to serve the state, he sets his store by the moral

law. The gods love him and his people prosper.

But what if a man should laugh at justice, grab what he wants, and

disregard by his words and actions honesty and truth, and plunder holy

shrines? Can he hope to escape the consequences of his rape?

When the criminal makes off with his loot, and the murderer becomes king, why

should I still cling to the old wisdom and morality, or honor in song the

sacred harmony?

And why should I make pilgrimages to Delphi, or Olympia, or any holy place,

if these manifest truths are not made absolute for every man, and the gods'

warnings provoke laughter with no thought of what comes after?

O Zeus universal, if you hear our song, show us

again your immortal power, in this darkest hour, when lies fate.

and Apollo's words are well forgotten and your warnings

unheard.

I have decided, senators of Thebes, to visit the holiest temples of the city to

make sacrifices there with incense and flowers to the all-powerful gods

the

king is confused at the moment by his own nightmares and fantasies he can't

make balanced judgments or estimate from past experience what is likely to happen

each new sensational revelation he takes as truth and is terrified the more i

have tried to comfort him but i failed so it seems sensible to offer

prayers and first to apollo whose altar stands nearest

of sunlight and healing we stand in the shadow of a curse shine

on our darkest corners where there is sickness and dirt make us whole and

clean like desperate sailors we lose our last hope when we see our captain in

despair

and show me the way to the palace of King Oedipus. Or better still, to the

man himself, if you know where he is. This is the palace, and the king is

inside it. This lady is his wife and mother of his children. God bless her

then and all her family, bearing children to such a great man. God bless

you too, sir, and thank you for such a courteous greeting. Have you travelled

here for your own purpose or to bring us news? News, dear lady, good news too,

for your husband and for his whole family. What news is it? Who sent you? I

come from Corinth.

And my message is bound to please you.

Though it's painful, too, and will make you sad to begin with. One message

causing two such opposite reactions, tell me.

The Corinthians will make Oedipus king of the whole Isthmus.

Everybody says so.

But Polybus rules in Corinth and has done for years. Isn't he still king?

Polybus is dead, my lady, and buried.

Polybus is dead.

The father of Oedipus, dead.

Unless I'm a liar, in which case strike me dead on the spot.

You go, quickly, run to the king.

Tell him the news.

Oh, oracles, dreamers of dreams, fortune tellers, where are your predictions now?

The one man...

Oedipus has kept clear of for all these years for fear he should murder him, and

that man is dead at long last.

Dead! And Oedipus had nothing to do with it. Caster, my dearest, you called me

out from the palace again. What's going on? This man has news for you. Listen,

and then tell me what you think of oracles with their mystification and

mumbo-jumbo. Who is he? What does he have to say? He comes from Corinth.

Your father, he's dead.

Polybus, do you understand me?

He's dead.

Tell me yourself.

Get it quite clear.

I can't put it any plainer. He's dead, all right.

He's gone the way we all go. How did he die?

Was it murder or sickness?

Sleep comes easily to an old man's eye. He was ill then and gradually declined.

Poor old man. He was old and tired. He'd lived long enough.

Well, then.

priestess at Delphi with her oracle, a whole sky full of screaming birds

prophesying ruin.

I was the man who would kill my father, and my sword has never left its

stabbing. Perhaps he died of a broken heart because I was in exile. Perhaps I

killed in that way, but I don't think so.

Polypus is dead, and so is the oracle and all its prophecies.

Rotten! That was my prophecy, didn't I say so right from the beginning? You

said it, but I was confused and frightened. Forget it now. It's over.

My mother, while she's alive, I can't be safe. There's still that to fear.

Fear? Why fear?

We live our lives at the mercy of chance, the purest coincidence.

No one can predict the future, so what's the point of fearing it?

Live, enjoy life, take each day as it comes.

As for marrying your mother, you're not the first man to have dreamed that

dream. Every man is his mother's lover in imagination or in daydreams. It's

commonplace.

If a man dwells on his most private fantasies, his life won't be worth

living. Believe me. That's all very well. Your celebrations of the woman who

brought me into the world happen to be dead, too. But she isn't. Not yet. She's

alive. And while she lives somewhere inside me, I'm still afraid.

Much less afraid. Your father's dead.

Less afraid. Maybe still afraid of her.

Don't mind me asking, sir. Who is this lady who scares you so much? The queen.

Merope, the dead king's wife.

What's she done?

There's nothing to scare you about her, surely? My friend, there was an oracle

once from Delphi.

Dreadful prophecy.

Too dreadful to tell a stranger? Or can anyone hear? Oh, it's no secret.

Apollo's mouthpiece, the Pythia herself, told me I was doomed to marry my own

mother and kill my father bloodily with my own hands. It's for this reason that

I left Corinth and have stayed away so long. I've prospered, as you see,

abroad.

But nothing can compensate for the loss of my parents, love.

The pleasure denied me of seeing them face to face.

And this is the fear that's kept you in exile?

No other reason? Well, it was enough.

I was determined not to kill my father.

Well, I came to do you one good turn, and now I can do you another.

What other?

Well, if you know more, you'll earn my gratitude.

That was partly my motive in coming, I will admit. And to do myself a good turn

later, when you come back home.

Home? You mean Corinth. I shall never go back.

I shall never see either of my parents again. My dear young fellow, you've got

it all wrong.

What do you mean, old man?

Well, for God's sake.

Tell me. Tell me everything you know. This fear of yours that stops you coming

home? The fear that the gods' prediction should come true. Is it all that about

your parents and the crime you're doomed to commit? Of course it is.

And from the very first moment, that fear has never left me.

Pointless, sir. Quite without basis.

Nothing to be scared of at all.

Why?

I don't understand you.

If I'm their son, who says you're their son?

Polybus wasn't your father.

No relation at all.

What are you saying?

Polybus wasn't my father. No more your father than I am.

Just the same relationship, in fact.

The same relationship? My father and you? How is that possible? It's possible

because that man was not your father and neither am I.

And why did he call me his son?

I gave you to him as a present.

Gave me to him?

But he loved me like a son. No father could have done more. He had no children

and wanted a child.

What was I then?

A foundling?

Or a slave child bought somewhere? Not a bit of it. You were found on the

mountain in a hollow under some trees up there on Githyra. What were you doing up

there?

Looking after the sheep.

That was my job.

What were you?

Journeyman shepherd taking whatever work came. That's right. And a good thing for

you that I was, eh?

Son, because I saved your life. No question about that.

What, was I in danger then? Or in pain?

In pain.

Look at your ankles.

They're still swollen up more than normal.

What's that to do with it?

An old weakness I've had since a child. I know you have.

Your ankles were drilled through and tied together.

I cut you free.

That must be true.

You can still see the scars.

I had them as a boy. How else did you get your name?

E.D.

Puss. Swollen Foot.

Well, that's what it means, isn't it? Dear gods.

Who would do such a thing to a child? My father or my mother?

Don't ask me that. Ask the other chap, the one who gave you to me. Gave me? You

didn't find me yourself?

I did not. There was another shepherd.

He gave you to me and asked me to look after you. And who was he?

Could you identify him?

He was always thought of as one of Laius' men.

Laius?

The Laius who was king here before? King Laius, that's the one. This chap worked

for him.

And is he still alive?

Where can I see him? Ask your own people. They should know.

The shepherd.

Good people, do any of you know him?

Have any of you seen him here or in the country? If you know this man, for God's

sake, say, speak up now.

The time has come to solve this mystery once and for all. I think that this

shepherd and the shepherd you've already sent for must be identical.

But ask the queen.

She's sure to know. Jocasta.

You know the shepherd, the one we've sent for? Is it the same man?

What man?

What does it matter?

One shepherd or another?

None of it matters.

Forget it, the whole thing.

Don't pursue it. Forget it? Of course I can't forget it. What nonsense.

My birth's a mystery, but with all these clues, I intend to solve it. Listen to

me. In heaven's name, listen.

If you want to stay alive, this search must end.

It's making me ill.

I'm sick with it already. Isn't that enough? There's no need for such glue.

Suppose it proved that I was born a slave, from generations of slaves.

Would that sicken you or affect your standing? Listen, I'm begging you, don't

go on. I must go on. I must know the truth.

I know.

I know what I'm talking about.

I'm telling you this for your own good. And when did I ever put my own good, as

you call it, above the service of the state?

My God.

You're doomed.

You can't escape.

I have one wish and one wish only that you never discover.

Who you really are. Hurry, one of you.

Fetch that shepherd here. My wife is too proud of her blue blood.

She's stared she may have married a slave.

It's finished.

No chance now.

You're doomed.

I've said all there is to say.

And my last word to you.

Forever.

Why has the queen left us so suddenly?

Why did she become so emotional?

I don't like it, this refusal to speak.

It's like the silence that hangs over a city when a storm is about to break.

Storms, hurricanes, let them all come.

I've traveled this far, and now I am determined to discover my identity.

If my birthplace was the gutter, I shall hunt it out.

My wife, like all women, is snobbish about rank and upbringing. If I was the

child of chance, with good luck for my godparents, I wouldn't be ashamed. My

true mother is fortunate coincidence.

My brothers and sisters, the changing seasons.

And I change with them as naturally as the trees.

If that's my background, who could ask for better? I am what I am. I have no

wish to be otherwise.

But who I am.

That I must know.

And I will know it.

If I can foretell the future, either by prophecy or common sense, I predict that

by tomorrow morning, this truth will be gone.

That mysterious Kitharum, that magical mountain, whose father and mother and

nurse to Oedipus are king.

And our voices will sing praises for his outlandish birth, a child of the earth,

and glory to Apollo and thanksgiving.

Or perhaps some sky-born Olympian brought him to birth, an immortal

mother. Maybe Pan, who goes roaming the slopes at evening, seduced a wild

goddess of woodland or screen.

Or Apollo, who relishes high pasture.

bred a son from a spirit?

Or Hermes in his summit of Hyene did the deed?

Or was Dionysus' passionate seed sown on Helicon?

Where a nymph lay dreaming.

Elder statesman of Thebes, I think I can see the man we're waiting for.

I'm making a guess, I never set eyes on him, but my men are bringing him and he

looks the same age as this man from Corinth.

Is he the one?

You should know him. You've seen him before.

I recognize him.

This is the man. He was my servant and honest as the dead.

Now, friend from Corinth, you speak first.

Is this the man you mean?

It is.

And you, old shepherd, look me in the eye...

and answer my questions.

Did you work for old King Laius?

Yes, sir, I did.

I was born and bred in his service, not bought in the market.

And what was your job here? How were you employed?

For most of my life, I've been a shepherd, sir.

And where?

In what part of the country did you usually work?

Well, it would be... Kithairan, mostly. All around there. And this fellow here?

Have you ever seen him before?

What man do you mean, sir? How would I know him?

This man, standing here.

Did you have any dealings with him ever that you remember?

I can't say.

Not just this minute.

I can't remember.

Of course he's forgotten, but I'll soon remind him. The days when us two were

neighbours up there on Kithairan, he won't forget that, will you?

He had two flocks and I had one.

Three seasons altogether we were up there, the two of us.

And then from spring right through to the autumn. Then I drove my lot down to

Corinth, and he took his lot down to Thebes to Laius' place. Now, is that

true or isn't it?

Well, true enough, it's a long time ago. In that case, you won't have forgotten

that boy.

The baby you gave me. You told me to look after it and bring it up as my own.

Why are you asking about that? It's years ago.

And he's a grown man.

My dear old mate.

This is that baby.

God damn you, be quiet.

Keep your mouth shut. Now, now, old fellow, you deserve that sharp tone more

than he does. Why, great king, what have I done wrong? Not giving a straight

answer to a straight question. He was asking you about the child. It's just

talk. He knows nothing. He doesn't understand. Now, listen.

If you won't speak willingly, you'll be forced to speak.

I'm an old man, sir. Don't hurt me. You've got to twist his arms back

quickly.

God help me now. What have I done?

What more do you want to know? This man here was asking you about a child.

Was it you who gave him that child?

Was it?

Yes.

It was me. I wish I'd died that day.

He'll die today unless you tell the truth.

I'll die if I tell it anyway, that's for sure.

This fellow is still determined to prevaricate. Oh, no, I'm not. I told

you, I gave it him.

What else?

Where did it come from?

Was it your child?

Or did someone give it to you? Not mine.

Would I give my own child away? It came from... someone else.

Who else?

From Thebes?

From one of the citizens here?

What kind of house did that baby come from?

I beg you, sir, by all the gods, don't ask me that.

I am asking.

If I must ask again, you're as good as dead.

Well, you see...

It was born in Lyre's house.

A slave?

Or was it a blood relation?

I'm on the edge, sir.

Must I say it? Yes, we're both on the edge.

I must hear you say it.

They did say it was his.

But the queen in the palace, she could tell you.

Do you mean she gave it to you?

Yes, sir, she did.

Why?

For what purpose?

To kill it, sir.

Her own child.

Poor woman.

Yes, sir, there was some prophecy. She was scared stiff.

What prophecy?

There was talk.

that the boy would kill his father.

And why, in the name of all the gods, did you give it to this

man?

I couldn't kill it, master.

I couldn't do it. A little boy, three days old.

I thought he'll take it miles away to his own country. It'll be all right.

So he took it and saved its life, and now it's all turned out like this.

If you are that man, sir, the boy my friend took to Corinth, you were marked

out for suffering from the day you were born.

All now.

Nothing left to find.

It all came true.

Every single word.

Let the night come.

Daylight has no mercy.

It shows too much, too clearly.

Yes.

My parenthood a crime my marriage a

crime And that murder

Committed on my own father

Like a shadow thrown in the dust is the short life of man.

Sunlit generations pass into the night. And happiness, like a bird in flight,

flutters and is gone. We have seen Oedipus the king brought down to

misery.

Suffering, grief, happiness, pain is mortal man's destiny.

Like a champion marksman, he'd be shot down the Sphinx in full flight.

The master of the gods' reward was kingship and power over men.

The prize of one hour of brilliant insight.

From that day he was king in Thebes. Like a solid wall, his power surrounded

us, and we sang of the benefits of his rule.

Was there ever a reversal of fortune?

More terrible than this.

How can any man endure such merciless agony?

Who was ever marked out by destiny for suffering like his?

Oedipus, world-famous king, when you sucked and fondled at the same breast.

How could the flesh keep silent so long where both son and father caress?

Time is an all-seeing eye.

That searches out hidden guilt when it seems most secure.

Then brings down the knife on the father and son who shared a wife.

And the blood that was spilt.

Son of our murdered king, why did you ever come here?

Your destiny leaves me choking with tears.

Bringing salvation for us.

With your own vision.

Wise men of the city, if you have any feeling at all for the royal family of

Thebes, those descendants of Labdicus, you can't hold back your tears.

Not when you hear what I have to tell you and see yourself the terrible scene

in the palace.

In there, things have been done, deliberate things of such horror, such

self-mutilations that rivers could not wash away the blood.

and the stain on the family will be everlasting.

Haven't we seen and suffered enough?

What more is there to say?

First of all, in the plainest language, the Queen is dead.

Dead?

How can she be dead?

Poor woman.

I'll tell you how.

She killed herself.

You haven't seen it, and count yourselves lucky.

I shall never be able to forget it.

That... Image will always be with me now.

I was there.

And I'll tell you what happened as accurately as I can.

When she rushed into the palace in anguish, she went straight into the

bedroom, tearing her hair out in handfuls and muttering like a mad woman.

She slammed the doors and locked herself in, and we heard her shouting.

Something about Laius, her first husband, who's been dead for years, and

the night they conceived the son who was to kill him and breed misbegotten

children on his own mother.

Then it became confused.

She screamed and beat upon the bed where she had conceived a husband by a husband

and children by a child. I heard all that.

Her actual death was behind the locked doors.

And Oedipus broke in at that point, raving up and down the hall and shouting

for a sword so that all our eyes were fixed on him and we all forgot what she

was doing.

That wife of mine, that wife and mother, he shouted.

Her fertile belly, twice it's been harvested, me and my children.

Then he suddenly made for the door. None of us told him, as though some...

Premonition suddenly told him she was there. He bellowed and shouted and

shoulder-charged the doors and kicked them till the bolts and hinges

shattered, and he stumbled in.

We saw her slowly turning in the air, swinging slightly like a pendulum,

strung up by the neck.

She'd hanged herself.

The king ran to her, loosed the ropes, and lifted her down, all the while

groaning heartbreakingly, like an animal.

He laid her gently on the floor, and then... This

was unbearable.

The worst of all.

There were two golden brooches pinned on her dress.

He opened them up, lifted them high in the air at arm's length, and plunged

them down into his eyeballs!

Screaming and groaning that his own guilt and suffering were too great for

his eyes ever to see it. That now they would both be in darkness forever.

That he would never see again those he should never have seen, nor ever love

those he should never have loved. That's the way he went on, cursing himself and

stabbing his eyelids again and again, till his face was a mass of... blood

and tears not drops of blood but like a thunderstorm or cloudburst gushing down

his cheeks so they

embraced in the crime and embraced in the punishment too

man and wife together

they were happy you know for a long time

The family was famous and considered fortunate.

But from today, horror, pain and grief, all the

suffering men have a name for will make their names notorious forever.

Has he any relief?

Or is the pain getting worse?

He's yelling for someone to unbolt the doors and drag him out so that all

Thebes will see the father, killer, and mother.

I can't say that word in public.

He's shouting repeatedly that he must be kicked out of the city.

He's exiled by his own decree.

He mustn't stay long enough to let the curse fall on his own family.

But he's in pain.

And half his strength is gone, poor man.

He can't see.

He needs someone to guide him.

And the physical agony must be worse than any man can bear.

You'll see yourself.

The doors are opening.

Sorrow and pity you must feel when you see him with your own eyes.

His worst enemy couldn't wish him this.

Have any man's eyes ever seen sufferings more terrible?

Mine have not.

What mania, what insanity has turned your brain, man of all sorrows?

Some demon of the night.

Some destructive impulse in man, prowling silently round you,

waiting its chance.

Has sprung within human strength, howling at your throat.

I am fascinated and repelled in a trance of horror

and pity.

I want to watch your pain and to turn from it.

I want to learn from your torment.

But I shudder at what the knowledge might mean.

Pity someone.

I can't see where my legs are taking me.

Is that my voice, floating like a ghost in front

of my face?

The punishment begins here.

Where will the end be?

A place unspeakable to men's ears.

Horrors too dreadful for human eyes to see.

Dark now.

All dark.

This nightmarish blackness surrounds me.

I shall never see daylight again.

Black cloud a thick fog forever

enfolds me like a cloak the pain in my

eyes dear gods grinds sharper

but the pain in my memory cuts deeper this

is his life now to suffer twice over

But the body's sharp pain and the mind's dull ache.

My friends, are you there?

You don't desert me.

Still loyal, still kind.

You stay with me, although I am blind.

You give me your care.

I have no eyes now to see your face.

But I know that you're here by the sound of your voice.

Your mutilated eyes.

What darkness in your mind.

What demon could bring you to such despair?

Apollo, my friends!

Apollo the God!

His power... So determine, my agony, that these eyes were blinded by my

own hands.

Why have eyes to see my own degradation and misery?

This is the truth, simple and hard.

Can the earth's loveliness or all its beauty comfort eyes like mine?

What music could I hear to soothe such pain?

What could I ever see or hope to see to bring relief or cure?

Waste no more time.

Take me from the city. No one has ever been more damned.

No pity for the man all men curse and the gods of war.

The pain in the flesh is doubled in the mind.

Ignorance made you happy.

The truth has made you blind.

Damn the man who saw my ankles bleed and cut me free from

those straps.

His mercy only made things worse. I should have died.

Did I live for this agony?

And for those that love me a lifetime of misery?

A letter, a child's grave on the mountainside. Now my name will be known

forever.

My father's killer, my mother's lover.

Born to cause suffering and to suffer.

Will there be any horror or shame not synonymous with either person or ever

a man more damned?

No, never.

You bring blindness and exile on your own head by distraction.

You would have been better dead. You

must never say that!

Never!

What has happened here has happened for the best.

Don't dare tell me otherwise.

If I could see...

How could I look my father in the face when I meet him in the underworld?

Oh, my mother.

No death could be punishment enough for the horror of what I have done to her.

Oh, my children, whom I love.

What pleasure for me to see their faces again, conceived as they were conceived.

My eyes are a father's eyes. What would they see?

and this marvellous city in which i was born the greatest among men if i had

eyes i could still see its palaces and temples which by my

own edict my own folly my own insane determination have forbidden the

murderer of lias the unclean thing that all men turn away from and the gods hate

i mean myself

With eyes in my head, how could I look anyone in the face?

Even the Theban people in the streets.

My hearing, too.

If I'd known a way to block up these receivers, or cut them off from every

sound the world makes, I'd have done that too, without regrets, to make a

prison cell of my own mind.

In solitary confinement from the world, no sight or sound of all these horrors

could touch me there.

That would be peace.

The wastelands of Cithaeron, like a nurse cradled me, kept

me alive for this.

Trees, gullies, naked rocks, you shall have let me die.

You preserved me to parade before the world the well-kept secret of who my

father was and who my mother and Corin, my childhood home, and Polybus and

Merope, whom I loved.

and thought my parents how could you imagine what a corrupt man your open

-faced boy would become in his age if ever a rosebud was soggy and rotten

within if ever an apple was filthy with maggots let these images describe me in

my youth born damned among the damned

and that triple junction under the trees that overgrown place where three roads

meet do the trees still remember and the shaded pathways what happened there

whose blood was spilt my father's my own on the way to thebes i was that day and

what acts i did when i got there on the dead man's wife entering so joyfully the

same passage that gave me exit into the world sowing my seed in the warm earth

When I was German, it's a marriage for a monster.

Father, brother, son, bride, wife, mother, children, sisters, all

confused, horribly mingled in a liaison, too filthy to give a name to, too

corrupt to be remembered with anything but loathing. No more then.

Nothing.

What should never have been done should never be spoken of.

Take me away.

Quickly, for God's sake.

Hide me as far from the city as a man can go.

Drown me.

Bury my body under the floor of the ocean.

Where are you?

Is anyone there?

Or have you all gone?

For pity's sake, someone, help me.

Don't leave me alone.

Take me.

You need not draw back.

It's not infectious, this crime of mine. I am the one who must bear the guilt and

the punishment and the shame.

And I must bear it alone.

It's up to him now to deal with you. He will advise us and take action as

provisional governor in your place.

Pray on.

Of course.

There's nothing I can say to him.

And why should he listen to anything I say?

I've treated him unjustly.

I haven't come to crow, Edithus, now you are down.

or to accuse you of crimes or misjudgments committed in the past.

But you, people, if you have no respect for the common decencies, the sympathy

due to any man's suffering, revere the sun at least, whose warmth and

brightness sustains us.

The open street at the end of the day is no place for a thing unclean, cursed,

and sentenced to be cast out.

Not even in the open air, on the common earth, or under the rain from heaven

will he find welcome or shelter.

Take him in.

His sufferings are no business of the public. It's private.

A question of family, grief, and prayer.

A matter for his relations, not the whole city. This is a kindness, Creon.

More than I expected in my degradation.

For your sake.

Not mine.

Let me ask one favor.

What favor? You need not go on your knees.

Get rid of me quickly.

Deport me to some empty wasteland where the human voice is never heard.

I could have done that already, of course.

But it seems safer as a matter of priority to consult the Oracle.

But the Oracle has spoken.

unambiguously kill the father killer, drive out the unclean thing.

I am the man. That's true. That's what was said.

But in circumstances as extraordinary as these, it seemed safer to consult the

god again. For what?

I am the cause of all this pain and the punishment is known. What is there to

ask? Haven't you of all men learned to trust the gods?

Yes, I've learned that.

One favor more I must ask or beg.

The woman who lies dead in the palace, let her be buried

decently with whatever formalities you think appropriate.

She's your sister, your flesh and blood, and you owe her that.

In my case...

Thebes is my country, my homeland, though I never knew it until today, and

my presence alive within her walls would be a curse on her. Let me leave and go

up into my own mountains of Cithaeron.

My mother and father left me there to die in the wilderness, and I shall die

now in accordance with their wishes who wished me dead.

My death, I know, will be mysterious.

My life was saved miraculously, and not for the common death of old age or

sickness, but for some other ending, awe-inspiring and perhaps evil.

Let it come as it will.

And now, my children.

The boys, Creon, Polyneices and Eteocles, they're almost men and can

look after themselves wherever they go. But the girls?

They're so small, such babies yet.

They have shared everything with me, food and drink and company. I doubt if

they've ever so much as eaten a meal away from their father. Look after them,

Creon, for my sake.

And if I could just once more touch them and

share my tears with their... Just once more.

Kindness and generosity could do no more.

Grasping their hands and remembering, I could imagine I had eyes to see

them once more before I go.

I heard something.

Are they here already?

Are they crying?

You have taken pity, Creon, and brought them to me unasked. The dearest of my

children. Am I right?

I know how much you love them, and love them still in spite of everything. God

bless you, Creon.

May you have better luck both as a king and as a man than I've had.

Children, where are you?

Come here to me.

Embrace me.

Antigone is maining.

These hands are your brother's hands and your father's.

The hands that blinded me.

I was blind already, if the truth be known. I saw nothing as I fathered you

on my own mother.

Only a wife was ever a man more blind.

My eyes can't see you now, but they can cry still, and they do, to

think what hard lives you will lead in the world when you're grown up, the

vicious things people will say, festivals and public holidays.

No fun for you, they'll be, staying at home in tears while the others enjoy

themselves, and then later, when you're old enough to be married, where is the

man who will be...

brave or foolhardy enough to take you on, and that scandalous reputation that

you'll stick to all my children and my children's children. Their father killed

his father, then ploughed up the same ground where he sprouted, gave his own

mother children. Those girls, yes, they're his sisters. That's the sort of

thing people will say.

And who will marry you in those circumstances?

Nobody will.

My poor girls, virginity and barrenness is all you can look forward to.

Crayon. Menoikis was your father, and you must be their father now as nearest

kin, the two of us who brought them into the world both dead, or dead to them.

They're quite alone apart from you.

Don't let them wander as orphans through the world, homeless as well as

husbandless, and don't condemn them to share the punishment that falls on me.

They're very young, very poor now.

And if you don't help them quite without hope, promise me.

And take my hand upon the promise.

Good brother.

Good!

If you were older, my girls, and could understand such things, I

could tell you so much.

But we'll leave that now.

When you say your prayers, ask for peace, a place to call home,

and a better life than your father's.

That's enough.

No more tears in public.

You must go inside.

No.

Not yet.

Just a moment longer.

Even against your better judgment.

No.

Everything must be done correctly. The proper thing at the proper time. On one

condition.

Then I have your promise. I promise to send me into exile.

That is the gods' decision, not mine.

I shall follow their instructions.

Don't force me in there when the gods hate me. If they hate you, they will

cast you out. But do you agree?

Will you do what I ask?

No. I shall do what I say I will do.

No.

I'm in your hands.

Then go in.

But leave the children here.

The children?

Don't take them away from me.

Don't do that.

Don't give me orders Those days are over your orders have brought you

to this Now you must learn to obey

people of thebes inheritors of the ancient city of our ancestors

you have all seen oedipus the king who solved the riddle the she

-monster sang and by his genius saved the state and whose fame for that deed

was so great no man could but envy him overwhelmed by a

tidal wave of disasters

That will sweep him to his grave.

Judge no man's life until he is dead.

There are no winners till the race is run. Call no man fortunate

or safe from pain.

Till he lies in his last everlasting bed.

That the earth covers his head.