Preview

How Does Oedipus Control His Fate

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
894 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
How Does Oedipus Control His Fate
Consider that life is predestined or that characters are controlled by higher forces. It is told that within Oedipus Rex that Oedipus has no control over what has transpired in his journey from baby to man. In A Doll House, Nora’s life is controlled by Torvald in her job as a mother and a wife. Oedipus is the victim of the God’s fate, a life that which was written by them, or so the characters in the the play describe. At the end of the play, Oedipus does an action to himself by his own hands. When Nora leaves Torvald and her children she is making her own choice; a choice she decided on her own. She is tired of the conditions of which she lives under and makes her own decision. Oedipus is controlled by higher forces in which he has no control …show more content…
Citizens are not to question the fate the gods put upon them or the destiny they have written for every person. Oedipus does not seem capable of changing his fate, though by the end of the play he questions the gods motives. “I Oedipus, who bear the famous name”(Sophocles 960) Oedipus says this in the beginning of the play and clearly is full of pride and dignity that he believes himself to be above the gods power. Oedipus killing the original king of Thebes and solving the riddle of the Sphinx changed Thebes, but was it fate that drove Oedipus to kill the king or solve the riddle. It is fate that pursues Oedipus to find his identity but fate is responsible for his incest. When Oedipus summons Teiresias to Thebes, The blind man tells that one cannot outrun fate or change it. Teiresias explains to the company present that the man who killed King Laius is in Thebes. …show more content…
For Oedipus’s reasoning is blinding himself from his doomed sight and leaving Thebes for the rest of his days. Nora leaves Torvald her life and her children as a wife and mother behind to find her own Identity. Both characters can not accept the fates they have been given and choose and in the end make their choices to forge their own destiny. Fate is an universal principle that one cannot control, but we can choose our own paths and the same time and create new destinies for

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    Pride In Oedipus Rex

    • 316 Words
    • 2 Pages

    The people believed at the time of Sophocles that an individual achieves his destiny as a result of his own fate. This is true in the case of Oedipus the king, whose anger; pride and blindness towards the truth bring his tragic downfall. At the start of the play, Oedipus is depicted as a confident ruler, who saved Thebes from the curse of Sphinx, furthermore, he becomes the king overnight. He declares his name gladly just as it were itself a recuperating charm: “Here I am myself— / you all know me, the world knows my fame: / I am Oedipus” (7–9). At the end, this pride becomes the curse for him (Sophocles, 1882).…

    • 316 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    The role of fate is the power that determines the outcome of events as well as the actions of how people choose what they want to do can contribute to a breakdown of a person. In Oedipus Rex by Sophocles, Oedipus’ own actions through his life contribute to his downfall at the end of the play. It is Oedipus choice to look for answers of his childhood. Oedipus’ blindness to the truth of his life causes him to make a decision to become blind at his downfall. The excessive pride Oedipus has results in his decision to going after king Laios murderer not knowing he is the murderer. The actions of Oedipus are factors in his downfall as he chooses to fill in missing information of his childhood.…

    • 983 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    When Oedipus learns the truth about his identity he must decide what he should do about the city of Thebes and his marriage to his birth mother. Seeing his wife dead ultimately causes him to gouge his eyes out with her pins and become blind and he then asks to be banned from the city of Thebes, which means he is now alone, powerless, and no longer the king. As for Nora, after her husband finds out the truth about her forging a signature he shows his true colors, and Nora then realizes that her whole life has been an act. First with the way her father treated her and now once again with her husband. She is left with two decisions, either to live on as a married couple but under her husband’s oppression or to leave her husband and family and go about her life. Nora comes to the conclusion of leaving Helmer, her husband as well as her children. Although many may say that this is not a tragedy because Nora is now free from her husband and the life of an inanimate object; however the fact that she is leaving behind her children and the man she once thought she loved is a tragedy that not everyone would understand. Both Oedipus and Nora show true characteristics of going through a tragic dilemma equally. Although both examples are different and one is more dramatic then the other, nonetheless they…

    • 1128 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In the play, people lived their lives based on fate. The people relied on oracles to reveal this fate. Oedipus attempted to control this by using his free will. The oracle disclosed that he will kill his father and marry his mother. Oedipus wanted to prevent this from happening so he used his free will to control his life’s direction. He chose to leave his home in Corinth. He moved to the town of Thebes, where he met his love and had four children. Unbeknownst to him, fate had taken over and he moved to the city Thebes, where his birth parents actually lived. His love was later revealed as his birth mother.…

    • 566 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In Sophocles’ O edipus The King, Oedipus was born with the curse that he would kill his father, Laios, and marry his mother, Jocasta. Oedipus tries to avoid his fate by running away from Corinth, however this causes him and Laios to meet one last time, and Oedipus ends up fulfilling the prophecy. With this in mind, the gods create a person’s predetermined fate, and no one can ever escape it, as Jocasta points out; “No mortal can practise the art of prophecy, no man can see the future.” (935). O edipus The King i llustrates t hat the gods have the ultimate power in people's’ lives rather than free will of the people, an individual cannot overcome fate because the gods determine their future, and personalities are chosen by the gods and as well…

    • 820 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    It is common belief to assume that mankind does indeed have free will and each individual can decide the outcome of his or her life. Fate and free will both decide the fate of Oedipus the King. However, it not fair for Oedipus to take full responsibility of killing his father and having an incent relationship with Queen Jocasta because fate has overcome his free will.…

    • 1552 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    birds were known for helping the gods' oracles to see the future or an individual's…

    • 387 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Oedipus blinds himself in shame, accepting full responsibility for poising the city and willingly takes the punishment of exile. In the end, Oedipus’ arrogance led to his downfall. He lost his wife, his eyesight and his kingship. He uncovered the riddles of his life and found out that he was the boy who was the subject of the prophecy. His intelligence, egotism and arrogance led to this finding which caused him losing all that he had. The resolution of his life puts Oedipus above any other tragic hero. He unravels his life in a way that pushes the limits of agony a human can take and there he finds incomparable greatness of…

    • 669 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Fate In Oedipus The King

    • 565 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The concept of fate is a controversial theme in literature, but the dilemma faced by Vulcan and Cryos shows that human destiny is inevitable and should be embraced instead. Inevitable is often defined as an unavoidable situation, one that is associated with impending doom. One such example is found in the tale of Oedipus Rex, the tragic hero of Thebes who is destined to kill his father and marry his mother. Oedipus learns that in attempting to run away from the prophecy, he fulfills it instead. After blinding himself in shame, Oedipus bemoans to his friends that “my measure of ills fills my measure of woe; Author was none, but I” (Sophocles 47). Oedipus laments the fact that he was the one who authored his fate as he tried to run away from it.…

    • 565 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Oedipus Rex

    • 456 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Oedipus is not the puppet of his own fate, but indeed the creator of his own fate. Oedipus creates his own fate because after hearing the oracle, he did not return to his hometown, Corinth, but went to Thebes. He was afraid of making his fate come true, so he did everything possible to avoid the fate. He did not realize that by avoiding his fate, he was actually heading toward it. In Thebes, he fulfills his fate by killing his father and taking his mother as his bride. Soon, he tries to investigate who killed Laios, but he does not know it was actually himself. None of Oedipus’s choice were predetermined, and nor were they accidental.…

    • 456 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    In Oedipus the King by Sophocles, Oedipus is responsible for the tragedy of his downfall. Fate and free will are two opposing ideas that Sophocles seamlessly blends into the play. Sophocles ultimately leaves it up to the audience to interpret the reality behind this argument. Oedipus is presented with a series of choices throughout the play, and his arrogant and stubborn nature push him to impulsively make the wrong decisions, the decisions that ultimately lead him to his downfall. While Oedipus and those around him consider "fate" the source of Oedipus' problems, Oedipus' decisions show the audience that it is he who is responsible. Sophocles is able to drive his message about the pitfalls of human arrogance through Oedipus' fatal flaws and…

    • 1182 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Free will is something that has always been questioned from the beginning of time. Do we really have the option of free will, or are we all destined to fate? The ancient Greeks believed in fate and that the gods had complete control over our lives. That concept is also believed in modern day society; Christianity believes that God has a plan for us and that our futures are already preordained. We see throughout the play that Oedipus’s life was prophesied from the beginning and as much as he tries to avoid it fate always seems to find him.…

    • 716 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Fate vs. Free Will puzzle has been very controversial in the past. The answer to this very complicated puzzle lies in one’s moral values, because in the end that's what one chooses to believe. Oedipus possesses a sense of pride and ego. This feeling blinds him from seeing the truth because he essentially doesn’t want to believe the truth. One cannot change his fate, but he can merely change its course. One’s destination has and will always be the same. Sophocles beautifully portrays this theme in his well-written tragedy: Oedipus…

    • 602 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Humanities

    • 878 Words
    • 4 Pages

    It is always said that we are all predestined with a set prophecy. No matter how much one tries to escape it, our fate will always conquer. Whether it’s finding the right person who you are going to marry or the career path a person chooses, it’s all up to the decision of fate. Knowing ones fate can either uplift or destroy a person because of the path it permits the person to take. Oedipus Rex by Sophocles is a prime example of how one’s fate destroys him and he couldn’t escape it. Oedipus being the main character, gains knowledge of his horrid fate and attempts to break away from it. Because Oedipus gains knowledge of his fate and does try and run from it, he mistakenly kills his father and marries his mother, denies the truth, and blinds himself.…

    • 878 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Oedipus The King Free Will

    • 1244 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Unlike the king that dies with his image and greatness, a self sacrificing individual dies with the start of their legacy. In the play Oedipus, the protagonist’s free will generates the downfall in the play which becomes clear that fate takes over his life. Oedipus, the protagonist, is still able to make his own decisions; however, he was mainly mortified based on his lack of judgment and his bad decisions throughout the play. Aristotle, the Greek philosopher considers this play to be a huge example of tragic drama and theory in it due to Oedipus’s terrible philosophy long ago. “Shepherd: There had been prophecies... It was said that the boy would kill his own father.” (64). Even though young Oedipus could not control the sociological causes during his childhood, he failed to acknowledge the truth about himself even when he was told by several other character in the play and still refuses to face his responsibilities.…

    • 1244 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays