Oedipus The King Fate Vs Free Will Research Paper

710 Words3 Pages
David Romano Mrs. Flanders English 10 Honors March 30th, 2015 Oedipus the King: Fate versus Free Will Throughout Oedipus the King there are many prevalent themes that transpire in the story. One of these themes is fate versus free will and whether a person’s choices, or the god’s choices for them are more important. During the time that Sophocles’ wrote this play, the gods were very highly respected and honored for the control that they had on people’s lives’. Despite the changes that occurred because of free will, fate influence was much greater, because of the inability for Oedipus to escape the oracle given to him, mainly because of the character traits given to him and the other characters by the gods. Throughout the play Oedipus makes many choices that…show more content…
“Oedipus relentlessly forges ahead, a man of action fixated on solving this old mystery. Of course, Oedipus has noble motives; he begins his quest for the killer out of civic mindedness, to purge Thebes of its guilt and the resultant plague,” (Korovessis). This is shown when Oedipus is interrogating Tiresias by saying “You scum of the earth, you’d enrage a heart of stone! You won’t talk? Nothing moves you? Out with it, once and for all,” (Sophocles 276). After discovering that the source of Thebes recent struggles was that the murderer of Laius was still in the city, Oedipus goes on a manhunt stopping at nothing to find the killer. Little does he know, that he is the killer and that his obstinacy will lead to the suicide of his wife/mother, the exile from his city, and binding of his own eyes. If Oedipus had not focused so much of his attention on finding the killer but instead finding other ways to support Thebes in their hard times, Oedipus could have evaded his
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    the outcomes of man, but did they predict correctly the outcome of Oedipus the King. This takes us to fate vs. free will, which is a very strong and recurring theme throughout the play. Although, both fate and free will can be argued as the downfall of Oedipus. In the beginning, Oedipus has sent Creon to see the oracle and try to rid Thebes of its plague. But after his trip, the rest of the play takes a drastic turn. When Oedipus learns that in order to cure Thebes he must find the killer of the

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