(gentle piano music) (footsteps pattering) (door squeaks) - My children, latest generation born from Cadmus, why are you sitting here with wreathed sticks in supplication to me, while our city fills with incense, chants and cries of pain?

Children, it would not be appropriate for me to learn of this from any other source, so I have come in person, I Oedipus, whose fame all men acknowledge.

But you there, priest, you seem to be the one who wants to speak for those assembled here.

What emotion brings you to me, fear or desire?

You will be confident that I will help you, I shall assist you willingly in every way, for I would be a hard-hearted man indeed if I did not pity suppliants like these.

- Oedipus, ruler of my native land, you see how people here of every age are crouching down around your altars, some fledglings barely strong enough to fly and others bent by age, with priests as well for I'm priest of Zeus, and these ones here, the pick of all our youth, the other groups sit in the market place with suppliant sticks or else in front of Pallas' two shrines, or where Ismenus prophesies with fire, for our city, as you yourself can see, is badly shaken.

She cannot raise her head above the depths of so much surging death, disease infects the fruit blossoms in the land, disease infects our herds of grazing cattle, makes women in labor lose their children.

And deadly pestilence, oh that fiery god, swoops down to blast the city, emptying the house of Cadmus and fills black Hades with groans and howls.

So these children and myself now sit here by your home, not because we think you're equal to the gods, no.

We judge you the first of men in what happens in this life and in our interactions with the gods.

For you came here to our Cadmeian city, and freed us from the tribute we were paying to that cruel singer, and yet you knew no more than we did, and had not been taught.

In their stories the people testify, how with gods' help you gave us back our lives.

(exhales heavily) So Oedipus, our king, most powerful in all mens eyes, we're here as suppliants, begging you to find some help for us, either by listening to a heavenly voice or learning from some other human being, don't let our memory of your ruling here declare that we were first set right again and later fell, no.

Restore our city so that it stands secure.

In those times past you brought us joy and with good omens too, be that same man today.

If you're to rule as you are doing now, it's better to be king in a land of men than in a desert.

An empty ship or city wall is nothing if no men share your life together there.

- My poor children, I know why you have come.

I am not ignorant of what you yearn for, for I well know that you are ill, and yet sick as you are, there is not one of you whose illness equals mine.

Your agony comes to each one of you as his alone, a special pain for him and no one else, but the soul inside me sorrows for myself, for the city, and for you all together.

You are not rousing me from a deep sleep, you must know I've been shedding many tears, and in my wandering thoughts exploring many pathways.

So, I get followed up on the one thing that I could find and acted on it.

So I have sent away my brother-in-law Creon, to Apollo shrine to learn what we might do from the gods.

But, as I count the days, the amount of time that he's been gone, I now fear for what he's doing.

For he has been gone too long, well past the time he should have taken, but when he returns I will be a wicked man indeed if I do not act on all the god reveals.

- What you have said is most appropriate, for these men have just informed me that Creon is approaching from Lord Apollo.

- As he returns may fine shining fortune bright as his countenance attend on him.

My royal kinsman, child of Menoeceus, what news from the god do you bring us?

- Good news, we'll tell you all events happily if we come to the right conclusion.

- What is the oracle?

So far your words inspire in me no confidence or fear.

- Well, if you wish we can speak the news in public, I am prepared to so or we could step inside.

- Speak out to everyone, the grief I feel for these citizens is even greater than any pain I should feel for my own life.

- Well then, let me report what I heard from the god.

Lord Phoebus clearly demand you drive away this polluting stain which our land has harbored, which will not heal if we keep nursing it.

- What sort of cleansing, and this disaster, how did it happen?

- By banishment, or the atonement for murder by shedding blood, this blood brings the storm which blasts our state.

- And the one whose fate the god revealed, what sort of man is he?

- Well, before you came my lord to rule our ship of state, Laius ruled this land.

- Yes I have heard that, but no one has seen the man.

- He was killed, and now the god is clear, those murderers he says, must be punished, whoever they are.

- Where are they, in what country?

Where am I to find a trace of this ancient crime, it will be hard to track.

- Here in Thebes so says the god, what is sought is found, but what is overlooked escapes.

- When Laius fell in bloody death, where was he?

At home, or in his fields, or in another land?

- He was abroad, on a trip to Delphi, that is what he told us.

He began the trip but certainly did not return.

- Was there no messenger, no companion who made the journey with him, and witnessed what took place and came back, one who might provide some knowledge that men could use?

- They were all killed, except for one who was scared and ran away, but not before we were able to ask him one thing.

- What was that?

We might get somewhere if we had one fact, we could find many things if we had some slender hope to get us going.

- He said it was robbers, not just a single man but a group of them.

They all came on and they attacked Laius.

- How would a thief have dared to do this, if he did not have financial help from Thebes?

- That's what we thought, but with the king dead and no one sought revenge.

- When the ruling king had fallen in this way, what bad trouble blocked your path, preventing you from looking into it?

- It was the Sphinx, she sang her enigmatic song and (indistinct) investigation, you know what the matter at hand.

- Then I will start afresh, and once again shine light on darkness.

It is most fitting that Apollo demonstrates his care for the dead man, and worthy of you, too.

So now as is right, you will see how I work with you, seeking vengeance for this land, as well as for the god.

This polluting stain I will remove, not for some distant friend, no, but for myself.

For whoever desire to do this may soon enough desire to turn his hand on me, too, and kill me.

Thus, in avenging Laius, I serve myself.

I'll do everything I can.

With the god's help, this will all come to light successfully, or else it will prove our common ruin.

♪ May Phoebus, who sent this oracle, ♪ ♪ come as our savior and end our sickness.

♪ Oh sweet speaking voice of Zeus, you have come to glorious Thebes from golden Pytho, but what is your intent?

- My fearful heart twists on the rack and shakes with fear.

O Delian healer, for whom we cry aloud in holy awe, what obligation will you demand from me?

A thing unknown or now renewed with the revolving years?

Immortal voice, O child of golden Hope, speak to me!

- First I call on you, Athena the immortal, daughter of Zeus, and on your sister, too, Artemis, who sits on her glorious round throne in our market place.

And on Phoebus, who shoots from far away.

O you three guardians against death, appear to me!

- If before now you have ever driven off a fiery plague to keep away disaster from the city and have banished it, come to us this time as well!

- Alas, the pains I bear are numberless.

My people now all sick with plague, our minds can find no weapons to serve as our defense.

Now the offspring of our splendid earth no longer grow, nor do our women crying out in labor getting relief from a living new-born child.

- [All] Our city dies, we've lost count of all the dead.

- Her sons lie in the dirt unpitied, unlamented.

Corpses spread the pestilence as youthful wives and grey-haired mothers on the altar steps wail everywhere and cry in supplication, seeking to relieve their agonizing pain.

- Their solemn chants ring out.

They mingle with the voices of lament.

O Zeus' golden daughter, send your support and strength, your lovely countenance!

- And that ravenous Ares, god of killing, who now consumes me as he charges on with no bronze shield but howling battle cries, let him turn his back and leave this land.

For if disaster does not come at night, day arrives to see it does its work.

O you who wield that mighty flash of fire, O Zeus, with your lighting blast let Ares be destroyed!

- O Lyceian lord, how I wish those arrows from the golden string of your bent bow with their all-conquering force would wing out and champion us against our enemy.

And with the blazing fires of Artemis, as well, with which she races through the Lycian hills.

- I call upon the god who binds his hair with gold, the one whose name our country shares, the one to whom the Maenads shout their cries.

Dionysus with his radiant face, may he come to us with his flaming torchlight, our ally against Ares, a god dishonored among gods.

- You pray, but if you listen now to me, you'll get your wish.

Hear now what I have to say and treat your own disease, and then you may find some relief from your distress.

I shall speak as one who is a stranger to the story, a stranger to the crime.

If I alone were tracking down this act, I would not get far without a single clue.

As is the case, as it was after the event that I became a citizen of Thebes, I now proclaim the following to all of you Cadmeians.

Whoever it is who knows the man who murdered Laius, son of Labdacus, I order him to reveal it all to me.

And if the murderer's afraid, I urge him to avoid the major charges against him by speaking out against himself.

If so, he will be sent out from this land unhurt and undergo no further punishment.

If someone knows that the killer is a stranger from some other land, let him not stay mute.

As well as a reward, he'll earn my thanks.

But if he remains quiet, if anyone, through fear, hides himself or a friend of his against my orders, here's what I shall do.

So listen to my words.

For I decree that no one in this land, in which I rule as your king, is to give that killer shelter or talk to him, or act in concert with him during prayers.

Ban him from your homes, each one of you, for he is our pollution, as the Pythian god has just revealed to me.

In doing this, I'm acting as an ally of the god and of dead Laius, too.

And I pray, whoever it is who did this act, the worst of agonies to wear out his wretched life.

And I pray, too, that if this man is to become an honored guest in my household and with my knowledge, I shall suffer all the things I've just called down upon the killers.

Now, I possess the ruling power which Laius held in earlier days.

I have his bed and his wife, she would have borne his children if his hopes to have a son had not been disappointed.

Children from a common mother might have linked Laius and myself, but as it turned out, fate swooped down upon his head.

So now I will fight on his behalf, as if the matter concerned my own father, and I will do everything I can to find the man who spilled his blood and kill them.

As for those of you Cadmeians who do not follow what I urge, I pray the gods send you no fertile land, no, and no children in our women's wombs, may they perish in our present fate or one more hateful still.

And to all of you Cadmeians who support my efforts, may Justice, our ally, and all the gods look down on you with kindness always.

- My lord, since you extend your oath to me, I will say this.

I am not the murderer, nor can I tell you who the killer is.

As for what you're seeking, it is for Apollo, who launched this search to state who did it.

- That is well said, but no man has the power to force the gods to speak against their will.

- May I then suggest what seems to me to be the next best course of action?

- Yes, and if there is a third course, don't hesitate to let me know.

- Our lord Teiresias is know to be able to see into things, like lord Apollo.

With him, a man investigating this may well find out the details of the crime.

- I've looked into that, it's not something I could overlook.

At Creon's urging, I have sent two messengers to go find him and have been wondering for some time now why he has not come.

- Apart from that, there are rumors, but inconclusive ones from a long time ago.

- What kind of rumors?

I'm looking into every story.

- It was said that Laius was killed by certain traveler.

- Yes, I've heard as much, but no one has seen the one who did it.

- Well, if the killer has any fears, once he hears your charges against him, he will not hold back, for they are serious.

- When a man has no fear of doing the act, he is not afraid of words.

- No, not in the case where no one stands there to convict him.

But at last it seems that Teiresias is being guided here, our god-like prophet, in whom the truth resides more so than any other men.

- Teiresias, you who understand all things, that what can be taught and what cannot be spoken of, what happens in heaven and what happens down here on the earth.

You know, although you cannot see, how sick our state is.

And so we find in you alone, great seer, our shield and savior.

For Phoebus Apollo, as I'm not sure if you've heard the news, has sent us an answer to our question.

The only cure for this infecting pestilence is to find the men who murdered Laius, son of Labdacus, and kill them or else expel them from this land as an exile.

So do not withhold from us your prophecies by the voices of the birds or by some other means.

Save this city and yourself.

Rescue me, save us from this pollution by the dead, for any mortal man's finest labor is to help with all his power other human beings.

- Alas, alas!

How dreadful it can be to have wisdom when it brings no benefit to the man possessing it.

This I knew, but it had slipped my mind.

Otherwise, I would not have journeyed here.

- What's wrong?

You've come, but you seem so sad.

- Let me go home, you must bear your burden to the very end, and I will carry mine, if you'll agree with me.

- What you are saying is not customary and shows little love toward the city state which nurtured you if you deny us your prophetic voice.

- I see your words are also out of place.

I do not speak for fear of doing the same.

- If you know something, then by all means, do not turn away.

We are your suppliants, all of us.

We bend our knees to you.

- You are all ignorant.

I will not reveal the troubling things inside me, which I can call your grief as well.

- What are you saying?

Do you know and will not say?

Do you intend to betray me and destroy the city?

- I will cause neither me nor you distress.

Why do you vainly question me like this?

You will not learn a thing from me.

- You would move something made of stone to rage!

Will you not speak out?

Will your stubbornness never have an end?

- You blame my temper, but do not see the one which lives within you.

Instead, you are finding fault with me.

- What man would listen to these words of yours and not be enraged.

You insult the city!

- Yet events will still unfold, for all my silence.

- Since they will come, you must inform me.

- I will say nothing more.

Fume on about it if you wish, as fiercely as you can.

- Oh, I will.

In my anger I will not conceal just what I make of this.

You should know, I get the feeling you conspired in the act, and did everything, you could short of killing the man with your own hands.

If you could use your eyes, I would have said you had done all of this work by yourself.

- Oh, is that so?

Then I would ask you to stand by the very words which you yourself proclaimed and from now on not speak to me or these men.

For the accursed polluter of this land is you.

- You dare to utter shameful words like this?

Do you think you can get away with it?

- I am getting away with it.

The truth within me makes me strong.

- What do you mean?

Speak the words again, so I can understand them more precisely.

- Did you not grasp my words before, or are you trying to test me with your question?

- I did not fully understand your words.

Tell me again.

- I say that you yourself are the very man you're looking for.

- That is twice you've uttered that disgraceful lie, something you will regret.

- Shall I tell you more, so you can grow even more enraged?

- As much as you wish, it will be useless.

- I said that with your dearest family, unknown to you, you are living in disgrace.

You have no idea how bad things are.

- Do you really think you can just speak out and say things like this, and still remain unpunished?

- Yes, I can, if the truth has any strength.

- It does, but not for you.

For your ears, your mind, your eyes are blind.

- You are a wretched fool to use harsh words, soon enough all man will use to curse you.

- You live in endless darkness of the night, so you can never injure me or any man who can glimpse daylight.

- It is not your fate to fall because of me.

It is up to Apollo to make that happen.

He will be enough.

- Is this something that Creon has devised, or is this your invention?

- Creon is no threat.

You have caused this trouble on your own.

- O riches, ruling power, skill after skill surpassing all in this life's rivalries, how much envy you must carry with you, if, for this kingly office, which the city gave me, for I did not seek it out.

Creon, my old trusted family friend, has conspired to overthrow me and paid off a double-dealing quack like this, a crafty bogus priest, who can only see his own advantage and who in his special art is absolutely blind.

Come on, in the name of all the gods tell me this, when the Sphinx, that singing bitch was here, you did nothing to set the people free, why not?

Her riddle was not something that the first man to stroll along could solve, no.

A prophet was required.

And there the people saw your knowledge was of no use.

No signals from birds or words from the gods, but then I came, Oedipus, who knew nothing and yet I finished her off, using my wits rather than relying on birds.

That is the man you want to overthrow, hoping, no doubt, to sit up there with Creon, once he's king.

But I think you and your conspirator in this will regret trying to usurp the state.

- To us it sounds as if Teiresias has spoken in anger, and, Oedipus, you have done so, too.

That is not what we need, but what we should be looking into is this, how can we best carry out the god's decree?

- You may be king, but I have the right to answer you and I control that right, for I am not your slave, I serve Apollo.

Since you have chosen to insult my blindness, you have your eyesight, yet you do not see how miserable you are, or where you live, or who it is who shares your household.

Do you know the family you come from?

Without your knowledge you've become the enemy of your own kindred, those down below and those up here, and the dreadful feet of that two-edged curse from father and mother both will drive you from this land in exile.

Those eyes of yours, which now can see so clearly, will be dark.

What harbor will not echo with your cries?

Where on Cithaeron will they not soon be heard, once you have learned the truth about the wedding by which you sailed into this royal house, a lovely wedding, but the harbor's doomed?

You've no idea of the quantity of other troubles which will render you and your own children equals.

So go on, keep insulting Creon and my prophecies, for among all living mortals no one will be destroyed more wretchedly than you.

- Must I tolerate this insolence?

Get out, and may the plague get rid of you!

Off with you, now!

And don't come back here to my home ever again.

- I would not have come, but you summoned me.

- I did not know you would speak so stupidly.

If I had, you would have waited a long time before being summoned here.

- I was born like this.

You think I am a fool, but to your parents, the ones who made you, I was wise enough.

- Wait, my parents?

Who was my father?

- This day will reveal that and destroy you.

- Everything you speak is all so cryptic, like a riddle.

- But you know in solving riddles, I am not the best there is.

- Mock my excellence, but you will find out I am truly great.

- [Teiresias] That quality of yours now ruins you.

- I do not care, if I have saved the city.

- [Teiresias] I will go now.

Boy, lead me away.

- Yes, let him guide you back for you're just in the way.

Once you're gone, you won't provoke or annoy me further.

- I'm going, but first I shall tell you why I came.

I do not fear the face of your displeasure, there is no way you can destroy me.

I tell you, the man you have been seeking all this time, while proclaiming threats and issuing orders about, the one who murdered Laius, that man is here.

According to reports, he is a stranger who lives here in Thebes, but he will prove to be a native Theban.

From that change he will derive no pleasure.

He will be blind, although now he can see.

He will be poor, although he now is rich.

He will set off for a foreign country, groping the ground before him with a stick.

And he will turn out to be the brother of the children in his house.

Their father, too, both at once, and the husband and the son of the very woman who gave birth to them.

He sowed the same womb as his father and murdered him.

Go in and think on this.

If you discover I have spoken falsely, you can say I lack all skill in prophecy.

- Speaking from the Delphic rock the oracular voice intoned a name, but who is the man who with his blood-red hands has done unspeakable brutality?

- The time has come for him to flee, to move his powerful foot more swiftly than those hooves on horses riding on the storm.

- That wise interpreter of prophecies stirs up my fears, unsettling dread.

I cannot approve of what he said and I cannot deny it.

- I'm confused, what shall I say?

My hopes flutter here and there, with no clear glimpse of past or future.

I have never heard of any quarreling, past or present, between those two.

The house of Labdacus and Polybus' son, which could give me evidence enough to undermine the fame of Oedipus, as he seeks vengeance for the unsolved murder for the family of Labdacus.

- [All] Apollo and Zeus are truly wise, they understand what humans do.

- But there is no sure way to ascertain if human prophets grasp things any more than I do, although in wisdom one man may leave another far behind.

But until I see the words confirmed, I will not approve of any man who censures Oedipus.

It was clear when that winged Sphinx went after him he was a wise man then, we witnessed it.

He passed the test and endeared himself to all the city.

So in my thinking now, he will never be guilty of a crime.

- You citizens, I have just discovered that Oedipus, our king, has leveled charges against me, disturbing allegations.

So I have come here, in these troubled times, for if I have injured him in word or deed, then I have (indistinct) having wished to grow ripe old age bearing his reproach.

For the single (indistinct) from this report is no single isolated matter, but for any scope of all, if I'm to be called a bad man in the city, been called a wicked citizen by you.

- And my friends, perhaps he charged you spurred on by the rash power of his rage, rather than his mind's true judgment.

- Was it publicized that my opinion convinced Teiresias to utter lies?

- That's what was said, just for that matter I do no know.

- Did he accuse me with a steady gaze, in a normal state of mind?

- I do not know.

What those in power do I do not see.

But he's approaching from the palace, here he comes in person.

- You, how did you get here?

Has your face grown so bold that you now come to my own home?

You who are obviously the murderer of the man whose house it was.

Come, in the name of all the gods, tell me this, did you plan to do it because you thought I was a coward or a fool?

Or did you think I would not learn about your actions as they crept up on me with such deceit, or that, if I knew, I could not deflect them?

You tell me, for this attempt of yours, is it not madness to go back to the king's place, without a horde of men, without a troop of soldiers, seeking out the god, which only gold or factions could attain?

- That's enough, listen to me.

It is my turn now to make a suitable response.

Once you know, then you can judge me for yourself.

- You are a clever talker, but from you I will learn nothing for I know you now, a troublemaker, an enemy of mine.

- If you think being stubborn and forgetting common sense is wise, you're not thinking as you should.

- And if you think you can act to injure a man who is a relative of yours and escape without a penalty, then you're not thinking as you should.

- I agree, and that would make sense.

So tell me the nature of the damage that you say I've done against you.

- Did you or did you not send for Teiresias, that prophet?

- Yes, and I'd do the same again.

- How long is it since Laius- - Since Laius what?

What does he have to do with death?

- Since he was carried off and disappeared, and since he was murdered so brutally?

- That was long time ago.

- And back then was Teiresias as skilled in prophecy?

- Then, as now, he was honoured for his wisdom.

- And back then did he ever mention me?

- No, never, not while I was with him.

- Did you not investigate the killing?

- Yes, but we discovered nothing.

- And why did this man, this wise man, not speak up?

- I do not know.

And when I do not know something, I like to keep my mouth shut.

- You know enough, or at least you understand enough to say- - What?

If I have done something, I will admit it.

- If Teiresias were not working with you, he would not name me as the one who murdered Laius.

- If he says this, if only you're the one who knows, but I believe it's time for me to ask you a question that you've been asking me.

- Ask all you want, you'll not prove that I'm the murderer.

- Are you not married to my sister?

- Since you ask me, yes.

I don't deny that.

- And do you two not rule this land as equals?

- Whatever she desires, she gets from me.

And am I not third, equals power to you both?

- That's what makes your friendship so deceitful.

- No, not if you think this through, like I have.

First, consider this.

Why would anyone wish to rule with fear when they can live carefree and safe, if the powers were the same?

I, for one, have no natural desire to be king in move on to performing royal act.

The same picture for any man whose understanding grasps things properly.

For now I get everything I want from you, but without the fear.

If I were king myself, I'd be performing royal act against my will.

And I am not yet so unwise to want things that bring no benefits.

For now I greet all men, and all men greet me.

And all men that want something from you now flatter me, for it is I who bring them what they want.

So why would being king be any sweeter to me the royal power that I attain?

And my mind is wise, will not turn treacherous.

It's not in my nature to love such policies.

And if another man did, I've got to work with him.

I couldn't bear to, but if you need proof of this, go to Delphi, ask the oracle exactly what was said.

And then at that point, if you have discovered that I have planned something, or I've conspired with Teiresias, then arrest me and put me to death, and not on your authority alone, on mine as well, a double judgment.

Do not provoke me on an unproved charge.

It's not good to judge these things by guesswork, to calling bad men good or good men bad.

In my view, to throw away a noble friend is like cutting one's own life, the thing most dear to him.

Give it time, for only time will truly reveal this criminal.

A bad man will be exposed in just one day.

- For a man concerned about being killed, my lord, he has spoken eloquently.

Those who are unreliable give rash advice.

- If some conspirator moves against me, in secret and with speed, I must be quick to make my counter plans.

For if I just rest and wait for him to act, then he'll succeed in what he wants to do, and I'll be finished.

- And what do you want, to exile me from here?

- No, I want you to die, and not just run off, so I can demonstrate what envy means.

- I see you've become unbalanced.

- I'm sane enough to defend my interests.

- You should be defending mine as well.

- But you're a treacherous man, it is your nature.

- What if you are wrong?

- I still have to govern.

- Not if you do it badly.

- Oh Thebes, my city!

- I still have some power in me and it is not yours alone.

- My lords, an end to this.

I see Jocasta coming from the palace, and just in time.

With her assistance, you should bring this quarrel to a close.

- You foolish men, why are you arguing in such a silly way?

With our land so sick, are you not ashamed to start a private fight?

You, Oedipus, go in the house, and you, Creon, return to yours.

Why blow up a trivial matter into something huge?

- Sister, your husband Oedipus wishes to do one of two dreadful things to me, to banish me from my fathers' country or to kill me.

- That's right, lady.

I caught him committing treason, conspiring against my royal authority.

- May I not prosper but die a man accursed, if I have done what you claim I've done.

- In the name of the gods, Oedipus, trust him in this.

Respect his oath he made before all heaven, do it for my sake and for those around you.

- I beg you, my lord, consent to this, agree with her.

- What is it then you're asking me to do?

- Pay Creon due respect.

He has not been foolish in the past, and now that oath he's sworn has power.

- Are you aware just what you're asking?

- Yes, I understand.

- Then tell me exactly what you're saying.

- Do not accuse a friend of yours and thus dishonor him with a mere story which may not be true, when he has sworn an oath and therefore could be subject to a curse.

- By this point you should clearly understand, when you request this, what you are doing, seeking to exile me from Thebes or kill me.

- May I die the most miserable of deaths, abandoned by the gods and by my friends, if I have ever harbored such a thought, but the destruction of this city wears down on the troubled heart within me, and so does this.

If you two add new problems to the ones which we've had so long been afflicting us.

- Let him go, then, even though it;s clear I must be sent out from my own land or killed, forced out in disgrace.

I have been moved to act compassionately by what you have said, not by Creon's words.

And if he stays here, he will just be hateful to me.

- You are obstinate, obviously unhappy to concede, and when you lose your temper, you go too far.

But men like that, they find it most difficult to trust in themselves, in that there's justice.

- [Oedipus] Why not go, just leave me alone?

- I'll leave, these men here, these men know I'm a reasonable man.

- Lady, will you escort our king inside?

- Yes, once I have learned what happened here.

They talked, their words gave rise to uninformed suspicions, an all-consuming lack of proper justice.

- From both of them?

- Yes.

- And what caused it?

- With the city in such distress, it is enough, it seems to me, enough to leave things as they are.

- Now do you see the point we've reached thanks to your noble wish to dissolve and dull my firmer purpose?

- My lord, I have declared it more than once, so you know it would have been quite mad if I abandoned you, who, when my cherished Thebes, this city was in such trouble, set it right, and now in these harsh times which now consume us, should prove a trusty guide.

- By all the gods, my king, let me know why in this present crisis you now feel such unremitting rage?

- To you I will speak, since I respect you more than I do these men.

It's Creon's fault.

He conspired against me.

- In this quarrel what was said, tell me?

- Creon claims that I'm the murderer, that I killed Laius.

- And does he know this first hand, or did he picked it up from someone else?

- No, he set up that treasonous prophet.

What he says himself sounds innocent.

- Oh, forget about those things you've said and listen to me.

And ease your mind with this, no human being has skill in prophecy.

And I'll show you why with this example.

King Laius once received a prophecy.

I won't say it came straight from Apollo, but it came from one of those who assist the god.

It said Laius was fated to be killed from a child conceived of him and me.

Now, according to the story, Laius was killed by foreigners, by robbers, at a place where three roads meet.

Besides, before our child was three days old, Laius had his ankles fused tight together and ordered other men to throw him out on a mountain rock where no one ever goes.

And so, Apollo's plan that he'd be the one to murder him, didn't work.

Laius never suffered what he feared, that his own son would be his murderer, although that's what the oracle had claimed.

So don't concern yourself with prophecies.

Whatever the gods intend to bring up, they themselves make known quite easily.

- Lady, as I listen to these words of yours, my soul is shaken and my mind is confused.

- And why do you say this?

What's worrying you?

- I thought I heard you say that Laius was killed at a place where three roads meet?

- That's what we said and what people still believe.

- Where is this place?

Where did this happen?

- In a land called Phocis.

Two roads lead there, one from Delphi and one from Daulia.

- How long is it since these events took place?

- The story was reported in the city just before you took over royal power here in Thebes.

- Oh Zeus, what have you done?

What have you planned for me?

- What is it, Oedipus?

Why is your spirit so troubled?

- Not yet, no questions yet.

Tell me this instead.

Laius, how tall was he?

How old a man?

- He was big, his hair was turning white.

In shape he was not all that unlike you.

- The worse for me.

I may have just set myself under a dreadful curse without my knowledge.

- What do you mean?

As I look at you, my king, I start to tremble.

- I am afraid, full of the terrible fears the prophet sees.

But you can now reveal this better if you now tell me one thing more.

- I'm shaking, but if you ask me, I will answer you.

- Did Laius travel with a small group of soldiers, or a royal escort like a royal king?

- Five men, including a herald, went with him.

A carriage carried Laius.

- Alas, alas!

It is all too clear.

Lady, who told you this?

- A servant, the only one who had gotten away and came back here.

- Is there any chance he's still in our household now?

- No, once he returned and understood that you had now assumed the power of slaughtered Laius, he clasped my hands, begged me to send him off where animals graze out in the fields, so he could be as far away as possible from the sight of town.

And so, I sent him.

He was a slave, but he'd earned my gratitude.

He deserved an even greater favor.

- I'd like him to return here back to us, and quickly, too.

- And that can be arranged, but why's that something you would want to do?

- Lady, I'm afraid I may have said too much.

That's why I want to see him here in front of me.

- Then he will be here.

But now, my king, I deserve to learn why you are so distressed.

- My forebodings have now grown so great that I won't keep them from you, for who is there that I should confide in rather than in you about such a twisted turn of fortune.

My father was Polybus of Corinth, my mother Merope, a Dorian.

There I was considered the finest man in all the land, until, as fate would have it, something really astonishing took place, though it was not worth what it caused me to do.

At a dinner, there a man who was drunk from too much wine began shouting at me, claiming that I was not my father's real son.

That troubled me, but for a day at least I said nothing, though it was difficult.

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

And they were angry at the man who had insulted them in that way, so I was reassured, but nonetheless, the accusation always troubled me.

The story had become well known all over.

And so, I went in secret off to Delphi.

I didn't tell my mother or my father.

And Apollo sent me back without an answer.

So I didn't learn what I had come to find, but when he spoke he uttered monstrous things, strange terrors and horrific miseries, it was my fate to defile my mother's bed and to bring forth to human eyes a family which no man could bear to look down upon, and to murder the father who engendered me.

When I heard that, I ran away from Corinth.

I thought of it as just another place beneath the stars.

I traveled to other lands, so I would never see that prophecy fulfilled, the abomination of my evil fate.

In my traveling, I came across that place with which you say.

Now, lady, I will tell you the truth.

As I was on the move, I came across a place where three roads meet, and there I met a herald and a horse-drawn carriage.

And inside there was a man like you described.

The guide there tried to force me off the road and the old man, too, he got personally involved.

And in my rage, I lashed out at the driver, who was shoving me aside, and that old man, seeing me walk past him with his double whip, and struck me on my head, right here on top.

Well, I retaliated in good measure.

I hit him with a quick blow with the staff that I was holding and he fell from the carriage onto the road and then I killed them all.

If that stranger was somehow linked to Laius, who is now more unfortunate than me, what man could be more hateful to the gods?

No stranger and no citizen can welcome you into their homes, instead they must shut me from their doors, a curse that I laid upon myself with these hands of mine, these killer's hands, I now contaminate that dead man's bed.

Am I not depraved?

Am I not utterly abhorrent?

Now I must fly into exile and there, a fugitive, never to see my people, never set foot in my native land again, or else I must get married to my mother and kill my father, Polybus, who raised me, the man who gave me this life.

If someone claimed that this came from some malevolent god, would they not be right?

O you gods, you pure, blessed gods, may I never see that day.

Let me rather vanish from the sight of men, before I ever see a fate like that roll over me.

- My lord, to us these things are ominous, but you must sustain your hope until you hear from the servant who was present at the time.

- I do have some hope left, at least enough to hear from the man that we summoned from the fields.

- And once he comes, what do you hope to hear?

- I'll tell you, if we discover what he says matches what you have said, then I'll escape disaster.

You said that in your story, Laius was killed by a band of thieves.

If that is true, then I was not the killer, since one man could never be mistaken for a crowd, but if he says it was a single man, then I'm the one responsible for this.

- That's certainly what was reported though then.

He cannot now withdraw what he once said.

The whole city heard him, not just me.

And even if he does change his old words, he cannot ever demonstrate, my lord, that Laius' murder fits the prophecy.

For Apollo clearly said the man would die at the hands of an infant born from me.

Now, how did that unhappy son of ours kill Laius, when he had perished long before?

So as far as these oracular sayings go, I would not look for confirmation anywhere.

- You are right in what you say.

But nonetheless, send for that peasant.

Don't fail to do that.

- I will call him here as quickly as I can.

Let's go inside, I shall not do anything that does not meet with your approval.

- I pray fate still finds me worthy, demonstrating piety and reverence in all I say and do in everything.

Our lofty traditions consecrate, those laws engendered in the heavenly skies, whose only father is Olympus.

They were not born from mortal men, nor will they sleep and be forgotten.

In them lives an ageless mighty god.

- But I pray to god to never abolish the rivalry so beneficial to our state.

That god I will hold on to always, the one who stands as our protector.

- But if a man conducts himself disdainfully in what he says and does, and manifests no fear of righteousness, no reverence for the statues of the gods, may miserable fate seize such a man for his disastrous arrogance, and that he does not behave with justice when he strives to benefit himself, appropriates all things impiously, and, like a fool, profanes the sacred.

- What man is there who does such things, who can still claim he will ward off the arrows of the gods aimed at his heart?

If such actions are considered worthy, why should we dance to honor god?

No longer will I go in reverence to the sacred stone, the earth's very center, or to the temple at Abae or Olympia, if these prophecies fail to be fulfilled and manifest themselves to mortal men.

- [All] But if you, all-conquering, all-ruling, Zeus.

- If by right these names belong to you, let this not evade you and your ageless might.

For ancient oracles which dealt with Laius are withering, men now set them aside.

Nowhere is Apollo honored publicly, and our religious faith is dying away.

- You leading men of Thebes, I think it is appropriate for me to visit our god's sacred shrine, bearing this garland, for Oedipus has let excessive pain seize on his heart and does not understand what is happening now by thinking of the past, like a man with sense.

Instead he listens to whoever speaks to him of dreadful things.

I can do nothing more for him with my advice, and so, Lycean Apollo, I come to you, who stand here beside us, a suppliant, with offerings and prayers for you to find some way of cleansing what corrupts us.

For now we are afraid, just like those who on a ship see their helmsman terrified.

- Strangers, can you tell me where I can find the house of Oedipus, your king?

Better yet, if you know, can you tell me where he is?

- His home is here, stranger, and he's inside.

This lady is the mother of his children.

- [Man] May her happy home always be blessed, for she is his queen, true mistress of his house.

- I wish the same for you, stranger.

Your fine words make you deserve as much, but tell us now why you have come, do you seek information, or do you wish to make a report?

- Lady, I have good news for your whole house and for your husband, too.

- And what is your news?

Where have you come from?

- I've come from Corinth.

I'll give you my report at once, and then you will, no doubt, be glad, although perhaps you will be sad, as well.

- And what is your news?

How can it have two such effects at once?

- People there, in the lands beside the Isthmus, will make him their king.

They have announced it.

- What are you saying?

Is old man Polybus no longer king?

- No, he's dead and in his grave.

- What?

Has Oedipus' father died?

- [Man] Yes, if what I'm telling you is not the truth, then I deserve to die.

- You there, go at once and tell this to your master.

Oh, you oracles of the gods, so much for you.

Oedipus has for so long been afraid that he would murder him, he ran away.

And now Polybus is died, killed by fate and not by Oedipus.

- Ah, Jocasta, my dearest wife, why have you summoned me to leave our home and come out here?

- You must hear this man, and as you listen, decide for yourself what these prophecies of the gods amount to.

- Who is this man?

What report does he have for me?

- He comes from Corinth, bringing news that Polybus, your father, is no longer is alive, he's dead.

- What?

Stranger, let me hear from you in person.

- If I must first report my news quite plainly, then I should let you know that Polybus has passed away, he's gone.

- By treachery, or was it the result of some disease?

- With old bodies a slight weight on the scale will bring his final peace.

- Apparently his death was from an illness?

- Yes, and from old age.

- Alas!

Indeed, lady, why should any man pay due reverence to Apollo's shrine, where his prophet lives, or to those birds which scream out overhead?

For they foretold that I was going to murder my own father.

But now lies beneath the earth dead, and I am here.

I never touched my spear.

Perhaps he died from a longing to see me.

and in that sense I brought about his death.

But as for those prophetic oracles, they're worthless.

Polybus has brought them to Hades, where he lies.

- Was I not the one who predicted this some time ago?

- You did, but then I was misguided by my fears.

- You must stop filling up your heart with all these things.

- But my mother's bed, I am afraid of that.

And surely I should be?

Why should a man whose life seems ruled by chance live in fear.

A man who never looks ahead, who has no certain vision of his future.

It's best to live haphazardly, as best one can.

Do not worry you will wed your mother.

Although it is true in their dreams, a lot of men have slept with their own mothers, but someone who ignores all this bears life more easily.

- Everything you say would be commendable, if my mother were not still alive.

But since she is, I must remain afraid, although what you are saying is right.

- But still, your father's death is a great comfort to us.

Yes, it is good, I know.

But I do fear that lady, she is still alive.

- This one you fear, what kind of woman is she?

- Old man, her name is Merope, wife to Polybus.

- And what in her makes you so fearful?

- Stranger, a dreadful prophecy sent from the gods.

- Is it well known, or something private which another person has no right to know?

- No, no, it's public knowledge.

Loxias once told me, it was my fate that I would marry my own mother and shed my father's blood with my own hands.

That's why, many years ago, I left Corinth.

Things turned out well, but nonetheless it does give one of the sweetest joy to look into the eyes of one's own parents.

- And because you were afraid of her you stayed away from Corinth?

- And deserve not to be my father's killer.

- My lord, since I came to make you happy, why don't I relieve you of this fear?

- You would receive from me a worthy thanks.

- That's really why I came, so your return might prove a benefit to me back home.

- But I will never go back to my parents.

- My son, it is so clear you have no idea what you are doing.

- What do you mean, old man?

In the name of all the gods, tell me.

- And that's why you're a fugitive and won't go home?

- I feared Apollo's prophecy might reveal itself in me.

- You were afraid you might become corrupted through your parents?

- Yes, old man, that was my constant fear.

- Are you aware these fears of yours are groundless?

- And why is that?

If I was born their child- - Because you and Polybus were not related.

- What do you mean?

Was not Polybus my father?

- He was as much your father as this man here, no more, no less.

- How can any man who means nothing to me be the same as my own father?

- Polybus was not your father, no more than I am.

- Then why did he call me his son?

- Well, if you must know, he received you many years ago as a gift.

I gave you to him.

- He really loved me.

How could he if I came from someone else?

Before you came, he had no children, that made him love you.

- When you picked me up, had you bought me or had you found me by accident?

I found you in Cithaeron's forest valleys.

- What were you doing wandering up there?

- I was looking after flocks of sheep.

- You were a shepherd, just a hired servant roaming here and there?

- Yes, my son, I was.

But at that time I was the one who saved you.

- When you picked me up and took me off, what sort of suffering was I going through?

- The ankles on your feet could tell you that.

- My old misfortune, why mention that?

- Your ankles had been pierced and tied together, I set them free.

- My dreadful mark of shame, I've had that scar there since I was a child, so... - That's why fortune gave you your very name, the one which you still carry.

- Tell me old man, in the name of heaven, why did my parents, my mother or my father, do this to me?

I don't know, the man who gave you to me knows more of that than I do.

- You mean to tell me you got me from someone else?

It wasn't you who stumbled on me?

- No, it wasn't me.

Another shepherd gave you to me.

- Who?

Who was that?

Do you know him?

Can you tell me any details, ones you know for certain?

- Well, I think he was one of Laius' servants, that's what people said.

- You mean king Laius, who ruled this land many years ago?

- That's right, he was one of the king's shepherds.

- Is he still alive?

Can I still see him?

- You people live here, you'd best answer that.

- Do any of you here now know the man, the one that this man refers to, either here in Thebes or in the fields?

Answer me, it is critical, time at last to find out what all of this means.

- The man he mentioned is, I think, the same peasant from the fields you wanted to see earlier.

But of this Jocasta could tell you more than anyone.

- Lady, do you know the man, the one we summoned here minutes ago?

Is that the one this messenger refers to?

- Why ask me what he means?

Forget all that.

There's no point in trying to sort it all out.

- With all of the indications of the truth right within my grasp, I cannot end this now.

I must find out the details of my birth.

In the name of the gods, no.

If you have any concern for your own life, then stop it.

Do not keep investigating this.

I will suffer, that will be enough.

- Be brave, even if it should be revealed that I was born from a shameful mother, whose family for three generations have been slaves, you will still have your noble lineage.

- Listen to me, I beg of you, do not do this.

- I will not be convinced that I should not learn the whole truth of what these facts amount to.

- I care about your well being, what I tell you is for your benefit.

- What you tell me for my own good only brings me more distress.

- Oh, you unhappy man.

May you never find out who you really are.

- Go, one of you, and bring that shepherd here.

Just leave the lady to enjoy her noble family.

- Alas, you poor miserable man!

There's nothing more that I can say to you.

And now I will never speak again.

- Why has the queen rushed off, Oedipus, so full of grief?

I fear a disastrous storm will soon break through her silence.

- Then let it break, whatever it is.

As for me, no matter how base born my family, I wish to know the seed from where I came.

Perhaps my queen is now ashamed of me and of my insignificant origin, she likes to play the noble lady.

But I will never feel myself dishonored.

I see myself as a child of fortune and she is generous, that mother of mine from whom I spring, and the months my siblings have seen me by turns both small and great.

That's how I was born.

I cannot change to someone else, nor can I ever cease from seeking out the details of my own birth.

- If I have any power on prophecy and skill in knowing things, then you, Cithaeron, by tomorrow's moon will surely know that Oedipus pays tribute to you as his mother and his nurse, and our choral song and dance acknowledge you because you are so pleasing to our king.

- O Phoebus, we cry out to you, may our song fill you with delight.

Who gave birth to you, my child?

Which immortal god bore you to your father Pan, who roams the mountainsides?

- Was it some daughter of Apollo, whose god loves all country's fields?

Perhaps Cyllene's royal king?

- Or was it the Bacchanalian god dwelling on the mountain sides, who took you as a new-born joy from maiden nymphs of Helicon with whom he often romps and plays?

- Although I've never seen the man we've been looking for some time now, if I had to guess, I think I see him.

He looks very old, as is appropriate, if he's the one.

But if any of you know him, you'll recognize him better than I would.

- Yes, I recognize the man, there's no doubt about it, he worked for Laius, a trusty shepherd.

- Stranger from Corinth, let me first ask you this, is this the man that you mentioned?

- Yes, he is, he's the man you see in front of you.

- Old man, come here.

Look at me, now answer what I ask you.

Some time ago, did you work for Laius?

- Yes, as a slave, but I was not bought.

I grew up in his house.

- How did you live?

What was the work that you did?

- Most of my life I've spent looking after sheep.

- Where, in what particular areas?

- On Cithaeron or the neighbouring lands.

- in your time there, did you ever come across this man?

- In doing what?

What man do you mean?

- This man right here, did you ever come across him?

- Right now I can not say that I remember him.

- My lord, that's surely not surprising.

Let me refresh his failing memory.

I'm sure he will remember all too well the time we spent around Cithaeron.

He had two flocks of sheep and I had one.

I was with him there for six months at a stretch, from early spring until the autumn season.

In winter, I'd drive my sheep down to my folds, and he'd take his to pens that Laius owned.

Isn't that what happened, what I've just said?

- You spoke the truth, but it was long ago.

- All right, then.

Now, tell me if you recall how you gave me a child, an infant boy, for me to raise as my own foster son.

- What?

Why mention that?

- Well, this man here, my friend, was that young child back then.

- Damn you!

Can't you keep quiet about it.

- Hold on, old man.

Don't criticize him.

What you have just said is far more objectionable than his account.

- My noble master, what have I done wrong?

- You did not tell us of that infant boy, the one he asked about.

- That's what he says, but he knows nothing, he's a useless busybody.

- If you don't tell us of your own free will, once we start to hurt you, you will talk.

- By all the gods, don't torture an old man.

- You two there, tie up this fellow's hands.

- Why are you doing this?

This is too much for me.

What is it you want to know?

- That child he mentioned, did you give it to him?

- I did, how I wish I'd died that day.

- [Oedipus] Well, you're going to die if you don't speak the truth.

- And if I do, there's an even greater chance that I'll be dead.

- It seems to me the man is trying to stall.

- No, no, I'm not.

I already told you, I did give him the boy.

- Where did you get it?

Did it come from your home or somewhere else?

- It was not mine, I got it from someone.

Which of our houses?

Which of our citizens?

- In the name of the gods, my lord, don't ask.

Please, no more questions.

- If I have to ask again, then you will die.

- The child was born in Laius' house.

- From a slave or from some relative of his?

- Alas!

What I'm about to say now, it's horrible.

- And I'm about to hear it.

But nonetheless I have to know this.

- If you must know, they said the child was his.

But your wife inside the palace is the one who could best tell you what was going on.

- You mean she gave the child to you?

- Yes, my lord.

- Why did she do that?

- So I would kill it.

- That wretched woman was the mother?

- [Man] Yes, she was afraid of dreadful prophecies.

- What sort of prophecies?

- The story went, that he would kill his father.

- If that were true, then why did you give the child to this old man?

- I pitied the boy, master, and I thought he would take him off to a foreign country where he's from, but he rescued him, only to save him for the greatest grief of all.

For if you are the one this man says you are, then you know your birth carried an awful fate.

- So it all came true.

It is so clear now.

Light, let me look upon you one final time, as man who stands revealed as cursed, cursed by my birth, cursed by my own family, and cursed to murder where I should not kill.

- O generations of mortal men, how I count your life as scarcely living.

What man is there, what human being, who attains a greater happiness than mere appearances, a joy which seems to fade away to nothing?

- Poor wretched Oedipus, your fate stands here to demonstrate for me how noble of man is ever blessed.

- Here was a man who fired his arrow well, his skill was matchless.

And he won the highest happiness in everything.

- For Zeus, he slaughtered the hook-taloned Sphinx and stilled her cryptic song.

For our state, he stood there like a tower against death, and from that moment, Oedipus, we have called you our king and honored you above all other men, the one who rules in mighty Thebes.

- But now whose story is more terrible to hear?

Whose life has been changed by such ferocious agonies?

- Alas!

For celebrated Oedipus, the same spacious place of refuge served you both as child and father, the place you entered as a new bridegroom.

- How could the furrow which your father planted, poor wretched man, have tolerated you in such silence for so long?

- Time, which watches over everything and uncovered you against your will, now sits in judgment of that fatal marriage, where child and parent have been joined for so long.

- O child of Laius, how I wish I'd never seen you.

Now I wail like one whose mouth pours forth laments.

- To tell it right, it was through you I found my life and breathed again, and then through you my eyesight failed.

- O you most honored citizens of Thebes, what actions you will hear about and see, what sorrows you will bear, if as natives here, you are still loyal to the house of Labdacus?

I do not think the Ister or the Phasis rivers could cleanse this house.

It conceals too much and soon will bring to light the vilest things, brought on by choice and not by accident.

What we do to ourselves brings us most pain.

- The calamities we knew about before were hard enough to bear.

What can you say to make it worse?

- I'll waste no words.

Know this, noble Jocasta, our queen, is dead.

- That poor unhappy lady, how did she die?

- She killed herself.

You did not see it, so you'll be spared the worst of what went on.

But from what I can recall of what I saw, you'll learn how that poor woman suffered.

She left here frantic and rushed inside, fingers on both hands clenched in her hair.

She ran through the hall straight to her marriage bed.

And she went in, slamming both doors shut behind her and crying out to Laius, who's been a corpse a long time now.

She was remembering that child of theirs born many years ago, the one who killed his father, who left her to conceive cursed children with that son.

She lay moaning by the bed, where she, poor woman, had given birth twice over, husband from a husband, children from a child.

After that I don't fully know how she died.

With a scream Oedipus came bursting in, he would not let us see her suffering, her final pain.

As we watched him charge around, back and forth, he kept asking us to give him a sword, as he tried to find that wife who was no wife, whose mother's womb had given birth to him and to his children.

As he raved, some immortal power led him on, no human in the room came close to him.

With a dreadful howl, as if someone had pushed him, he then leapt at the double doors, and bent the bolts by force out of their sockets, and burst into the room.

And then we saw her.

She was hanging there, swaying, with twisted cords roped round her neck.

When Oedipus saw her with a groan, he took her body out of the noose in which she hung, and when the poor woman was lying on the ground, what happened next was a horrific sight.

From her clothes he ripped the golden brooches she wore as ornaments, raised them high, and drove them deep into his eyeballs, crying as he did so, "You will no longer see all those atrocious things I suffered, the dreadful things I did.

No, you have looked upon those you never should have looked upon.

And those I wish you did not see.

So now and for all future time be dark."

And with these words he raised his hand high and struck, not once, but many times, right in the sockets.

And with every blow blood spurted down from his eyes, down on his beard, and not in single drops, but showers of dark brain with blood like hail.

So, what these two have done overwhelms, not one alone, this disaster swallows up a man and wife together.

That old happiness they had once shared in their rich ancestry was truly once joy, but now lament and ruin.

Death and shame, and all calamities which men can name are theirs to keep.

- [Priest] And has that suffering man found some relief to ease his pain?

- He shouts at everyone to open up the gates and thus reveal to all Cadmeians his father's killer, his mother's, I must not say those words.

He wants them to cast him out of Thebes, so the curse he laid will not come on this house if he still lives inside, but he is weak.

And he needs someone to lead him on his way.

His agony is more than he can bear as he will show you.

For on the palace doors the bolts are being pulled back.

Soon you will see a sight which even a man filled with disgust would have to pity.

- An awful fate for human eyes to witness, the worst I've ever seen.

O you poor man, what madness came over you?

What eternal force pounced on your life and springing further than the longest leap, brought you this awful doom?

Alas, alas!

I cannot look at you.

There's much I wish to learn, you fill me with such horror, yet there are many things I wish to ask, there's much I must know.

- Alas, alas!

Such wretchedness, I'm miserable, I am.

Where do I go?

How can the wings of air sweep up my voice?

My destiny, how far you have sprung now!

- To a fearful place from which men turn away, from a place they hate to look upon.

- The dark, horror wrapped around me, this nameless visitor swept here by fair and fatal winds.

I cannot resist.

Alas for me!

And yet again, alas for me!

The agony of piercing brooches stabs me.

The memory of aching shame.

- In your distress it's not astonishing you bear a double load of suffering, a double load of pain.

- My friend, so you still care for me and with patience to nurse me, now I'm blind.

- You have carried out such dreadful things, how could you dare to blind yourself this way?

What god drove you to do it?

- It was Apollo, friends, it was Apollo.

He brought on things on which I suffer, but the hand which stabbed out my eyes was mine alone.

Tell me, in my mentionable life, why should I have eyes when nothing I could see would bring me joy?

- What you have said is true enough.

- What is there for me to see, my friends?

Whose greeting can I feel and hear delight?

Hurry now, cast me away from Thebes, a man utterly accursed, completely lost the mortal man the gods despise the most.

- Unhappy in your fate and in your mind which now knows all, would I have never known you?

- Whoever the man is who freed my feet, who released me from that cruel shackle and rescued me from death, may that man die.

It was a thankless act if I had perished then, I never would have brought such agony to myself or to my friends.

- I agree, I would have preferred your death, as well.

- And men would not see in me the husband of the woman who gave birth to me.

And now I sit here, abandoned by the gods, the son of a corrupted mother, if there is some other fate more terrible than all the rest, then me too belongs in the fate of Oedipus.

If I had eyes, I do not know how I could look upon my father as I like to Hades.

Will I look upon my own wretched mother?

Against those two, I have committed acts, not even if I hang myself, that would not be sufficient punishment.

Perhaps, you think that the sight of my own children might bring me joy, no.

Look how they were born.

They could never bring delight to eyes of mine.

Nor could the city or its massive walls, or the sacred images of its gods.

I am the most abhorred of men, I, the finest one of all those bred in Thebes, and I have condemned myself, telling everyone to banish for impiety, the same man that the gods have now exposed as sacrilegious.

A son of Laius, too.

Tell me, with such polluting stains upon me, could I look into your eyes and hold your gaze?

Cithaeron, why did you shelter me?

Why, when I was handed over to you, did you not do away with me at once, so that I would never reveal the nature of my birth?

Polybus, and Corinth, my father's ancient house, the very place men called my home.

You raised me well, so fine to look at, so corrupt inside.

Now I've been exposed as something bad, contaminated in my origins.

You hidden forest grove, you thicket and defile where three paths meet, you who watched my father's blood get dripped from my own hands, do you remember me?

Do you remember what I did there in front of you and what I did here when I came here to Thebes?

You marriage rites, you gave birth to me, and then when I was born, you gave birth again, leaving children incestuous, blood family of mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, wives and children, the most atrocious act that man can commit.

But it is wrong to speak off what it is wrong to do, so in the name of all the gods, curse me away to the outside of Thebes, or hurl me into the sea, or slaughter me, anyway I will never be seen again.

- Creon is coming.

He is just in time to plan and carry out what you propose.

With you gone he's the only one who's left to act as guardian of Thebes.

- Alas!

How will I talk to him now?

How can I gain his trust when not long ago I treated him with such contempt?

- Oedipus, I have not come here to mock or to blame you for disasters in the past.

But if you can no longer respect human beings, at least respect our lord the sun, whose light makes all things grow, and do not wanna show pollution of this kind neither earth nor light nor sacred rain can welcome such a sight.

- Take him into the house.

The wisest thing would be for the family to be the only ones to see and hear him.

- In name all the gods, since you have now come to treat me so differently from what I would expect, and have come to treat me graciously, do what I ask.

I will speak for your benefit and not mine.

- What are you so keen to get from me?

- Cast me away to live outside of Thebes, where no one, no living human being, will look upon me again.

- Yeah, that is something I could do, but I would like to ask the god what to do first.

- But what the god said was so clear.

The corrupted man who murdered his father must be done away with.

- Yes, that's what was said, but with things the way they are now, I'd like to ascertain quite quickly what to do.

- Will you then be making a request on my behalf when I am so depraved?

- Yes, for even you must now trust in the gods.

- I do, I go.

And I have a task for you as I make this plea, that woman in the house, please bury her as you see fit.

You are the one to give your own the proper funeral rites, but never have my father's city be condemned to have me living here while I still live.

Let me make my home in the mountains of Cithaeron, whose fame is now my own.

For when my mother and father were still alive, they chose that as my special burying place.

Thus, when I die, I'll be following the orders of the ones who tried to kill me.

As for my two sons, Creon, there's no need for you to care for them on my behalf, they are men.

Thus, they could survive no matter where they go.

My two poor daughters have never known my dining table placed away from them or lacked their father's presence.

They shared everything I touched, that's how it's always been.

My children, I weep for you.

Although I cannot see, I think about your life in days to come, the bitter life which men will force on you.

Your father killed his father, and then ploughed his mother's womb, where he himself was born, conceiving you where he, too, was conceived.

Those are the insults that they will hurl at you.

- [Creon] You have grieved enough, now get into the house.

- I must obey, although that is not what I desire.

- [Creon] In due time all things will work out for the best.

- I will go, but you know there are conditions.

- Tell them to me.

Once I heard them, I'll know what they are.

- Cast me away to live outside of Thebes.

- Only the god can give you what you want.

- I've become abhorrent to the gods.

- Then you will quickly get what you desire.

- So you agree?

- I don't like to speak thoughtlessly and say things I do not mean.

- Come then, lead me off.

- Do not try to be in charge anymore.

You've lost all power you once had.

- You residents of Thebes, our native land, look upon this man, this Oedipus, the one who understood that celebrated riddle.

- He was the most powerful of men.

- All citizens who witnessed this man's wealth were envious.

- Now what a surging tide of disaster sweeps around him.

- So, until we see that final day, we cannot call a mortal being happy until he's passed beyond this life free from pain.

(rousing soft music)