Key Facts
full title · Antigone, Oedipus the King, Oedipus at Colonus
author · Sophocles
type of work · Play
genre · Antigone and Oedipus the King are
tragedies; Oedipus at Colonus is difficult to classify.
language · Ancient Greek
time and place written · Antigone is believed to have been
written around 441 b.c., Oedipus
the King around 430 b.c., and Oedipus
at Colonus sometime near the end of Sophocles’ life in 406–5
b.c. The plays were all written and produced in Athens,
Greece.
date of first publication · The plays probably circulated in manuscript in fifth-century b.c. Athens
and have come down to modern editors through the scribal and editorial
efforts of scholars in ancient Greece, ancient Alexandria, and medieval
Europe.
publisher · There is no known publisher of original or early editions.
The most important modern edition of the Greek texts, prepared by A.
C. Pearson, was published by Oxford University Press in 1924 and
reprinted with corrections in 1928.
tone · Tragic
tense · Present
setting (time) · All three plays are set in the mythical past of ancient
Greece.
setting (place) · Antigone and Oedipus the King are
set in Thebes, Oedipus at Colonus in Colonus (near
Athens).
protagonist · Oedipus is the protagonist of both Oedipus
the King and Oedipus at Colonus. Antigone
is the protagonist of Antigone.
major conflict · Antigone’s major conflict is between
Creon and Antigone. Creon has declared that the body of Polynices
may not be given a proper burial because he led the forces that
invaded Thebes, but Antigone wishes to give her brother a proper
burial nevertheless. The major conflict of Oedipus the King arises
when Tiresias tells Oedipus that Oedipus is responsible for the
plague, and Oedipus refuses to believe him. The major conflict of Oedipus
at Colonus is between Oedipus and Creon. Creon has been
told by the oracle that only Oedipus’s return can bring an end to
the civil strife in Thebes—Oedipus’s two sons, Eteocles and Polynices,
are at war over the throne. Oedipus, furious at Thebes for exiling
him, has no desire to return.
rising action · The rising action of Oedipus the King occurs
when Creon returns from the oracle with the news that the plague
in Thebes will end when the murderer of Laius, the king before Oedipus,
is discovered and driven out. The rising action of Oedipus
at Colonus occurs when Creon demands that Oedipus return
to Thebes and tries to force him to do so. The rising action of Antigone is
Antigone’s decision to defy Creon’s orders and bury her brother.
climax · The climax of Oedipus the King occurs
when Oedipus learns, quite contrary to his expectations, that he
is the man responsible for the plague that has stricken Thebes—he
is the man who killed his father and slept with his mother. The
climax of Oedipus at Colonus happens when we hear
of Oedipus’s death. The climax of Antigone is when
Creon, too late to avert tragedy, decides to pardon Antigone for
defying his orders and burying her brother.
falling action · In Oedipus the King, the consequences
of Oedipus’s learning of his identity as the man who killed his
father and slept with his mother are the falling action. This discovery
drives Jocasta to hang herself, Oedipus to poke out his own eyes,
and Creon to banish Oedipus from Thebes. The falling action of Oedipus
at Colonus is Oedipus’s curse of Polynices. The curse is
followed by the onset of a storm, which Oedipus recognizes as a
signal of his imminent death. The falling action of Antigone occurs
after Creon decides to free Antigone from her tomblike prison. Creon arrives
too late and finds that Antigone has hanged herself. Haemon, Antigone’s
fiancé, attempts to kill Creon but ends up killing himself. Creon’s
wife, Eurydice, stabs herself.
themes · The power of unwritten law, the willingness to ignore
the truth, the limits of free will
motifs · Suicide, sight and blindness, graves and tombs
symbols · Oedipus’s swollen foot, the three-way crossroads, Antigone’s entombment
foreshadowing · Oedipus’s name, which literally means “swollen foot,” foreshadows
his discovery of his own identity. Tiresias, the blind prophet,
appears in both Oedipus the King and Antigone and announces
what will happen to Oedipus and to Creon—only to be completely ignored
by both. The truth that comes from Tiresias’s blindness foreshadows
the revelation that inspires Oedipus to blind himself. Oedipus’s
command in Oedipus at Colonus that no one, not
even his own daughters, know where he has been buried foreshadows
the problems surrounding burial in Antigone.
