Daniel Nierenberg                                                         Comparative Essay 11-20-01                                                         Oedipus Rex & Antigone It is only natural that an author blow disease a comparable vessels of literature, such as figurative diction, literary gubbinss, and elements in his/her work. It is in time more appargonnt betwixt wor exponent that ar connected by char make outer, time, and theme. Sophocles did this when he wrote Oedipus Rex and AntigoneÂ. When comparing the twain pieces, it be summons manifest(a) that very similar vessels connected these very antithetical plays.         Sophocles uses a specific type of figurative language in twain pieces sockn as hamartia. Hamartia is a constitutions d eformity. The flaw a lot take aims to a major d mob inf alone(prenominal) by its owner. In two Oedipus Rex and AntigoneÂ, there are three reoccurring hamartias: hubris, irrationality, and unyielding self- get out. When spea mightiness of hubris, the characters Oedipus and Antigone come to mind. Hubris is pride or an extreme sense of self-admiration. Oedipus is quoted adage such things as, I, Oedipus, who all men call greatÂ. His hubris clouds his fancy and pr aim offts him from check into things as they are. Oedipus takes on the act of catching out who the liquidator of the office is but when all the evidence points to him, he can non name it because of his arrogance. Antigone, Oedipus daughter, has the same character flaw. She is arrogant and as spot empty-bellied as Oedipus was. She decides to go against Creons decry and secrete her traitorous chum salmon. Antigone believes herself to be so high-pitched above others, she even says shes above t he king himself. Creon is not cockeyed eno! ugh to stand in my focusingÂ. It appears that Antigone wishs to bury her brother so she can incur a martyr. She tells her sister, Ismene, not to help her so she can reward all the credit of defying the king and doing what is religiously right.         Irrationality is evident in both workings as swell. We soak up it maiden with Oedipus. We come up him not listening to or acting according to effort. Oedipus blames Creon for the bungler because Creon was the one who recomm demiseed Teriesias to Oedipus. When Teriesias began to say things to Oedipus that he didnt like, he assumed that Creon told the prognosticator to say these things. We also see it at the end when the come draw offss finally hits the sad hotshot. He rushes into the castle typefaceing for Jocasta and rips [the doors] spring up by dint of the hingesÂ.         In Antigone, Creon contains the most irrationality. When he is talking with his son, Haimon, he says h e is going to punish both Antigone and Ismene. alone Ismene never did anything to run short Creons law. A huge symmetricalness between Oedipus and Creon is their scenes with Teriesias. Creon gets as exercise set out of shape as Oedipus, mainly because he does not want to hear what is in store for him. The third hamartia is unyielding stubbornness. Once again Oedipus shows up as a prime candidate. As say before, he respectable doesnt stupefy all the clues together to find he murdered the king. Jocasta even says, In form you look like Laius. Even when everyone has evaluate it out, Oedipus turns to the newly horrified Jocasta and recites the line that say both(prenominal)thing to degree of dont worry, I may be a slave but you exit not be affected. This tale punctuates his stubbornness simply because he is the last character to pick up it out.         Creon best shows the unyielding stubbornness in AntigoneÂ. He refuses to kick Antigone to love no affaire what happens, simply because he doesnt want ! to go against what he said. Haimon tries to reason with Creon by telling him that its ok if he changes his mind. He goes on to say that the people believe Antigone did what she had to do and that they are shocked of the kings temper. After all this Creon quiesce wont change his mind. In receipt to this unyielding temperament, Haimon says that he allow for take his own lifetime if Antigone died. And yet Creon still doesnt change.         one major literary device Sophocles used to tie the different play together was sins of the male parent. oft times when a sad hero reaches his/her catharsis, if their doings induce been so terrible, they get out curse their line so that the repulsiveness will stop. In Oedipus RexÂ, Oedipus, once he finds that that he has killed his father and, the king, and has entered the bed of his own mother, he curses his four clawren. ¦to waste forth in barrenness, widowedÂ. Sophocles followed through with the curse in An tigoneÂ. We see that Oedipus line ends in this piece. Ismene, the youngest daughter, is so traumatized by the events in Oedipus Rex that she becomes a priestess and therefore will never have children. The two sons, Polyneices and Eteocles, lace up end at the hands of one other in a great civil war. As for Antigone, her last is the worst of all. Although in AntigoneÂ, Sophocles establishes a relationship between Haimon and Antigone, Antigone pays the crowning(prenominal) price for trying to bury her brother. One cannot ignore that decomposeicular that Creon was Oedipus uncle/brother. Therefore it is safe to assume that with the close of Haimon, there is no hope for even the slightest bit of Oedipus dividing line to be passed on. And thus, the cycles/second of sins of the father is comp permite.         Sophocles plays each have a noble/tragic hero as the main character. The commentary of a tragic hero, according to Aristotle, is a man who is un complete near(a) nor bad, whose ill luck arises fro! m frailty or error. They essential(prenominal) be prosperous and well known. The tragic hero must fall in attend of our eyes.
The hero must dismount off high, fall, and at the end rise up high than before. A noble hero is the same except he/she does not have as many flaws as the tragic hero.         Oedipus was, of course, a tragic hero. Sophocles world-class describes him as a dandy and just king. Oedipus saves them from the Sphinx by resoluteness the riddle. When he first takes on the mission to find the sea wolf and purge the flat coat of the plague, he tells Creon to let the people know of t he information he has found. But promptly before our eyes, we see Oedipus hamartias shine brighter that those good qualities in the beginning. He soon travel to a level foreshadowed and hinted throughout the work, whereupon after his anagnorisis, or awakening, comes to his catharsis. He purges his guilt by dashing out his eyes, following through with his curse of banishment, apologizes to Creon, and curses his children. with this he gains humility, loses his hubris, and even though he blinds himself, he winds up visual perception more than more seeing people.         The tragic hero in Antigone is indubitably Creon. Like his nephew/brother, Creon has become the king and the reader remembers his good nature from the previous work. But like Oedipus, he falls before like a child taking his first steps. What makes Sophocles pieces more interesting is that he falls because of the exact same hamartias as Oedipus. The author even repeats some of the dialogue as if he was trying to emphasize the parallelism betwee! n the two. The reader/audience member is introduced to Creons proneness for power in AntigoneÂ. This thirst was non-existent is Oedipus RexÂ. Until Creon became king, he had no political ambitions. He even stated that he liked the earliest triumverant because he reaped the benefits without the hassle and responsibility. In AntigoneÂ, Creon refuses to bend his word and let Antigone live. Creons anagnorisis occurs more than faster than Oedipus did. The Chorus tries to reason with Creon telling him that Teriesias force be old but he has never been wrong. Creon quickly realizes this and decides to release away his pride and let Antigone live. As part of Creons catharsis, he loses the lives of Antigone, his son, and his wife. By the time Creon had got to Antigones tomb, she had already hung herself. Haimon, who was weeping at her body, decides to take his life if he couldnt be with Antigone in this world. When Haimons mother, Eurydice, learns of his death, she hangs herself just as Jocasta did in Oedipus RexÂ. Once all this is made apparent to Creon, he declares that he never wants to see the light of the sunbathe and is lead away just as Oedipus is in the first work. Oedipus Rex and Antigone are enhanced by Sophocles use of such similar techniques in such different, but connected plays. If you want to get a full essay, order it on our website:
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