Oedipus Oedipus Rex is a Greek tragedy written by Sophocles about a man who tries to escape a prophecy of his life from coming true but in turn, ends up fulfilling it instead. Oedipus, the protagonist of the story, is destined by the prophecy to kill his father, Lauis and then marry his mother, Jocasta. Oedipus though, shortly discovers that all this time he had been in denial and subsequently to his own demise. With this, Sophocles, knowing that his audience already knows the outcome of the play, uses this knowledge to create situations that involve a number of verbal, dramatic, and situational irony that keeps the audience on the edge and also develop the characters in the play. This play sends a strong message of fate and free will to the audience.
When in fact, he is made a fool by his own actions. Aristotle created the many requirements of a tragic hero, all of which Romeo possesses. He has both a hamartia and a tragic flaw; these are what truly cause the tragic ending to Romeo’s life. He had many miscalculations within the play, the most important of which is putting his trust in Balthasar and assuming Juliet to be dead. While that may have been the final contribution to his death, his tragic flaw is what is shown throughout the play.
According to Brown, “The dramatist depicts incidents which arouse pity and fear for the protagonist [Antigone], then during the course of the action, he resolves the major conflicts, bringing the plot to a logic and foreseeable conclusion (Brown, para 5). The tragic hero in Antigone is Creon. Tragic heroes are not all good and not all bad. Creon suffers a great deal due to his tragic flaw and destructive pride. Creon believes the gods make him suffer the loss of his wife and son as punishment for his pride.
Who do you consider is most responsible for the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet? Shakespeare’s play Romeo and Juliet all ends in a terrible tragedy, however there has to be someone to blame for this, but who? I strongly believe that Friar Lawrence is responsible for the tragedy. The main reasons why I think he is to blame is because he married Romeo and Juliet without anyone’s permission; he also helped them to have a secret night together; gave Juliet a dangerous potion; faked her funeral breaking the hearts of her family and he continued abusing the use of confession throughout the play. The most disgraceful thing is that he is a man of god and he committed all of these horrendous sins!
“I am in blood / Stepp’d in so far, that, should I wade no more, / Returning were as tedious as go o’er.” (3.4.136-138) In this quote, Macbeth is telling himself that because he has stepped into evil so deeply, it will be hard to go back to morallity because he will never be able to rid of this guilt brought onto him. He begins to feel so remorseful, that he starts hallucinating and realizing that he has done such treacherous deeds. Even though he can still see how his actions are terrible, as the play develops, he begins to inch deeper and deeper into his own destruction of innocence. Macbeth had always felt threatened by Macduff because Macduff knew what a traitor he really was. Therefore, he had wanted to plot to end Macduff’s life as to not pose a threat on his reign any longer.
An example of his tragic flaw is the trust he puts in Cassius. This backfires as Cassius tricks him into killing Caesar for selfish reasons. Another example of his naïve attitude is allowing Mark Antony to give a eulogy speech at Caesar’s funeral. This, it once again backfires and Mark Antony ends up turning the plebeians against him. This is shown when Mark Antony uses reverse psychology by stating “But Brutus is an honorable man.” His tragic flaw shapes and foreshadows his downfall.
In his own hands is the guilt of; the death of his wife, his children being cast from their home, and the eventual blinding of himself. It is ultimately Oedipus's hubris that is his fatal flaw. Despite overwhelming evidence, Oedipus decided to make decisions that any rational thinking person would not have. This raises the question; namely, did Oedipus really never consider the possibility that Lauis was his father and Jocasta his mother?The play relies on the Greeks' knowledge of the myth of Oedipus. This is true because otherwise Sophocles' use of dramatic irony would be fruitless.
Little does the reader know, Oedipus’ adamant and presumptuous character pushes himself to make the wrong choices, making him responsible for fulfilling his own fate. Although other characters and Oedipus himself may believe that it was “fate” that brought this horror upon him, the reader and the audience is fully aware by the end of the play that Oedipus is the one responsible for this outcome. Oedipus’ downfall caused by this theme can be traced back to the crossroad encounter with Laius, his questioning to Tiresias, and at the end of the play. The audience never sees the encounter between Oedipus and Laius at the crossroad. However, the encounter characterizes Oedipus’ character.
The curse on Thebes serves as the conflict in the story. Oedipus plays the force moving to resolve the conflict by seeking the late king’s killer. He learns early on how to lift the curse, but is unable to because of his failure to realize that he is the murderer of Laïos. He is the force that opposes the protagonist’s motion in that it is his inability to accept guilt and his ignorance of this guilt that delays the removal of the curse. In addition, Oedipus’ role as the antagonist is concretized by his having caused the conflict: he is guilty of the murder of Laïos and is therefore the bringer of the curse.
This plan backfires though, because his family and friends bend over backwards to find the cause of his madness. Every main character in Hamlet seems to have their own conjectures as to why Hamlet is acting so out of character. One obvious reason is the mourning of his father's death. In addition to this, though, they all have personal ideas of varying merit. Claudius thinks that Hamlet has some kind of secret cause for the sudden change in his personality.