Journal Prompt, OAC
Not to Be Born Is Best?!
"Not to be born is best
when all is reckoned in, but once a man has seen the light
the next best thing, by far, is to go back
back where he came from, quickly as he can."
(Chorus, Sophocles Oedipus at Colonus, p. 358)
Ok, by "he" is clearly meant anyone. But how is it best not to be born? And where does the chorus want those unfortunate enough to be born to go, "quickly as [they] can"? Are we to take the chorus at their word — is life that hopelessly "tragic"? Do other plays read thus far bear that out? Do other plays challenge that take on things? Do you? Explain. . . .
Text Access
Sophocles. The Three Theban Plays. Trans. Robert Fagles. Penguin Classics. New York: Penguin Books, 1984. (Available via bookstore.)
Characters
See list on p. 281 in Fagles translation. Note the presence of a character important from the Athenian — i.e., the audience's — perspective: Theseus, king of Athens, often treated in the plays as the founder of democracy.
Setting, Situation
A lot of this can be obtained from the Antigone and Oedipus the King pages. Note, though, that this play is set in the outskirts of Athens, not at Thebes. Also, that this bringing of Oedipus to Athens is very much an Athenian innovation to the myth. (Compare the bringing of the Oresteia plot to Athens.)
- Oedipus has grown old wandering from place to place accompanied by his loyal daughter Antigone
- Oedipus and Antigone arrive at a grove sacred to the Furies, at Colonus, just north of, and outside of, Athens, where Theseus is king
- Much of the suspense in the action concerns just which city-state, Athens or Thebes, will become the final resting place of Oedipus. Why is this such a big deal? Read the play to find out!
- In the meantime, Eteocles, Oedipus' younger son, has grown up and been made king of Thebes. But Polynices, Eteocles' older brother, is preparing an army to take the kingship for himself
The Play Itself
In the sequence of three plays, Oedipus the King, Oedipus at Colonus, Antigone, Oedipus at Colonus is number two in story sequence, but last in sequence of composition and production. Composed at the very end of Sophocles' very long life (ca. 496-406/5), it was not produced until 401, after his death. By that time, Athens had been soundly defeated in the war with Sparta (431-404), and had lost the empire it once controlled. Hence the atmosphere of dreamy nostalgia over Athens' greatness in the choral ode, lines 762-817.
Something else to note: Sophocles was himself a native of this Athenian suburb of Colonus.
Notes Keyed into Text
p. 285. Translator's stage direction: "A citizen of Colonus approaches from the right." Colonus was a suburb of Athens, outside the walls of the city center itself. But its territory and people formed part of the city state (polis) that was Athens in the larger sense: "The polis of the People of Athens."
p. 298. Oedipus would appear to be praying to the same Furies as figured so prominently in Aeschylus' Eumenides. Here they are called by the names "Eumenides" (a word that doesn't appear in Aeschylus' play) and "Awesome Goddesses — "awesome" in the sense of "awe-inspiring" or "revered" — that's the name Athena gives them in Eumenides). He prays to them because, one gathers, (a) he's stepped onto their sacred ground and (b) he seeks to placate them so they won't treat him like a trespasser in Athenian territory. But Oedipus will himself by play's end be transformed into a kind of terrifying male fury — an alastōr.