Sophocles' Oedipus Rex / edited and with an introduction by Harold Bloom.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Bloom, Harold.

Series:

Bloom's modern critical interpretations

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Sophocles. Oedipus Rex.

Sophocles.

Oedipus (Greek mythological figure)--In literature.

Oedipus.

Physical Description:

viii, 245 pages : illustrations ; 25 cm.

Edition:

Updated edition.

Other Title:

Oedipus Rex

Place of Publication:

New York : Chelsea House, [2007]

Summary:

First presented between 429 and 425 B.C., Oedipus Rex is the most well known extant tragedy by the fifth century Greek dramatist Sophocles. The sheer volume of performances and reinterpretations of the work in the intervening centuries speaks to its enduring power. Sophocles' Oedipus was itself a new version of an older myth, the story of an abandoned child who unwittingly fulfills a prophecy that he will murder his father and marry his mother. In this tragic episode, Sigmund Freud found a manifestation of the human urges he called the Oedipus Complex, a psychoanalytic reading of Sophocles' play that literary critics have spent the last century combating. This collection of essays draws upon a rich history of criticism and commentary on Oedipus Rex to examine the questions of fate, free will, heroism, and humanity that the tragedy continues to provoke.

Contents:

Introduction / Harold Bloom

Oedipus : ritual and play / Francis Fergusson

On misunderstanding the Oedipus Rex / E.R. Dodds

The innocence of Oedipus : the philosophers on Oedipus the King / Thomas Gould

Introduction to Oedipus the King / Bernard Knox

Speech and silence : Oedipus the King / Rebecca W. Bushnell

Oedipus and Teiresias / Frederick Ahl

Introduction : what is a father? / Pietro Pucci

The Oedipus Rex and the ancient unconscious / Martha C. Nussbaum

Knowingness and abandonment : an Oedipus for our time / Jonathan Lear

Life's tragic shape : plot, design, and destiny / Charles Segal.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 231-233) and index.

ISBN:

0791093093

OCLC:

70836764

Publisher Number:

9780791093092 90000