OEDIPUS THE KING
Suppliants of all ages are seated
round the altar at the palace doors,at their head a PRIEST OF ZEUS. To them enter
OEDIPUS.OEDIPUSMy children, latest born to Cadmus old,Why sit ye here as suppliants, in your handsBranches of olive filleted with wool?What means this reek of incense everywhere,And everywhere laments and litanies?Children, it were not meet that I should learnFrom others, and am hither come, myself,I Oedipus, your world-renowned king.Ho! aged sire, whose venerable locksProclaim thee spokesman of this company,Explain your mood and purport. Is it dreadOf ill that moves you or a boon ye crave?My zeal in your behalf ye cannot doubt;Ruthless indeed were I and obdurateIf such petitioners as you I spurned.PRIESTYea, Oedipus, my sovereign lord and king,Thou seest how both extremes of age besiegeThy palace altars—fledglings hardly winged,and greybeards bowed with years; priests, as am Iof Zeus, and these the flower of our youth.Meanwhile, the common folk, with wreathed boughsCrowd our two market-places, or beforeBoth shrines of Pallas congregate, or whereIsmenus gives his oracles by fire.For, as thou seest thyself, our ship of State,Sore buffeted, can no more lift her head,Foundered beneath a weltering surge of blood.A blight is on our harvest in the ear,A blight upon the grazing flocks and herds,A blight on wives in travail; and withalArmed with his blazing torch the God of PlagueHath swooped upon our city emptyingThe house of Cadmus, and the murky realmOf Pluto is full fed with groans and tears.Therefore, O King, here at thy hearth we sit,I and these children; not as deeming theeA new divinity, but the first of men;First in the common accidents of life,And first in visitations of the Gods.Art thou not he who coming to the townof Cadmus freed us from the tax we paidTo the fell songstress? Nor hadst thou receivedPrompting from us or been by others schooled;No, by a god inspired (so all men deem,And testify) didst thou renew our life.And now, O Oedipus, our peerless king,All we thy votaries beseech thee, findSome succor, whether by a voice from heavenWhispered, or haply known by human wit.Tried counselors, methinks, are aptest found1To furnish for the future pregnant rede.Upraise, O chief of men, upraise our State!Look to thy laurels! for thy zeal of yoreOur country's savior thou art justly hailed:O never may we thus record thy reign:—"He raised us up only to cast us down."Uplift us, build our city on a rock.Thy happy star ascendant brought us luck,O let it not decline! If thou wouldst ruleThis land, as now thou reignest, better sureTo rule a peopled than a desert realm.Nor battlements nor galleys aught avail,If men to man and guards to guard them tail.OEDIPUSAh! my poor children, known, ah, known too well,The quest that brings you hither and your need.Ye sicken all, well wot I, yet my pain,How great soever yours, outtops it all.Your sorrow touches each man severally,Him and none other, but I grieve at onceBoth for the general and myself and you.Therefore ye rouse no sluggard from day-dreams.Many, my children, are the tears I've wept,And threaded many a maze of weary thought.Thus pondering one clue of hope I caught,And tracked it up; I have sent Menoeceus' son,Creon, my consort's brother, to inquireOf Pythian Phoebus at his Delphic shrine,How I might save the State by act or word.And now I reckon up the tale of daysSince he set forth, and marvel how he fares.'Tis strange, this endless tarrying, passing
strange.But when he comes, then I were base indeed,If I perform not all the god declares.PRIESTThy words are well timed; even as thou speakestThat shouting tells me Creon is at hand.OEDIPUSO King Apollo! may his joyous looksBe presage of the joyous news he brings!PRIESTAs I surmise, 'tis welcome; else his headHad scarce been crowned with berry-laden bays.OEDIPUSWe soon shall know; he's now in earshot range.[Enter CREON]My royal cousin, say, Menoeceus' child,What message hast thou brought us from the god?CREONGood news, for e'en intolerable ills,Finding right issue, tend to naught but good.OEDIPUSHow runs the oracle? thus far thy wordsGive me no ground for confidence or fear.CREONIf thou wouldst hear my message publicly,I'll tell thee straight, or with thee pass within.OEDIPUSSpeak before all; the burden that I bearIs more for these my subjects than myself.CREONLet me report then all the god declared.King Phoebus bids us straitly extirpateA fell pollution that infests the land,And no more harbor an inveterate sore.OEDIPUSWhat expiation means he? What's amiss?CREONBanishment, or the shedding blood for blood.This stain of blood makes shipwreck of our state.OEDIPUSWhom can he mean, the miscreant thus denounced?CREONBefore thou didst assume the helm of State,The sovereign of this land was Laius.OEDIPUSI heard as much, but never saw the man.CREONHe fell; and now the god's command is plain:Punish his takers-off, whoe'er they be.OEDIPUSWhere are they? Where in the wide world to findThe far, faint traces of a bygone crime?CREONIn this land, said the god; "who seeks shall find;Who sits with folded hands or sleeps is blind."OEDIPUSWas he within his palace, or afield,Or traveling, when Laius met his fate?CREONAbroad; he started, so he told us, boundFor Delphi, but he never thence returned.OEDIPUSCame there no news, no fellow-travelerTo give some clue that might be followed up?CREONBut one escape, who flying for dear life,Could tell of all he saw but one thing sure.OEDIPUSAnd what was that? One clue might lead us far,With but a spark of hope to guide our quest.CREONRobbers, he told us, not one bandit butA troop of knaves, attacked and murdered him.OEDIPUSDid any bandit dare so bold a stroke,Unless indeed he were suborned from Thebes?CREONSo 'twas surmised, but none was found to avengeHis murder mid the trouble that ensued.OEDIPUSWhat trouble can have hindered a full quest,When royalty had fallen thus miserably?CREONThe riddling Sphinx compelled us to let slideThe dim past and attend to instant needs.OEDIPUSWell,Iwill start afresh
and once againMake dark things clear. Right worthy the concernOf Phoebus, worthy thine too, for the dead;I also, as is meet, will lend my aidTo avenge this wrong to Thebes and to the god.Not for some far-off kinsman, but myself,Shall I expel this poison in the blood;For whoso slew that king might have a mindTo strike me too with his assassin hand.Therefore in righting him I serve myself.Up, children, haste ye, quit these altar stairs,Take hence your suppliant wands, go summon hitherThe Theban commons. With the god's good helpSuccess is sure; 'tis ruin if we fail.[Exeunt OEDIPUS and CREON]PRIESTCome, children, let us hence; these gracious wordsForestall the very purpose of our suit.And may the god who sent this oracleSave us withal and rid us of this pest.[Exeunt PRIEST and SUPPLIANTS]CHORUS(Str. 1)Sweet-voiced daughter of Zeus from thy gold-paved Pythian
shrineWafted to Thebes divine,What dost thou bring me? My soul is racked and shivers with
fear.(Healer of Delos, hear!)Hast thou some pain unknown before,Or with the circling years renewest a penance of
yore?Offspring of golden Hope, thou voice immortal, O tell
me.(Ant. 1)First on Athene I call; O Zeus-born goddess,
defend!Goddess and sister, befriend,Artemis, Lady of Thebes, high-throned in the midst of our
mart!Lord of the death-winged dart!Your threefold aid I craveFrom death and ruin our city to save.If in the days of old when we nigh had perished, ye
draveFrom our land the fiery plague, be near us now and defend
us!(Str. 2)Ah me, what countless woes are mine!All our host is in decline;Weaponless my spirit lies.Earth her gracious fruits denies;Women wail in barren throes;Life on life downstriken goes,Swifter than the wind bird's flight,Swifter than the Fire-God's might,To the westering shores of Night.(Ant. 2)Wasted thus by death on deathAll our city perisheth.Corpses spread infection round;None to tend or mourn is found.Wailing on the altar stairWives and grandams rend the air—Long-drawn moans and piercing criesBlent with prayers and litanies.Golden child of Zeus, O hearLet thine angel face appear!(Str. 3)And grant that Ares whose hot breath I feel,Though without targe or steelHe stalks, whose voice is as the battle shout,May turn in sudden rout,To the unharbored Thracian waters sped,Or Amphitrite's bed.For what night leaves undone,Smit by the morrow's sunPerisheth. Father Zeus, whose handDoth wield the lightning brand,Slay him beneath thy levin bold, we pray,Slay him, O slay!(Ant. 3)O that thine arrows too, Lycean King,From that taut bow's gold string,Might fly abroad, the champions of our rights;Yea, and the flashing lightsOf Artemis, wherewith the huntress sweepsAcross the Lycian steeps.Thee too I call with golden-snooded hair,Whose name our land doth bear,Bacchus to whom thy Maenads Evoe shout;Come with thy bright torch, rout,Blithe god whom we adore,The god whom gods abhor.[Enter OEDIPUS.]OEDIPUSYe pray; 'tis well, but would ye hear my wordsAnd heed them and apply the remedy,Ye might perchance find comfort and relief.Mind you, I speak as one who comes a strangerTo this report, no less than to the crime;For how unaided could I track it farWithout a clue? Which lacking (for too lateWas I enrolled a citizen of Thebes)This proclamation I address to all:—Thebans, if any knows the man by whomLaius, son of Labdacus, was slain,I summon him to make clean shrift to me.And if he shrinks, let him reflect that thusConfessing he shall 'scape the capital charge;For the worst penalty that shall befall himIs banishment—unscathed he shall depart.But if an alien from a foreign landBe known to any as the murderer,Let him who knows speak out, and he shall haveDue recompense from me and thanks to boot.But if ye still keep silence, if through fearFor self or friends ye disregard my hest,Hear what I then resolve; I lay my banOn the assassin whosoe'er he be.Let no man in this land, whereof I holdThe sovereign rule, harbor or speak to him;Give him no part in prayer or sacrificeOr lustral rites, but hound him from your homes.For this is our defilement, so the godHath lately shown to me by oracles.Thus as their champion I maintain the causeBoth of the god and of the murdered King.And on the murderer this curse I lay(On him and all the partners in his guilt):—Wretch, may he pine in utter wretchedness!And for myself, if with my privityHe gain admittance to my hearth, I prayThe curse I laid on others fall on me.See that ye give effect to all my hest,For my sake and the god's and for our land,A desert blasted by the wrath of heaven.For, let alone the god's express command,It were a scandal ye should leave unpurgedThe murder of a great man and your king,Nor track it home. And now that I am lord,Successor to his throne, his bed, his wife,(And had he not been frustrate in the hopeOf issue, common children of one wombHad forced a closer bond twixt him and me,But Fate swooped down upon him), therefore IHis blood-avenger will maintain his causeAs though he were my sire, and leave no stoneUnturned to track the assassin or avengeThe son of Labdacus, of Polydore,Of Cadmus, and Agenor first of the race.And for the disobedient thus I pray:May the gods send them neither timely fruitsOf earth, nor teeming increase of the womb,But may they waste and pine, as now they waste,Aye and worse stricken; but to all of you,My loyal subjects who approve my acts,May Justice, our ally, and all the godsBe gracious and attend you evermore.CHORUSThe oath thou profferest, sire, I take and swear.I slew him not myself, nor can I nameThe slayer. For the quest, 'twere well, methinksThat Phoebus, who proposed the riddle, himselfShould give the answer—who the murderer was.OEDIPUSWell argued; but no living man can hopeTo force the gods to speak against their will.CHORUSMay I then say what seems next best to me?OEDIPUSAye, if there be a third best, tell it too.CHORUSMy liege, if any man sees eye to eyeWith our lord Phoebus, 'tis our prophet, lordTeiresias; he of all men best might guideA searcher of this matter to the light.OEDIPUSHere too my zeal has nothing lagged, for twiceAt Creon's instance have I sent to fetch him,And long I marvel why he is not here.CHORUSI mind me too of rumors long ago—Mere gossip.OEDIPUSTell them, I would fain know all.CHORUS'Twas said he fell by travelers.OEDIPUSSo I heard,But none has seen the man who saw him fall.CHORUSWell, if he knows what fear is, he will quailAnd flee before the terror of thy curse.OEDIPUSWords scare not him who blenches not at deeds.CHORUSBut here is one to arraign him. Lo, at lengthThey bring the god-inspired seer in whomAbove all other men is truth inborn.[Enter TEIRESIAS, led by a boy.]OEDIPUSTeiresias, seer who comprehendest all,Lore of the wise and hidden mysteries,High things of heaven and low things of the earth,Thou knowest, though thy blinded eyes see naught,What plague infects our city; and we turnTo thee, O seer, our one defense and shield.The purport of the answer that the GodReturned to us who sought his oracle,The messengers have doubtless told thee—howOne course alone could rid us of the pest,To find the murderers of Laius,And slay them or expel them from the land.Therefore begrudging neither auguryNor other divination that is thine,O save thyself, thy country, and thy king,Save all from this defilement of blood shed.On thee we rest. This is man's highest end,To others' service all his powers to lend.TEIRESIASAlas, alas, what misery to be wiseWhen wisdom profits nothing! This old loreI had forgotten; else I were not here.OEDIPUSWhat ails thee? Why this melancholy mood?TEIRESIASLet me go home; prevent me not; 'twere bestThat thou shouldst bear thy burden and I mine.OEDIPUSFor shame! no true-born Theban patriotWould thus withhold the word of prophecy.TEIRESIASThywords, O king, are wide of the
mark, and IFor fear lest I too trip like thee...OEDIPUSOh speak,Withhold not, I adjure thee, if thou know'st,Thy knowledge. We are all thy suppliants.TEIRESIASAye, for ye all are witless, but my voiceWill ne'er reveal my miseries—or thine.2OEDIPUSWhat then, thou knowest, and yet willst not speak!Wouldst thou betray us and destroy the State?TEIRESIASI will not vex myself nor thee. Why askThus idly what from me thou shalt not learn?OEDIPUSMonster! thy silence would incense a flint.Will nothing loose thy tongue? Can nothing melt
thee,Or shake thy dogged taciturnity?TEIRESIASThou blam'st my mood and seest not thine ownWherewith thou art mated; no, thou taxest me.OEDIPUSAnd who could stay his choler when he heardHow insolently thou dost flout the State?TEIRESIASWell, it will come what will, though I be mute.OEDIPUSSince come it must, thy duty is to tell me.TEIRESIASI have no more to say; storm as thou willst,And give the rein to all thy pent-up rage.OEDIPUSYea, I am wroth, and will not stint my words,But speak my whole mind. Thou methinks thou art
he,Who planned the crime, aye, and performed it too,All save the assassination; and if thouHadst not been blind, I had been sworn to bootThat thou alone didst do the bloody deed.TEIRESIASIs it so? Then I charge thee to abideBy thine own proclamation; from this daySpeak not to these or me. Thou art the man,Thou the accursed polluter of this land.OEDIPUSVile slanderer, thou blurtest forth these taunts,And think'st forsooth as seer to go scot free.TEIRESIASYea, I am free, strong in the strength of truth.OEDIPUSWho was thy teacher? not methinks thy art.TEIRESIASThou, goading me against my will to speak.OEDIPUSWhat speech? repeat it and resolve my doubt.TEIRESIASDidst miss my sense wouldst thou goad me on?OEDIPUSI but half caught thy meaning; say it again.TEIRESIASI say thou art the murderer of the manWhose murderer thou pursuest.OEDIPUSThou shalt rue itTwice to repeat so gross a calumny.TEIRESIASMust I say more to aggravate thy rage?OEDIPUSSay all thou wilt; it will be but waste of breath.TEIRESIASI say thou livest with thy nearest kinIn infamy, unwitting in thy shame.OEDIPUSThink'st thou for aye unscathed to wag thy tongue?TEIRESIASYea, if the might of truth can aught prevail.OEDIPUSWith other men, but not with thee, for thouIn ear, wit, eye, in everything art blind.TEIRESIASPoor fool to utter gibes at me which allHere present will cast back on thee ere long.OEDIPUSOffspring of endless Night, thou hast no powerO'er me or any man who sees the sun.TEIRESIASNo, for thy weird is not to fall by me.I leave to Apollo what concerns the god.OEDIPUSIs this a plot of Creon, or thine own?TEIRESIASNot Creon, thou thyself art thine own bane.OEDIPUSO wealth and empiry and skill by skillOutwitted in the battlefield of life,What spite and envy follow in your train!See, for this crown the State conferred on me.A gift, a thing I sought not, for this crownThe trusty Creon, my familiar friend,Hath lain in wait to oust me and subornedThis mountebank, this juggling charlatan,This tricksy beggar-priest, for gain aloneKeen-eyed, but in his proper art stone-blind.Say, sirrah, hast thou ever proved thyselfA prophet? When the riddling Sphinx was hereWhy hadst thou no deliverance for this folk?And yet the riddle was not to be solvedBy guess-work but required the prophet's art;Wherein thou wast found lacking; neither birdsNor sign from heaven helped thee, butIcame,The simple Oedipus;Istopped her mouthBy mother wit, untaught of auguries.This is the man whom thou wouldst undermine,In hope to reign with Creon in my stead.Methinks that thou and thine abettor soonWill rue your plot to drive the scapegoat out.Thank thy grey hairs that thou hast still to learnWhat chastisement such arrogance deserves.CHORUSTo us it seems that both the seer and th [...]