Sophocles Oedipus Tyrannus 1348

Der Chor.

Mir selbst auch wäre dies erwünscht.

Oedipus.

Dann übt' ich nicht Vatermord,

Hieße dann den Menschen nicht

Des Weibes Gatte, deren Schooß mich trug.

Nun von den Göttern fern, und der Verruchten Sohn,

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Leb' ich und ihr gesellt, welcher ich selbst entsproß.

Kennte die Erde noch größere Schmach, denn die,

Traf sie den Oedipus!

Der Chor.

Chorus

I cannot agree that you have counseled well: you would have been better dead than living and blind.

Oedipus

Do not tell me that things have not been best done in this way:

give me counsel no more. If I had sight, I know not with what eyes I could even have looked on my father, when I came to the house of Hades, or on my miserable mother, since against both I have sinned such sins as hanging myself could not punish.

1370

But do you think that the sight of children, born as mine were, was lovely for me to look upon? No, no, never lovely to my eyes! No, neither was this town with its towering walls, nor the sacred statues of the gods, since I, thrice wretched that I am—

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I, noblest of the sons of Thebes—have doomed myself to know them no more by commanding that all should reject the impious one, the one whom the gods have revealed as unholy, a member of Laius’ own race! After bearing such a stain upon myself,

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was I to look with steady eyes on this folk? No indeed: were there a way to choke the source of hearing, I would not have hesitated to make a fast prison of this wretched frame, so that I should have known neither sight nor sound.

1385

It is sweet for our thought to dwell beyond the sphere of grief. Alas, Cithaeron, why did you provide a shelter for me? When I was given to you, why did you not slay me straightway, that I might never reveal my origin to men. Ah, Polybus, ah, Corinth , and you that were called the ancient house of my father,

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how fair-seeming was I, your nurseling, and what evils were festering underneath! Now I am found to be evil and of evil birth. Oh you three roads, and you secret glen, you, thicket, and narrow way where three paths met—

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you who drank my father’s blood from my own hands—do you remember, perhaps, what deeds I have performed in your sight, and then what fresh deeds I went on to do when I came here? Oh marriage rites, you gave me birth, and when you had brought me forth,

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you again bore children to your child, you created an incestuous kinship of fathers, brothers, sons, brides, wives, and mothers—all the foulest deeds that are wrought among men! But it is improper to mention what it is improper to do—

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hurry, for the love of the gods, hide me somewhere beyond the land, or slay me, or cast me into the sea, where you will never behold me any longer! Approach—deign to lay your hands on a wretched man—listen and fear not: my plague can rest

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on no other mortal.

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Chorus

But here is Creon in good time to plan and perform that which you request. He alone is left to guard the land in your place.

Oedipus

Ah, me, how will I address him?

What claim to credence can be shown on my part? For in the past I proved to be wholly false to him.

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Creon

I have not come to mock or reproach you with any any past fault.

To the Attendants.

But you, if you no longer respect the children of men,

revere at least the all-nurturing flame of our lord the Sun, and don’t show so openly such a pollution as this, one which neither earth, nor holy rain, nor the light itself can welcome. Take him into the house as quickly as you can: it best accords with pity that

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kinfolk alone should see and hear a kinsman’s woes.

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Oedipus

For the gods’ love—since you have done a gentle violence to my prediction and come in a spirit so noble to me, a man most vile—grant me a favor: I will speak for your own good, not mine.

Creon

And what do you wish so eagerly to get from me?

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Oedipus

Cast me out of this land with all speed, to a place where no mortal shall be found to greet me.

Creon

This I could have done, to be sure, except I craved first to learn from the god all my duty.

Oedipus

But his pronouncement has been set forth in full—to let me perish, the parricide, unholy one that I am.

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Creon

Thus it was said. But since we have come to such a pass, it is better to learn clearly what should be done.

Oedipus

Will you, then, seek a response on behalf of such a wretch as I?

Creon

Yes, for even you yourself will now surely put faith in the god.

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Oedipus

Yes. And on you I lay this charge, to you I make this entreaty: give to the woman within such burial as you wish—you will properly render the last rites to your own. But never let this city of my father be condemned

to have me dwelling within, as long as I live. No, allow me to live in the hills, where Cithaeron, famed as mine, sits, which my mother and father, while they lived, fixed as my appointed tomb, so that I may die according to the decree of those who sought to slay me.

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And yet I know this much, that neither sickness nor anything else can destroy me; for I would never have been snatched from death, except in order to suffer some strange doom.
  But let my fate go where it will. Regarding my children, Creon, I beg you to take no care of my sons:

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they are men, so that they will never lack the means to live wherever they should be. My two girls, poor hapless ones—who never knew my table spread separately, or lacked their father’s presence, but always had a share of all that

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reached my hands—I implore you to take care of them. And, if you can, allow me to touch them with my hands, and to indulge my grief. Grant it, prince, grant it, noble heart. Ah, if I could but once touch them with my hands, I would think that I had them

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just as when I had sight.

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Creon’s Attendants lead in the children, Antigone and Ismene.

What is this? Oh, gods, can it be my loved ones that I hear sobbing, can Creon have taken pity on me and sent my children, my darlings?

Am I right?

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Creon

You are. I have brought this about, for I knew the joy which you have long had from them—the joy you now have.

Oedipus

Bless you, and for this errand may the god prove a kinder guardian to you than he has to me.

My children, where are you? Come, here, here to the hands of the one whose mother was your own, the hands that have made your father’s once bright eyes to be such orbs as these—his, who seeing nothing, knowing nothing,

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became your father by her from whom he was born! For you also do I weep, though I cannot see you, when I think of the bitter life that men will make you live in days to come. To what company of the citizens will you go, to what festival,

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from which you will not return home in tears, not sharing in the holiday? But when you reach a ripe age for marriage, who shall he be, who shall be the man, my daughters, to risk taking upon himself the reproaches

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that will certainly be baneful to my offspring and yours? What misery is lacking? Your father killed his own father, and bore you from the source of his own being!

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Such are the taunts that will be cast at you. And who then will wed you? The man does not live, no, it cannot be, my children, but you will wither in barren maidenhood. Son of Menoeceus, hear me: since you are the only father left to them—we, their parents, are both gone—

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do not allow them to wander poor and unwed, for they are your own kin, nor abase them to the level of my woes. Pity them, seeing them deprived of everything but you at such an age.

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Promise, noble man, and touch them with your hand. To you, children, I would have given much counsel, if your minds were mature. But now pray that you may live where occasion allows, and that the life which is your lot may be happier than your father’s.

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Creon

Your grief has had a sufficient scope: move on into the house.

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Oedipus

I must obey, though I do it in no way gladly.

Creon

Yes, for it is in season that all things are good.

Oedipus

Do you know on what terms I will go?

Creon

You will tell me, and then I will know when I have heard them.

Oedipus

See that you send me to dwell outside this land.

Creon

You ask for what the god must give.

Oedipus

But to the gods I have become most hateful.

Creon

Then you will quickly get your wish.

Oedipus

So you consent?

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Creon

It is not my way to say idly what I do not mean.

Oedipus

Then it is time to lead me away.

Creon

Come, then, but let your children go.

Oedipus

No, do not take them from me!

Creon

Do not wish to be master in all things: the mastery which you did attain has not followed you through life.

Chorus

Residents of our native Thebes , behold, this is Oedipus,

who knew the renowned riddle, and was a most mighty man. What citizen did not gaze on his fortune with envy? See into what a stormy sea of troubles he has come! Therefore, while our eyes wait to see the final destined day, we must call no mortal happy until

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he has crossed life’s border free from pain.

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