The Theban Plays: King Oedipus; Oedipus at Colonus; Antigone
Description
King Oedipus/Oedipus at Colonus/Antigone
Three towering works of Greek tragedy depicting the inexorable downfall of a doomed royal dynasty The legends surrounding the house of Thebes inspired Sophocles to create this powerful trilogy about humanity's struggle against fate. King Oedipus is the devastating portrayal of a ruler who brings pestilence to Thebes for crimes he does not realize he has committed and then inflicts a brutal punishment upon himself. Oedipus at Colonus provides a fitting conclusion to the life of the aged and blinded king, while Antigone depicts the fall of the next generation, through the conflict between a young woman ruled by her conscience and a king too confident of his own authority. Translated with an Introduction by E. F. WATLINGProduct Details
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About the Author
Sophocles first won a prize for tragic drama in 468, defeating the veteran Aeschylus. He wrote over a hundred plays for the Athenian theater, and is said to have come first in twenty-four contests. Only seven of his tragedies are now extant, these being Ajax, Antigone, Oedipus the King, Women of Trachis, Electra, Philoctetes, and the posthumous Oedipus at Colonus. A substantial part of The Searches, a satyr play, was recovered from papyri in Egypt in modern times. Fragments of other plays remain, showing that he drew on a wide range of themes; he also introduced the innovation of a third actor in his tragedies. He died in 406 BC.
E.F. Watling was educated at Christ's Hospital and University College, Oxford. His translations of Greek and Roman plays for the Penguin Classics include the seven plays of Sophocles, nine plays of Plautus, and a selection of the tragedies of Seneca.