“WHO NEEDS OEDIPUS REX?” Sara Montejano

Thesis Statement Oedipus Rex is a play that possess the ability to move it’s audience; however the audience it was intended to move has drastically changed and the play no longer invokes the same shock value as it did in Ancient Greece.

Let’s take it back a few centuries…  Oedipus Rex is written around 430 B.C.  Theatre starts to transform during this time, becoming more modernized.  Theatre plays an important role in public festivals.

Ancient Greek Theatre Develops  “The style of acting can best be described as nonrealistic”(Brian).  Actors wore masks which was the actors persona. Indicating the age, social standing, and sex of the character.  All the actors were males; and had used slow, stylized gestures to convey their character.  The idea of a single actor was created by Thespis. Which is associated to our word “thespian” meaning actor.  “Aeschylus who is most famous for his tragic trilogy the Oresteia, introduced the concept of a second actor, expanding the possibilities for plot and histrionics through the interaction of two characters in his dramas”(Terzoulin).

Who was Sophocles?  He was the son of a wealthy merchant and was lucky enough to study all the arts.  In his first playwriting competition in 468 B.C he took 1 st place defeating Aeschylus.  Wrote over 120 plays, the most popular being the Oedipus trilogy.  “Sophocles served many years as an ordained priest of Alcon and Asclepius, the god of medicine”(Sophocles).

Sophocles’ Innovations  Sophocles was the first to use a third actor. He also changed the way trilogies were performed. Instead of the three stories coming together to tell one story he “chose to make each tragedy a complete story in itself as a result of which he had to pack all of his action into the shorter form”(Sophocles).

The Atmosphere  The City Dionysia was a festival held every year to honor the goddess Dionysus.  Theatres were large arenas; amphitheaters holding up to 20,000 people.  “For three days audiences came to the Theatre of Dionysus at daybreak to watch a trilogy of plays each day”(Brian).  These festivals also included religion, politics and civic debate.  “Tragic playwrights wrote plays that explored man’s relationship to the god’s, the conflict between the individual and the state, and the role of fate in determining the outcome of one’s life”(Brian).

Theatre…Not the movies!  Theatre of today is not as popular as it was in the time of Sophocles.  Actors are both male and female and don’t rely on masks to convey their persona.  Plays are rarely performed in arenas anymore and usually are in a more intimate setting.  Playwrights are now questioning man’s relationship with the world and himself more that his relationship with the gods and the roles of fate.

Shock Value Then And Now  Oedipus is a character who, “contains all the virtues for which the Athenians were famous and the vices for which they were notorious”(Lawall 613).  Questions man’s ability to control fate. “Oedipus determines his own conduct, by being the man he is”(Lawall 614).  The most obvious shock in this play would be that Oedipus has slept with his mother and she had his children, being both mother and grandmother.  Greek tragedies didn’t show much violence on stage, the act of Oedipus gauging out his eyes and Jocasta hanging herself was done offstage and explained by the chorus.  Today we see Oedipus’ character as more of a weak, ignorant man.  The idea of gods and fate has changed to more of people taking matters into their own hands and people are trying to control their own fates. There are no prophesies or oracles other than the occasional palm reader and physic. Today’s society put less and less trust into those people and put more trust in what can be proven by fact or concrete evidence.  The shock of mother and son sleeping together would still be shocking today but the small bits of blood would do nothing to shock a modern day audience. Then “Oedipus Rex”Now “Oedipus Rex”

Watch this…. This is closely resembles what was seen by the audience in Ancient Greece.  NmFK3SRI NmFK3SRI  In this we see blood but the actual gauging of the eyes doesn't happen on stage. In today’s film we have movies like Saw, Hostel, Texas Chainsaw Massacre to name a few in which violence and gore is shown often.

Today’s shock  In the clip we see blood but the actual gauging of the eyes doesn't happen on stage. In today’s film we have movies like Saw, Hostel, Texas Chainsaw Massacre to name a few in which violence and gore is shown often.  Now audience are less and less shocked by violence and gore; almost as if we are numb to the reality of what we are watching.  Shocking today’s audience would call for gruesome murder scenes and more sexuality in the production. “Oedipus Rex” though very interesting does not shock audiences the same way as it did in 430 B.C.

So what does all this mean…  Plays such as “Oedipus Rex” are meant to invoke thought and emotion from their audiences. Modern day audiences have become more “numb” to the shock that was groundbreaking in Sophocles’ time, and require more extreme forms of violence and irony to truly be shocked the same way Athenians were in their time.  “Oedipus Rex” has become more of a classic play amazing in it’s time, a new play version is needed for modern day audiences to shock and make them think the way Sophocles intended.

Works Cited Brian, Doyle L., comp. "A Study Guide for Sophocles' Antigone." Didaskalia. King's College London. 18 Nov Doyles, Teri. "Ancient Greece." Cedarville University. 22 Nov Lawell, Sarah, ed. The Norton Anthology of World Literature. 2nd ed. Vol. A. New York: W,W, Norton & Company, "Sophocles." Online-Literature. 12 Nov Terzoulin, Gas. "History of Theatre From Ancient Greece." Newsfinder. 17 Nov "The Oedipus Trilogy." Online-Literature. Jalic.Inc. 11 Nov