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Question: Antigone and Oedipus the King(the plays)!?
Can someone please explain Antigone and Oedipus the King!? I looked up sparknotes, and they gave me a different version!.


I'd prefer long description, but brief descriptions are good too!.Www@QuestionHome@Com


Best Answer - Chosen by Asker:
Oedipus the King:

In this play, Oedipus's kingdom, Thebes, is suffering from a plague!. He sends his brother-in-law, Creon, to the Oracle at Delphi to find a solution to this problem!. When Creon returns, he says that the plague will be over when the murderer of King Laius, thier last king, is brought to justice!. So Oedipus starts a search for the murderer!. He asks Tiresias for anything he knows about the murderer!. Tiresias refuses at first, but then Oedipus makes him tell the truth!. Tiresias reveals that Oedipus is the murderer of the old king!.

Oedipus refuses to believe him and accuses Creon of conspiring with Tiresias in order to win the throne!. Oedipus's stubbonness leads him to say that Tiresias is a bad prophet!. Before Tiresias leaves, he says that the murderer of the king marries his own mother!.

When Oedipus is irritated by the accusation, Jocasta asks him what is wrong!. When she hears of the prophecy, she tells him not to worry since all prophecies are wrong!. She says that her own son was supposed to kill his father, so the son was taken out of Thebes to die!. King Laius, his father, was killed by a band of thieves, not his son!.

When Jocasta tells him that King Laius was killed at the crossing of three roads, Oedipus thinks that he may be the killer!. He says that he came to Thebes because, when he was the prince of Corinth, he heard someone say that he was not really the son of the king and queen, and he wanted to find his parents!.

Soon, a messenger arrives from Corinth saying the Polybus, the king, is dead!. Jocasta says this disproves the prophecy since Oedipus did not kill his father!. The messenger, a shepherd, tells him that they were not his real parents and that he came to Corinth as an orphan!.

As Oedipus asks further, the shepherd reveals that Oedipus is the son of Laius and Jocasta!. He was cast out because of a prophecy!.

Jocasta kills herself by hanging and Oedipus stabs out his eyes!.


Antigone:

Antigone is Oedipus's daughter!. She was supposed to marry Haimon, the son of Creon!. At the beginning of this play, there is a was in which both of her brothers die!. The one who fought for Thebes, Eteocles, is buried, but Polyneices is not!. Antigone goes ahead and buries him regardless of Creon's decree that anyone who buried him would be killed!.

When Antigone is caught burying him, she is taken to Creon, and he prepares to hang her!. Haimon begs for her life, but to no avail!.

Tiresias tells Creon to bury him or else be cursed by the gods!. Creon agrees!. So that he is not blamed for Antigone's death directly, he plans to entomb her alive, not hang her!.

Tiresias persuades Creon to let Antigone go, but too late!. She has hung herself!. When he goes to see, he sees Haimon near her, raving!. Haimon tries to kill Creon, misses, and kills himself!. Eurydice, Creon's wife, kills herself because of grief!.

Creon is left alone to repent the consequences of his stubbornness!.Www@QuestionHome@Com