Besides the predictions of Teiresias, what other foreshadowings ...

[jlmhmf]

Besides the predictions of Teiresias, what other foreshadowings of theshepherds revelation does the play contain?
 
  What will be an ideal response?

Question 2

Oedipus is punished not for any fault in himself, but for his ignorance.Not knowing his family history, unable to recognize his parents on sight, he is blameless; and in slaying his father and marrying his mother, he behaves as any sensible person might behave in the same circumstances. Do you agree with this interpretation?
 
  What will be an ideal response?

[bfulkerson77]

Answer to Question 1

• Two extended passages that occur between Tereisiass predictions and the shepherds revelations give a number of hints to the eventual outcome. At lines 769788, Jocasta tells Oedipus that there was a prophecy that her husband Laius would be killed by his own son, that he had therefore had his newborns ankles pierced and sent him away to his presumed death, and that Laius himself and his attendants had been killed in a fight at a place where three roads met. There is enough in this account to make Oedipus begin to seriously question whether his own curse might not have been fulfilled. At lines 10761107, the messenger tells Oedipus that Polybus was not his actual father, that he had brought the infant Oedipus to Polybus and Merope after receiving him from Laiuss shepherd.

Answer to Question 2

• Its true that Oedipus is unaware of who his real parents are, and true also that by leaving Corinth he does what he can to avoid fulfilling the prophecy. But even though there is a school of interpretation that sees Oedipus as the mere plaything of the gods, a puppet with no choice in the unfolding of his own fate, it still strikes us as something of a stretch to say that he behaves as any sensible person might behave in the same circumstances. It is questionable, to say the least, whether any sensible person would escalate a silly squabble over right of way into a murderous rampage. With his awareness of the curse that hangs over his head, its not going too far to say that Oedipus could play it a lot safer than he does, and that he is tempting fate in killing any man old enough to be his father and, especially, in marrying any woman old enough to be his mother.