Sight And Blindness In Oedipus The King Essay

In the novel Oedipus the king,what Sophocles strives to reveal to us about his society is that although the truth can often hurt, knowledge to the greeks was very important to them because they were a people who needed to be informed about everything. In Sophocles time gods were revered more than anything, and because of how powerful these divine beings were it was not in any human's control to question them since they could not confront these all divine beings who controlled their fate and actions. Throughout the novel Sophocles intentions are to show the readers the concept of sight and blindness as well as the idea of fate and freewill, greek plays in these ancient times were designed to incorporate throughout the story dramatic irony which a theme that revolves around the story..

In the argument between tiresias and oedipus,.Oedipus, who has the physical ability to see believes he can uncover the truth of his life, however his hubris leads him to trust his own superior knowledge and in doing so he mocks Tiresias for his obscenities regarded towards him and refers to him as “ a blind man lost in the night”(425-426). However with the dramatic irony that Sophocles presents throughout the novel the assumption can be made that although Oedipus is very brilliant he is truly the blind man, when his hubris is present it causes him to place the burden of guilt onto others. It takes the blind prophet Tiresias to point out just how ignorant Oedipus is by mocking him for his “precious eyes which are blind to the corruption of [his] life”, as well as his intelligence that allowed him to solve the riddle of the Sphinx, regarding him as “the best man alive for solving riddles” (470-472,501). All these insights lead Oedipus into doubting his true