Books with title The Oedipus Plays

To Laius, King of Thebes, an oracle foretold that the child born to him by his queen Jocasta would slay his father and wed his mother. So when in time a son was born the infant's feet were riveted together and he was left to die on Mount Cithaeron. But a shepherd found the babe and tended him, and delivered him to another shepherd who took him to his master, the King or Corinth. Polybus being childless adopted the boy, who grew up believing that he was indeed the King's son.

Oedipus the King, also known by its Latin title Oedipus Rex, is an Athenian tragedy by Sophocles that was first performed around 429 BC. This translation by Francis Storr was first published in 1912. In the play, prior to the start of Oedipus the King, Oedipus has become the king of Thebes while unwittingly fulfilling a prophecy that he would kill his father, Laius, and marry his mother, Jocasta. The action of Sophocles' play concerns Oedipus' search for the murderer of Laius in order to end a plague ravaging Thebes, unaware that the killer he is looking for is none other than himself. At the end of the play, after the truth finally comes to light, Jocasta hangs herself while Oedipus, horrified at his patricide and incest, proceeds to gouge out his own eyes in despair.

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