The Oedipus Trilogy - The Original Classic Edition. Sophocles Sophocles

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The Oedipus Trilogy - The Original Classic Edition - Sophocles Sophocles

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TEIRESIAS

       Is it so? Then I charge thee to abide

       By thine own proclamation; from this day Speak not to these or me. Thou art the man, Thou the accursed polluter of this land.

       OEDIPUS

       Vile slanderer, thou blurtest forth these taunts, And think'st forsooth as seer to go scot free.

       TEIRESIAS

       Yea, I am free, strong in the strength of truth.

       OEDIPUS

       Who was thy teacher? not methinks thy art.

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       TEIRESIAS

       Thou, goading me against my will to speak.

       OEDIPUS

       What speech? repeat it and resolve my doubt.

       TEIRESIAS

       Didst miss my sense wouldst thou goad me on?

       OEDIPUS

       I but half caught thy meaning; say it again.

       TEIRESIAS

       I say thou art the murderer of the man

       Whose murderer thou pursuest.

       OEDIPUS

       Thou shalt rue it

       Twice to repeat so gross a calumny.

       TEIRESIAS

       Must I say more to aggravate thy rage?

       OEDIPUS

       Say all thou wilt; it will be but waste of breath.

       TEIRESIAS

       I say thou livest with thy nearest kin

       In infamy, unwitting in thy shame.

       OEDIPUS

       Think'st thou for aye unscathed to wag thy tongue?

       TEIRESIAS

       Yea, if the might of truth can aught prevail. OEDIPUS

       With other men, but not with thee, for thou

       In ear, wit, eye, in everything art blind.

       TEIRESIAS

       Poor fool to utter gibes at me which all

       Here present will cast back on thee ere long.

       OEDIPUS

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       Offspring of endless Night, thou hast no power

       O'er me or any man who sees the sun.

       TEIRESIAS

       No, for thy weird is not to fall by me.

       I leave to Apollo what concerns the god.

       OEDIPUS

       Is this a plot of Creon, or thine own?

       TEIRESIAS

       Not Creon, thou thyself art thine own bane.

       OEDIPUS

       O wealth and empiry and skill by skill

       Outwitted in the battlefield of life,

       What spite and envy follow in your train!

       See, for this crown the State conferred on me. A gift, a thing I sought not, for this crown

       The trusty Creon, my familiar friend,

       Hath lain in wait to oust me and suborned This mountebank, this juggling charlatan, This tricksy beggar-priest, for gain alone Keen-eyed, but in his proper art stone-blind. Say, sirrah, hast thou ever proved thyself

       A prophet? When the riddling Sphinx was here Why hadst thou no deliverance for this folk? And yet the riddle was not to be solved

       By guess-work but required the prophet's art; Wherein thou wast found lacking; neither birds Nor sign from heaven helped thee, but I came, The simple Oedipus; I stopped her mouth

       By mother wit, untaught of auguries.

       This is the man whom thou wouldst undermine, In hope to reign with Creon in my stead. Methinks that thou and thine abettor soon

       Will rue your plot to drive the scapegoat out. Thank thy grey hairs that thou hast still to learn What chastisement such arrogance deserves.

       CHORUS

       To us it seems that both the seer and thou, O Oedipus, have spoken angry words.

       This is no time to wrangle but consult

       How best we may fulfill the oracle.

       TEIRESIAS

       King as thou art, free speech at least is mine

       To make reply; in this I am thy peer.

       I own no lord but Loxias; him I serve

       And ne'er can stand enrolled as Creon's man. Thus then I answer: since thou hast not spared

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       To twit me with my blindness--thou hast eyes, Yet see'st not in what misery thou art fallen,

       Nor where thou dwellest nor with whom for mate. Dost know thy lineage? Nay, thou know'st it not, And all unwitting art a double foe

       To thine own kin, the living and the dead;

       Aye and the dogging curse of mother and sire One day shall drive thee, like a two-edged sword, Beyond our borders, and the eyes that now

       See clear shall henceforward endless night. Ah whither shall thy bitter cry not reach, What crag in all Cithaeron but shall then Reverberate thy wail, when thou hast found With what a hymeneal thou wast borne Home, but to no fair haven, on the gale! Aye, and a flood of ills thou guessest not Shall set thyself and children in one line.

       Flout then both Creon and my words, for none

       Of mortals shall be striken worse than thou.

       OEDIPUS

       Must I endure this fellow's insolence?

       A murrain on thee! Get thee hence! Begone

       Avaunt! and never cross my threshold more.

       TEIRESIAS

       I ne'er had come hadst thou not bidden me.

       OEDIPUS

       I know not thou wouldst utter folly, else

      

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