Oedipus

Oedipus is a fabula crepidata (Roman tragic play with Greek subject) of c. 1061 lines of verse that was written by Lucius Annaeus Seneca at some time during the 1st century AD. It is a retelling of the story of Oedipus, which is better known through the play Oedipus Rex by the Athenian playwright, Sophocles. It is written in Latin. The chorus at the end of Act 1 give an account of the plague, and its development. At the end of Act 2 they give an account of Bacchus who was the patron god of Thebes. At the end of Act 3 they recount earlier horrific occurrences connected with Thebes. However, at the end of Act 4 they become more philosophical and praise living life along "a safe middle course" rather than being ambitious. They therefore relate the story of Icarus as a parable of a person who flew too high. They do however make clear that no one is able to alter their fate. This second point is made much more forcefully in a speech by them in Act 5, and they stress that neither God nor prayer can alter the life that is predestined for the individual. This view of fate is contrary to the teachings of Stoicism, which hold that fate and divinity are the same. Also the view of fate as arbitrary, rather than rational and benign, is not part of the Stoic cosmological view.Along with Seneca's other plays, Oedipus was regarded as a model of classical drama in Elizabethan England. The translator Alexander Neville regarded the play as a work of moral instruction. He said of the play "mark thou ... what is meant by the whole course of the History: and frame thy lyfe free from such mischiefes."In recent times, A. J. Boyle in his 1997 book Tragic Seneca: An Essay in the Theatrical Tradition rejects the criticism of T. S. Eliot that Oedipus, like the other plays of Seneca, is simplistically peopled by stock characters. He says that "In the Oedipus, for example, it is hard to name any stock character except the messenger." The play, in its theme of powerlessness against stronger forces has been described as being as "relevant today in a world filled with repeated horrors against those who are innocent, as it was in ancient times."