I have now decided that I am incredibly tired of Greek literature if you can even call it that. The Greeks were certainly interesting folks, but they wrote in a way so affected by their pagan ways that all of the writings of fiction came out to be almost exactly the same. There is a hero. There is a problem. Someone asks the oracle or Gods for help. The answer isn’t what everyone wants to hear. No one listens and then some stuff goes down. I found this interesting the first few times, although after freshman English, three years of Latin filled with numerous Greek and Roman stories, and finally this version of Oedipus I have had my fill.
In comparison to writings inspired by other religions such as Christianity and Judaism the stories of the Greeks are rather meaningless and devoid of moral value. I find that most of the Greek stories, unless retold by Disney, end up creating little connection at all between the readers, and the characters and gods who are unlikable, unrealistic, and lack the power to make their own decisions.
Oedipus I found to be interesting in 9th grade because I was a 9th grader. Now that I read it again in a form that I like even less I find very little to enjoy. Maybe as it is a tragedy there is not supposed to be any joy created. Instead all I get from the play is that Oedipus has many unfortunate things happen to him for no reason. I don’t even like him, but there is almost no one who deserves what he goes through or even to hear about it. Is the whole story just meant to show that destiny can’t be stopped, again, and that not only must Oedipus’s father be punished with death, but also his son and mother and many others must be punished to make up for one betrayal of the gods? The whole plot is unnecessary and recycled. The incest is just a tabloid headline like topic to pull in readers.
The only thing I see in a story such as this is brainwashing provided to the people to let them know what will happen if they don’t listen to what their leaders told their gods to tell their priests to tell them. This controlling probably worked do to the empty mindedness of most of the Greeks and the vulnerability to fear of all humans ever. Fear would keep the people docile. Fear would keep the poor, poor. Fear destroys governments and brings them about. I don’t see anything good about fear, but I also don’t have to lose what every leader always has, being one over all.
