Plays of Sophocles: Oedipus the King; Oedipus at Colonus; Antigone

Here is a man who solves the riddle of the Sphinx, who holds a city together as plague-devastated Thebes begs for salvation, who refuses to stop digging for truth even when he knows it will destroy him. This is the story of Oedipus: the king who was destined to kill his father and marry his mother, and who discovers this truth not through prophecy or divine intervention, but through his own relentless intelligence. The plays trace his catastrophic journey from sovereign to blind exile, and then follow his daughter Antigone as she makes an impossible choice between divine law and human authority. These are not comfortable tales of good versus evil. They are examinations of what happens when a man confronts the gap between who he believes himself to be and who the gods know him to be. Sophocles wrote these plays to be performed in open-air theaters for thousands of citizens at a time, and they retain their power to make an audience collectively hold its breath. If you have ever wondered what it costs to know too much, or what duty looks like when it collides with power, these are the stories that asked those questions first.