Lyric Essay

    It can be incredibly frustrating when you do everything in your power to avoid an outcome, only to have that outcome become reality after all. Maybe it’s something small like taking your dog out on a long walk so they don’t have an accident in your house, only to see that when you return home your puppy is already peeing in your kitchen. Or perhaps it’s something larger, like leaving your assumed parents to avoid killing your father and marrying your mother, only to kill an old man, who happens to be your father, then save a town and marry the widowed queen of thebes, who happens to be your mother, unknowingly fulfilling the one thing you were looking to avoid. 

This idea of going to extreme measures to avoid an outcome, only to have that outcome come true, is undoubtedly a central portion of the story of Oedipus. Oedipus, because he wants to do everything to not fulfill his prophecy, or unwanted outcome, moves away from his parents, which only brings him closer to producing said outcome. He killed an old man on the road due to, arguably, self-defense, which happened to be his true father. He then freed the city of Thebes of a plague, assuming it was just a good deed, but ended up marrying the widowed queen and having children with her, and therefore fulfilling his prophecy. Oedipus took many precautions and this overwhelming idea of not wanting something to happen influences almost all of his actions. Because this idea seems far-fetched and ironic, it makes you question, have the authors of these tales done this on purpose? Or is this just a coincidence that these precautions only brought him closer to the outcome?

This irony is no coincidence. Aristotle wrote in On Tragic Character, that “whatever a character says or does may be [what] such a character will inevitably do.” Oedipus knew of the prophecy and although he tried to avoid it in every way possible, it was inevitably what he did. This comes back to the idea of a tragic character and his tragic flaw. It is inevitable that what the tragic character is trying to not induce, said character in some part of the story, will find that his actions produced the outcome. This may seem like something only a character of Greek Mythology has to endure, but how has the media in our society adapted it into modern story lines?

This idea is perhaps a bit more common than it may seem. In the book Lolita, written by Vladimir Nabokov, we can connect the character Humbert Humbert to that of Oedipus. The novel follows a pedophile obsessed with a young girl, Lolita, and the measures that he takes to fuel his obsession. Around the middle of the novel, after Humbert fakes a relationship with the child’s mother, he abducts the child and takes extreme precaution and manipulation to not have Lolita catch on to the disturbing nature that is their situation, as well as to not get caught. When he suspects Lolita may have suspicion of her ‘father’ when at a new school, he drives her all around the country in order to not have a permanent home, and to ensure that Lolita does not have any close connections with another. While taking many precautions such as carrying a gun, writing down license plate numbers, and attempting to keep tabs on Lolita and those around him, in the end Lolita has had a plan despite every action Humbert has done to prevent this, and Lolita is able to free herself from the relationship. This outcome has been Humbert’s main worry since the beginning, and despite his actions to stop this from occurring, it was inevitable and out of Humbert’s hands in the end.

Obviously, Humbert and Oedipus have two completely different characters and worries, but we can see similarities between the two. Both had a main concern; Oedipus’ was the worry that he would kill his father and marry his mother, while Humbert was that Lolita would find suspicion in him and eventually escape. They both took measures to stop this from occurring; Oedipus fled home, Humbert fled their current living situation. The actions they took only got them closer to the outcome; by leaving his parents, Oedipus got closer to finding his real parents and got closer to where the prophecy would be fulfilled. By leaving the school and traveling all around the country, Lolita was bought more time and had more opportunities to execute her plan. Now we can really see how this general idea in Oedipus has been adapted into modern day literature, and how common it can be.

A lighter, more comedic and childlike application of this idea in Oedipus is that of the show, “That’s So Raven,” an older Disney Channel show. In the show, Raven has visions and can see certain things that are going to happen in the future, the majority situations that she believes should be stopped. While she takes the measures to stop the outcome and make sure that the vision she had does not come true, it ends up backfiring and the vision takes place in real time. However, being a children’s show, the ending is not disturbing like Oedipus blinding himself or a child predator locked up behind bars, there is a message or a lesson learned and taught to viewers. While in Oedipus’ case, his story was of a very negative nature, Raven’s is positive. This is simply a difference in audience, mature vs. immature. However this adaptation goes to show that not every events-taken-to-stop-undesired-outcome must result in a negative ending. 

Oedipus’ story is no longer far-fetched irony, it has become a compelling storyline in modern day adaptations of this idea. We’ve discovered how common this idea can really be, even in modern day life. By breaking down a story, it’s revealed how influencing Greek Mythology can be, and makes for a great read or watch.