Elements of Tragedy from Oedipus the King and Things Fall Apart - Research Paper Example

?Elements of Tragedy from “Oedipus the King” and “Things Fall Apart” In real life settings, tragedy is concealed under one’s unconscious thoughts of what the future brings. However, there were fictional tragedies that could hypnotize one’s imaginations and feelings as if the timelines of the stories happen in real life. For example, tragedies in the stories of the most renowned writers such as Sophocles’ Oedipus the King and Chinua Achebe’s Okonkwo: Things Fall Apart could prime and stain memorable lessons with emotional states to the readers. Hereby, these stories could truly declare the mystery of time which beheaded the fate of the protagonists. Oedipus the King and Things Fall Apart are stories whose protagonists have squinted their ways to their tragic fate as they urge their not meticulous acts. Both stories have an almost the same nature of making lamentable endings for the main characters who suffered loss of reputation and dignity for themselves. The comparisons for the two stories could serve as a switch to an insight understanding of the tragedy that could flash a relieving thought for the readers. Oedipus and Okonkwo were introduced as heroes. Oedipus, king of Thebes, was able to save his land from a monster while Okonkwo defeated a cat through wrestling. Both of the protagonists in two different stories portrayed strength and courage, and they were considered as the greatest in their times. However, the preamble scenes of the stories described the nature of Sophocles and Achebe as authors. Sophocles was influenced by the Greek literature because he tackled about gods such as Apollo. Achebe was influenced by his race as a Nigerian because the setting of the story depicted a Nigerian culture. In both stories, the protagonists were introduced as important members in their respective communities. Oedipus was hailed as the king of Thebes and the one who defeated the Sphinx while Okonkwo "had brought honour to his village by throwing Amalinze the Cat" (who was the greatest wrestler in all the villages from where he came from) (Achebe). They both rose to power from virtually nothing. Oedipus was an abandoned child who fled from his foster parents and gained fame only by his wits in defeating the great Sphinx while Okonkwo was the son of the lazy Unoka, who left him with nothing. He had to work hard from a young age to reach where he was in the story. Though wit and hard work may be very good qualities, they both shared the same fault, as well. They were both short-tempered individuals. It is this temper of theirs that ultimately led to them hurting others as well as themselves. In fact, in Achebe's story, he was described as having "a slight stammer and whenever he was angry and could not get his words out quickly enough, he would use his fists. He had no patience with unsuccessful men." It was with this kind of rage that he killed the messenger of the missionaries. Oedipus was no different. It was in a fit of rage when he killed the previous king Laius, who was his true father. For all their strength and their statuses in their communities, they both ended their stories despairing and defeated. Oedipus’s failure to avert his cruel fate, the death of his mother and wife, Jocasta, and the realization that he was the one that caused the city’s problems drove him to blind himself as punishment. He then exiled himself from the city to lift the curse on the people of Thebes. Okonkwo hung himself after failing to stir his people to revolution against the missionaries. For two great men who were once revered as heroes, such a fate was shameful and cruel. It was also worth mentioning the fact that these two heroes brought upon themselves their own misfortune. Their rage was certainly a big factor affecting their decisions leading to their fates. Oedipus killed his father in anger and found out the ruinous truth about his past by being stubborn and threatening everyone who knows anything to tell him about his past leading him to despair and regret. Okonkwo killed and hurt many people out of anger, including his wives and children. His anger kept him against the changes being brought by the missionaries and when his anger was not enough to beat them, he hung himself. Another factor could also be their pride. Oedipus was proud in that he felt he could beat the will of Apollo. He tried so hard to prevent his destiny but ended up doing so anyway. Okonkwo was proud of a different sort. He was proud of having achieved so much, and his own self-righteousness led him to anger which then led him to do bad things. It was also his pride in his culture that made him averse to anything other than the laws of his people, no matter how terrible the law may be. The best example for this case would be of the time when he killed his favored adopted son Ikemafuna just because it was ordered of him, and he didn’t want to look weak. This action ruined his relationship with his eldest son, Nwoye. The story of Oedipus highlights the consequence of the main character’s decision in life as he tried to invalidate the oracles. Logically, Oedipus was burdened with the prophecy that results to the tension of his emotion, and led him to displaced his anger to the man he killed, whom Oedipus lately discovered as his father (Sophocles 5). With regard to Okonkwo’s story, the major theme includes the importance of Okonkwo’s view to masculinity which blocks his affection to his family. He wanted to be superior by showing anger and disgust to the things around him specifically to his son, Nwoye (Achebe). Nwoye is lazy like his grandfather, Unoka. Okonkwo could remember his lazy father because of his inactive son. He would discipline Nwoye through violence. Nwoye resorted for the love of his father who is not expressive with his emotions (Achebe). Thus, there is a weak, emotional bond between Okonkwo and Nwoye. This weak attachment resulted to the conversion of Nwoye’s religion to Christianity as influenced by the white men. The white men brought a traditional change like religion, which is one of the highlights in the story. Okonkwo was so angry after knowing that the white men influenced his son and his tribes not to worship in natural gods and goddesses (Achebe). Okonkwo could not voice out his concern for his customs and native traditions. Okonkwo is very unwilling to listen to the white men, whose language differed from his own native tongue (Achebe). Hence, the impact of language differences could serve as a barrier for Okonkwo to communicate with the white men whose intention for colonizing the Nigerian tribe was so questionable for him (qtd. in Ward and Said). In a general manner, the importance of masculinity, dynamics of tradition and lingual differences affected the life of Okonkwo. These things primed himself to kill his own life after feeling guilty of slaying the white men’s messenger with his repressed depression of doing the same to his surrogate son, Ikemefuna. The major themes of Oedipus and Okonkwo’s story were denominated with Aristotle’s “Anagnorisis” because both of them tumble their fortunes as they recognize their downfalls (Mori 1). Readers might find the protagonists as pathetic as they rage themselves from their suppressed thoughts and pains that fooled and poisoned the intent of their false beliefs. These two protagonists may share many qualities, but the stories themselves tackle different issues from very different periods of time in very different places. Oedipus the King was a play set in Thebes showcasing how limited man is in the face of god. According to A. E. Haigh, the story was “picture of the blindness and fallibility of mankind” (188-191). Most of the main characters of the story were trying to avoid a fate that they did not want. Laius ordered his son to be thrown out and killed when he learned that he would one day kill him. Oedipus was not killed, but he was taken in by another family and when he learned that he would kill his father and sleep with his mother, he thought the prophecy was about his current parents, so he fled. On his travels he unknowingly killed his real father on the road, fulfilling the first part of the prophecy. The second part was fulfilled when he defeated the Sphinx and was made the king of Thebes and the husband to his mother, Queen Jocasta, whom he did not know at the time. For all the attempts to avoid fate, the prophecy was still fulfilled, and Oedipus was left as a blind, ruined man exiled from the city where he was once a beloved king. It was Oedipus’s figurative blindness to the events that transpired around him and not his actual blindness at the end of the play that led him to his demise. Similarly, Okonkwo was fixated in trying to be the polar opposite of his father. His father was lazy and a debtor. Okonkwo dedicated his life to being successful, hardworking and strong, abhorring people whom he thought was weak and things that made him weak. He grew up working hard to be the best sort of person that their patriarchal culture dictated that he even hurt his family just to maintain his alleged “strength.” It was this obsession with being the best in his culture that made him so averse to the change that the Europeans brought to the Ibo tribe’s culture. After living a life striving to be the best only to see the standards change was too much for him. He took his own life at the end of the story rather than see everything he knew fall apart. “European colonialists did not precipitate Okonkwo's ultimate downfall. It was Okonkwo's seeds of self-destruction, which were deeply concealed in his desire to be the antithesis of his "feminine" father [that led to his demise]” (Strong-Leek). Sophocles and Achebe wrote stories that could mold one’s perspective in realizing that even heroes are not perfect. The legendary stories of Oedipus and Okonkwo could make someone learn that people should not severely regress on the good qualities that they have such as knowledge and strength. Thus, the best matters in life could be discovered when the features of the weaknesses are explored. Nevertheless, Oedipus and Okonkwo could be the compact controllers of their lives if they were able to appreciate the grace of tragedy. Works Cited Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart. South Africa: Heinemann Publishers Limited, 2005. Print. Haigh A. E. The Tragic Drama of the Greeks. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1896. Print. Mori, Catherine Anne Mcanulty. The Transformation of Oedipus: Characterization and Anagnorisis in the Oedipus Tyrannus of Sophocles. Columbia: The University of British Columbia, 1995. Print. Sophocles. “Oedipus Rex”. eNotes. The Gale Group Inc., 2007. Web. 7 Jul. 2012. Sophocles. Oedipus the King. Trans. F. Storr. 1994-1998. The Internet Classics Archive. Web. 5 Jul 2012. Strong-Leek, Linda. "Reading as a Woman: Chinua Achebe's 'Things Fall Apart' and Feminist Criticism.” African Studies Quarterly 5.2 (2001): 2. Web. 5 Jul 2012. Ward, Selena, and Zahr Said. Things Fall Apart: Chinua Achebe. New York: Spark Publishing, 2002. Print. Read More