The Tumultuous Nature of Home
The characters of both Homer’s epic poem and Sophocles’ tragedies are trying to establish or return to the safety of their homes. They are searching and yearning for the safety, stability, and comfort that are expected at one’s own home. However, the home often disappoints in these regards, and is regularly the setting for extreme trauma and violence instead. By first establishing the expectation that safety and comfort can be achieved only within one’s home, and then failing to meet that expectation, Homer and Sophocles demonstrate that these qualities are dependent on the characters themselves, and not merely a particular setting.
The Odyssey is largely the tale of one man, Odysseus’, quest to return to Ithaca …show more content…
In Oedipus The King, Oedipus tries to establish a comfortable home, far from his prophesized future in which he “should defile my mother's bed And raise up seed too loathsome to behold, And slay the father from whose loins I sprang” (794-797). By running away from his future, and establishing a home far away, he hopes to achieve safety from his horrifying prophecy. However, his prophecy follows him, and his new home cannot save him. On the contrary, his new home is the setting of the self-inflicted violence that occurs upon Oedipus’ understanding of his life. Sophocles shows his audience that having a happy home does not protect one from everything, and that Oedipus may have been better off if he hadn’t created this home for himself. The same theme of the danger of the home carries over into Antigone. However, this time, the protagonist is trying to return someone else home, instead of themselves. Due to Antigone’s belief in “The immutable unwritten code of heaven” (455), she doesn’t believe her brother can rest until he is given a proper burial, and returned home to the gods. Antigone thinks that the peace and safety of home can only be achieved for her brother if he is buried, and she will stop at nothing to give this to him. For her devotion to her brother, Antigone is sentenced to death. The reader
The characters of both Homer’s epic poem and Sophocles’ tragedies are trying to establish or return to the safety of their homes. They are searching and yearning for the safety, stability, and comfort that are expected at one’s own home. However, the home often disappoints in these regards, and is regularly the setting for extreme trauma and violence instead. By first establishing the expectation that safety and comfort can be achieved only within one’s home, and then failing to meet that expectation, Homer and Sophocles demonstrate that these qualities are dependent on the characters themselves, and not merely a particular setting.
The Odyssey is largely the tale of one man, Odysseus’, quest to return to Ithaca …show more content…
In Oedipus The King, Oedipus tries to establish a comfortable home, far from his prophesized future in which he “should defile my mother's bed And raise up seed too loathsome to behold, And slay the father from whose loins I sprang” (794-797). By running away from his future, and establishing a home far away, he hopes to achieve safety from his horrifying prophecy. However, his prophecy follows him, and his new home cannot save him. On the contrary, his new home is the setting of the self-inflicted violence that occurs upon Oedipus’ understanding of his life. Sophocles shows his audience that having a happy home does not protect one from everything, and that Oedipus may have been better off if he hadn’t created this home for himself. The same theme of the danger of the home carries over into Antigone. However, this time, the protagonist is trying to return someone else home, instead of themselves. Due to Antigone’s belief in “The immutable unwritten code of heaven” (455), she doesn’t believe her brother can rest until he is given a proper burial, and returned home to the gods. Antigone thinks that the peace and safety of home can only be achieved for her brother if he is buried, and she will stop at nothing to give this to him. For her devotion to her brother, Antigone is sentenced to death. The reader