Oedipus at Thebes

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Sophocles' Tragic Hero and His Time

Bernard Knox

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In this widely praised book, an eminent classicist examines Sophocles' Oedipus Tyrannus in the context of fifth-century B.C. Athens. In attempting to discover what the play meant to Sophocles' contemporaries—and in particular in disentangling Sophocles' ideas from Freud's psychoanalytical interpretations—Bernard Knox casts fresh light on its timeless and universal nature. For this edition, Knox has provided a new preface and a list of suggested readings.
"What a joy it is to welcome this book back in print. As perennial as Sophocles' great play itself, Knox's work has never gone out of date, and never will."—Robert Fagles
Reviews of the earlier editions:
"A superb analysis, demonstrating that when classical study is aware of Freud and the techniques of modern literary criticism, it can be as exciting nowadays as it must have been during the Renaissance."—New Yorker
"A superb critical and textual investigation."—New York Times
"One of the major contributions to Sophoclean and to Greek studies in recent years."—Virginia Quarterly Review
"A magnificent contribution ... which is really required reading."—Cedric Whitman, American Journal of Philology
"A brilliant piece of work combining the best of classical scholarship with the best of modern literary criticism."—John E. Rexine, Hellenic World

Bernard Knox is director emeritus of Harvard's Centre for Hellenic Studies in Washington. Among his many books are The Heroic Temper, The Oldest Dead White European Males, and Backing into the Future: The Classical Tradition and Its Revival. He is the editor of the Norton Book of Classical Literature and wrote the introductions and notes for Robert Fagles's translations of the Iliad and Odyssey.

"Historian, literary critic and master of Attic tragedy, Bernard Knox—arguably the most eminent classicist of our day—brings Oedipus alive in all his roles: as a figure from mythology, as a ruler in fifth century Athens, and as an inescapable contemporary presence. Oedipus at Thebes, the author's first book, is the finest book on the subject that we have. What a joy it is to welcome it back in print. As perennial as Sophocles' great play itself, Knox's work has never gone out of date, and never will."—Robert Fagles, Arthur W. Marks '19 Professor of Comparative Literature at Princeton University
 

"Even after forty years Oedipus at Thebes remains a superb close reading of Sophocles' masterpiece. Knox's comments on the play's relation to fifth-century thought are still exciting. The book still makes one feel the grandeur of Sophocles' themes and the depth and power of his language."—Charles Segal, Harvard University

"A superb analysis, demonstrating that when classical study is aware of Freud and the techniques of modern literary criticism, it can be as exciting nowadays as it must have been during the Renaissance."—New Yorker
 
 

"A superb critical and textural investigation."—New York Times

"One of the major contributions to Sophoclean and to Greek studies in recent years."—Virginia Quarterly Review

"A magnificent contribution . . . which is really required reading."—Cedric Whitman, American Journal of Philology

"A brilliant piece of work combining the best of classical scholarship with the best of modern literary criticism."—John E. Rexine, Hellenic World
ISBN: 9780300074239
Publication Date: March 30, 1998
306 pages, 5 1/2 x 8 1/4