Oedipus Tyrannus (1058-1124)

It must not happen that, with such clues in my grasp, I fail to bring my birth to light.

For the gods’ sake, if you have any care for your own life, do not continue this search! My anguish is enough.

Be of good courage. Even if I should be found the son of a servile mother—a slave by three descents—you will not be proven baseborn.

Hear me, I implore you: do not do this.

I will not hear of not discovering the whole truth.

Yet I wish you well—I counsel you for the best.

These best counsels, then, vex my patience.

Oh ill-fated man, may you never know who you are!

Go, some one, fetch me the herdsman.

Leave this woman to glory in her princely stock.

Alas, alas, miserable man—that word alone can I say to you—and no other word ever again. She rushes into the palace.

Why has this woman gone, Oedipus, rushing off in wild grief? I fear

a storm of sorrow will soon break forth from this silence.

Break forth what will! Be my race ever so lowly, I crave to learn it. That woman perhaps—for she is proud with more than a woman’s pride—feels ashamed of my lowly origin. But I, who hold myself son of Fortune

that gives good, will not be dishonored. She is the mother from whom I spring, and the months, my kinsmen, have marked me sometimes lowly, sometimes great. Such being my heritage, never more can I prove

false to it, or keep from searching out the secret of my birth.

Elders, if it is right for me, who have never met the man, to guess, I think I see the herdsman we have been looking for for a lone time. In his venerable old age he tallies with this stranger’s years, and moreover I recognize those who bring him, I think, as servants of mine.

But perhaps you have an advantage in knowledge over me, if you have seen the herdsman before.

Yes, I know him, be sure. He was in the service of Laius—trusty as any shepherd.

I ask you first, Corinthian stranger, if this is the man you mean.

He is, the one you are looking at.

You, old man—look this way and answer all that I ask—were you once in the service of Laius?

I was—not a bought slave, but reared in his house.

Employed in what labor, or what way of life?