Searching for Oedipus

How I Found Meaning in an Ancient Masterpiece

Kenneth Glazer

• Publisher: Hamilton Books
• Year: 2018
• eBook ISBN: 9780761870463
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Literary Criticism in Drama
• Index: Literature

Aristotle considered it to be the model on which all other tragedies should be based. Freud viewed it as the key to unlocking the subconscious. Countless others have agreed with D.H. Lawrence's assessment that it is "the finest drama of all time." It is Oedipus Rex, one of the most celebrated—and disputed—works in all of Western literature. For centuries, classicists, psychologists, philosophers and many others have tried to solve the "Riddle of Oedipus," the age-old puzzle of what Sophocles's masterpiece means and why it is so singularly mesmerizing.
In Searching for Oedipus, Kenneth Glazer offers a fresh and personal way of looking at Oedipus Rex by recounting what Oedipus Rex has meant to him at different points in his life and how, gradually over many years, he came to answer this ancient riddle for himself.

Along the way, Searching for Oedipus shows just how deeply Oedipus Rex is embedded in our cultural DNA and how strongly its influence continues to be felt. Both a valuable resource for scholars and a riveting, accessible analysis for the general reader, Searching for Oedipus brings to life a work of art that, even after 2,500 years, still retains the power to shock and inspire.

Table of contents

• Title Page
• The Backstory
• Introduction
• The Circular Detective
• Know Thyself
• From Aristotle to Freud and Beyond
• Borne Back Ceaselessly
• “The Lives I Cut Down with These Hands”
• “Cursed in My Birth”
• The Man Who Didn’t Know He Was Home
• “Is There a Man More Agonized?”
• The Meaning of Heroism
• Conclusion
• Appendix
• Acknowledgments
• Notes
• Index
• About the Author