QUOTE EXPLICATION AND SHORT ESSAY PRACTICE:
Read the following quotation from Oedipus Rex. 1.) explain in what context it is used in the play and 2.) explain how it is used as a literary device. Write a well-developed answer with complete sentences. Be sure to form a topic sentence based on the essay prompt, and be sure to pull in sections of the quote into your answer as you discuss that part of the quote.
(Oedipus speaks to the chorus after Jocasta has run from the room)
“I know my birth, no matter how common
it may be – I must see my origins face-to-face.
She perhaps, she with her woman’s pride
may well be mortified by my birth,
but I, I count myself the son of Chance, . . .
I’ll never see myself disgraced.”
This quote is a good example of the use of dramatic irony in the play Oedipus Rex. Oedipus makes this declaration when he is about to learn of his real parents. He thinks that it will not really matter who they are even if they are of low social status. Jocasta, unfortunately, now realizes who he is and runs terrified from the room. As a result, the comment is steeped in dramatic irony. Even though he is willing to face his origin “no matter how common it may be,” he will soon find out to his horror how royal it is and how his parents’ high birth will be his undoing. He also disavows Jocasta’s being “mortified by my birth,” but he does not realize how realistic and legitimate her reaction is. The irony is, also, that being mortified is actually an understatement of her realization. The dramatic irony continues in his calling himself a “son of Chance,” which is the last thing he is. First of all, the oracle foretold his fate very specifically – no chance in that, and he purposefully acted out of his own free will to try to avoid the fate chosen for him – again, no chance there. Lastly, he crowns this series of ironic comments by the grossly mislead prediction that he will “never see myself disgraced”; little does he know that moments from this point he will be forever an outcast.