The Three Theban Plays (Oedipus Rex, Oedipus at Colonus, Antigone)

Sophocles’ The Three Theban Plays brings together three of the great tragedies of ancient Greece: Oedipus Rex, Oedipus at Colonus and Antigone. Written in the fifth century BC and centred on the cursed royal house of Thebes, the plays follow a family caught between prophecy and choice, civic duty and private grief, the authority of rulers and the demands of divine law. In Oedipus Rex, a king’s determined search for the truth threatens to unravel everything he knows about himself; in Oedipus at Colonus, an ageing, exiled Oedipus approaches the end of his life in a place of unexpected sanctuary; and in Antigone, his daughter defies King Creon in a confrontation between conscience and political power. Together, these dramas explore the limits of human knowledge, the burden of inheritance and the terrible cost of pride.

First performed in the theatres of ancient Athens, Sophocles’ tragedies helped define the dramatic tradition that would shape European literature for centuries, from Shakespearean tragedy to modern philosophy and theatre. Their emotional force lies not simply in the workings of fate, but in the dignity and fallibility of people struggling to act rightly in a world whose moral order remains uncertain. This celebrated grouping, in the translation by Robert Fagles, offers an enduring encounter with stories that continue to illuminate questions of justice, responsibility, family and the price of truth.

From the book

"I have been a stranger here in my own land."

— Sophocles, Oedipus at Colonus

On The Three Theban Plays

“Sophocles is the great master of tragic irony.”

— H. D. F. Kitto, Greek Tragedy