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Oedipus at Colonus ART AND IMAGES IN PSYCHIATRY SECTION EDITOR: JAMES C. HARRIS, MD Oedipus at Colonus [Oedipus’] fate moves us only because it might have been our own....Itmaybethat we were all destined to direct our first sexual impulses toward our mothers; and our first impulses of hatred and violence toward our fathers; our dreams convince us that we were.... Sigmund Freud, The Interpretation of Dreams1(p276) OPHOCLES’ TRAGIC STORY OF tribution? Was it his formulation of in- As these psychoanalytic theories Oedipus, King of Thebes, was fantile sexuality and of the Oedipus com- evolved, so strongly involved was Freud deemed by Aristotle to be the plex (epigraph) as a universal theme in with the Oedipal theme that he applied his perfect tragedy. Friedrich human development or more broadly his Oedipal views to ethnology in Totem and SNietzsche (1844-1900) emphasized it in psychoanalytic theory? But did he con- Tabooandtoreligioninhislastbook,Moses his book The Birth of Tragedy. Sophocles’ sider the full legend portrayed in and Monotheism. Fully aware that Oedi- plays were rediscovered in the 16th cen- Sophocles’ successive plays Oedipus the pus’ faithful daughter Antigone accompa- tury and revived again in the 19th. When King and Oedipus at Colonus? Viewing the niedhiminhisblindwanderingsinOedipus Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), who first legend as a whole, did Oedipus4 have an at Colonus, Freud referred to his attentive read Oedipus the King in Greek at age 17 Oedipal complex as Freud defined it? daughter, Anna, as his Antigone as his years, later attended performances of the health declined.3(p442) Among Freud’s large play, he was intrigued by the modern au- collection of antiquities, he kept a figure dience’s intense response to the proph- of the Sphinx, and above and to the right, ecy that Oedipus would kill his father and facing his analytic couch, he placed a small marry his mother. It was a psychological framed reproduction of Jean Auguste Do- dynamic he found within himself in his minique Ingres’s, Oedipus Explaining the self-analysis after his father’s death and Enigma of the Sphinx (Figure 1). When recognized in his patients. Freud was evacuated to London in 1938 So identified was Freud with the Oe- after the Nazi invasion of Austria, he in- dipal theme that on May 6, 1906, for his sisted on taking his antiquities with him. 50th birthday, his followers in Vienna He placed the Ingres painting in his Lon- gave him a medallion showing his pro- don study on the wall behind his desk next file on one side and Oedipus answering to the window that looks out onto the gar- the Sphinx on the other. The Sphinx side den, where it can be seen today. Freud’s was inscribed with a quote from identification with the Oedipal prophecy Sophocles’ play: He “who divined the is striking and suggests an archetypal iden- famed riddle and was a man most tification with a mythological theme. Carl mighty.”2(p59) Freud turned pale, for he Jung’s proposals about archetypal identi- had long dreamed that his bust would fication offer one explanation for under- be placed in the university court in Vi- standing Freud’s psychological dynamic. enna along with its illustrious profes- Figure 1. Oedipus Explaining the Enigma of the Ingres’s painting dramatizes the con- sors’ and inscribed with exactly this line Sphinx. frontationwiththeSphinx.Inarockyland- from Sophocles.3 Five decades later, scape, naked and muscular, Oedipus is Ernest Jones donated Freud’s bust to the Freud first broached the Oedipal shown in profile as he faces the Sphinx. university with this inscription2(p59);it theme in his letters to his confidant Standingintheshadowsofacave,shelooks was unveiled and placed in the Univer- Wilhelm Fliess (1858-1928) in the late out fiercely at the viewer, not at Oedipus, sity Arcade on February 4, 1955. 1890s. Subsequently he introduced the as he answers her riddle. A discarded foot The riddle of the Sphinx posed was, Oedipal theme in his The Interpretation and human bones provide evidence of “There walks on land a creature of two feet of Dreams in 1900 (epigraph). On the last those who perished. A terrified compan- and 4 feet, which has a single voice, and day of his 1909 Clark lectures,5 Freud pre- ion runs away toward Thebes. it also has three feet; alone of the animals sented the case of Little Hans and re- The full Oedipal legend is far more on earth it changes its nature....When ferred to his Oedipal wishes as evidence complex than this one dramatic proph- it walks propped on the most feet, Then of sexuality in childhood. Oedipal wishes ecy. It begins with the curse Pelops placed is the speed of its limbs least.”4(p19) were proposed as the “nuclear com- on Laius, Oedipus’ father and King of She strangled and devoured anyone plex” of every neurosis.6 The term Oedi- Thebes, for his homosexual rape and en- unable to answer. Oedipus solved the pus complex was used for the first time in slavement of Chrysippus, son of Pelops.4 riddle by answering, “man, who crawls on 1910. As his thinking evolved, Freud con- For this crime, Pelops’ curse is that if Laius all fours as a child, walks on two feet most sidered incestuous wishes in relation to has a son, his son will kill him and marry of his life, and with a cane in old age.”4(p19) the father as well as the mother. Finally his wife, Jocasta. To avoid his fate, Laius Stunned by his correct answer, the Sphinx, (in 1919-1926), he spoke of the com- responds with another criminal act, in- emblematic of the terrible feminine, with plete Oedipus complex that formulated fanticide. Jocasta surrenders her son, the face and head of a woman, the body his views about Oedipal identification and whose ankles are pierced and bound (“Oe- of a lion, and the wings of a bird of prey inherent bisexuality.6 In his last years he dipus” means “swollen footed”). He is (Figure 1), committed suicide. But what gave more attention to the Oedipus com- abandoned to die on Mount Cithaeron riddle did Freud solve to deserve this at- plex in females. outside Thebes. Instead Oedipus is found (REPRINTED) ARCH GEN PSYCHIATRY/ VOL 67 (NO. 5), MAY 2010 WWW.ARCHGENPSYCHIATRY.COM 438 ©2010 American Medical Association. All rights reserved. Downloaded From: https://jamanetwork.com/ on 09/30/2021 by a servant of the king of Corinth who and to take sides against his brother, who and the likelihood of maternal overstimu- takes him to that city where the childless has usurped the kingdom from him. For lation. Hans’ parents later divorced. Chil- king, Polybus, adopts him and raises him banishing him, Oedipus curses him, say- dren who are raised in such homes where with his wife in the royal court. ing that he and his brother will kill one they experience overstimulation by one As a young man, Oedipus consults the another in battle, and sends him away parent and are rejected and feel threatened oracle and learns of the prophecy that he (Figure 2). bytheothermayconstellatethesymptoms will kill his father and marry his mother Henry Fuseli’s (1741-1825) dramatic that Freud envisioned and recognized in and also about the circumstances of his painting (Figure 2) illustrates that tense himself as an Oedipal complex. Moreover, own death. Loving his adoptive parents, encounter in Oedipus Cursing His Son, there may be genetic vulnerability for such he abandons Corinth. Later at a place Polynices. Oedipus, remorseful and blind, sensitizationduringthedevelopmentalpe- where 3 crossroads meet near Mount Ci- is shown with blood-red eyes as Polynices riod (eg, harm avoidance). If the termcom- thaeron, he argues with Laius, not know- kneelsbeforehim.Outragedathisunfaith- plex is used, it would seem best to refer to ing who he is. When Laius refuses to give fulsons,OedipuscondemnsPolynicesand a mother or father complex. Bowlby’s at- way and attacks him, a fight ensues and utters his fateful curse. Polynices recoils tachment model9 suggests that separation Oedipus kills him. Coming to the city of while Antigone seeks their reconciliation anxiety preceded Hans’ phobia. Psycho- Thebes, Oedipus learns that there is a and her weeping sister, Ismene, is shown analysts today would place greater empha- plague that cannot be lifted until the profoundly sorrowful. sis, as does Bowlby, on Hans’ early devel- riddle of the Sphinx is answered. By some The king of Athens provides protec- opment, the pre-oedipal phase. Moreover, accounts the plague is punishment too for tion for Oedipus, Ismene, and Antigone. life span developmental psychologists and Laius’ sexual crime. He answers the riddle, The Chorus accepts Oedipus’ plea of in- life span developmental theorists like Erik the city is saved, and he agrees to marry nocence; his burial in a secret site in the Erikson(1902-1994)emphasizethatthere Jocasta, the wife of the dead king, not are developmental tasks that must be mas- knowing she is his mother. Freud sug- teredsequentiallybybothparentsandchil- gested that the marriage is the fulfill- dren at each phase of the life cycle. ment of an infantile wish, but the leg- Returning to the question posed in end suggests Oedipus is the means to Sophocles’ play, if one considers the Oe- carry out Pelops’ curse against Laius. They dipal legend in its entirety, Oedipus him- marry and have 4 children, 2 sons and 2 self did not have an Oedipus complex. He daughters. Then the solver of riddles is was an agent, a haughty victim, who car- faced with another plague. To end it, he ried out the curse on his father for child must find the man who killed Laius.
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