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  • 沙弗克力斯: 伊底帕斯王
    SOPHOCLES: Oedipus the King
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• • 沙弗克力斯: 伊底帕斯王 / SOPHOCLES: Oedipus the King
  • [ 读物介绍 ]
  • SophoclesOedipus the King This play belongs to a theatrical tradition two thousandyears older than the world of Shakespeare. Its author, Sophocles, was born in497 B.C., five years before the battle of Marathon; and as a fifteen-year-oldyouth he led the chorus, which celebrated the naval victory of Salamis over thePersians. He was one of three great ancient Greek tragedians, all nearcontemporaries. The eldest, Aeschylus, actually fought in the battle of Salamisin 482, while the youngest, Euripides, was born in that same year. Sophocles enjoyed a far from tragic career at the height ofAthenian prosperity, and died at the age of ninety, shortly before Athens fellto a league of other Greek states. Oedipus the King was probably composed inabout 429 B.C. and is one of 123 plays that Sophocles is known to have written— though only seven have survived in their entirety. Ancient Greek tragedy expresses a questioning and evenskeptical sensibility that is rooted in a polytheistic religiousoutlook. It arose out of sacred dances and songs performed before an audienceby a chorus. At some point an unfolding narrative developed out of these, andeventually a single actor — an individual voice — was heard. When Aeschylusadded a second speaking voice, the drama was born. And when Sophocles added athird actor, the chorus was relegated to the role of a commentator rather thana participant in the action. The chorus therefore represents a kind of audience withinthe play itself, one that directs and expands our emotional response to theaction with interludes of lyrical reflection. However, it still plays animportant part within the drama, as it expresses the hopes and fears of thelarger community in which the central characters interact. In this respect itprovides a religious backdrop to the drama, placing the specific events withina broader context of community and religious laws. For the Greeks, religion was a question for the communitymore than for the individual. So this religious context does not have very muchin common with our own world-view, which tends to be either secular ormonotheistic, and is a consideration for the individual alone. In the age ofSophocles, the whole community built up a protective relationship with therealm of the unknowable, in the form of prayers and sacrifices to the gods.This relationship underpins all of Greek drama. And it is through the chorusthat this relationship is mainly expressed. On this religious foundation is constructed an intensepsychological thriller of daring acuity, hailed as a classic even in ancienttimes. Aristotle saw it as the very model of tragic drama. On the most obviouslevel, its taut plot unfolds with swift and relentless power. Much of itspressure is generated by the ‘Oedipal’ nature of the impulses it lays bare, butit takes us far beyond Freud. Oedipus the King is an exploration of the natureof the self, of human freedom and human knowledge. These themes are held in place by means of a device, called‘tragic irony’, which is a particular trademark of Sophocles as a playwright.Tragic irony hinges on the fact that the story of Oedipus, even in Sophocles’day, was ancient myth. It is about a man who is told that he is fated to murderhis father and marry his mother; in trying to avoid this prophesy, he actuallyfulfills it. The original audience was already very familiar with the outlinesof this story. And this enabled Sophocles to load almost every line with anextra layer of unconscious meaning — even a certain metaphysical texture — foran alert audience to appreciate. The play describes a man’s gradual discovery of the truthabout his past. This truth is available to him from the moment he steps throughthe gates of Thebes, and discovers that the city has recently lost its king.But he chooses, for fifteen years, to make no inquiries at all about how hispredecessor on the throne has died. The reason can only be that he alreadyknows at some level the whole truth of what he himself has done. As he uncoversthe truth, he is uncovering his own self-deception. In the play, Oedipus the man is given a glimpse of his ownmyth, which he has struggled all his life not to have to embrace. Of course,the question with regard to the prophecy he is given (in modern science-fictionterms, the time-traveler from the future), is whether the future already existsor not. It is a question we naturally feel ambivalent about. We want meaning, asense of myth, a feeling that our life is leading somewhere, that it isconnected to a larger pattern (envisaged here as some kind of divine purpose)but we also want to feel that we can forge that destiny ourselves. The audience, like the oracle, knows where the life ofOedipus is leading, and that his very will to be free of that conclusion isgoing to take him there. And the terror we feel is also for ourselves. For ustoo, perhaps, all our efforts to find fulfillment are simply bringing us stepby step to some terrible fate. All his life Oedipus asserts his freedom ofaction, but he becomes truly free only in his search for self-knowledge, whichends with the destruction of that self.Sophocles’ intentions with this play must pass not onlythrough the interpretations of the actors and the director, but alsothrough the altogether more grievous process of translation into modernEnglish. This version has been set in unresolved — that is, relatively strict —blank verse, in an attempt to match the mainly iambic rhythm of the Greek.Generations of English translators of Sophocles have put their shoulders to theiambic pentameter, and no modernist translator has offered any convincingreason for abandoning this tradition. I have thereby been able to distinguishthe choral odes by some very simple and clearly heard changes of meter,including some free verse.I have tried to be true to the meaning of each word in itscontext, while at the same time conveying that meaning with an immediatelyclear and resonant impact. I have adopted modern, idiomatic English, but I hopethat the underlying sense of the meter allows for the language to shiftsmoothly into a more complex, less naturalistic mode of expression, where thedramatic context calls for it. Again, the choruses should still be recognizableby a more richly metaphorical and formal language as well as by their tone. Clearly, between all these aims, together with the demandsof the meter, there has to be some give and take. One’s hope is that anyclangors that this process throws up, does not interrupt, even for thescholarly listener, the sublime progress of Sophocles’ masterpiece to itsterrifying and piteous. Notes by Duncan Steen. The CastOedipus .. . . . . . . . . . . . Michael SheenJocasta .. . . . . . . . . . . . Nichola McAuliffePriest . . . . . . . .. . . . . Edward de SouzaCreon . . . . . . . . .. . . . Adam KotzA Messenger from Corinth .. . . . . . . . . . . . Neville JasonA Shepherd .. . . . . . . . . . . . Bruce AlexanderTiresias/Narrator .. . . . . . . . . . . . John MoffattA Messenger from the Palace. . . . . . . . . . . . JonathanKeebleHead Chorus .. . . . . . . . . . . . Heathcote WilliamsStrophe .. . . . . . . . . . . . Bruce Alexander & Laura BrattanAntistroph .. . . . . . . . . . . . Karen Archer & Jonathan Keeble About the Readers As one of the most gifted of the younger generation of Britishactors, MICHAEL SHEEN has been seen widely on stage and screen. His memorableperformance in the title role of Henry V for the Royal Shakespeare Company waspreceded by appearances in contemporary plays, including Osborne’s Look Back InAnger, Pinter’s Moonlight and The Homecoming. The title roles in Peer Gynt andRomeo and Juliet are also in his repertoire. Among his film work is Wilde, MaryReilly and Othello. He is increasingly active as a director (The Dresser,Badfinger). Since he left RADA, Sheen has recorded extensively and has alsodirected Romeo and Juliet for Naxos AudioBooks. EDWARD DE SOUZA has played leading roles in over a dozenWest End plays and in several seasons with the Royal Shakespeare Company,Stratford, at the Old Vic and the National Theatre. His film credits includeThe Thirty-Nine Steps and The Spy Who Loved Me. ADAM KOTZ has worked extensively in leading roles with, inparticular, The Royal National Theatre and Cheek by Jowl Theatre Company. Playsinclude Racing Demon, Measure for Measure, and A Family Affair. Television andfilm work includes Band of Gold, Touching Evil and Shot Through The Heart.JOHN MOFFATT’s distinguished theater career encompasses twohundred roles across the UK, forty-two major London productions and twoBroadway appearances. He played Malvolio in Twelfth Night at the Open AirTheatre, Regents Park, appeared in Ingmar Bergman’s production of Hedda Gablerand in Married Love directed by Joan Plowright. Film credits include Prick UpYour Ears, and he has been seen on UK television in productions as varied asLove in a Cold Climate and Maigret. NEVILLE JASON trained at RADA where he was awarded theDiction Prize by Sir John Gielgud. He has worked with the English Stage Co.,the Old Vic Company and the Royal Shakespeare Company as well as in films,television productions and musicals. This popular reader on Naxos AudioBookscan also be frequently heard on radio. BRUCE ALEXANDER is best known as Superintendent Mullett in ATouch of Frost and has appeared in many other television shows such as BerkeleySquare, Casualty and Peak Practice. He has also played major roles in thetheater, notably with the Royal Shakespeare Company. He is a director of ACTER,which annually tours Shakespeare to US campuses. HEATHCOTE WILLIAMS, poet, playwright and actor, has made asignificant contribution to many fields. He is best known for his extendedpoems on environmental subjects: Whale Nation, Falling for a Dolphin, SacredElephant and Autogeddon. His plays have also won acclaim, notably AC/DCproduced at London’s Royal Court, and Hancock’s Last Half Hour. As an actor, hehas been equally versatile — taking memorable roles in Orlando, Wish You WereHere, and Derek Jarman’s The Tempest, in which he played Prospero. Whale Nationand Sacred Elephant are available on Naxos AudioBooks, read by HeathcoteWilliams. JONATHAN KEEBLE trained at the Central school of Speech andDrama. Theater includes Coventry, Liverpool, Lancaster, West YorkshirePlayhouse, and a season at Manchester’s Royal Exchange. He has featured in over150 radio plays for the BBC and is an established voice actor. KAREN ARCHER has worked for the Royal Shakespeare Company inNicholas Nickleby and as Mrs. Erlynne in Lady Windermere’s Fan, as well asacross the UK in plays such as Ghosts, She Stoops to Conquer and Who’s Afraidof Virginia Woolf. Her television appearances include The Chief, Ruth RendellMysteries, Casualty and Chancer and she has been seen in the films The SecretGarden and Forever Young. LAURA BRATTAN trained at the Guildhall School of Music andDrama. She has appeared in the films Crime Time and Tomorrow Never Dies. Hermany television credits include Casualty, The Bill, Wycliffe,Little Lord Fauntleroy, Melissa, Five Children and Touching Evil. NICHOLA McAULIFFE is a wonderfully talented and versatileactress. She starred starred in seven series of the hugely popular SurgicalSpirit for Granada Television. Numerous theater credits include several WestEnd runs. She was awarded a Laurence Olivier Award for her role in Kiss Me Katefor the Royal Shakespeare Company.
  • • 作品列表
    • • CD01
      • 作品编号：23274  Oedipus the King

      • The Riddle Of The Sphinx

      • A Crowd Gathers Outside The Royal Palace Of Thebes

      • Enter Creon, Brother To Jocasta

      • Chorus : Strophe - Antistrophe

      • Enter Oedipus

      • Leader Of The Chorus Speaks

      • Enter Tiresias

      • Chorus : Strophe - Antistrophe

      • Enter Creon

      • Enter Oedipus

      • Enter Jocasta

      • Leader Of The Chorus

      • Oedipus

      • Leader Of The Chorus

      • CD02
      • 作品编号：23274  Oedipus the King

      • Chorus : Strophe - Antistrophe

      • The Messenger From Corinth

      • Oedipus And Jocasta

      • Chorus : Strophe - Antistrophe

      • Enter The Shepherd

      • Chorus : Strophe - Antistrophe

      • Enter The Palace Messenger

      • Oedipus Returns

      • Creon Returns

      • Final Chorus