Four Tragedies and Octavia (22 page)

Better be rid of doubts.

CREON
:                            Thus hate is bred.

OEDIPUS
: No king can rule who is afraid of hatred.

Fear is the sovereign's shield.

CREON
:                                      But when men fear,

Then must imperious sovereignty fear them.

Fear must recoil upon its author's head.

OEDIPUS
: Arrest this guilty man, and in a dungeon

Keep him confined! I shall return within.

Not yours, not yours the fault that brought such peril to us.

Not for that do the Fates bear hard on the house of Labdacus.

We are assailed by the ancient anger of the gods.

Castalia's woods gave shelter, long ago, to the wanderer
¹

Who came from Sidon; travellers from Tyre refreshed themselves

In Dirce's waters; when Agenor's son paused in these forests

After his weary search across the world for her
²
whom Jove

Had carried off; he rested here, to worship, while he feared,

The ravisher whom he sought. Phoebus commanded him to follow

A straying heifer, one whose neck had never felt the yoke

Of plough or heavy waggon; so he ceased from wandering

And gave our people a new name,
³
from that ill-omened heifer.

Since then, strange monsters many a time

Have risen from our soil. The serpent

Creeps from the glens to raise its head

Hissing above the ancient oaks,

Above the pines; his body's bulk

Sprawls on the ground, his azure head

Tops the Chaonian trees.

Earth has conceived a monstrous brood

Of men in arms; the bent horn shrieked

Its battle-call; the curved bronze trumpet

Sang its shrill song; the tongues of men

That had not learnt the art of speech,

Voices that none had ever heard,

Broke out with cries of battle.

The fields were filled with brother armies;

As was the seed that gave them birth,

Their life was measured in a day;

Born with the Morning Star,

Before the rise of Hesperus they were dead.

Such prodigies appalled the wanderer;

He could not but await in fear

The onslaught of the newborn race.

At last the breed of terror was destroyed,

Their mother Earth received into her lap

Her newborn sons.

So may all civil strife be ended;

So may that fratricidal war

Remain a memory for the land of Thebes,

The land of Hercules.

And still remains to tell the fate of Cadmus' grandson –

The strange growth sprouting from his brow, the wild stag's horns,

The hounds that hunted their own master.

Down from the woods and hills Actaeon fled,

Outstripped the pack through glades and stony places,

Shied like a stag at the string of wind-blown feathers,

Drew away from the nets which he himself had set,

Looked in the depth of a still lake, and saw

Horns on his head and his face the face of a beast:

In that same lake the goddess of stern chastity

Had bathed her virgin limbs.

OEDIPUS
: My mind is troubled; all my fears return.

The blood of Laius is upon my hands –

The gods of heaven and hell allege. And yet

My conscience knows no sin; it knows itself

More surely than the gods above can know it,

And it denies the charge. There was a man…

As I remember dimly… whom I met

Upon a road, and struck down with my staff

And killed. But he began it; I was young

And he was old and arrogant; he leaned

Out of his carriage and commanded me

To stand aside. The place was far from Thebes,

In Phocian land, a place where three roads meet.…

O wife, my love, help me resolve my doubts.

Tell me, how old was Laius at his death?

Young, lusty, on the day he died – or ageing?

JOCASTA
: Not old, not young; nearer to age than youth.

OEDIPUS
: Would he be guarded by a numerous escort?

JOCASTA
: The greater part of them had gone astray

Confused by the dividing roads; a few

Still followed faithfully the royal carriage.

OEDIPUS
: Did any fall beside their royal master?

JOCASTA
: One brave and loyal henchman shared his fate.

OEDIPUS
: I know the guilty man. Numbers and place

Confirm it. And the time?

JOCASTA
:                            Ten summers since.…

OLD MAN
: Sir, you are summoned by the men of Corinth

To take your father's throne. King Polybus

Has entered into everlasting rest.

OEDIPUS
: Fortune strikes blows at me from every side.

Well, tell me how my father met his end.

OLD MAN
: In peaceful sleep the old man passed away.

OEDIPUS
: So, my progenitor is in his grave,

And no one killed him. Now, behold, these hands

Are clean and fear no sin; in innocence

I lift them to the sky. Yet still a fate

There is to fear, a fate more terrible.

OLD MAN
: No fear will touch you in your father's kingdom.

OEDIPUS
: Back to my father's kingdom I would go,

But for one fear – I dare not face my mother.

OLD MAN
: Why? Fear your mother? She expects your coming

And anxiously awaits it.

OEDIPUS
:                        As I love her,

I must avoid her.

OLD MAN
:            In her widowhood?

OEDIPUS
: You say the very word I fear.

OLD MAN
:                                                What is it

That weighs upon your soul? This buried fear?

You may confide in me; I am a man

To keep kings' secrets under loyal silence.

OEDIPUS
: Delphi has warned me; marriage with my mother

Fills me with dread.

OLD MAN
:                  Forget that idle fear;

A monstrous fear – have none of it. Our queen

Was not in truth your mother.

OEDIPUS
:                                     Not my mother?

What should she want with an adopted child?

OLD MAN
: Heirs shield a king in time of disaffection.
¹

OEDIPUS
: What gave you access to the chamber secrets?

OLD MAN
: These hands gave you, a baby, to your mother.

OEDIPUS
: You gave me to her? Who gave me to you?

OLD MAN
: A shepherd, on Cithaeron's snowy slopes.

OEDIPUS
: And what chance took you wandering in that forest?

OLD MAN
: 'Twas on those hills I used to tend my sheep.

OEDIPUS
: Did you see any marks upon my body?

OLD MAN
: Your feet were pierced with iron pins; those ankles,

Maimed and deformed, gave you the name you bear.

OEDIPUS
: Who was the man who made a gift to you

Of my poor body? Tell me who he was.

OLD MAN
: He was the keeper of the royal flocks,

The chief, with others under his command.

OEDIPUS
: Tell me his name.

OLD MAN
:                            An old man's memory

Is not so clear; it rusts with long disuse.

OEDIPUS
: You'd know him if you saw him?

OLD MAN
:                                                      Ay, maybe.

Sometimes a little sign can jog to life

A distant memory long lost and buried.

OEDIPUS
: I will have all the shepherds and their flocks

Assembled at the sacred altars. [
To attendants
] Go,

Summon at once all that have charge of them.

OLD MAN
: No! Let a secret that has long lain hidden

Whether by chance or by design, remain

Hidden for ever. He that uncovers truth,

Uncovers it, too often, to his harm.

OEDIPUS
: What harm, worse than the present, can be feared?

OLD MAN
: A thing so hard to seek, you may be sure,

Will prove no simple thing when found. Here meet

Two rights, the king's advantage and the state's,

Neither above the other; leave them both

Untouched. Touch nothing; Fate will show her hand.

OEDIPUS
: Where all is well, let well alone; no harm

Can come of probing what is desperate.

OLD MAN
: Would you seek greater notability

Than royal heritage confers? Beware

Lest you be sorry to have found your father.

OEDIPUS
: Yet I must find the truth, though it be shameful,

About my parentage – and search I will.…

    An aged man approaches; it is Phorbas,

He that was master of the royal shepherds.

Do you recall his name or know his face?

OLD MAN
: His looks awake a memory; that face

Is one I know, yet do not know for certain.…

When Laius was king, were you a shepherd
¹

Tending his prime flock on Cithaeron's slopes?

PHORBAS
: Ay, there was always fine fresh pasturage

In summer on Cithaeron, where I worked.

OLD MAN
: Have you seen me before?

PHORBAS
:                                            Not to remember –

OEDIPUS
: Do you remember giving him a child,

A boy? Speak out. Why does your face turn pale?

You are not sure? You need not choose your words.

Truth won't be hidden by procrastination.

PHORBAS
: You delve into the long forgotten past.

OEDIPUS
: Speak, or else torture must fetch out the truth.

PHORBAS
: 'Tis true, I gave an infant to this man –

A useless gift, it never could have grown

To enjoy the light of day.

OLD MAN
:                          Say no such thing!

He is alive, and may his life be long.

OEDIPUS
: Why do you think the infant must have died?

PHORBAS
: An iron bolt was driven through the feet

To pin the legs together; swelling sores

Had festered and inflamed the whole small body.

OEDIPUS
: Need you ask more! Fate stands beside you now
¹
…

Tell me what child it was.

PHORBAS
:                            Duty forbids –

OEDIPUS
: Let fire be brought! Hot coals will burn out duty!

PHORBAS
: Must truth be sought by such inhuman means? Have pity!

OEDIPUS
: If you think me harsh and ruthless,

Yours is the power to punish that offence,

By telling me the truth. Who was the child?

What father's and what mother's son was he?

PHORBAS
: Your wife was that child's mother.

OEDIPUS
:                                                Earth, be opened!

Ruler of darkness, hide in deepest hell

This monstrous travesty of procreation!

The bans, heap stones upon this cursed head,

Strike me to death with weapons! Let all sons,

All fathers, draw their swords upon me; husbands,

Brothers take arms against me; let my people,

Stricken by pestilence, seize brands from pyres

To hurl at me! Here walks this age's sin,

Here walks the abomination of the gods,

The death of sacred law – from his first day

Of innocent life deserving only death.…

    Now be your courage keen; now dare a deed

To match your sins! Into the palace, go,

Go quickly, give your mother joyful greeting,

Blest in the increase of her happy home!…

Had I the choice, to shape my fate

To my desire, then I would trim my sail

To gentler winds, not fight against the gale

Till timbers trembled at its weight.

Not buffeted from side to side,

But borne by the light breezes' gentle force

On a safe middle course

My ship of life would ride.

There was a youth in Crete, who feared the king

And madly tried to fly towards the stars,

Trusting his life to an untried device,

Hoping to match his skill against the birds

Whom nature made to fly; but those false wings

Betrayed him, and a portion of the sea

Got a new name from him. While Daedalus,

Older and wiser, chose a middle course,

And hovered in the lower air, awaiting

His fledgling son –

Scared like a bird that sees a hawk

And gathers in her frightened young

From every side –

But now, alas, the boy was in the sea,

His hands encumbered with the instruments

Of his too daring flight.

Wherever man exceeds the mean,

He stands upon the brink of danger.