The Oedipus at Colonus Project

Homelessness

Venue

Free Event

Please RSVP through the link provided. The event Zoom link will be distributed via email, and available to registered attendees starting 2 days prior to the event.

Fri, Nov 05.2021 7:00 PM

Virtual Event

This presentation of The Oedipus Project is part of a series of events accompanying the release of Bryan Doerries' translations of Sophocles' Oedipus Trilogy: Oedipus The King, Oedipus at Colonus, and Antigone. We encourage our audience to attend all three events and engage in the story of an intergenerational curse passing through a single family, tracing an arc from early childhood trauma to familial and societal collapse.

We are proud to collaborate with The On Being Project on this series.

About the play

Oedipus at Colonus by Sophocles

After years of wandering in exile, without shelter or protection, the blind, elderly beggar Oedipus stumbles upon the sacred grove of the Furies on the outskirts of Athens in an area called Colonus, with his daughter Antigone by his side. Upon discovering where they are, Oedipus reveals that an oracle has foretold he will finally find refuge and rest in Colonus, and Oedipus’ body—after he is dead—will protect the city that houses it for all time. No longer the polluted and banished man, whose very presence brings bad fortune to anyone who comes in contact with him, over the course of the play, Oedipus transforms into a holy suppliant, sacred to the gods, bestowing gifts upon those who show him compassion and mercy. Oedipus at Colonus interrogates the impulse to exile, warehouse, and dehumanize people seeking shelter, asylum, and protection, and explores why showing reverence and respect for the less fortunate always makes communities stronger.