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Probably no other character in Greek tragedy has been so thoroughly discussed in the psychological literature as Oedipus. Most of these discussions are based upon Sophocles' play, Oedipus the King, and deal with the themes of patricide and incest as first outlined by Freud. These same themes have been emphasized by the interpreters of Oedipus at Colonus, Sophocles' less well known play about the death of the aged Oedipus†. the Oedipus of Colonus may be dealing with another crucial life issue besides the oedipal one—the issue of old age and death. Most of them only incidentally mention the issue of old age and death (1, 2, 5); in a recent article, Seidenberg and Papathomopoulos state it explicitly, but draw more upon Sophocles' life than upon the play, itself, to elaborate their point (6).
In this paper Oedipus will be used as an example of a man facing issues associated with the final life crisis, that of death, and an attempt will be made to demonstrate how he solves these issues. The thesis is as follows. In the play, Oedipus at Colonus, we find the picture of an old man whose past sins still haunt him, who decries the infirmities and dependency of old age, who finds death a bitter potion; for Oedipus, as for any man, the problem is to face his past and