Self-Destruction in Oedipus Rex*

The self-blinding of Oedipus is among the most famous self-destructive behaviors in Western literature. The prevalent interpretation holds that the act is catalyzed by feelings of revulsion and guilt, feelings which surge up in Oedipus when he learns the truth about himself. Graves, in exception, maintains that it is not feelings of guilt for past crimes but feelings of remorse for Jocasta's suicide which are decisive.3 Kanzer, in a stimulating discussion of Sophocles' trilogy as a whole, stresses the regressive aspect of Oedipus' action, and underscores its unconscious equivalence to castration,5 items which Lesser also dwells on in a recent paper.6

My purpose here is to offer further psychoanalytic interpretations of Oedipus' self-destruction. I shall confine myself to the passages of Sophocles' play which deal directly with self-destruction, for I believe that only a meticulous examination of Sophocles' text will help us fully understand Oedipus', as well as Jocasta's, suicidal conduct.

The most significant motivational factors in the self-destructive behavior of Oedipus (and the ones that commentators have ignored) are his initial tendency to discharge his aggressive impulses on someone else and his subsequent tendency to discharge those same impulses on himself when he finds himself thwarted in his initial aim. And indeed, as we examine self-mutilating and self-killing actions in Sophocles' work as a whole, we discover that this tendency to turn on to the self aggressions which were originally meant for others is the one clear constant in Sophocles' depiction of self-destruction. In the Ajax, for example, the suicidal hero's first impulse, upon learning that Achilles' armor has been given to Odysseus, a development which he considers to be disastrous, is to kill the individual whom he takes to be responsible for his undoing, namely Odysseus; when this proves impossible, Ajax stabs himself. Again, in the Antigone, the suicide of Creon's son,