Sophocles: The Theban Plays
06/03/2017
The Theban Plays is a term often used for three tragedies by Sophocles; Oedipus the King, Oedipus at Colonus and Antigone; all of which deal with the legendary matter of Thebes and its King Oedipus. Although often regarded as a trilogy, the plays were not originally intended as such, being written at widely different times, as part of sequences now lost, and featuring different, sometimes incompatible, versions of the underling myth.
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Free online texts
Gutenberg: Plays of Sophocles: Oedipus the King; Oedipus at Colonus; Antigone; translated by Francis Storr.
Internet Archive: Sophocles - Oedipus Tyrannus, Oedipus at Colonus, Antigone, translated by John Swinnerton Phillimore (1902). Multiple formats.
Internet Archive: Three Theban plays : Antigone, Oedipus the King, Oedipus at Colonus, translated by Theodore Howard Banks (1956). Multiple formats.
Loebulus. L020 - Sophocles -- Sophocles I: Oedipus the King. Oedipus at Colonus. Antigone. PDF of public domain Loeb edition in Greek and English.
University of Adelaide (Internet Archive): The Oedipus Trilogy (Oedipus the King - Oedipus at Colonus - Antigone), translated by F. Storr. Multiple formats.
Wikisource: Sophocles. Multiple translations.
Performances and Reviews
Theatre 80, New York
New York Times: Three Plays, Eight Actors, All Sophocles, by Rachel Saltz, 2 November 2008.
Translation Reviews
Peter J. Ahrensdorf translation
Davidson.EDU: Prof Offers Unadorned Translation of Sophocles Plays, 10 April 2014.
Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews: Greek Tragedy and Political Philosophy, reviewed by Edith Hall.
Other Resources
BBC Radio 4 In Our Time: Thebes. Melvyn Bragg with Edith Hall, Samuel Gartland, and Paul Cartledge.
History of Ancient Greece: Sophocles, podcast by Ryan Stitt.
Librivox: Sophocles.
Sophocles' Three Theban Plays, resources by translator Jamey Hecht.
Wikipedia: Sophocles
Youtube: Sophocles' Theban Plays, video blog by Phillip Zapkin.
The Great Conversation: Further reading at Tom's Learning Notes
Sophocles: The Theban plays - Oedipus the King, Oedipus at Colonus and Antigone.
Aeschylus: Seven Against Thebes.
Aeschylus: The Oresteia - the only true trilogy still extent from ancient Greek tragedy.
Aristotle: The Poetics.
A.E. Haigh: The Tragic Drama of the Greeks (1896).
Ancient Greek resources: Learn to read Greek classics in the original.
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