Oedipus Rex: Fate

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his city and gives him to King Polybus because the King and Queen could not have a child.
Oedipus grows up as the son of Polybus and Merope. When Oedipus was a young man he was told that he was not his father's son. He tires to dismiss this horrible accusation as that of a drunken man, but it always bothered him. One day Oedipus decides to go to the Oracle to see his knowledge of Oedipus' birth.
The oracle tells Oedipus his fate is the death of his father by his own hands and that he will marry his mother. He does not answer the original question Oedipus asked as to who his true parents are. Upon hearing this Oedipus decides to leave the city and never return as long as his parents (Polybus, Merope) are still alive.
Oedipus is running from his fate as he leaves the city and heads far from there. On his travel down the road he encounters a chariot drawn by horses and they force him off the road, and as the charioteer went by Oedipus hits him, the man swings back. Oedipus hits him ...

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side."(Oedipus Rex, 37) These lines powerfully demonstrate the fear of fate held by Iocaste and Laios, such great fear that they would kill their first born child!
Queen Iocaste certainly feared and believed in fate but she does not believe that prophecies, oracles and soothsayers could see the fate of others. Many times in the story she says things which pronounce her disbelief in prophecies. "Thus, Apollo never caused that child to kill his father, and it was not Laios' fate to die at the hands of his son, as he had feared. This is what prophets and prophecies are worth! Have no dread of them�" (Oedipus Rex, 37) "No. From now on, where oracles are concerned, I would not waste a ...

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