The Sophocles Influence on the Saga

Sophocles is one of the most well known Greek writers who wrote several plays including Electra, Oedipus and Antigone.

While reading over the stories within Edith Hamilton's MYTHOLOGY, I couldn't help but realize all of the influences on Star Wars. As most of us know the films are truly a space mythology based very much on Campbell's Hero with a Thousand Faces. In addition it seems there are direct influences from the Sophocles plays to Star Wars and I wanted to write some of them down within this thread.

One of the most direct connections is the line "Far, far away." It as said by Creon when he met with the blind oracle Teiresias. This appears in Antigone.

In Oedipus, King Laius of Thebes is given word that his son will eventually kill him. His wife Jocasta (also the name of the Jedi Librarian) leave their son on a mountainside to die.

Many years later while the King is on a road to Delphi, he gets into an argument with a young man who kills him. It is recorded that the King was killed by robbers. While traveling to Thebes, this killer defeats a Sphinx who had been attacking the city. Due to his heroic deeds, this wandering man is welcomed into the city and crowned King. The man Oedipus who is now king marries Jocasta and decides to hunt down the man who killed King Laius. In the end he realizes that he is the son of Lauis and he is the killer. His mother/wife kills herself and Oedipus blinds himself so he no longer has to look upon the world (similar to Paul of Dune.)

This struggle between father and son reminded me of Star Wars. I'm not sure how direct the influence is but it is interesting. Lucas has a great interest in mythology and here is a story which deals with the struggle between father and son. Darth Vader left his wife behind and had never known his son. Like Lauis he is confronted by the son in later years. Luke doesn't actually kill his father, but he does watch the man die. There are some aspects which bind them.

On another level Thebes could represent the galaxy while the Sphinx would be the empire. Oedipus kills his father and then forces the Sphinx to kill itself by having a riddle contest. Luke watches his father dies and indirectly leads to the death of the Emperor. So from some perspective Luke defeated the Empire and will probably gain some control over the galaxy. So Oedipus took control of Thebes, while Luke is able to watch a new Republic be formed and he will probably lead the Jedi. So it is a similar story arc in that regard.

Antigone is more a struggle between brothers. Oedipus leaves Thebes with his daughter Antigone and goes out into the country. Both of his sons don't take the throne and Jocasta's brother Creon takes command of the kingdom. Later the two brothers Polyneices and Eteocles struggle for command of the city-state. In the end they both destroy eachother.

This is a big stretch but it reminded me a bit of the struggle between Obi-Wan Kenobi and Anakin Skywalker. In many ways they are brothers, the only family they have is eachother. They have differing views on what a Jedi should be like and those views eventually turn them against eachother. In the end Obi-Wan destroys Anakin and traps him into the Vader suit. Anakin destroys the Jedi and forces Obi-Wan to become a hermit on a backwards planet. Both characters are destroyed.

I stretched the influence a bit but thought I would state it anyway.

Does anyone else know of a Sophocles' influence or one by another writers like Euripides?

-Seldon

 

I can see similar faults in Anakin and Oedipus in their overlooking themselves as the root of the problem and the fact that they put too much stock into solving the problem themselves, rather than relying on others to help them. In his quest to solve the plague of Thebes, Oedipus overlooks the most logical solution, that he is the murderer and the cause of the tragedy that has befallen Thebes. Anakin, on the other hand, cannot accept things for what they are and the fact that everything must run it's course, even death.

 

Well, Sophocles wrote the plays of his trilogy our of order. He first wrote Antigone, followed it after some years with Oedipus at Colonus and then finished the whole story, near the end of his life, I believe, with Oedipus Rex. Since the story of Oedipus was fairly well known it never rubbed anyone the wrong way, and once all three were finished they were often performed together.

This should, of course, seem familiar, as Lucas told his epic story out of order. One can only hope that in the future people will pay his work the same respect as Sophocles, and view all six episodes of Star Wars in their numeric order.