The Oedipus we are left with at the end of the play is similarly both father and brother. Yet in the end, these two roles merge into one person – Oedipus himself. Oedipus is searching for Laius’ murderer: he is the detective seeking the criminal. How can Laius have been supposedly killed by one person – and also by many people? The story, however, reveals that Oedipus himself alone killed Laius. Throughout the play, a central inconsistency dominates - namely the herdsman and Jocasta both believe Laius to have been killed by several people at the crossroads. Similarly, the play itself works backwards towards a revelatory start: the story has, in effect, already happened - and Oedipus is forced to discover his own history. As the child of his own wife, and thus father and brother to his children, Sophocles explores various interrelationships between where things began and who fathered who. Oedipus embarks upon a search for his own origins, and - though he does not realize it - for his real parents. Indeed, literal sight is juxtaposed with 'insight' or 'foresight'. As with the previous theme, sight/blindness operate both literally and metaphorically within the play. realized) leaves him unable to face his family or his parents in the afterlife). At the end of the play, moreover, Oedipus blinds himself, because what he has metaphorically seen (i.e. Teiresias holds the key to the link between sight and blindness - for even though he is blind, he can still see and predict the future (if not the present). After Oedipus finds out what has happened, he bemoans the way everything has indeed 'come to light'. Teiresias, of course, is literally 'in the dark' with his own blindness - and yet manages to have sight over everything that is to follow. Oedipus - and all the other characters, save for Teiresias - is 'in the dark' about his own origins and the murder of Laius. Darkness and light are tightly wound up with the theme of sight and blindness in Sophocles' play.

Oedipus the king by sophocles