Oedipus: Minority Report

Oedipus: Minority Report

Period 2
9/16/15
Fate versus Free Will
It is easy to be influenced by false hopes and dreams and create lies to ease the conscience. It is also easy to be blind and ignorant to the truth because it seems too dreadful to hear. To forever be aware of the truth and fate that determines the consequences of every decision that has yet to be made, would for most, undoubtedly create a burden seemingly too large to handle with reason. However, would being aware of the future affect the decisions that lead up to determining one’s destiny? Throughout Oedipus Tyrannus and The Minority Report, this philosophy of fate versus free will, while recognizing the events that influence and form a future, clearly show the internal and external effects represented through both novels. Both Sophocles and Philip K. Dick incorporate the essential elements of blindness, prophecy and the continual strive to prove fate wrong, in order to represent the focus of each protagonist’s decisions and the effects it has on society.
As time progresses, both Oedipus and Anderton become figuratively blind to their own fate. However, blindness represents a vital characteristic as seen throughout Oedipus Tyrannus, due to the fact that throughout this play, those who are blind are the ones who ate truly able to “see” the future and fate of others. Although the visually impaired may not have physical sight, they are considered gifted through the visions they receive. Oedipus is essentially and figuratively blind to truth throughout his entire life. Teiresias, a blind prophet, speaks to Oedipus with reference to the fact that he is oblivious to his own fate, and astonished that Oedipus is too ignorant to recognize his own mother to whom he married. With an enraged tone, Teiresias draws Oedipus’ attention by forcefully saying, “You have eyes and do not see your own destruction…do you know whose son you are?” (Sophocles 11). Oedipus dismisses these accusations and responds to Teiresias by criticizing...

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