Oedipus Rex

To make Oedipus Rex more accessible for the modern reader, the Prestwick House Literary Touchstone Classics edition includes a glossary of the story's more difficult words, as well as convenient sidebar notes to help the reader with confusing or challenging portions of the text. These handy aids will help the reader more fully enjoy the beauty of the verse, the wisdom of the insights, and the impact of the drama.

Sophocles' Oedipus Rex has never been surpassed for the raw and terrible power with which its hero struggles to answer the eternal question, "Who am I?" The play, a story of a king who acting entirely in ignorance kills his father and marries his mother, unfolds with shattering power; we are helplessly carried along with Oedipus towards the final, horrific truth.

This vibrant new translation invites its readers to lose themselves in the unfolding of this tragic tale as suspenseful as a detective mystery, yet with an outcome long ago determined by Fate.