1、俄狄浦斯王剧本英文版Oedipus the King By Sophocles Translated by F. Storr - Dramatis Personae OEDIPUS THE PRIEST OF ZEUS CREON CHORUS OF THEBAN ELDERS TEIRESIAS JOCASTA MESSENGER HERD OF LAIUS - Thebes. Before the Palace of Oedipus. Suppliants of all ages are seated round the altar at the palace doors, at thei
2、r head a PRIEST OF ZEUS. To them enter OEDIPUS. - OEDIPUS My children, latest born to Cadmus old, Why sit ye here as suppliants, in your hands Branches of olive filleted with wool? What means this reek of incense everywhere, And everywhere laments and litanies? Children, it were not meet that I shou
3、ld learn From others, and am hither come, myself, I Oedipus, your world-renowned king. Ho! aged sire, whose venerable locks Proclaim thee spokesman of this company, Explain your mood and purport. Is it dread Of ill that moves you or a boon ye crave? My zeal in your behalf ye cannot doubt; Ruthless i
4、ndeed were I and obdurate If such petitioners as you I spurned. PRIEST Yea, Oedipus, my sovereign lord and king, Thou seest how both extremes of age besiege Thy palace altars-fledglings hardly winged, And greybeards bowed with years, priests, as am I Of Zeus, and these the flower of our youth. Meanw
5、hile, the common folk, with wreathed boughs Crowd our two market-places, or before Both shrines of Pallas congregate, or where Ismenus gives his oracles by fire. For, as thou seest thyself, our ship of State, Sore buffeted, can no more lift her head, Foundered beneath a weltering surge of blood. A b
6、light is on our harvest in the ear, A blight upon the grazing flocks and herds, A blight on wives in travail; and withal Armed with his blazing torch the God of Plague Hath swooped upon our city emptying The house of Cadmus, and the murky realm Of Pluto is full fed with groans and tears. Therefore,
7、O King, here at thy hearth we sit, I and these children; not as deeming thee A new divinity, but the first of men; First in the common accidents of life, And first in visitations of the Gods. Art thou not he who coming to the town Of Cadmus freed us from the tax we paid To the fell songstress? Nor h
8、adst thou received Prompting from us or been by others schooled; No, by a god inspired (so all men deem, And testify) didst thou renew our life. And now, O Oedipus, our peerless king, All we thy votaries beseech thee, find Some succor, whether by a voice from heaven Whispered, or haply known by huma
9、n wit. Tried counselors, methinks, are aptest found To furnish for the future pregnant rede. Upraise, O chief of men, upraise our State! Look to thy laurels! for thy zeal of yore Our countrys savior thou art justly hailed: O never may we thus record thy reign:- “He raised us up only to cast us down.
10、“ Uplift us, build our city on a rock. Thy happy star ascendant brought us luck, O let it not decline! If thou wouldst rule This land, as now thou reignest, better sure To rule a peopled than a desert realm. Nor battlements nor galleys aught avail, If men to man and guards to guard them tail. OEDIPU
11、S Ah! my poor children, known, ah, known too well, The quest that brings you hither and your need. Ye sicken all, well wot I, yet my pain, How great soever yours, outtops it all. Your sorrow touches each man severally, Him and none other, but I grieve at once Both for the general and myself and you.
12、 Therefore ye rouse no sluggard from day-dreams. Many, my children, are the tears Ive wept, And threaded many a maze of weary thought. Thus pondering one clue of hope I caught, And tracked it up; I have sent Menoeceus son, Creon, my consorts brother, to inquire Of Pythian Phoebus at his Delphic shri
13、ne, How I might save the State by act or word. And now I reckon up the tale of days Since he set forth, and marvel how he fares. Tis strange, this endless tarrying, passing strange. But when he comes, then I were base indeed, If I perform not all the god declares. PRIEST Thy words are well timed; ev
14、en as thou speakest That shouting tells me Creon is at hand. OEDIPUS O King Apollo! may his joyous looks Be presage of the joyous news he brings! PRIEST As I surmise, tis welcome; else his head Had scarce been crowned with berry-laden bays. OEDIPUS We soon shall know; hes now in earshot range. (Ente
15、r CREON.) My royal cousin, say, Menoeceus child, What message hast thou brought us from the god? CREON Good news, for een intolerable ills, Finding right issue, tend to naught but good. OEDIPUS How runs the oracle? thus far thy words Give me no ground for confidence or fear. CREON If thou wouldst he
16、ar my message publicly, Ill tell thee straight, or with thee pass within. OEDIPUS Speak before all; the burden that I bear Is more for these my subjects than myself. CREON Let me report then all the god declared. King Phoebus bids us straitly extirpate A fell pollution that infests the land, And no
17、more harbor an inveterate sore. OEDIPUS What expiation means he? Whats amiss? CREON Banishment, or the shedding blood for blood. This stain of blood makes shipwreck of our state. OEDIPUS Whom can he mean, the miscreant thus denounced? CREON Before thou didst assume the helm of State, The sovereign o
18、f this land was Laius. OEDIPUS I heard as much, but never saw the man. CREON He fell; and now the gods command is plain: Punish his takers-off, whoeer they be. OEDIPUS Where are they? Where in the wide world to find The far, faint traces of a bygone crime? CREON In this land, said the god; “who seek
19、s shall find; Who sits with folded hands or sleeps is blind.“ OEDIPUS Was he within his palace, or afield, Or traveling, when Laius met his fate? CREON Abroad; he started, so he told us, bound For Delphi, but he never thence returned. OEDIPUS Came there no news, no fellow-traveler To give some clue
20、that might be followed up? CREON But one escape, who flying for dear life, Could tell of all he saw but one thing sure. OEDIPUS And what was that? One clue might lead us far, With but a spark of hope to guide our quest. CREON Robbers, he told us, not one bandit but A troop of knaves, attacked and mu
21、rdered him. OEDIPUS Did any bandit dare so bold a stroke, Unless indeed he were suborned from Thebes? CREON So twas surmised, but none was found to avenge His murder mid the trouble that ensued. OEDIPUS What trouble can have hindered a full quest, When royalty had fallen thus miserably? CREON The ri
22、ddling Sphinx compelled us to let slide The dim past and attend to instant needs. OEDIPUS Well, I will start afresh and once again Make dark things clear. Right worthy the concern Of Phoebus, worthy thine too, for the dead; I also, as is meet, will lend my aid To avenge this wrong to Thebes and to t
23、he god. Not for some far-off kinsman, but myself, Shall I expel this poison in the blood; For whoso slew that king might have a mind To strike me too with his assassin hand. Therefore in righting him I serve myself. Up, children, haste ye, quit these altar stairs, Take hence your suppliant wands, go
24、 summon hither The Theban commons. With the gods good help Success is sure; tis ruin if we fail. (Exeunt OEDIPUS and CREON.) PRIEST Come, children, let us hence; these gracious words Forestall the very purpose of our suit. And may the god who sent this oracle Save us withal and rid us of this pest.
25、(Exeunt PRIEST and SUPPLIANTS.) CHORUS (strophe 1) Sweet-voiced daughter of Zeus from thy gold-paved Pythian shrine Wafted to Thebes divine, What dost thou bring me? My soul is racked and shivers with fear. Healer of Delos, hear! Hast thou some pain unknown before, Or with the circling years renewes
26、t a penance of yore? Offspring of golden Hope, thou voice immortal, O tell me. (antistrophe 1) First on Athene I call; O Zeus-born goddess, defend! Goddess and sister, befriend, Artemis, Lady of Thebes, high-throned in the midst of our mart! Lord of the death-winged dart! Your threefold aid I crave
27、From death and ruin our city to save. If in the days of old when we nigh had perished, ye drave From our land the fiery plague, be near us now and defend us! (strophe 2) Ah me, what countless woes are mine! All our host is in decline; Weaponless my spirit lies. Earth her gracious fruits denies; Wome
28、n wail in barren throes; Life on life downstriken goes, Swifter than the wind birds flight, Swifter than the Fire-Gods might, To the westering shores of Night. (antistrophe 2) Wasted thus by death on death All our city perisheth. Corpses spread infection round; None to tend or mourn is found. Wailin
29、g on the altar stair Wives and grandams rend the air- Long-drawn moans and piercing cries Blent with prayers and litanies. Golden child of Zeus, O hear Let thine angel face appear! (strophe 3) And grant that Ares whose hot breath I feel, Though without targe or steel He stalks, whose voice is as the
30、 battle shout, May turn in sudden rout, To the unharbored Thracian waters sped, Or Amphitrites bed. For what night leaves undone, Smit by the morrows sun Perisheth. Father Zeus, whose hand Doth wield the lightning brand, Slay him beneath thy levin bold, we pray, Slay him, O slay! (antistrophe 3) O t
31、hat thine arrows too, Lycean King, From that taut bows gold string, Might fly abroad, the champions of our rights; Yea, and the flashing lights Of Artemis, wherewith the huntress sweeps Across the Lycian steeps. Thee too I call with golden-snooded hair, Whose name our land doth bear, Bacchus to whom
32、 thy Maenads Evoe shout; Come with thy bright torch, rout, Blithe god whom we adore, The god whom gods abhor. (Enter OEDIPUS.) OEDIPUS Ye pray; tis well, but would ye hear my words And heed them and apply the remedy, Ye might perchance find comfort and relief. Mind you, I speak as one who comes a st
33、ranger To this report, no less than to the crime; For how unaided could I track it far Without a clue? Which lacking (for too late Was I enrolled a citizen of Thebes) This proclamation I address to all:- Thebans, if any knows the man by whom Laius, son of Labdacus, was slain, I summon him to make cl
34、ean shrift to me. And if he shrinks, let him reflect that thus Confessing he shall scape the capital charge; For the worst penalty that shall befall him Is banishment-unscathed he shall depart. But if an alien from a foreign land Be known to any as the murderer, Let him who knows speak out, and he s
35、hall have Due recompense from me and thanks to boot. But if ye still keep silence, if through fear For self or friends ye disregard my hest, Hear what I then resolve; I lay my ban On the assassin whosoeer he be. Let no man in this land, whereof I hold The sovereign rule, harbor or speak to him; Give
36、 him no part in prayer or sacrifice Or lustral rites, but hound him from your homes. For this is our defilement, so the god Hath lately shown to me by oracles. Thus as their champion I maintain the cause Both of the god and of the murdered King. And on the murderer this curse I lay (On him and all t
37、he partners in his guilt):- Wretch, may he pine in utter wretchedness! And for myself, if with my privity He gain admittance to my hearth, I pray The curse I laid on others fall on me. See that ye give effect to all my hest, For my sake and the gods and for our land, A desert blasted by the wrath of
38、 heaven. For, let alone the gods express command, It were a scandal ye should leave unpurged The murder of a great man and your king, Nor track it home. And now that I am lord, Successor to his throne, his bed, his wife, (And had he not been frustrate in the hope Of issue, common children of one wom
39、b Had forced a closer bond twixt him and me, But Fate swooped down upon him), therefore I His blood-avenger will maintain his cause As though he were my sire, and leave no stone Unturned to track the assassin or avenge The son of Labdacus, of Polydore, Of Cadmus, and Agenor first of the race. And fo
40、r the disobedient thus I pray: May the gods send them neither timely fruits Of earth, nor teeming increase of the womb, But may they waste and pine, as now they waste, Aye and worse stricken; but to all of you, My loyal subjects who approve my acts, May Justice, our ally, and all the gods Be graciou
41、s and attend you evermore. CHORUS The oath thou profferest, sire, I take and swear. I slew him not myself, nor can I name The slayer. For the quest, twere well, methinks That Phoebus, who proposed the riddle, himself Should give the answer-who the murderer was. OEDIPUS Well argued; but no living man
42、 can hope To force the gods to speak against their will. CHORUS May I then say what seems next best to me? OEDIPUS Aye, if there be a third best, tell it too. CHORUS My liege, if any man sees eye to eye With our lord Phoebus, tis our prophet, lord Teiresias; he of all men best might guide A searcher
43、 of this matter to the light. OEDIPUS Here too my zeal has nothing lagged, for twice At Creons instance have I sent to fetch him, And long I marvel why he is not here. CHORUS I mind me too of rumors long ago- Mere gossip. OEDIPUS Tell them, I would fain know all. CHORUS Twas said he fell by traveler
44、s. OEDIPUS So I heard, But none has seen the man who saw him fall. CHORUS Well, if he knows what fear is, he will quail And flee before the terror of thy curse. OEDIPUS Words scare not him who blenches not at deeds. CHORUS But here is one to arraign him. Lo, at length They bring the god-inspired see
45、r in whom Above all other men is truth inborn. (Enter TEIRESIAS, led by a boy.) OEDIPUS Teiresias, seer who comprehendest all, Lore of the wise and hidden mysteries, High things of heaven and low things of the earth, Thou knowest, though thy blinded eyes see naught, What plague infects our city; and
46、 we turn To thee, O seer, our one defense and shield. The purport of the answer that the God Returned to us who sought his oracle, The messengers have doubtless told thee-how One course alone could rid us of the pest, To find the murderers of Laius, And slay them or expel them from the land. Therefo
47、re begrudging neither augury Nor other divination that is thine, O save thyself, thy country, and thy king, Save all from this defilement of blood shed. On thee we rest. This is mans highest end, To others service all his powers to lend. TEIRESIAS Alas, alas, what misery to be wise When wisdom profi
48、ts nothing! This old lore I had forgotten; else I were not here. OEDIPUS What ails thee? Why this melancholy mood? TEIRESIAS Let me go home; prevent me not; twere best That thou shouldst bear thy burden and I mine. OEDIPUS For shame! no true-born Theban patriot Would thus withhold the word of prophecy.
