Thyestes

Tragic Tears. Oedipus and Thyestes Weeping

The paper analyses two passages from Thyestes and Oedipus, where the protagonists cry unexpectantly and involuntarily. In the first case, where Thyestes has a sort of metamorphoses in a werewolf, there is an exploration of all the semantic possibilities for this attitude: any of them is in part true. It is interesting the comparison with two Homeric passages, one where Odysseus manage to stop his tears, another where the unexpected crying is due to the goddess Athena. Oedipus cries after the revelation, when he represent the incarnation of rage.

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