Guilt Theme Analysis

Oedipus lives with the guilt and remorse for having violated two of the most severe taboos of civilized society—incest and the killing of one's parents. His overwhelming guilt at his actions caused him to blind himself and to beg to be banished from Thebes.

Yet Oedipus's sense of guilt for his famous crimes is more complicated in Oedipus at Colonus than it is in Oedipus Rex. He's a man who has suffered much for what he's done. He still feels guilt and revulsion, and he's still too ashamed to speak freely of his past when asked by the citizens of Colonus. However, with time has come some perspective. He realizes that he never intended to commit the acts he is infamous for committing. He killed his father in self-defense, he tells the citizens of Colonus, and without knowing what was happening. "Look through all humanity," he tells his listeners, "you'll never find a man on earth, if a god leads him on, who can escape his fate." Oedipus's guilt has diminished. At the same time, others who once shunned him and who now need his favor seek him out to express their own guilt at having cast him away before.