Oedipus monologue — Specimens of Greek Tragedy — Aeschylus and Sophocles

Fortune befriend thee for their presence here, Heaven guard thee better than it guarded me. Daughters, where are ye? Come unto these arms, These arms that issued from one womb with you, Which on the father that begot you brought This darkness for the light he had before. Blindly, my children, and unwittingly, Offspring I got in an incestuous bed. See you I cannot, but I weep for you, When I bethink me of the bitter life That ye must live, marks for the scorn of men. To what assembly, to what festival, Will ye e'er go and not be driven home In tears, excluded from the spectacle? And when your marriageable hour has come, Where will be found the man so venturesome To take upon him the reproach that falls Upon my parents and from them on you? What stain is lacking when your father slew His father, her that bore him took to wife 'Gainst nature's law, and had you born to him From the same womb from which himself was born? In face of such reproaches who will wed? No one will dare. Daughters, to waste away Lonely and childless is your certain doom. Son of Menoeceus, thou alone art left As father to these children, in one day Bereft of both their parents; let them not Go forth to roam famished and desolate, Nor let them be confounded with my crimes. Have pity on them, seeing them so young, Deprived of all saving thy charity. Reach forth thy hand in token of assent. Children, were ye of age to understand, I had much counsel giv'n ye; but now pray That you may dwell where it is best to dwell, And yours may be a happier lot than mine.