September 25, 2001
Divine punishment is an irreversible occurrence that creates distinct attitudes in characters. In Yeats’ poem, Leda and the Swan and Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex, Divine punishment plays a crucial role, and is the basis for the actions of both Oedipus and Leda.
The Idea of the Divine
Yeats and Sophocles explore the idea of Divine punishment in various ways.
Yeats shows Leda’s attitude towards the experience of the rape, and the result
of the rape leads to Leda’s attitude towards the Gods, which then leads to many
more travesties. In a similar way, Sophocles shows Oedipus’ reaction to Divine
punishment when Oedipus realizes that he has killed his father and married his
mother. It was these actions that drove Leda and Oedipus to experience Divine
punishment. As a result, each has suffered even more.
Leda & the Swan
In Yeats’ poem, Leda and the Swan, Yeats explores the idea of Divine
punishment in using the result of Leda’s rape as his subject. The offspring
Leda produced represents the Divine punishment of the story. In the story, Leda
is raped by a swan, which represents Zeus, the most powerful Greek God. The
consequences of this rape includes two children, Helen and Clytemnestra who
later marry and experience the fall of the Trojan empire and the killing of
Agamemnon, Clytemnestra’s husband. The story of Leda and the Swan
creates a vivid portrait of a rape between an all-powerful swan and Leda, the
Spartan Queen. It is peculiar that two such powerful individuals are the
subjects of the horrendous act of rape. Zeus is the most powerful of all gods,
and Leda herself has great power, being the Queen of Sparta. Aside from this
however, lies another topic, which Yeats attempts to explore, and that is the
idea of Divine punishment. The mere thought of punishment from the Divine,
meaning God, is the reason why Leda allows the Swan to continue the rape without
a great deal of fight. Yeats writes, “Being so caught up, so mastered by the
brute blood of the air, did she put on his knowledge with his power before the
indifferent beak could let her drop?” (140). Here, Leda must choose whether or
not she should put all of her power in Zeus, knowing that he has harmed her.
Her action to not resist the force leads to the Divine punishment. If Leda were
to resist Zeus’ actions, Troy would be destructed and the entire Trojan empire
would fall. Leda does not allow herself to give in and fight, because if she
does, her entire life and the life of her children would be tragically ruined.
Oedipus
In Oedipus Rex, Oedipus undergoes a decision in experiencing Divine
punishment. Oedipus is born knowing that he was going to kill a man, and that
man would be his father. As well, he knew that the woman he was going to marry
would be his mother. The evil action that he commits is living out this duty by
killing his father and marrying his mother even though he is fully aware that it
is an immoral thing to do. Sophocles writes, “Then let him go. And let me die,
if I must, or be driven by him in shame from the land of Thebes. It is your
unhappiness, and not his talk, that touches me” (184). Oedipus realizes that
what he has done was terrible, and he feels that his life too, should be taken,
which eventually leads him to tear his eyes out. The way he experiences Divine
punishment is how he feels he will be punished if he does not commit the
two immoral deeds. On the other hand, he is still punished when he kills his
father and marries his mother because it is such an immoral, unheard of act.
Oedipus knew that he was going to kill a man and marry a woman and it was those
actions, which lead to his Divine punishment. Oedipus’ struggle to find a way
how to kill the plague that had hit the empire also brought a great deal of
punishment to Oedipus’ life. Oedipus’ struggle with unsuccessfully curing the
plague is another form of Divine punishment that he faced.
Conclusion
The actions that lead up to the Divine punishment that Leda, the Queen of
Sparta, and Oedipus, the King of Thebes, endure are acts that were, by all
means, self-inflicted. Whether or not they committed these acts was not the
issue. The true issue was how Leda and Oedipus thought they were going to loose
something important if they did not follow what was “scheduled” in their lives.
Leda felt that had she resisted the rape, then the entire empire would fall, and
Oedipus felt that if he did not kill his father and marry his mother, he would
not have fulfilled his duty. They both feared punishment from the Divine.
Divine punishment is more than the ability to act out on what each character
felt was dutiful. It is the fear that comes if a character does not do
his/her action. The events, which lead up to the Divine punishment, are the
rape in Yeats’ Leda and the Swan, and the killing of the King, and
marrying of the Queen in Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex. Both pieces deal with
the concerns for the future that deal with culture, experience, and
intelligence. Leda and Oedipus did not want to burden the other people in their
lives by not acting out in the way the Gods told them to, therefore the
consequences for both were the irreversible changes caused by Divine punishment.
Copyright 2001