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In Oedipus, there’s a blind prophet who can “see” in a way that others can’t, and clear-sighted king named Oedipus who just can’t “see” the truth. What’s up with that? Check out Sophocles’ eye motif to see for yourself.

Video Transcription:

The most famous moment in Oedipus Rex is also the most disgusting: It’s the moment when Oedipus gouges out his own eyes. But that’s not the only example of sight and blindness in this play. In Sophocles’s world, eyes are everywhere. That’s what makes them a motif!

Funny, isn’t it? Oedipus is a guy who’s famous for his clear-sightedness and his speedy comprehension. But when it comes to the prophecy—and his twisted relationship with his mother and father—he just can’t quite see the truth. He’s figuratively blind to it through most of the play, and then, when he finally accepts the truth, Oedipus has to physically blind himself because the truth is too painful to look at.

On the other hand, from the moment we meet the prophet Tiresias in Scene I, we can tell that this character is a seer. Not in the literal sense, of course—Tiresias is completely blind. But figuratively, Tiresias expresses the most clear-sightedness of anyone in the play. He’s the only one who sees Oedipus for who he really is, and it’s Tiresias’s prophetic vision that saves the city of Thebes.

What should you take away from all this? How about the fact that in Oedipus, blindness equals vision and vision equals blindness. In other words, better to trust your intuition, your head, or your heart to lead you to the truth. That’s because too often, our eyes deceive us.