Reading Oedipus has never strayed far from the political: his story is, after all, the story of the rise and fall of a city, and even those readings that appear to disregard the polis altogether, presenting him as a figure of solitary desire, feed off and into theories of law, community, and violence. Psychoanalysis is the best example of that. Nonetheless, something changed drastically when Freud turned Oedipus Tyrannus into Oedipus Teknon, when the king becomes first and foremost the child, and the father turns into first and foremost an object of fantasy.  Read more...

Name of Periodical: Project Muse

Issue Number: 74

Year of Publication: 2010

Page Numbers: 131-146

doi Number: 10.1353/cul.0.0063