Oedipus & Hyppolitus Comarison

Oedipus and Hyppolitus Misfortune “The most tragic of plays is witnessing a good man come to a bad end through a peripeteia” Aristotle. Sophocles and Euripides present in their plays two main characters that after a sudden and unexpected reverse of circumstances, their lives completely change, arousing a sense of pity from the reader. Oedipus, originate more pity from the reader than Hippolytus, because of the actions they make and their reaction to the occurrence of events that causes the dramatically change in their lives. Even though both are responsible and at the same time not wholly responsible of the happening of their own tragedies, Hippolytus is more responsible for it than Oedipus because he does everything in extreme, like he worships only one god, Diana. Refuses to worship the god Aphrodite and denies that she is relevant to his life. Also, he has such a violent reaction when he finds out about Phaedra's passion and the extreme hate he has towards women. But Oedipus knowing what was going to happen in his life tries and tries to avoid it having no success at all. Hippolytus and Oedipus are both victims of a curse/prophesy which decreases the control they have over the events that occurs. Due to a family curse is that Oedipus leaves his home to go to Thebes, not knowing that he is actually going back to his real home, where he is going to marry his birth mother and his fate is going to start occurring. “it was my fate to defile my mother’s bed, …to murder the father who engendered me. When I heard that, I ran away from Corinth. From then on I thought of it just as a place beneath the stars. I went to other lands, so I would never see that prophecy fulfilled, the abomination of my evil fate.” (Oedipus, ll. 951-958). Here it shows how he tries to avoid his destiny by running away from Corinth not knowing that it was his fate that he was actually fulfilling. In contrast, Hippolytus, earns the displeasure of a goddess (Aphrodite) by only worshiping