Oedipus

Oedipus The Chorus in the play Oedipus has a few important functions. The chorus is set in the play to act as bystanders throughout the play, observing what goes on, reacting and offering opinions at regular intervals throughout the play. In this role they are important to the play as they often offer the voice of reason during moments of heated debate, the voice of fear and confusion during Oedipus' downfall, which seems to mirror the audience's reaction and emotion in many situations throughout the play. The Chorus is also used as a sort of audience for passages of description over what has gone on but hasn’t been introduced to the reader for instance after Jocasta has realized the truth the second messenger describes the scene inside the palace to the Chorus: "Within the porch, straight to the couch she rushed, her bridal bed, and tore her hair.” The Chorus offers a sort of narrative for the audience. This function is equally important to the success of the play. The Chorus often speaks in this way at the end of a scene to clarify what has just gone on. For instance at the end of the first scene, the chorus clarifies the play, chorus, audience, during, throughout, scene, role, narrative, important, gone, voice, sort, situations, reacting, part, often, offering, oedipus, observing, kept, just, instance, having, end, wives, within, way, viewer, very, upon, unpitied, type, truth, tore, time, think