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Delahoyde & Hughes
Orpheus
PHILOCTETES
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Philoctetes, produced in 409 bce, is said to be Sophocles'
second-to-last play before Oedipus at Colonus, a play to which it
bears resemblance. Here, "Sophocles expresses what it feels like to be a
man so isolated, so impersonally, so instrumentally used by his friends"
(Grene 191).
The play begins with Odysseus lurking about Lemnos where he had marooned
Philoctetes almost ten years ago, just before the start of the Trojan
War, "his foot / diseased and eaten away with running ulcers" (195) after
being bitten by a snake. He tells Neoptolemus, son of Achilles, that he
had orders to do it. Neoptolemus is expected now to chum up to
Philoctetes so that they can get the bow of Heracles from him.
Philoctetes had received the bow as a reward for lighting Heracles'
funeral pyre; a prophecy claims it is needed against Troy now.
Neoptolemus can pretend he's fed up with the Greeks for now giving him
the arms of Achilles, which have gone instead to Odysseus himself.
Neoptolemus claims to "have a natural antipathy / to get [his] ends by
tricks and strategems" (198), but he and a Chorus of sailors proceed.
Philoctetes greets them, pleading for pity and apologizing for his savage
appearance. He respects Neoptolemus as son of Achilles and tells his
story. Neoptolemus tells a mix of his story and some lies, reporting that
his father is dead while Odysseus lives: "War never takes a bad man but
by chance, / the good man always" (211). Neoptolemus promises that he'll
take Philoctetes back home and gets to hold onto the bow. The Chorus
pities Philoctetes with the most poignant lines from any Greek drama:
"Alas, poor soul, / that never in ten years' length / enjoyed a drink of
wine" (222).
Eventually Neoptolemus must tell Philoctetes the truth -- that he must
join the Atridae (the sons of Atreus: Menelaus and Agamemnon) in the
Trojan War. Neoptolemus refuses to give him back his bow. When the
"shabby slit-eyed" Odysseus appears (236), Philoctetes wants to kill
himself. He cannot be appealled to, and Odysseus and Neoptolemus leave to
prepare to sail. The Chorus chides Philoctetes.
There's a falling out between Odysseus and Neoptolemus, and the latter
decides to give back Heracles' bow, but he prevents Philoctetes from
killing Odysseus. Philoctetes will not relent, and his "final refusal is
the refusal of a man so wounded as to be unwilling to resume normal life
itself because, with that life, will come new and unpredictable
suffering. Better the old known pain, with the old known remedies" (Grene
192). This play also registers early an anti-Odysseus tradition in which
the erstwhile hero is cast as a "treacherous deceiver" (Powell 571).
Aristotle and countless others since have objected to the deus-ex-machina
ending: the spectre of Heracles appearing above the cave and commanding
Philoctetes to proceed to the war where he will be healed and will
succeed in killing Paris, "the cause of all this evil" (253).
Powell, Barry. Classical Myth. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 2001.
Sophocles. The Women of Trachis. Trans. Michael Jameson. Sophocles II. Ed. David Grene and Richmond Lattimore. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1957. 189-254.