Oedipus (Dryden play) and Jocasta who die in the end: Of all the persons of the drama, scarce one survives the fifth act. Oedipus dashes out his brains, Jocasta stabs herself, their children are strangled, Creon kills Eurydice, Adrastus kills Creon and the insurgents kill Adrastus; when we add to this, that the conspirators are hanged, the reader will perceive, that the play, which began with pestilence, concludes with a massacre. The following quotation, taken from the epilogue, summarises Dryden's approach: <poem> Their [i.e. Dryden/ Lee] treat is what your palates relish most, Charm! song! and show! a murder and a ghost!</poem> Extensive
Oedipus and the Sphinx and evil, but also between the sexes, and that the opening poem of "Buch der Leider" by Heinrich Heine was the source for the idea of the painting. In that poem the Sphinx triumphs over Oedipus. In a Freudian interpretation, it has been argued that the Sphinx represents the castrating effect of Moreau's mother that he has seeking to escape. At the time the painting was created, Moreau's father had recently died. By contrast, Henri Dorra has suggested that the poses of the sphinx and Oedipus are derived from the Greek etymological meaning of the word sphinx, which is to