FATE; A FAILURE ESCAPE

Salute to Sophocles for being able to produce such a dramatic play, Oedipus Rex. At first, I found this play boring and the language use is quite hard to understand. However, my perception towards this play change when I found out that what happen to Oedipus was actually fated and nothing he could do to change it.

Have you ever imagined yourself killed your own father and later got married with your own mother and have child? People will say that you are the most evil human on earth. Well, that is what happen to Oedipus and surprisingly, we don’t hate him for what he had done. In fact, we as readers feel empathy towards him for the fate that he could not avoid. Well done to Sophocles because he managed to get the sympathy from the readers towards Oedipus with his genius brain in his beautiful language.

What is fated to us can never be faded away. This is what I learn from this tragic play and it really helps me to understand more about life, love and fate. As human being, there is no way for us to avoid fate. We can only make plans but God will be the one who decides everything. In Islamic point of view, we have to believe in “qada’ and qadar”. It means that we have to accept the God’s plans because He knows better than anyone else. We must accept it with an open heart and believe that what is fated to us is actually the best thing that could happen in our life.

What happen to Oedipus is actually happening to all of us but not that extreme and tragic. Fate is something that out of our control. No matter how hard we try to avoid it, it will still come to us and there is no other way to run away. The best thing that we can do is learn to accept it and find the truth meaning in it.

“Romeo and Juliet”, “Greatest Love” and “Wau”??

We have heard a few famous playwrights such as William Shakespeare, Bernard Shaw and Sophocles whom their works have been recognised and rewarded from all over the world.. Their works have been studied and analyzed over the decades yet people still amaze with it. In fact, they still talk about how the tragic plays such as Romeo and Juliet and Oedipus Rex could be produced. I must say that these two plays are my favourite and I am really impressed by the beauty of the language use and also the unexpected story line.

I have never imagined myself writing a play. To be honest, I cannot even write a good short story. So, when I found out that we will have to write a play as a part of the assignment, my body was shivering – a usual expression I used to describe how bad I am. Fortunately, it needs to be done in a group. Thank God I don’t have to face this misery alone. At last, I formed a group with my group members Bruno and Amir.

After a lot of thinking and argument, we come out with a play entitled Greatest Love. This play is about a poor boy Karim who insists the football shoes so much that his mother could not afford to buy it. At last, the mother dies and he feels regret due to his bad actions towards his mother. I know it sounds cliché and boring but at that time, we could not think of any interesting story line. As expected, the play received a lot of negatives comments.

When I read the comments, I know we should come out with something interesting and the most important thing; it must contain values and messages. Suddenly, I got an idea for our new play and this time, we really put a lot of effort on it. The play is very nostalgic but full of messages. We proudly present “Wau” as our play and I really hope it will not be rejected.

Writing a play has given me chance to explore my writing skills and also to test my talent. At first, it was tough and challenging but we can improve ourselves from the mistakes and learn to be better. At least, I have tried hard and given my best and that makes me proud of myself.

TEIRESIAS: A Gift Or A Curse

Gender Confusion?

When I first heard this name Teiresias, I wondered what type of gender he owns. At first, I thought this person was female but I was totally wrong. I made a few researches about this person and I was surprised when I read his/her tragic life. I wonder how can human live in two genders and how it can be beneficial to all of us because we can choose what gender we want to be. I realize there are many people outside who want this chance so bad but dream on because it’s not going to happen.

When I read Teiresias’s history, I was listening to the song “If I Were A Boy” by Beyonce. Suddenly, I realized that this song was actually connected to the story and that made me more excited to know the details about Teiresias. Based on my readings, I found out that he was born as man and later he became female because he was cursed by the God due to his silly action – hitting a pair of copulating snakes with his stick. Then, he became a prostitute for seven years before he got back his masculinity. Based on his two different experiences, he could understand the basic needs that women and men wanted and this had given him an opportunity to be rewarded by the God. Later, he was gifted to be able to foreshadow of what will happen in future.

Frankly speaking, I have a lot of questions on my mind regarding Teiresias’s background. First, I wonder how could a person who was claimed to be a prophet would do such silly thing and the incident where he was cursed and transformed to be female was so illogical. In my point of view, in Greek mythology, there are a lot of irrational events or things that are not supposed to happen to human.

“I curse you!” We often say this to the person we hate in a hope that the person will transform to something ugly when we get angry. Unfortunately, there is no transformation happen. In

Malay culture, the word “curse” has been use for a long time ago. I can still remember the part where Gusti Putri was cursed by the Sultan Mahmud for rejecting his proposal in the Puteri Gunung Ledang the Musical recently. Also, the movie when Si Tenggang was cursed by the God for being rude and sinful towards his mother.

What happen to Teiresias was so tragic and unbearable. As a human being, we often make mistakes but we must know when to stop and how to correct our mistakes so that we will become a better person.