In the six dramas we have read, there is a common theme with respect to the children in each work. From Oedipus and Antigone to Hamlet and The Glass Menagerie, each of the plays shows the suffering of children that stems from the treatment of the actions of their parents. In this sense, children are victimized in these works but the victimization comes from those most responsible for their care.
In Antigone the actions of AntigoneÆs father are responsible for the death of her brother at the hands of Creon. Antigone will die because she cannot abide by CreonÆs rule because he will not provide proper burial to her brother. When she stands against him, he has no choice but to have her executed. Not only Antigone but also her sister Ismene has been victimized by their association with their father, Oedipus. When Antigone goes against Creon and buries her brother, Ismene warns her that their fatherÆs fate has taught her to fear the law and its consequences, (Sophocles 1960).
In Oedipus the King, OedipusÆ father victimized him by trying to have him killed as a child. When that plan fails, Oedipus is raised by a man who finds him where his father abandoned him. Eventually Hamlet will encounter his father but does not know him. In an ensuing struggle, he murders his father. Unbeknownst to Oedipus, he then marries his mother and bears children with her. When Thebes is plagued by a variety of ills, Oedipus considers his duty to avenge his fatherÆs murder and rid Thebes of what ails it. When he discovers what has actually occurred, he blinds himself and is banished from Thebes in self-imposed exile. The tragedy of Oedipus is that his deeds were spawned from his victimization by his father to the point where Oedipus unknowingly condemns himself, ôI curse myself as wellàif by any chance he proves to be an intimate of our house, here at my hearth, with my full knowledge, may the curse
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