In any discussion of the conscience and the icons that have become examples of what conscience means, there is a need to discover what a conscience is and from where it comes. Only then can the discovery of iconic roles such as Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Sophocles’ Oedipus be understood as examples of how the conscience works.
There can be no conscience without communication. The requirement of communication to establish a conscience is a common human trait. “There are tribes in Africa where a baby is called a kuntu, a ‘thing,’ not a muntu, a ‘person’” (Lederer 3). It is only when the kuntu learns to communicate in a reasoned way when the “thing” can put together complex thoughts into arguments, that it is set apart from the other creatures that inhabit the world. It is the question of muntu/kuntu where the binary of Being/not-being finds its source which, through time and effort, is discovered once the quest for Being is begun, deserted, started again, failed and then truly begun. In their wisdom, these ancient tribes associate the birth of communication with the dawn of humanity; with the finding of Being being discovered in the non-being; with the maturation to muntu depending upon the existence of kuntu where is found the irony in, “in the beginning was the Word” (Bible; Genesis 1:1) when the Word meant everything, nothing, and where all possible shades of gray; where sands slip beneath the feet; where flies the dragon of communication; where the “I” is found in the (/) between the two adversarial differences found in the binary of living.
Classic philosophy tells us that “the I,” a piece of the beginning, is always with us. It was not until the late 18th century that this concept was questioned. Schelling was the first to ask, “Where is the I in I if I cannot perceive the I” (Bowie 94). In rough translation: Where is the God in me if I cannot see it?
Schelling left the question unanswered because he had no answer. Such questions are eternal and can only be answered after the riddle is unwoven from its source which some claim to be communication through language. If the source is in language, (Language—thought expressed in speech or written form) then we are speaking of what delineates the self in each individual, by each individual, to provide voice for each individual, struggling against societies that continually strive, either through peer pressure or through regulation, to limit individual voices by warning of a cacophony of chaos that does not exist, has never existed, and cannot exist due to the nature of the person’s need to communicate with other individuals: to become muntu, to escape the kuntu and become a Being, a muntu.
Modern philosophers thought they had found the answer to Schelling’s question when born from the horrors of WWI and WWII, a new mode of thought changed the world upside-down: the philosophy of existentialism. Believing that no benevolent God could allow the horrors of these two wars, men began to think of life as being unguided; that life is not a benefit of vision from a benevolent God, but a consequence of the experiences of life, experiences that if unlearned from would be repeated until we did learn. Modern thought says that we exist, that we are born fresh and ready to learn, and then our essence comes from the experiences through which we learn. This theory is central to the development of conscience in the classic plays Hamlet and Oedipus Rex
The main characters in both plays, Hamlet and Oedipus, discover an untruth and struggle to find a solution. In so doing, they silently assent that the world contains things that are both “natural and artificial, living and dead, transient and sempiternal, all of which have in common that they appear and hence are meant to be seen, heard, touched, tasted, and smelled, to be perceived by sentient creatures endowed with the appropriate sense organs” (Arendt 19). Human life requires that reason drives the need for communication, or there is no reason to sense or be sensed; no reason to be or not be. Life assumes a quality of plurality where more than the one must exist. And since more than one truly exists, then language becomes an essential element that actively acknowledges the existence of the other and for the self to be recognized by the other; the Self, the Being, cannot stand alone.
The dilemma of the human conscience lies in its makeup. Sigmund Freud discussed this at some length. He began by defining childhood, much like the kuntu/muntu definition supplied by simpler human experiences. The id, to paraphrase Freud, is the first personality form produced in a child. Hardwired to satisfy our basic needs, the id also operates as a focus on pleasure acquisition and often creates a mental representation to meet its needs. The conscious mind is helpless before the id as it is never aware of its existence (Freud 5).
The superego observes social morays and creates an ego-ideal “or an ideal self-image in the eyes of those social rules” (Freud 6). It is the fate of the superego to scold or bash the ego for violations of social morays. Through the superego is created the conscience.
The ego is the referee between the id and the superego. It balances the needs of the id with the needs of the conscience creating the reasoned response that leads to ethical conduct. It uses a secondary process of thinking through which it adapts “cognitive and perceptual skills that distinguish fact from fantasy, allowing the ego to satisfy id needs in an appropriate manner” (Freud 6). In so doing, the ego is where the conscience is reinforced maintaining that balance between the id and the superego.
In modern discourse, much of the discussion about conscience is relegated the duality of human nature. Much has been made of that duality so much that a whole school of thought revolves around it. Within the modern theory of deconstruction, words and ideas are dependent upon relationships to one another and do not stand alone with separate values. Deconstructionist criticism has become a means “in which a text—any text—can be shown to be undercutting, or ‘deconstructing,’ itself at the same instant that it is working to organize, or ‘construct,’ itself into a stable, coherent and verifiable system of meaning” (Fitz 33). Commonly, a critic using deconstruction to analyze a work will search for binaries—words or characters of multiple meanings—to express the difference created when multiple readers view the work. An exploration of these binaries in Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex leads to the hidden meanings of human nature. Within the texts, there are many binaries: man/woman, good/evil, order/law, sight/blindness, just to name a few. The chief of the binaries lies at the very basis of life: muntu/kuntu or being/not being.
Few characters have become truly iconic. To become iconic, a character must be so influential that it becomes a part of the superego. Literary icons are immediately recognizable as a role model whenever mentioned. Both of the characters, Hamlet, and Oedipus have reached this level of influence. Both plays repeatedly performed in every culture of the world; their themes recognized as common throughout the human experience. Oedipus Rex was written by the ancient Greek writer Sophocles. One of the few Greek plays that have survived history, the play itself has become a significant moment in human development. The plot of Oedipus Rex has one of the most perfect plot constructions ever created in the field of drama. Aristotle took it as a model of tragedy. The plot is precise, compact, and an example of how the human conscience works. Thebes is in the midst of a famine and plague. The pestilence will not recede until a great evil, the murder of the former king has been rectified. Oedipus is instructed through the Oracle to “Drive out a pollution. Grown ingrained within the land” (98-9). Oedipus, being a responsible king of Thebes, decides that he must solve the murder, both as part of his duty as king as well as for the sake of the city: ‘So helping the dead king I help myself’ (141) and pronounces a curse on the murderer – “may he wear out his life / in misery to miserable doom” (249). Oedipus thus opens the gates to the eternal binary of good and evil. His search continues as he investigates the death of the former king.
Oedipus’ investigation is relentless. He pursues truth like a lion after its prey. When criticized he responds “you are wrong if you believe that one / a criminal, will not be punished only / because he is my kinsman” (551-3). Oedipus is establishing a new binary of crime and punishment. Still searching, Oedipus learns that the former king “was killed by foreign highway robbers / at a place where three roads meet” (715-6). Oedipus remembers accidentally killing an old man in such a place, a crime for which he has punished himself in memory only for years. His wife, Jocasta, tells him that the former king had fathered a child that was condemned to be slain because of a prophecy. The child was left on an exposed hillside with his ankles pierced. Oedipus is immediately troubled. He has such marks on his ankles. His conscience is piqued, “I think I have /called curses on myself in ignorance”, says Oedipus (744-5), fearing he has killed his father.
Further evidence is discovered of his crime, and Oedipus is trapped in a web of his making. He has always considered himself good, making every effort to make up for the single crime of his life. The crime is magnified by what fascinated Freud when it is discovered that Oedipus not only killed his father, he also married his mother and had children by her. It is the specter of not knowing that has ruined him.
Oedipus now has no choice. He is stuck firm in a newly created binary of king and man. As King of Thebes, it is his duty to find the reason for the plague in Thebes which turns out to require his self-sacrifice demanded by his conscience. “There is perhaps no feature of Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex as prominent as the ironic, tragic reversal that affects Oedipus, when his relentless search for the killer of his predecessor, King Laius, only confirms that he, Oedipus, has murdered not just a king, but his own father” (Searle 326). Bent upon removing the curse from Thebes, Oedipus intends on killing Jocasta, finds that she has hanged herself and then takes her clasps from her dress and ripped his eyes out. Self-blinded he is also self-exiled. His conscience could not survive without his sacrifice.
Oedipus has become iconic because of that sacrifice that was demanded of him by his conscience. To do otherwise would have violated the existence of the rolling binary influences of good/evil, crime/punishment, and king/man. Since that drama was first performed, it has been an example of the influence of conscience.
Hamlet is another of those iconic characters with a conscience. Hamlet is a young adult in internal turmoil. His father has died, his uncle has usurped a throne that, according to tradition, should be Hamlet’s, and his uncle has married his mother. Quite a lot for a young man to take. His speech with others in the court is courteous while his soliloquies are full of emotion. It is the binary of public/private that drives the play. Appearing controlled in his speeches with Claudius and the court, his first soliloquy reveals the passion within him. He constant refers to disease and rot and corruption with keywords like "rank" (138) and "gross" (138), and in the metaphor associating the world with "an unweeded garden" (137). Setting the stage for the play with his private remarks that stand so starkly against his public demeanor, Hamlet begins the journey to realization and justice. His search for meaning leads him to question all things learned with: There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, / Than are dreamt of in your philosophy (1.5.167-8). One of the most famous lines in Hamlet, this line, is essential to understanding the play. Hamlet is stating that what people learn is not as important as what people know. The conscience is built in, and all forms of knowledge cannot cancel that initial reaction that the conscience demands.
As the play progresses, Hamlet learns of the deceit of Claudius and must deal with it on his terms. The irony is that convention calls for him to kill Claudius in return for Claudius’ killing Hamlet’s father. This conundrum develops a new binary of revenge/justice. Is it revenge to kill one that has killed? If the first killing is wrong, then is the revenge killing not wrong also? Questions abound throughout the play, but this is the centerpiece that demands resolution. For Hamlet it is an action he must take without glee: The time is out of joint; O curs'd spite, /That ever I was born to set it right! (1.5.188).
Hamlet descends the path toward either self-destruction or taking revenge. His conscience will not allow inaction. Even the thought of inaction causes Hamlet to redress himself:
What a piece of work is a man! how noble in reason! how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how express and admirable! in action how like an angel! in apprehension how like a god! the beauty of the world! the paragon of animals! And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust? man delights not me: no, nor woman neither, though by your smiling you seem to say so. - Hamlet (2.2.295-302)
The ugliness of humanity which Hamlet discusses leads him to consider suicide and reject it. His quandary is set. He must live to exact justice. That becomes the reason for his existence. At the end of the play, he takes his opportunity and dispatches Claudius in a particularly bloody scene.
Once resolve sets in, there is no question in Hamlet’s mind that he must pursue his conscience. It is the action of seeking a solution that delays him. To not act is the same as asking if he should be or not be.
Both of these plays present characters that turn resolution into action. In the case of Oedipus, the first action is to investigate the reason for the plague. The second action is to investigate the murder of Laius, and the third action is to act on the discovery of his guilt. In so doing, Oedipus provides the iconic conscientious character that will not dodge his own judgment for his own benefit. His sacrifice is just as much for his own conscience as it is for the community of Thebes of which he is king. Hamlet, after he learns of the death of his father, must find the reason and then find the conscious resolve to act on it. His discovery of the truth, much like Oedipus’ discovery of the truth, leads him to reject inaction, reject suicide and reject exposing the plot. He, according to his conscience, must perform the act of justice himself.
It is not the actions of the characters that make them examples of iconic consciousness; it is the interspection, the decisions based upon their conscience, and then the resolve to carry out their judgments.
Works Cited
Arendt, Hannah, and P. R. Baehr. The Portable Hannah Arendt. New York: Penguin, 2003. Print.
Bowie, Andrew. Schelling and Modern European Philosophy: An Introduction. First Ed. London: Routledge, 1993. Print.
Fitz, Earl E. "The Passion of Logo(centrism), Or, the Deconstructionist Universe of Clarice Lispector." Luso-Brazilian Review. University of Wisconsin Press, Winter 1988. Web. 28 May 2015.
Freud, Sigmund, and Joyce Crick. The Interpretation of Dreams. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1999. Print.
"Genesis 1:1." The Holy Bible. N.p.: Cambridge UP, 1987. N. p. Print.
Lederer, Richard. The Miracle of Language. First Ed. New York: Pocket Books, 1991. Print.
Searle, Leroy F. "The Conscience of the King: Oedipus, Hamlet, and the Problem of Reading." Comparative Literature. Research Gate, n.d. Web. 6 Mar. 2016.
Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. Cambridge: Cambridge U.P., 1968. Print.
Sophocles, and R. D. Dawe. Oedipus Rex. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1982. Print.
