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Sophocles’ Philoctetes –
Philoctetes was a Greek warrior who had been bitten by a serpent while on a mission on
the way to Troy. His wound became infected and the putrid smell, combined with his anguished
cries of pain, led the Greeks, at the suggestion of Odysseus, to abandon him on the barren,
uninhabited island of Lemnos. Philoctetes is only able to survive because he owns the bow of
Heracles and he can sustain himself on the birds he shoots down with its arrows that never
miss. Ten years later, Achilles is dead and the Greeks at Troy receive a prophecy that they can
only take Troy with Philoctetes and the bow of Heracles. Odysseus knows that Philoctetes, if
still alive, will kill him and so he persuades the young son of Achilles, Neoptolemus (“New
Warrior”), to convince Philoctetes to go to Troy.
The play offers an acute ethical dilemma for Neoptolemus – he does not want to lie to
achieve his goal, but he is also aware of how important it is to end the war that has caused so
much death and destruction. Is it ethical to put one’s personal morality aside to serve a greater
good? If so, what happens to one’s own sense of ethics? What is gained and lost? Philoctetes
stubbornly refuses to go to Troy. His grievances against the Greeks are so palpable that his
certainty and resoluteness is very attractive to Neoptolemus, who must choose between a man
who has nothing but his sense of righteous indignation and a man who will do anything to get
what he wants.
Eventually Neoptolemus steals the bow from Philoctetes when he is in the midst of the
most debilitating pain. He breaks his oath in doing so and betrays the newly forged bond of
friendship. Philoctetes wakes to realize that he has lost both his bow - his means of life (one
word for “bow” bios, in Greek also means “life”) - and his chance of ever returning home.
Neoptolemus returns with a seeming change of heart and returns the bow and tries to
convince Philoctetes to come with him to Troy. Odysseus then follows and the young man
stands between them, preventing Philoctetes from killing his enemy, who withdraws in haste.
Finally Heracles appears and orders Philoctetes to go to Troy and take the city – the word of a
god – or is it? Sophocles only had three actors play all the roles in the play (apart from the
chorus). The only actor available to play Heracles would have been the same actor who played
Odysseus. Was Sophocles planting a seed of doubt in the minds of his audience? Could these
orders to go to war also be one last great trick?
We know little about the life of Sophocles, but he may have served as a general in the
Athenian armed forces. We also know that he brought the cult of the healing god Aesclepius to
Athens, at a time when the city was dealing with a protracted and destructive war. The shrine
of Aesclepius, whose symbol of the snake twisted around a staff is still with us today as a
medical sign, was established next to the theatre, creating a tangible link between ancient
drama and the role of healing.