This article is intended for students studying Sophocles's 'Antigone' in various subjects. It should also be of interest to anyone who wants to know more about the tragedy and Greek culture in general. Wherever appropriate, the Greek words will be used to highlight their uses in the original literature.
1. When Oedipus's two sons, Eteocles and Polyneices, both died in a battle when they fought on opposite sides of the Theban war , Creon assumed the throne and dictated Polyneices an outlaw, thus prohibiting his proper burial. Antigone, Oedipus's daughter, tried to convince her elder sister, Ismene, to help her to bury Polyneices. Wary of the transgression that would certainly lead to severe punishment, Ismene attempted to talk Antigone out of the commitment, without success. Antigone insisted to go for that her way and soon led to her capture by the soldiers of Creon. An agon (struggle) took place when both Creon and Antigone firmly defended their perspectives, resulting in capital punishment for Antigone. Creon's actions, however, proved to perturb the physis of his world, and bad consequences soon followed. Antigone decided to die honorably by hanging herself in the cave she was incarcerated. Haemon, Creon's son and Antigone's fiancee, committed suicide, and followed by Eurydice, Creon's wife over the grief of her dead son. Now alone and bitter, Creon finally appreciated the limitations of his way.
2. Sophocles's weapons to timeless tragedies rested on 3 aspects : conflict, contrast, and irony. The conflicts of values, most notably from Antigone and Creon, led to an agon and resulted in a double-loss situation – not the zero-sum game Creon might have expected. The use of stichomythia, the formalized, line-by-line dialogues between 2 characters, were like the rapid-fire Q and A session in ancient Greece. Yet stichomythia reflected even more on the inevitable tragic conflict : the contrasting perspective in values foreshadowed a tragic outcome. From the memorable opening exchanges between Antigone and Ismene to the 'Antigone vs. Creon' agon, the dialogues not only reflected viewpoints but also the character of the speakers. Irony lurked behind characters throughout the tragedy. When Antigone felt she has done something right, she could not understand why the gods would lead her to such a bad outcome. When Creon thought that he has defeated Antigone and upheld the law of his state, he had to bear the consequences of his actions.
3. The first stasimon (choral ode) is known as the Ode to Man, one of the most iconic choral songs in all of Greek drama. The song celebrated humanity's achievement to control nature and build up sophisticated systems and organizations in various areas. The song pointed to a sentiment more relevant to Sophocles's days than the mythic past of Oedipus's family. The achievement depicted in the ode served as a testament to Pericles's successful reforms to Athens, basing on a staunch rationalism and humanism. The concept of the polis (city-state) was beautifully demonstrated through a primitive form of democracy. The Sophoclean age also saw the emergence of the Sophists. Leading sophists such as Protagoras embraced the potential of Man as the 'measure of all things'. Through an anthropological point of view, many sophists celebrated the ability of human culture to control their instinctual nature and solve the outstanding problems in their world.
4. Yet the more we attempt to look for positive attributes from the Ode to Man, the more we feel that something is not quite right. Note the ambivalence of meanings in the use of words : while the word 'deinos' appears to mean wonderful, as translated by many, the word can also mean terrible. The ambivalence from the world sounded less optimistic than the Ode has appeared to be. If the content of 'Ode to Man' was what Sophocles thought what Man should be like, then what was taking place in 'Antigone' was certainly the opposite – which could be another Sophoclean irony. Characters in this tragedy kept on making inappropriate choices instead of well-informed one, no matter how noble their intentions might be. Finally, humans still have yet to find a way to defeat Death itself – the issue that the characters in 'Antigone' had to confront.
5. If the spirit of the Ode demanded a commitment to the polis, which included accepting and observing the laws of the State (Creon's perspective), that did not take into account the possibility of violating certain rules of the oikos, which meant family or household in Greek (Antigone's perspective). For the tragedies of the Classical Greece, the tensions between oikos and polis have always been prominent. Humans were caught in the agon of individual versus the State, which has become a timeless theme all the way to today.
6. 'Antigone' is the textbook example of the Nomos-Physis debate, a series of intellectual interactions that reached a climatic point in the 4th century BC. Antigone and Creon represented the nature (physis) and culture (nomos) sides of the debate respectively. The physis-oriented Antigone pointed to gods and divine will to justify her burial of Polyneices; while nomos-oriented Creon stated that Antigone's actions were unacceptable as the law decreed that as a citizen she should have an obligation to observe the rules and adjusted the appropriate moral outlook. At the end of the story, Sophocles provided the worldly observation that none of the sides have emerged victorious. What that means to be a human, therefore, is to embrace both sides of the debate as part of our makeup.
7. To a lesser extent, the rise-fall structure, common in many tragedies and epics, is also evident in 'Antigone'. While the rise-fall structure is more obvious in plays like 'Oedipus Rex', this pattern can also be observed in Creon's short-lived victory and subsequent misfortunes. Creon, who adopted a humanistic outlook and believed his political and cultural machines – laws, trials and punishment – could lead to order in the polis, eventually turned into a monster itself and courted disaster for himself.
8. Though one can argue Antigone has not risen in any ways (other than on Ismene at the beginning), Creon and Antigone both became victims of a tragic device – the reversal of one's fortune. The brightness turned unexpectedly to complete darkness through the short span of the play. As Sophocles would have perceived, fate might be doing the work here, yet the characters' hamartia (tragic flaw) certainly contributed to their misfortunes, too.
9. The context of the performance of Antigone can be important for the interpretation of the play. e.g. The French showing of Antigone, staged by Nazi Germany in 1944, has distorted the meanings of the play and concentrated on absolute obedience, which was quite expected for such an ideology.
10. Literary theory provided the challenge about the ultimate meaning of the play – did it depend on the author or did it depend on the interpretation of the audience? Barthes' ideas would be insightful in this aspect.
by Ed Law
