Gender roles and loyalty in Antigone

Female by nature, not by law…are supposed to be obedient…ruled by men…there’s something unnatural about what Antigone is doing….  This play is about gender also. Ismene =ideal woman. Women should be silent and Ismene voices that. Women should be sensible, should be ruled by men. Greek audience at the time is supposed to hate Antigone Creon he wants to see himself as voicing the opinions of the gods… Antigone also says that she’s working for the divine…and that complicates things. Creon stands for the city He aligns his authority with the authority of the gods. He doesn’t think of himself of going against the gods. He has taken over and summoned the people and asked them how he rules….. how does he rule? Notice how he likes public speaking!

When the city is suffering…. when the city is in trouble, you shouldn’t be silent. The city is at this point in a kind of danger that Creon does not see yet. He will see it later on…. if the city is suffering he wants the people to speak up and take action…. he’s not talking about Antigone of course…. but she’s doing just that…. Loyalty is to the state! Not to another human being! And yet at the end of the play, to whom does he show loyalty??? HIS SON. These are his values and he does not abide by his values… It is not in a way family vs. state…. it is family vs. Creon state…. this is the state that Creon is organizing….. why does this state have to fall? Not state in general…. keep that in mind… He wants us to see the proclamation coming up is in harmony….. he’s inviting us to see the proclamation: Eteocles will be buried in his grave while Polyneices will not be buried…. he is not to be mourned….. Creon uses the future ( Eteocles SHALL BE BURIED……) .

Antigone uses the past Another thing we noticed is the cruelty of the king ( you shall watch him chewed up )…something that we see rot, devoured, we see the body, he doesn’t belong with the living …. or the dead…what happens when the body becomes food for the animals??? The idea that we’re supposed to watch someone rot, take delight in it…. Someone is going to violate the proclamation, we don’t know who is the criminal…we are looking for the identity of the person who has violated the law…. what is the crime?? It looks almost miraculous, someone sprinkled dust over the body and buried it without leaving any marks….. or traces…as if the body was visited from above Chorus wonders if it’s the god’s doings……and Creon loses it when the Chorus says that! Here’s Creon is arrogant, how can a man know what the gods want? Both characters act in a way that they think the gods want them to do…. Creon thinks he’s doing all this to please the gods Creon cannot believe that Antigone did the burial….

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She is his niece and a woman! :O Notice that he’s interrogating and asking for the truth just like Oedipus Nature is assisting Antigone…. ature participates in the events…mimicking what Antigone was gonna do with her own hands. The dust rising……she was about to finish the ritual but then someone removed the dust off the body the second time she visited the body Why does Antigone abide by the laws of the gods? They are there forever…. Human laws like everything human, are subject to change Antigone is basically saying Creon’s worthless cause once someone comes after you to rule, things will change Antigone’s demise and Creon’s demise Both will have terrible ends Creon thinks that he has supreme power over her, and that power is to kill her…. according to the proclamation, whoever …they will be stoned to death in public,…fate given to her by man…. gender roles is very important Antigone tries to weaken his powers by put down his laws…. saying that his laws are not strong as the gods cause they were there forever…whereas his laws are only in effect in his reign…. that is one way Second way is saying that I know I will die…. even if you are not the one putting me to death, I will die anyways….. by saying that, she is robbing away of his power…. ssentially Creon is only a guy killing her…but her death is just gonna come to us…. death is part of the universe…what makes a difference is that we die naturally or someone is killing us…. And creon’s reaction to antigone’s words is that he’s being lectured by a woman…

Creon’s the man, so therefore he needs to teach this subordinate woman how to behave…. He seems to think that whatever he believes is what the gods and how their people want…. identifies their wishes with what they think others wishes also. Ismene comes out, shy, obedient, at the end of theplay changes her mind and wants to die with Antigone….. he had a real change of mind namely she saw that what she wanted in the beginning of the play when she was called cowardly…. her decision is as cowardly now namely that now she wants to be accused of the burial …is that she doesn’t want to be left alone… LONLINESS…. that’s another theme of the play. Antigone enjoys the support of the citizens but dies alone in a tomb Creon is loathed by his citizens and is also alone when his family is no longer alive…he is ruling a kingdom and no one respects him…thought to be a corrupt king. Ismene doesn’t want to be alone….. Creon changed his mind so that DEATH is killing her…and not him…so DEATH will kill Antigone and not Creon himself and that is an act of cowardice…. some of the characteristics transfer to other characters. Haemon and exchange between father and son. Antigone is very much the daughter of Oedipus….. Antigone and Haemon never talks…or interacts…. they never will come together…so son goes to talk to his father. What seems to matter to Creon more than anything else is obedience…power relationships…someone is obeying someone else…. e demands obedience from his sons and his subjects…ruling both state and family in the same way…. he does not differentiate the family and the state….. in EVERYTHING…. small and just things and unjust things.. bigs.. that is the problem….

It is NOT family vs. state! It’s actually family vs. tyranny / Creon’s state…. Is Creon disobedient? Does he violate his own principle? Yes he is disobedient to himself to his own proclamation…. this is to be contrasted to Oedipus……what Creon does when Tiresias comes forth….. he changes his mind and does something different…. he actually tries to save Antigone to which he has condemned her….. Creon thinks that both his family and city as his possession. He does rule the land at someone else’s judgement in the end…. by Tiresias ….. CONTRADICTIONS AND INCONSISTANCIES….He is not changing his principles…. but the change in action was for personal gain! Had he saved in Antigone, it’s doubtful for him to change his ruling if she even lived…. Unmarried women are put to death in marriage gown….. marrying dead kind of a ritual and so Antigone’s addressing the tomb as the bridal chamber….. she’s having sex with Death, that’s her husband from now on.

The idea is that DUE BRIDAL CHAMBER…already an emphasis on DEATH, not Haemon… To die if she so wishes or live…. how can she live?! SHE CANNOT LIVE…. she does NOT wish to die!!.... Creon wants a clean conscience…. he makes it sound like whether Antigone dies or lives, it is up to her or the gods, he has nothing to do with it….. Antigone put in the tomb, locked inside, left there to die…. Polynices and he is not in his tomb…notice the unnatural of things…a living person taken into tomb…. not dead yet…a corpse is left outside left to rot…… Rituals are important the gods will not listen to the chorus cause of Creon’s past protecting, shielding himself!... he wants to keep Haemon so he can stay in his throne…. not for the sake of his son, it’s for himself… they might belong to different realms cause Creon does not see what’s going on inside the cave/tomb .

Haemon is embracing Antigone, and Creon is asking him to join his father…. he would be saying bye to Antigone and joining the father, and also joining the political succession of his father and no love…. so what does he do…he attempts to kill the father with his swords but fails…and cannot touch the father…. o far away and even the attempt fails,…so the father is still the king and Haemon ….. he no longer belongs to anyone…. disowns his father…. he does not belong with death yet…. he leans on the sword (phallic symbol) and kills himself…. FULFILLMENT of marriage ….. sexual union with Antigone…. sword is the phallic that enters him…blood is of the woman….. once blood starts coming out, blood drops fall on her white cheeks, break of hymen……. Antigone has never been touched by anybody…. Haemon’s body receives the wound. Eurydices kills herself with a knife and Creon is alone Political situation in france in the play * Think about nazi, jews, money, greed, later on before she dies (ring). Who is the hero? Who is the villain? This makes it harder for us to pinpoint who is who…. Antigone’s stubborn = French resistance. A lot of emphasis on childhood, beauty, purity Many people who read anouilh’s play doesn’t like her she goes back and forth a lot. METATHEATER : beyond the theater, outside the theater, something that goes beyond it watching a play; any kind of comment about the play, about what’s going on…second look at what’s going on….

Prologue is a character that tells us what is going to happen Chorus tends to delay, more of a commentary on the action itself... similar function to the prologue in this play Prologue is commenting on the roles of the characters, basically introducing us to the main actors, he is talking about the situation….. Page 4: Prologue gives us that insight into Creon’s soul: sensitive man, someone who doubts his political authority, something very important and different from the Sophocles one. Characters are full of self doubt, is a second level situation…looking at what I’m doing and figuring out what I’m doing….. Function of metatheater? The effect?

Conveys a sense of inevitability as if the characters cannot be anything other than what they are…they have been given roles….. assigning the roles and they are going to enact the roles and there’s no escaping that… The idea that theater and maybe life in a totalitarian regime is more like a play…if you live in a state where you can die anytime, your life won’t matter much, might as well go out and have fun….. et’s just do what we have to do and get it done …get the job done ( what Creon says a lot) and move on…truth of life lies elsewhere….. characters talk about the truth a lot here….. Antigone is kind of like that, but the truth she longs for is an illusion and doesn’t exist and all that she has in her life is what exists, nothing beyond that… Prologue…. is just like the Greek gods, a kind of fate…. Scene between antigone and nurse Nurse doesn’t exist in the original…. have Tiresias but not here... it’s the nurse..

We are given a first insight of Antigone…. she’s rebellious, not sleeping, she’s out…god knows where she is Nurse thinks she’s having a boyfriend…yet she’s about to be betrothed to Haemon…aristocratic women should not behave this way…. there’s all this back and forth between them… The Nurse is perhaps.. IS the example of pure love and care in the play, there’s nothing selfish, impure about her…. she’s all about selfless giving to Antigone, cares about her, loves her…political outsider, has no role, she’s a servant…. nothing to gain from the system….. o you might say that’s what is achieved, introducing kindness and goodness into a world where motives are very much fluid, neither Creon or Antigone are good or bad, they are deluded…. Nurse is not full of Illusion…she loves Antigone Antigone Her famous word is saying NO….. no is a word of a rebel….

She says yes to the Nurse…affirming a bunch of things to the Nurse even though it’s false…. we have a bunch of yeses right after the other. Affirming things to the Nurse, denying things to everyone else…WHY? Nurse is someone she trusts, not a political authority….. rusts her and not an opposition to her as she is to everyone else, even her sister One of the things we noticed is that the relationship of Ismene and Antigone and how they are different in here than in Sophocles Ismene still the same in which she is opposite of Antigone, follows rules, obedient She understands where Creon’s coming from, but there’s some other stuff too One of them is the BEAUTY contest…. Antigone is physically unattractive and Ismene is physically attractive, and there’s a jealousy thing between the two sisters…. Haemon is in between….

Antigone steps in and uses Ismene’s stuff to attract Haemon STRESSES Nazi’s term of BEAUTY blonde, blue eyes, and not any way dark skin and stuff Ismene is the resemblance of beauty= German Nazis Antigone= French resistance STRENGTH & WEAKNESS Antigone .. not as beautiful as Ismene apparently Antigone’s love for dirt and mud…. has a lot to do with her upbringing, was told to do things in a certain order, she was told to be clean, not dirty…. keeping surface clean of mud, cover up the imperfections, not let physical ugliness show…. Same applies to strength… Person who says no? erson who says yes? Antigone in this play is IN LOVE WITH LIFE…she loved life when she was little, but as she grew up, she realized that the world is really corrupt so now she doesn’t really care about dying and she doesn’t others to touch her…does that mean Antigone is in love with death? NO, not exactly, she is tired of living….. a very young innocent Antigone and now that she is an adult, she doesn’t want the world that she sees in her…she js doesn’t want to live IN THIS WAY…rejecting REGIME…German occupation of France, resisting THAT kind of life… Childhood= paradise…. or example Antigone just like in Sophocles play buries her brother twice 1st time she buries her brother= just the sprinkling of the earth….. ”are you sure it wasn’t an animal that did it? ” animal metaphors …. THE SPADE…little childhood spade…rusty also.. we know that this spade belongs to Polynices children are associated with purity, innocence, all these ideas that the Nurse resembles spade= rusting….. playfulness, innocence, lack of care is gone .. it doesn’t exist. uses this to bury the brother second time, Antigone did it with her bare hands

Antigone is very much behaving like an animal when she is arrested Creon thinks it might have been an animal the first time She behaves like an animal Why would a girl be like an animal? What’s the association with the animal that ends up being a woman?? Why bring up animals here? Antigone is very much an adolescent, someone who hasn’t grown up….. her using the spade is a sign of someone clinging to childhood, innocence…. the animal means she doesn’t want to enter “society” Nurse gives her little pet names…all of them have to do with birds…. alls her dove/sparrow/turtle dove….. so that’s another case in the play where Antigone is thought of as a bird, as a non human, term of endearment used by the bird……all of them comparing.

Antigone to a non-human and then we have Creon continuing that later on….. all of these things resemble Antigone as not belonging to society …. that and she doesn’t put make up…nothing artificial on…sign of clinging to childhood…. rejection of artificiality, she’s clean pure, naked….. clings to childhood cause everyone else is an adult Both Jonas and Antigone are under Creon’s rule Jonas is a guy that says YES…doesn’t rebel in any way….. Antigone is the rebel How does the guards behave…. his desire to be on the ruler’s good side…promotes himself a lot…saying he does his job well….

Creon and Jonas are fixated on doing well & being efficient Creon is very in favor of taking orders and executing…Jonas is his subject Efficiency…. every failure was followed by with justifications just in case the king wants to kill you…his greed to get more money… Self promotion, beautifulness, efficiency, desire to be on the ruler’s good side….. nd those are the values that Creon likes and that’s what Jonas displays We know who did it and now we go to the confrontation between Antigone and Creon Creon’s obsession with duty…. he sees his job as a duty that needs to be executed almost mechanically…. Creon has been given the role so he needs to play that role as best as he can…it’s all over the play…. so a few examples Creon says that.

Thebes needs a king with no fuss…Ismene’s a sensible person, Antigone’s a irrational person Creon is the guy that says yes Antigone’s a person that says no Creon is caring about just DOING THE JOB, doesn’t matter about how it’s done…not that kinda guy…just DO THE JOB By doing that, Jonas and Creon is alike Creon is the lover of CLEANLINESS…Antigone is the one that likes to get her hands dirty…mud…. Ismene is the clean make up etc…. make up…. Antigone is the natural, and Ismene is not….. Creon is a practical guy…hygiene.

The world is empty of meaning….. Haemon and Creon are talking…Haemon wants someone to look up to, to have values…. Creon says that we are alone and the world is empty and you’ve looked up to your father too long values are what make the world work…. ut in the play, if you’re given an order, just go execute it…if you want to live and value life, given a task execute that task… next: keeping quiet…is what Ismene shows in both plays…. Creon here does not believe in the gods in this play…. he thinks the gods are him in this play…absence of the divine completely…. gods are actually being ridiculed * Creon: be practical…don’t waste time…. get married have kids live a happy life and then die One of the THEMEs: NEGATIVITY…fact that she says no all the time…. Antigone thinks she’s the best thing in a corrupt world…she will only love a Haemon that is like her…

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