The Greek audience would have been familiar with the story told in Antigone and with the background of the characters. An understanding of Antigone's family and her father's fate helps to put the events of the play in context. Antigone is of the Labdacids, a great but star-crossed family. Her father was Oedipus. Oedipus was born of Laius and Jocasta, the rulers of Thebes, but his parents were warned in prophecy that the boy would grow up to murder his father and marry his mother. A herdsman was charged with killing the child, but out of pity he gave the boy to another herdsman from a neighboring kingdom. This second herdsman gave the child to his own king and queen, who raised the child as their own. The child Oedipus never knew that his adoptive parents were not his biological parents. When a young man, Oedipus was warned by an oracle that he would kill his father and marry his mother. He fled home, thinking he would be able to avoid this fate, embarking on a series of adventures that resulted in the exact fulfillment of the prophecy. Along the way, he solved the riddle of the Sphinx, saving Thebes and becoming her king as well as Jocasta's new husband‹but not before he killed, in a fit of uncontrolled anger, a stranger at a crossroads. The stranger, of course, was his true father, Laius. After Oedipus had been in power in Thebes for some time, a plague began to kill Theban citizens. An oracle informed the king that Thebes was being punished because Laius' murderer was dwelling among them. Oedipus, the great riddle-solver, set out to learn the culprit's identity. Finally, he learned that Laius was the man at the crossroads, and worse, that Jocasta and Laius were his true parents. Jocasta was able to put the pieces of the puzzle together some time before her husband-son, and in despair she hanged herself. Oedipus, on discovering her body, blinded himself with her broaches and left the city. He entrusted his daughters, Antigone and Ismene, to Creon's care.
In the days preceding the start of the action of Antigone, Thebes has been torn by war. Many years have passed since Oedipus's reign, and war eventually broke out between Oedipus's two sons. During the conflict, the two brothers, Polyneices and Eteocles, fought against each other as leaders of the two different sides.
In Sophocles play, Antigone, the reader explores many aspects of a Greek tragedy. In this play, a complex family follows a series of mishaps after hearing from a “seer.” After the family thinks they have overcome the worst, they then endure two brothers fighting over both of their rightful places on the throne. In the end, both of them die, but one, Eteocles, was buried a king, and the other, Polynices was left to be untouched a “traitor.” Their sister, Antigone, feels it is her rightful to disobey her uncle, Creon, who sets a decree that declares Policies was to be left unburied. She called this “the doom reserved for enemies marches on the ones we love the most” (Fagles 1984, 59).
Not understanding or listening to the opinion of others can frequently have unfortunate consequences and even lead to tragedy. In the play, Antigone, written by Sophocles, the two main characters, Antigone and Creon, both failed to listen which led to the death of several people. It was exhibited how important it is to acknowledge the truth and this was the central theme of the play. The conflict between Antigone and Creon started because they had opposing viewpoints of whether or not Antigone’s brother, Polyneices, should have been buried after he died in battle. Antigone strongly believed that Polyneices should have because it was the law of the gods and they are eternal, while man’s laws are not. However, Creon, on the other hand,
The latest war in Thebes was waged between two brothers-- Eteocles and Polyneices. Polyneices, the elder brother, was to have the throne; but Eteocles drove him out by convincing the people that Polyneices carried Oedipus' curse. Polyneices went to Argos and raised an army, then returned in order to drive Eteocles out and retake control of Thebes (Oedipus at Colonus 1532-5). In the ensuing battle, the brothers killed each other-- they "worked out their share in common death" (Antigone 162). Their strife is over. Polyneices' army has returned to Argos, leaving the kingship of Thebes to Creon.Creon has just come to power in a city that has had more than its share of grief: King Laius was murdered, then the Sphynx and a plague tormented the polis with death. Next, Oedipus discovered his own crime...
In Sophocles' Antigone, the dilemma between nomos of the city and nomos of the home divides blood relatives and causes an inevitable conflict. Kreon, Thebes’ ruler, supports nomos of the states and honors polis before oikos. In contrast, Antigone promotes blood ties of oikos and divine laws that govern the dead. Kreon punishes Antigone for carrying out her duty to Polyneikes, and in doing so, he presents a different perspective and reversed order of priorities. In Antigone, polis and oikos depend on one another and share a symbiotic relationship. Since both are unstable, they cannot exist by themselves without problems. This, in turn with Kreon's stubbornness, leads to an untenable encounter.
Oedipus accidentally killed his father and married his mother. Because of that act, Oedipus ended up cursing his family and died a horrible death. After his death, his sons inherited his kingdom and in a power struggle ended up killing each other. One of the sons, Polynices attacked the city to try and claim power from his brother. But since both of the brothers died and the city was not taken Polynices was labeled as a traitor whereas the other brother who died defending the city was celebrated as a hero. Creon decreed at the beginning of the play Antigone that no one was to bury the body of traitorous Polynices. Antigone felt that it was here responsibility to bury the body because he was still a member of her family. This led to a huge argument with Creon who felt he shouldn’t be crossed because he was the leader of the state. Eventually both Creon and Antigone are destroyed by the gods (and by each other) through their own actions.
Antigone, in Greek legend, was the daughter of Oedipus. When her brothers Eteocles and Polynices killed one another, Creon, king of Thebes, forbade the rebel Polynices’ burial. Antigone disobeyed him, performed the rites, and was condemned to death for what she had done.
Conflict of law, presents the initial disturbance within Thebes. Creon, King of Thebes, refuses to bury the body of Polynices, for in his eyes Polynices is 'his country's enemy' Antigone pg.131. Thus, despite breaking the laws of the gods, Creon holds his power higher than that of God and heavens and enforces his law. As the story follows, Sophocles expands on the ignorance presented by Creon and Antigone, and it is also found that it is impossible to defeat an ignorant man, or woman in argument. It is this ignorance, that establishes the notion of the sin and punishment that both Creon and Antigone face due to their stubbornness and self will.
Sophocles’ play Oedipus and Antigone have many parallel themes and conflicts. Certain characters and events are mirrored and go through similar sequences in both plays. One conflict that is prevalent in both plays is the idea of loyalty. In Oedipus, many are loyal to Oedipus, including the city of Thebes itself. In Antigone, there is much strife in the relationships as well, and the idea of loyalty arises.
Polynices, however, is not done. He goes to Argos and recruits an army to take Thebes. The plan backfires though and Eteocles and Polynices end up killing each other, and the army is driven off. With no male heir to the throne, Creon, Oedipus' brother, takes the throne. This may be a lot for one person to handle, but Antigone's grief has just begun.
Thebes was invaded by Oedipus’ son, Polynices, and his followers. As Oedipus predicted in the previous play, Polynices and his brother, Eteocles, killed each other during battle. Creon, the king of Thebes, ruled that Eteocles should have a proper burial with honors and Polynices, the invader, be left unburied to rot.
Creon and Antigone, main characters in the Greek tragedy Antigone by Sophocles share some of the same characteristics that make up a tragic hero, but to varying degrees. Antigone, daughter of her mother/grandmother, Jocasta, and father, Oedipus is head strong, proud, and stubborn. She had three siblings, Ismene her sister, and two brothers Eteocles and Polyneices who found there deaths at the end of each others sword in battle over which would become king of Thebes. Antigone's pride fullness and loyalty is revealed when Polyneices is denied proper burial by her uncle and king Creon. The two buttheads in the political for Creon and personal for Antigone situation and bring about the downfall of the royal family.
This story has very little action, and there is ultimately no resolution. The first conflict encountered in this story is Oedipus and Antigone sitting in the forbidden garden of the Eumenides, in which the chorus curses them for, and they eventually move. The next conflict we see is Creon bullying Oedipus and abducting his daughters, and both were saved by Theseus. The final conflict is between Polynices and Oedipus when Polynices asks for his father’s help regarding the war between himself and his younger brother, Eteocles. Oedipus refuses to return to Thebes for any reason and curses both Polynices and Eteocles saying that they will be the death of their battle.
Polyneices was to be untouched because after ruling Thebes side by side with his brother Etocles, the two brothers fought in war for the thrown. Polyneices gather his own army and fought against his own city. After that he was deemed the title of a traitor and Creon announced his rule about Polyneices, Antigone was caught burying her brother and denied nothing because she believed traitor or not he was still a soldier for Thebes and he was her own blood so she could not sit around and let this happen to her brother.
In the play, Antigone, Antigone’s brothers, Eteocles and Polynices, killed each other over the throne of Thebes. Eteocles took the rightful throne to King after his father ran away in shame because he killed his own father and married his mother. As soon as Eteocles took the throne, he banished his brother, Polynices, so that he did not have to share the throne. Polynices went to create an army with the Argos Kings and mad Thebans. During the battle, Polynices and Eteocles fight to death and both of them die. Polynices is to rot to death and be eaten by the wild dogs and animals, while Eteocles gets the proper burial for he was the rightful king. In Martin Luther King Jr.’s...
Antigone is a play about a woman who disobeyed the King's order to not bury her brother. The play was written by the famous Greek tragedian, Sophocles, in 441 B.C. The story took place in the city of Thebes and the time period is not mentioned. The main characters introduced in the play are of Antigone, Ismene, Creon, and Haemon. The primary focus was centered on Antigone and the consequences she faces after breaking the King's orders.