A long time ago in Greece, a duke named Theseus ruled the city known as Athens. One day, four women knelt in front of Theseus’s horse and wept, stopping him from getting into the city. The eldest woman tells him that they are grieving the loss of their husbands, who were killed at the siege of the city of Thebes. Creon, lord of Thebes, had dishonored them by refusing to bury or cremate their bodies. Enraged at the ladies predicament; Theseus marches in to Thebes, which he easily conquers. After returning the bones of their husbands for the funeral rites, Theseus discovers two wounded enemy soldiers lying on the battlefield, nearing death. Rather than kill them, he mercifully heals the Theban soldiers’ injuries, but sentences them to a life of imprisonment in an Athenian tower.
The prisoners, whose names were Palamon and Arcite, are cousins. They both live in the tower for several years. One spring morning, Palamon wakes up early and looks out the window, and sees the beautiful Emelye, Theseus’s sister-in-law. She is making flower garlands. He falls in love with her on sight. His cry disturbs Arcite and wakes up and comes to investigate what is going on. As Arcite peers out the window, he too falls in love with the beautiful young lady. They fight over her, but eventually realize the ineffectiveness of this struggle when they remember neither of them can ever leave the prison.
One day, a duke named Perotheus, petitions for Arcite’s freedom. Theseus agrees on the condition that Arcite must be banished forever from Athens. Arcite returns to Thebes, he is miserable and jealous of Palamon, who can still see Emelye every day from the tower. But Palamon too grows more sorrowful than ever; he believes that Arcite will lay siege to Athens...
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... her that if she decides to marry that she should remember Palamon, who possesses the qualities of a worthy knight.
All of Athens mourns the death of Arcite. Emelye, Theseus, and Palamon are brokenhearted. Egeus, Theseus’s father, pulls Theseus aside and tells him that every man must live and die and that life is a journey through sadness that must at some point, come to an end. After some years pass by, the mourners feel better except for Emelye and Palamon, who continue to go about dreadfully, dressed in black. During one assembly at Athens, Theseus criticizes the two for grieving excessively. He reminds them that God ordains that all must die. He requests that they stop mourning, and that Emelye take Palamon as her husband. They obey, and as they realize the wisdom of Theseus’s advice over many years, Emelye and Palamon enjoy a long, loving, and happy marriage.
Antigone is a play about the tension caused when two individuals have conflicting claims regarding law. In this case, the moral superiority of the laws of the city, represented by Creon, and the laws of the gods, represented bt Antigone. In contrast, Oedipus The King is driven by the tensions within Oedipus himself. That play both begins and concludes within the public domain, the plot being driven by the plague that troubles the city, and which is so graphically brought to life by the Priest. In both Antigone (ll179-82) and Oedipus The King (ll29-31) the city is likened to a storm tossed ship, and it cannot be merely coincidence that Oedipus The King was written at the beginning of the Peloponnesian War, a time when Athens itself was suffering the effects of plague. Oedipus The King reaches its climax with a now blinded Oedipus daring to show himself to the people of Thebes, forgetting that he is no longer the leader of the state. In Antigone, it is Creons abuse of absolute power that leads to his tragic downfall. Whilst Oedipus determinedly tried to get to the root of his peoples ills, ultimately discovering that he was in fact the cause of them, Creon morphs from a supposedly caring leader into a tyrannical despot, eager to take the law into his own hands. It is the actions of Antigone that helps to bring about Creons fall from grace, as her steadfast refusal to accept th...
In the first part of the play Egeus has asked the Duke of Athens, Theseus, to rule in favor of his parental rights to have his daughter Hermia marry the suitor he has chosen, Demetrius, or for her to be punished. Lysander, who is desperately in love with Hermia, pleads with Egeus and Theseus for the maiden’s hand, but Theseus’, who obviously believes that women do not have a choice in the matter of their own marriage, sides with Egeus, and tells Hermia she must either consent to marrying Demetrius, be killed, or enter a nunnery. In order to escape from the tragic dilemma facing Hermia, Lysander devises a plan for him and his love to meet the next evening and run-off to Lysander’s aunt’s home and be wed, and Hermia agrees to the plan. It is at this point in the story that the plot becomes intriguing, as the reader becomes somewhat emotionally “attached’’ to the young lovers and sympathetic of their plight. However, when the couple enters the forest, en route to Lysander’s aunt’s, it is other mischievous characters that take the story into a whole new realm of humorous entertainment...
Four days before the wedding of the noble Duke, Theseus, and the queen of the Amazons, Hippolyta, Demetrius won the favor of Egeus to marry his daughter, Hermia, despite her profound love for another man, known as Lysander. Additionally, Hermia’s close friend, Helena, was desperate to gain Demetrius’s attention romantically. Hoping to escape her father’s enforced marriage,
Throughout the epic, Aeneas suffered the loss of many people dear to him. The first person to pass away was his wife Creusa. During the ...
“Count no man happy till he dies, free of pain at last.” (Sophocles) The royal line of Laius bears the curse of tragedy. A godly malediction that seemingly could have been avoided many times by his regal descendants. Indeed, Oedipus’ daughter, Antigone, could have had a reprieve for the mistakes of the past, yet she chose not to; instead she sought to embrace her kin’s demise. Knowing in full that she would be pleasing the gods with her defiance of mortal laws, Antigone found a reason to tempt fate, and thus her life would wither away only to be reborn again in the afterlife. This production of Antigone, the last play of the Oedipus Rex trilogy, will focus on Antigone’s masochistic
Seven youths and seven maidens from Athens were sent as tributes every nine years into the labyrinth, to be killed by the Minotaur, because King Minos’s son had died due to king Aegeus sending him on a deadly quest (Hamilton 239). Theseus volunteered as tribute, but unknown to everyone, he planned to kill the Minotaur. When he got in the maze, he killed the sleeping Minotaur with his bare hands (Hamilton 241). This was him getting vengeance on Minos for sacrificing the maidens and youths to the Minotaur. Him killing the Minotaur was also out of compassion for the people of Athens, who were afraid of being sacrificed. Another notable instance of Theseus caring about others was after Hercules had killed his wife and kids. He comforted him and saved him from killing himself out of guilt (Hamilton 259). At his essence, Theseus cared so much for others that he put himself in danger to help
The story starts with a fight about love. Egeus, who is Hermia’s father, does not want Hermia to be in love or with Lysander at all. Egeus wants his daughter to be with Demetrius who is in love with Hermia, but Hermia does not love him. Egeus goes to Theseus who is the Duke of Athens. Egeus tells him about the situation, and of course the Duke will go with Egeus side since he is the father of Hermia and he decides what she should do. Now Hermia is stuck with marrying Demetrius, becoming a nun, or being put to death. Hermia and Lysander decide to run away in the woods where there are no rules and where nothing can stop them from being in love. Hermia trusting Helena, who is her best friend with the secret she tells her. Helena is in love with Demetrius. She goes to tell Demetrius that Hermia has decided to run to the woods in hopes Demetrius would take her back.
In the awe-inspiring play of Antigone, Sophocles introduces two remarkable characters, Antigone and Creon. A conflict between these two obstinate characters leads to fatal consequences for themselves and their kindred. The firm stances of Creon and Antigone stem from two great imperatives: his loyalty to the state and her dedication to her family, her religion but most of all her conscience. The identity of the tragic hero of this play is still heavily debated. This tragedy could have been prevented if it had not been for Creon's pitiful mistakes.
In the Antigone, unlike the Oedipus Tyrannus, paradoxically, the hero who is left in agony at the end of the play is not the title role. Instead King Creon, the newly appointed and tyrannical ruler, is left all alone in his empty palace with his wife's corpse in his hands, having just seen the suicide of his son. However, despite this pitiable fate for the character, his actions and behavior earlier in the play leave the final scene evoking more satisfaction than pity at his torment. The way the martyr Antigone went against the King and the city of Thebes was not entirely honorable or without ulterior motives of fulfilling pious concerns but it is difficult to lose sight of the fact that this passionate and pious young woman was condemned to living imprisonment.
In the first scene of the play you are introduced to the duke of Athens, Theseus, who lays down the law for Hermia. Hermia, the daughter of Egeus, desires to go against her father’s wishes of marrying Demetrius, and instead marry Lysander. Theseus firmly states to Hermia, “Either to die the death or to abjure forever the society of men”; which simply put, Theseus gives Hermia the option to die or to no longer enjoy the company of men (Crowther). Furthermore he means to send her to a nunnery. This exemplifies the first variation of love within this play: arranged love, i.e. arranged marriage. Theseus then gives the order to Hermia that she must have her decision by his own wedding day with Hippolyta, thus giving her four days to decide her fate.
Theseus represents the voice of reason and moderation in the play because he seems to be the only normal character left. He only appears in the play during the daytime, when nothing magical occurs. He is the only character who shows complete sanity in the dreamlike fantasy world around him. He is the Duke of Athens so many people come to him with their problems. When Egeus comes to Theseus about the problem he is having with his daughter, Hermia, Theseus takes power over the situation. He explains to Hermia that if she goes against her father’s rules, by his words, she will be sentenced to death or sent to a convent. (Act 1, Scene 1, Pages 4 and 5, Lines 30-34). He states, “For you, fair Hermia, look you arm yourself to fit your fancies to your father’s will; Or else the law of Athens yields you up,- which by no means we may extenuate,- to death, or to a vow of single life.” Hermia is so in love that she can not make a reasonable decision, so she runs off into the imaginative woods with Lysander.
The strengths and weaknesses of the Athenian character traits laid out in the “Funeral Oration” are exemplified by the character of Creon in Sophocles’ Antigone, and suggest that Athenians held certain concerns in the Golden Age of their empire.
Sexism and “male dominance” are recurring themes throughout the play that cause resentment and conflict between characters. Some characters believe that trivial factors such as gender are reason for others to be oppressed. A prime example of this type of discrimination is the forced relationship between Theseus and Hippolyta. It is clear from the beginning of the play that Hippolyta is neither enthusiastic nor excited about her upcoming wedding with Theseus, despite the latter’s obvious anticipation. Theseus is absolutely ignorant of his future wife’s feelings, and even goes as far as to insensitively remark, “Hippolyta, I woo’d thee with my sword, / And won thy love doing thee injuries” (I. i. 16-17). This shows that he hardly regards her as a person, and more as a conquest from one of his exploits. To him, their marriage is nothing but a victory and reward earned by violently forcing an innocent woman to be his wife. The fact that he would use such means to make Hippolyta marry him proves that he has littl...
Sophocles establishes Electra as the protagonist of this play. Noble birth, yet is not treated as such, isolated in her grief. Both physically and emotionally tormented, Electra’s emotions heighten to a point of no return. Becoming increasingly irrational, maddening to the point where justice blurs with revenge. Embodying this play by Sophocles, is revenge, the central theme focusing on how it affects the perpetrator. Electra is an important example of this central theme. The only way to ease her suffering is to see Clytemnestra and Aegisthus dead. “For her, the living are agents of the dead and hardly to be separated from them” (Scodel, R. 1984. p. 80.). Electra takes it upon herself to see them put to death, with adultery, murder and hatred are moral motivations driving her. However, Electra’s moral corruption could also be rooted in hatred, jealousy and envy. Hatred towards her mother, Clytemnestra for the suffering she is forced to live. Jealousy and envois of her sister, Chrysothemis and brother, Orestes as they live in relative freedom compared to her slave like conditions. Chrysoth...
At the beginning of the story, we met King Theseus of Athens who recently won a battle against Scythia. He returned home with his new wife Hippolyta and her lovely little sister, Emily. On their way back to Theseus' house, they came across two men, none other than Theseus' cousins Arcite and Palamon. The two also happened to be enemies of the Duke, so Theseus took them back with them to lock them away. While locked away the cousins form a sort of pact with each other swearing that they would remain loyal to each other. Little did they know that their loyalty would be tested in the near future. One day, while locked away, Arcite and Palamon both spotted Emily strolling out in the