McGee lectures on Sophocles’ Antigone in Room 303 at WHS
(see more lectures at learnstrong.net)

Antigone is part of a trilogy
Sophocles is interested in exploring human suffering
Set in Thebes, where Oedipus’ story took place

Short synopsis of the play
Funerals tell us a lot about a culture
For the Greeks, all souls go to Hades
How you get there is comprised in how you are buried

Antigone tells her sister they have to bury their brother even though Creon forbids it
Her sister says that men make the laws and women obey the men
Antigone says she’ll do it herself, shows how strong she is

Creon is the king, he is the single point of authority
If you don’t obey the rules, you are punished
Explanation of Grecian stoning practices
He learns the body has been buried and wants to know who did it

Story about student who has issues with assistant principal
If you make a rule and someone breaks it, what do you do?
As an adult, what happens if you don’t enforce consequences?
If I do X and Y never happens to me, then I’ll keep doing X

What should the king do when he learns Antigone did it?
He isn’t able to intimidate her and she accepts her punishment without protest
She doesn’t allow her sister to take any credit for the burial
Antigone has a stubborn streak that reminds us of Oedipus

Antigone’s boyfriend is the son of the king
Creon decides to put Antigone in a cave and lock her in there
Haemon tells his father that he isn’t using his brain because killing her is a bad idea
He says their relationship is over if he goes through with it, then he leaves

Tiresias is blind, but he is a prophet who can see the past/future
He has lived both the life of a man and a woman and remembers those past lives
You need to bury the body of Polyneices and take care of the issue with Antigone
Creon claims the prophet is being paid under the table and is rebuked
He warns that before the end of the day a lot of people will be dead because of Creon’s pride

Creon goes to fix the problem and buries the body first
He learns that Antigone hung herself in the cave and Haemon got there too late
They fight and then Haemon commits suicide
Creon’s wife arrives, learns what happened, and then leaves to kill herself

Creon walks onstage with his son’s body and realizes he is a ruined man
He’s lost all credibility of Thebes and might go off to kill himself too
This amazing man at the beginning of the play is a ruined man by the end

Welcome to life which is filled with pain, suffering
Some of that suffering is given to us outside of our control
Another kind is the type of pain we seem to choose
Why do we call it “falling in love”?
Maybe the human condition is enjoying the pain even though it hurts us
Likes how moths fly into the flame and can’t stop themselves

Antigone is young, Creon is old
Creon is young, Tiresias is old
People of different generations talk past one another
Generational gap, I’m the old, you’re the young, I talk, you listen
Margaret Mead predicts that grandparents won’t be able to understand their grandkids
Would you listen to a 6th grader who wanted us to sit down and tell us about life?
What about when we ask our mom to sit down and listen to us?
In the play, Antigone is right when she tells Creon that he’s not doing what the gods want

Family politics
Haemon tries to get his father to listen, but he doesn’t

Gender politics
Most of the audience identified with Creon who was trying to enforce his rules and deal with issues
Modern audiences like Antigone because she’s a strong woman who doesn’t obey men