Antigone Structure
ANTIGONE
PROLOGUE (1-116): Antigone, resolute and determined, proposes to Ismene that they flout the decree of Creon and bury the body of Ploynices, even at the cost of death. Ismene is afraid to join her and tries to disuade Antigone from her purpose, urging the weakness of women ant the necessity of obedience to the state. Antigone, in a burst of furious anger, scorns her advice.
PARADOS (117-79): The Chorus of Theban Elders hails the defeat of the Argive army and the lifting of the siege of Thebes. Pride goeth before a fall; Polynices was guilty of treason to his country.
EPISODE 1 (179-376): Creon enters and declares to the loyal Theban Elders his philosophy that the state is supreme and that devotion to country outranks all other loyalties. To rule well, he asserts, he desires the advice of all. Then he repeats his edict that Polynices is not to be buried, on pain of execution. The body is being guarded to preventburial. One of the guards, a simple soldier, arrives and hesitatingly announces that during a dust storm, which made it impossible to see, someone has given ceremonial burial to the corpse by strewing dust on it--enough, according to Greek belief, to ensure passage of the dead man's soul; to the lower world. Creon, revealing his tyranical and proud temperment, flies into a rage; he immediately suspects conspiracy [recall Oedipous's reaction in O R to the news from the oracle which Creon brought] and threatens the guard with death unless the culprit is apprehended.
STASIMON 1 (376-424): The greatest woinder in the world is man--with his daring, genius, and inventiveness. But his shrewdness can bringruin to all, if he uses it in ways that are not righteous and just, particularly when he thereby undermines the state.
EPISODE 2 (425-655): Antigone is led in under arrest by the guard, having been apprehended repeating the burial rites. She is openly defiant and brutally outspoken, admitting her act freely to Creon, and asserting that it was
PROLOGUE (1-116): Antigone, resolute and determined, proposes to Ismene that they flout the decree of Creon and bury the body of Ploynices, even at the cost of death. Ismene is afraid to join her and tries to disuade Antigone from her purpose, urging the weakness of women ant the necessity of obedience to the state. Antigone, in a burst of furious anger, scorns her advice.
PARADOS (117-79): The Chorus of Theban Elders hails the defeat of the Argive army and the lifting of the siege of Thebes. Pride goeth before a fall; Polynices was guilty of treason to his country.
EPISODE 1 (179-376): Creon enters and declares to the loyal Theban Elders his philosophy that the state is supreme and that devotion to country outranks all other loyalties. To rule well, he asserts, he desires the advice of all. Then he repeats his edict that Polynices is not to be buried, on pain of execution. The body is being guarded to preventburial. One of the guards, a simple soldier, arrives and hesitatingly announces that during a dust storm, which made it impossible to see, someone has given ceremonial burial to the corpse by strewing dust on it--enough, according to Greek belief, to ensure passage of the dead man's soul; to the lower world. Creon, revealing his tyranical and proud temperment, flies into a rage; he immediately suspects conspiracy [recall Oedipous's reaction in O R to the news from the oracle which Creon brought] and threatens the guard with death unless the culprit is apprehended.
STASIMON 1 (376-424): The greatest woinder in the world is man--with his daring, genius, and inventiveness. But his shrewdness can bringruin to all, if he uses it in ways that are not righteous and just, particularly when he thereby undermines the state.
EPISODE 2 (425-655): Antigone is led in under arrest by the guard, having been apprehended repeating the burial rites. She is openly defiant and brutally outspoken, admitting her act freely to Creon, and asserting that it was