How Does Ismene Change In Antigone

Antigone Essay The relationship between Antigone and Ismene changes throughout each scene during the play. They go through traumatic situations dealing with loyalty, love and death. The choices Antigone and Ismene made based on their beliefs generated friction between their relationship. From the beginning of the play Antigone and Ismene had a distant relationship. Antigone is loyal to her family, she “But as for me, I will bury the brother I love” (Prologue 64-65), which shows her loyalty to her brother and family. On the other hand, Ismene is not loyal to her brother she states, “they mean a great deal to me; but I have no strength to break laws that were made for the public good” (Prologue 62-63). Their different views on what is good and bad is clear in the choices they make.
The choice that impacted Antigone and Ismene the most is when Antigone decides to bury Polyneices’ body. When Ismene decides not to help her sister with the burial; it sways their relationship the wrong way. To Antigone, Ismene’s decision is a sign of disrespect to their family. But to Ismene it is a sign of reverence to Creon, the king, and her home town. Ismene makes a choice to take punishment of what Antigone did. Antigone didn’t agree with what her sister was doing, she said “No, Ismene. You have no right to say so. You would not help me, and I will not let you help me” (Scene 2 131-132). Antigone did not understand why Ismene is taking blame for something that will lead to death. Ismene was trying to change her consequence that she had received. Everything Antigone and Ismene did had a consequence to it. When Antigone buried Polyneices’ body she knew the consequences of what would happen when she went against Creon’s rule. Ismene made the decision to not bury her brothers body, the consequence of that was that her sister would think of her as an unloyal