An Analysis of an Extract from the Play The Burial at Thebes

(pg. 29-31)

“I disobeyed (…) The man in charge?”

          This extract is essential to the whole of the play The Burial at Thebes. In this extract, Antigone confronts Creon for the first time after interring Polyneices, and the readers are presented with Antione and Creon’s conflicting rationales. law

Antigone states that she perceives gods’ laws as superior to those of “mortals” (7). She argues that Creon’s statues, “mortal force” (7) decreed by a mortal, are not valid before Zeus’s laws. Antigone declares that gods’ laws are “immemorial and binding” (5) for everyone, meanwhile humans’ laws are temporary and inferior. Thus, reasons Antigone, she can disregard Creon’s orders.

Antigone implies that she is more afraid of being punished in the underworld than she is in the mortal world. She states that she perceives the “death penalty” (14) as a relief because it reminds her that she has fulfilled her duty of burying Polyneices. If, however, she failed to do so, then “that would [have] be[en] worse” (17) for her “[t]han having to suffer any doom of [Creon’s]” (18).

We can also interpret Antigone’s insistence on burying Polyneices in terms of her “love” (5) for her family members.

In lines 24 and 25, Creon foreshadows his misery at the end of the play. The “resistance” (24), he mentions, is a direct allusion to his overall stubbornness throughout the play, and the “collapse” (25) is a boding of his demise after seeing that he has upset the gods.

The readers observe that Creon is determined to maintain a firm position when confronted with insurgence, such as that of Antigone. The words Creon uses, for instance “iron” (26), connote to his fierce and totalitarian attitude against resistance. Further, Creon explicitly states how an ideal relationship between the “ruled” and “rulers” should be: “Subordinates [a]re just not made for insubordination” (30) where “subordinates” refers to Antigone and anyone else who dare defy Creon’s authority. Finally, to accentuate his position and rule further, Creon asks a question and juxtaposes Antigone’s social status with that of his: “Who does she think [s]he is? The man in charge?” (34-35).

-Bora