hi guys and welcome back to VARs folks please like and subscribe for more content and follow my instagram @ bells books and check out my website www.misnylaw.com of this study guide and the Quizlet where you can test yourself on symbols characters themes and quotations so let's get started Antigone is originally a tragedy by Sophocles the Greek playwright from 1441 BCE it was first performed in Athens in ancient Greek Joe Henry's adaptation of Antigone was first performed on February 6th of 1944 in Paris he rewrote the play for the oppressive time he lived in inspired by its message of rebellion this version of the play was originally written in French it was performed under Nazi censorship as the Nazis were occupying France at the time as such and taking his rejection of King Creon Authority is ambiguous however there are clear parallels between Antigone and the French Resistance and Creon and the Nazi government this play because it was originally written in ancient Greek is set in Thebes in ancient Athens before we get into the summary of the play and talking about the characters and everything we first need to understand what happened before the start of Antigone before the play begins two brothers Antioch Cleese and polyneices died fighting of the throne during Thebes Civil War these brothers are the sons of Oedipus a Greek figure that you might have heard of he was a tragic error with the fatal flaw of hubris believing that your godlike he eventually accidentally fulfilled a prophecy that he would kill his father and marry his mother he eventually was blinded at the time that this play begins Creon is now the king and he's decided to honor Antioch Lee's and posthumously punish polyneices by denying him an honorable burial leaving his corpse on the battlefield to be eaten by vultures so before we get into a summary I'm going to go through the characters and talk you through who everyone is so the protagonist is Antigone she's the sister of polyneices and is mainly she's she defies Crayons orders to leave Polynices body unburied this the consequences and eventually does its mamie Antigone and Polynices sisters she's the complete opposite of Antigone she's considered more beautiful she's obedient and lawful and she doesn't want to bury polyneices because she's afraid of Creon crown the antagonist the current king of Thebes and here's a tragic hero he loses everything because he prioritizes what he believes is right Eurydice Crayons wife appears only at the end of the play when she commits suicide after hearing that her son has been killed Haman son of Creon and Eurydice is engaged Antigone he tries to support and take any but Creon refuses to listen to him when he finds them taking me dead he kills himself because he truly loves her the nurse looks after Antigone and his many but has no idea that Antigone was capable of defying the King's orders the guards they're not bad guys but they work for Creon and they're fine with carrying out bad orders they enforce laws and don't question them and then we have the chorus who's played by a single man who kind of serves as a commentator and narrator so I'm going to go through a summary now is going to be scene by scene just a general telling of the events first of all the chorus introduces the characters in the plot and explains the recent war between Atia Cleese and polyneices who were frightened over the crown both die and Creon becomes King as I mentioned before he celebrates a tea oakley's and refuses to bury polyneices and taking he is then seen sneaking home in the early morning and caught by her nurse and taking me claims she had a rendezvous with her sweetheart but eventually the nurse realizes that this isn't true at all if maybe then comes in and warns of taking it against trying to bury polyneices but we're beginning to suspect that something fishy is going on and in fact Antigone already has buried polyneices Haman then comes to visit Antigone and Antigone says that she can't marry him anymore Haman leaves upset his many Agana warns Antigone against trying to bury polyneices highlighting the importance of loyalty to King Creon and all of Polynices negative traits at this point Antigone confesses to the audience and to his mainly she's already buried him cRIO learns from a god that Polynices has been buried in a toy shovel left behind he commands the guard to keep it a secret because he doesn't want to lose face Antigone is then caught and taken to Creon Croom begs her to renounce her actions and in taken II refuse 'as Creon then begs her to marry Haman and taken in refuses Korean is saddened and frustrated and take any antagonizes Creon say that five times fast leading to her punishment burial in a stone cave until her death Creon tells the course that Antigone wanted to die of her actions and there was nothing he could do while the chorus tries to convince him that there are still other courses he can take Haman then makes his father Creon to have mercy on Antigone and says that he doesn't consider him a good man anymore and taking me then has a guard write a letter to Haman as the cave is being sealed a messenger and the crowd watching his cries coming from inside the cave which aren't Antigone's they opened the cave they tear down the rocks and they see Antigone hanging dead Haman is there crying him and tries to stab or assault Creon before killing himself stabbing himself in the stomach Creon grieves and the chorus tells them that everything will only get worse and that's when you learned that you ridaz see Crone's wife has killed herself currently used to go to a meeting saddened but doesn't seem to have learned much so the key greek literary features that are we continued from the original Sophocles play is hamachi hamachi is the tragic heroes fatal flaw that leads to his downfall Creon despite being the antagonist is the tragic era his fatal flaw is his pride in arrogance he refuses to relinquish his decree and so loses everyone he loves to suicide the gods punish him for this flaw at the end of the day the course suggests that Krim will learn from his punishment I'm now going to talk about the themes the ideas which reoccur throughout this play the first and the biggest one which you probably have noticed already is that of civil disobedience Creon claims that whatever he says is law and to go against him is to go against justice he believes that as the ruling he cannot be wrong in his delivering of justice in contrast and taking he believes that Crayons law contradicts of the Society of Thebes therefore her burial of her brother is not only a personal choice but for his civil disobedience she's directly disobeying the law and taking his standards of divine justice clashed with crowns will as head of state there are standards for right and wrong that are more fundamental and universal than the laws of any governing body the next theme is suicide or tragedy so antagony Haman and Eurydice all commit suicide and polyneices and eteocles make decisions which caused their deaths the frequency of suicide and deaths suggests that life is tenuous and taking one's own life is acceptable we might want to consider this question our suicide and self-injury the only way that characters men Tiffany can influence their destinies the next thing we're going to talk about is women and this obviously runs throughout the play because the main character is a woman and taking is the focus she's the tights of the play and she's the protagonist as a woman she's a second-class citizen and Creon has overlooked her capabilities and her resilience while his mainly submits of patriarchy we can see that Antigone opposes the patriarchy Antigone is described as very unfeminine while his Mamie is very feminine we might see their femininity as the embodiment of their differences there's also a strong theme of sibling rivalry running throughout this play is mainly Antigone rival one another with their opposing views and looks their rivalry results in antagonist status as a heroic figure his mania might be subservient but Crayons unjust decrees are worth standing against we might also consider that the impetus for the events of this play is a sibling rivalry polyneices and eteocles fighting one another for the throne a fight that resulted in both of their deaths there's also a strong theme of family love we see that Antigone loves her brothers more than anything else in the world and Creon and his wife both love Haman we also see surprisingly Creon Olav Antigone he does attempt to kind of save her or give her some kind of freedom but he doesn't love her siblings her brothers enough he loves his crown and his power more than he loves his family the final theme that is really important is that of fate throughout the play many things are described as inevitable and there's this kind of idea that once put in motion there are events which are unstoppable and cannot be changed we might want to consider whether this is actually true or any of the things that happen in an taking me actually unstoppable or could they have been stopped but the people with power didn't want to stop them this play is really rich with symbols and symbols are characters settings or things which represent bigger ideas so first of all we have the chorus the man symbolizes the people and commentates on the actions in ancient Greek tragedy the chorus would have been a group of men who served the same purpose the stone tomb the stone tomb Antigone is sealed in symbolizes that Antigone's loyalties are not with the living but with the dead a dead father Oedipus and her dead brothers the grey world mentioned by Antigone at the start of the play it symbolizes the afterlife she's destined towards Crayons physical attack cram assault sin take a knee twisting her to his side but Antigone can't feel the pain this moment symbolizes that Antigone can no longer be affected by human governance or power knitting Eurydice the Knitting symbolizes her life and when she stabs herself as she stops fitting and she dies the guards you might consider that they symbolize the Nazis all the Nazi guards considering that and we've wrote the play during the Nazi occupation of Paris the guards blind obedience to their leader might represent the bind obedient of Nazi soldiers who weren't necessarily bad men but men who followed bad orders the final symbol to think about is the sinking ship and this is used by Creon when he's talking about his city Thebes he considers himself the captain of this ship which is going down and he can't stop the ship from going down but it is going down on the less I'm going to end with asking you some questions about this play for you to go away and answer and brainstorm maybe you could make mind map for each question and just kind of develop your critical thinking skills about this play and get you ready for writing an essay or taking an exam on this play so first of all what burial does Polynices deserve whose actions are justified Creon Zoran Tigga knees to what extent are the characters in control of their own fates how important is the chorus to the effectiveness of the plane what message does the player suggest about Tarrant rulers the ending is somewhat ambiguous do you think Creon has changed his ways and become less turrent based on his experience how does this play exemplify French resistance to the Nazi regime so I hope this video has really helped you get to terms with Antigone my Jean and we remember that this play is different from Sophocles original Antigone so if you're studying that one you might want to find a different study guide or you can leave requests in the comment down below and I will get to that play eventually don't forget the link down below is the quizlets you can study for your exam or your essay and the written version of this study guide if you would like to have a look at that over on my website have a great day please don't forget to Like and subscribe if this video helped you and bye bye