Thursday, November 20, 2003

Response 11 due.

Reading

Notes

As I see it, the play centers around a failure to communicate, but this is certainly not the only interpretation — nor, I suspect, is it the best! So we’ll talk about the play, and here are some questions to consider:

  1. What is the issue that causes conflict between Creon and Antigone?
  2. What are Creon’s and Antigone’s arguments? Whose position do you find more persuasive?
  3. Do you find the play’s ending at all satisfying? (Remember, we’re looking at “tragedy,” so something bad will happen at the end.) Think about the ending in the context of Hoagland’s “Heaven and Nature” and Gass’s “The Doomed in Their Sinking.” Do these essays make the ending more satisfactory or more problematic?
  4. Some of you have read this play in other settings. What were some of the issues that you discussed in those contexts? (This is an important question to consider — eventually you’ll need to learn to apply what you have learned in one class to another.)

I’ll also be returning your second essay in class and briefly lecturing on ancient Greek theater (perhaps even with pictures, if I can find them!).

(Regarding response papers: if you have turned in every response paper up to this point, you don’t need to turn one in on Antigone — but you do need to come to class ready to discuss the play.)