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The Good, the Bad, and the — What?

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1 The Good, the Bad, and the — What?
Sophocles’ Antigone 1

2 Preliminary Considerations…
Why? 21-Sep-18 Antigone

3 Quotation (Sentry’s speech describing evidence of minimal — but illegal — burial of Polynices’ body) LEADER: (to Creon) My king, ever since he began I've been debating in my mind, could this possibly be the work of the gods? CREON: Stop — before you make me choke with anger — the gods! You, you’re senile, must you be insane? You say — why it’s intolerable — say the gods could have the slightest concern for that corpse? (Sophocles Antigone pp. 72–73)

4 Another Quotation CREON:
I am not the man, not now: she is the man if this victory goes to her and she goes free. (Sophocles Antigone pp. 72–73) But if it’s about the conflicting claims of, on the one hand, family and religion, on the other hand, law and the state, what does this quotation have to do with that? Why is Creon so angry? Is it because he feels that Antigone’s disobedience threatens his masculinity? And does that / or does it not / jive with a supposed conflict between family and state, or between divine law and human law? Is family-religion gendered as feminine and state-law gendered as masculine? Is this a war of the sexes or what? But there’s more – for instance, who’s more sympathetic – good guys and bad guys. Is Antigone good and Creon bad? And if it’s not as simple as that, what are the definitions of good and bad that operate here? if, say, they’re both right, does that really help? what’s the good of its being both ok and not ok to bury Polynices? Is this play an affirmation of anything? Or does it question everything?

5 Agenda Preliminary Considerations… Device contract Recap and Update
Why? (what we just did) Device contract Recap and Update Who What When Revisited, Class Projects Antigone: Play Intro Play-facts, “Theban Cycle” Discussion Of Good Guys and Bad Guys, Or Is It That Simple? Look Ahead Performance Challenges 21-Sep-18 Antigone

6 Device Contract 21-Sep-18 Antigone

7 Device Contract for Thursday
I, [print name + B number], do solemnly swear to use my laptop/tablet [choose one] only for purposes related to class: notetaking, PowerPoint following, and the like. I also agree to display to the instructor and to the class my screen when requested by my instructor. At no point will I pull out or look at my cell phone, except by express arrangement with the instructor. Should I violate the terms of this agreement, I consent to have my right to use an electronic device in class revoked. [Sign name, date]

8 Recap and Update Who What When Revisited, Class Projects
class project. (a) building a collective theory of tragedy. (b) building an appreciation of the challnges of performance and brainstorimg approaches. Recap and Update Who What When Revisited, Class Projects

9 Who? What? When? Aeschylus Euripides Sophocles Aristophanes Euripides
Who? What? When? Tragedy Other Aeschylus BCE Sophocles ca. 496-ca. 406 Euripides 484?-406 BCE Seneca ca CE Satyr Drama Euripides 484?-406 BCE Comedy Aristophanes 448?–385? BCE Modern drama Anouilh CE 21-Sep-18 Antigone CLA77, Andrew Scholtz

10 Class Projects Tragic synthesis Adversity humanized?
1: A Theory of Tragedy 2: Performance Challenges Tragic synthesis impersonal forces personal resonance Adversity humanized? In-class, informal performance experimentation. as will be my practice during the semester, I’ll put out there ideas that I don’t expect you to buy into, but rather hope can function as prompts to further reflection. so the idea here is to ask whether – not to insist that – the impersonal or cosmic dimension can’t coexist with the personal, relatable in greek tragedy. Tragedy, then, as synthesis of antithetical categories. . . impersonal forces blind or cruel fate, as if the human implications mattered not a bit to the events themselves or their causes personal resonance. here, properly ethical considerations like “justice” or “free will” see perfectly irrelevant whether in terms of human agency or human impact. here, the human element – responsibility, moral comprehension, and the like – seem precisely what it’s all about. also, because so very human, it is surely a prime target for artistic expression. can, in other words, tragedy serve to make “the tragic fate of humanity,” as, for instance, illustrated in this “theban cycle” of soph, more relatably human, something we can identify with versus just pondering in the abstract. but what about their synthesis? Perhaps we can formulate it as follows: “Tragedy as the effort to humanize adversity,” as the effort, dramatized in stories told and performed in a variety of ways, to assimilate adversity within human consciousness and to find value in that very exercise. soon this afternoon, we’ll try to use one particular tragedy, Sophocles’ Antigone, as a proving ground for that hypothesis. For the next blog (due for Tu 2-Feb class) I’d like you to pick out (from the second reading in) Antigone one passage – a scene of maybe no more than two or three pages – you’d like to see used as a laboratory in performance. Then I’d like you to blog about what you feel the challenges are and suggest ways to deal with thhose challenges through staging, direction, anything performance-related. The scene that seems to get the most votes will be the scene we actually do in an impromptu rehearsal. that will be with a view to the performance group project we’ll be undertaking [which discuss] 21-Sep-18 Antigone

11 Antigone: Play Intro Play-facts, “Theban Cycle” 1-13-99
More on that soon. Right now, Antigone: Play Intro Play-facts, “Theban Cycle” CLA77, Andrew Scholtz

12 Play Facts Ca. 496-ca. 406 BCE First victory 468 Compositional order
Play Facts Sophocles “Theban Cycle” Ca. 496-ca. 406 BCE First victory 468 Compositional order Antigone (ca. 441) Oedipus the King (ca. 429) Oedipus at Colonus (ca. 406) Story order Oedipus the King Oedipus at Colonus Antigone Sophocles ca. 496-ca. 406 BCE first victory 468 “Theban Plays” Dates Antigone ca. 441 Oedipus the King ca. 429 Oedipus at Colonus ca. 406 (“Theban Plays,” cont.) Story order Thebes 21-Sep-18 Antigone CLA77, Andrew Scholtz

13 Myth Background: House of Thebes
Myth Background: House of Thebes Labdacus Oedipus Jocasta Polynices Eteocles Ismene Antigone Menoeceus Laius Creon Eurydice Megareus Haemon 7 Against Thebes (ANT PARODOS – “Glory – great beam of the sun, brightest of all / that ever rose on thed seven gates of Thebes, … you throw him back - / the enemy out of argos.” victory song.) deposed king Polynices + 6 allies versus … brother Eteocles important point - polynices treachery truly awful: risked terrible destruction for his city had he won, terrible losses for it even if he hadn’t his victory probably would have involved serious bloodletting once the victorious army entered the gates a combination on violent conquest and civil strife, the two worst nightmares for an ancient greek city so we can sympathize with creon’s measures: to punish the wicked and make an object lesson of them, to stabilize the state. yet to leave the body unburied represents not just an extreme and unusual punishment for a traitor; it subjects the land to ritual pollution but we can also sympathize with Antigone: the duties of family to the dead, the impiety of leaving the dead unburied, unable, therefore, to complete the passage to the other world SEVEN AGAINST THEBES: “… you throw him back — / the enemy out of Argos,” Antigone parodos 21-Sep-18 Antigone CLA77, Andrew Scholtz

14 Play Analysis (nums. = Penguin pages)
Play Analysis (nums. = Penguin pages) Prologue (59 ff.) Antigone, Ismene (burial) Parodos (choral entry ode, 65 f.) victory song 1st episode Creon, Sentry (Polynices’ burial) 1st stasimon (choral ode, 76 f.) “Many the wonders …” 2nd episode Sentry, Creon; Creon, Antigone, Ismene (Creon-Antigone agōn) 2nd stasimon (91 f.) “Blest they who escape misfortune” 3rd episode (92 ff.) Creon, Haemon (agōn) 3rd stasimon (101) madness of erōs 4th episode (101 ff.) Choral dialogue (kommos) w/ Antigone (bride of death); Antigone, Creon 4th stasimon (108 f.) myth parallels to Antigone 5th episode (110 ff.) Tiresias, Creon (prophecy, warning, agōn) Hyporchema (choral ode, 118 f.) Dionysus save the day! Exodos (119 ff.) Messenger, Eurydice; Choral dialogue (kommos) w/ Creon parodos stasimon koruphaios 7-Sep-2011 Antigone 2 CLA77, Andrew Scholtz

15 Discussion Of Good Guys and Bad Guys, Or Is It That Simple? 21-Sep-18
Antigone

16 Discussion: Good/Bad Guys/Acts
?? ?? so in the study guide I asked you to evaluate the issues and conflicts of the plays. let’s assemble some of these now. then, given that, and given what you know about the characters in the play, are there good guys? bad guys? If so, who are they and why? Or if not, then what? 21-Sep-18 Antigone

17 Look Ahead Performance Challenges 21-Sep-18 Antigone
Class two on Antigone: PERFORMANCE CHALLENGES. I'd like you to pick out from Antigone reading 2 (pp. 107-end) one passage — a scene of maybe no more than two or three pages — you’d like to see used as a laboratory in performance. Then I'd like you to write in your journal about what you feel the production/performance challenges are, and to suggest ways to deal with those challenges. The scene that seems to get the most votes will be the scene we actually do an impromptu rehearsal of in class. Look Ahead Performance Challenges 21-Sep-18 Antigone

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