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Updated: May 3, 2025
Calmly and with great dignity Antigone informs the herald that if nobody else buries her brother, she will. A warning threat fails to move her. The play closes with a double note of terror at the doom of Polyneices and pity for the death of a brave King. Further progress in dramatic art has been made in this play.
Jocasta tells how after the discovery of his identity Oedipus blinded himself but was shut up by his two sons whom he cursed for their impiety. Eteocles then usurped the rule while Polyneices called an Argive host to attack Thebes. A Choral description of this army is succeeded by an unexpected entry into the city of Polyneices who meets his mother and tells her of his life in exile.
In despair Polyneices goes away to his doom. "For me, my path shall be one of care, disaster and sorrows sent me by my sire and his guardian angels; but, my sisters, be yours a happy road, and when I am dead fulfil my heart's desire, for while I live you may never perform it."
These women then, through their unjust desire for a country not their own, justly lost their own. After Adrastus and Polyneices had joined in the expedition against Thebes and had been worsted in battle, the Thebans would not let them bury their dead.
Two brothers and two sisters are balanced in pairs against one another. The weaker sister Ismene laments the stronger brother, while the more unfortunate Polyneices is championed by the more firmly drawn sister. Equally admirable is the contrast between the righteous Amphiaraus and his godless companions. The character of each of these is a masterpiece.
On the morning after the defeat of the Seven who assaulted Thebes Polyneices' body lay dishonoured and unburied, a prey to carrion birds before the gates of the city which had been his home. His two sisters, Antigone and Ismene, discuss the edict which forbids his burial. Ismene, the more timid of the two, intends to obey it, but Antigone's stronger character rises in rebellion.
May an evil-doer never share my hearth or heart." Such is the ordinary man's view of the action of Polyneices, for in Sophocles the Chorus certainly represents average public opinion. It is quickly challenged by the entry of Antigone with the Watchman, whose story Creon hastens out to hear.
Jocasta and Antigone rush out to intervene, too late. They find the two lying side by side at death's door. Eteocles is past speech, but Polyneices bids farewell to his mother and sister, pitying his brother "who turned friendship into enmity, yet still was dear". In agony, Jocasta slays herself over her sons' bodies.
He has strange news to tell; another Theban is a suppliant at the altar of Poseidon close by, craving speech with Oedipus. It is Polyneices, whom Antigone persuades her father to interview. The youth enters, ashamed of his neglect of his father, and begs a blessing on the army he has mustered against Thebes. He is met by a terrible curse which Oedipus invokes on both his sons.
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