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LITELEC A54
The well known tragedy titled Antigone that was composed by Sophocles portrays
the struggles of a brave maiden against a tyrannical regent who despite all the opposition
and obstacles in her path achieves her goal of giving proper burial to her dead siblings
even at the cost of her own dear life. Its villain is left to a horrible fate that befalls him
and his kingdom at the hands of Theseus and the seven enemies of Thebes much later on
while she herself is granted peace in the Elysian Fields. In modern times this would be
uncaring society is smitten however if taken in the context of the Greek City State this is
in fact a story enforcing the rules of conformity and obedience to the societys norms.
While Antigone does meet a far kinder in comparison to Creon both will or do
end up dead by the end of the story for disobeying the twin pillars that are the State and
Religion, which during the time went hand in hand in governing the people of the city
states whom despite exhibiting the early characteristics of democratic government were
heavily intolerant of deviance even going so far as to develop the ostrakon, a process
which allowed the citizens of any city to exile whomever they wished by popular vote.
However as barbaric or hypocritical as this may seem it was merely but a survival tactic
as the method of warfare then and life itself was based around the Phalanx, a unit of
armed soldiers bearing a spear, shield and short sword advancing and fighting in a tightly
closed block formation. The entire concept rested on each and everyman fighting as one
for the greater survival of the unit and not for personal aggrandizement as such each
citys fate depended on the number of Phalanxes it could field and their level of unity
amongst themselves. This play is in effect an abject lesson to the results and
consequences of being individualistic and though the results were over exaggerated it was
probably more than enough as the phalanxes of Greece have proved their worth in the
Battle of Thermopylae and were adapted by Macedonia in later years while city states
themselves grew to be extremely close knit communities though it is quite ironic that this
would lead to their down fall since their xenophobia prevented them from unifying into
one nation.
All in all Antigone could be a considered a fair insight into the world of ancient
Greece and though it betrays little of the life of the Greeks at large being a fanciful tale
and all it gives an insiders look into the mindsets and culture of the Greeks by the way