Bloomsbury (2018) h/b 247pp £85 (ISBN 9781350017115)
This volume is part of a series commissioned by Bloomsbury focusing on individual Greek plays and edited by S., who founded the ‘Actors of Dionysus’. His aims are to set Sophocles’ Antigone in its historical context, explore the issues and trace its influence up to the modern day. The book includes an introduction by the editor, chapters by twelve experts, S.’s own complete translation of the original text, a comprehensive bibliography and an index. It admirably caters for the specialist and non-specialist alike.
In his Introduction S. assists the non-specialist by discussing the myth of Antigone, the moral and societal values, Sophocles’ biographical details, the relevance of Samos and a brief outline of Greek tragedy and its origins. Garvie’s contribution considers whether Antigone is right or wrong, beginning with a review of some modern interpretations of the play and then focusing on Sophocles’ original intentions and the reactions of the first 5th century Athenian audience. Sommerstein reflects on which characters within the play support Antigone and examines in particular the role of the chorus and their odes. Levett’s focus is the character of Creon and how he would have been viewed by the original audience. He sees the ‘combination of a stubborn nature and an inability to disentangle ethical obligations’ as central to Creon’s downfall. Mills explores the theme of incest, central to the ancestral curse on the family, and cites references to this in the play’s imagery and text. Roisman’s chapter looks at the portrayal of the two sisters and compares this with the relationship between Electra and Chrysothemis in Sophocles’ Electra. Scodel’s contribution concerns the apparent inconsistency between Antigone’s initial longing for death and her sad lament before she is taken to the cave. S. analyses Antigone’s change of heart by applying some of the categories from the attribution theory of social psychology.
Rehm is interested in the close relationship of humans with the earth and discusses this with examples from several other Greek tragedies before homing in on Antigone. He concludes that Antigone demonstrates ‘how much more powerful are the forces of nature than the decrees of Creon’. Esposito examines in detail two triptychs which he sees as portraying divinity—firstly, the Ode to Man chorus framed by the two watchman speeches and then the Ode to Eros enclosed within Haemon’s address to his father and Antigone’s farewell lament. Garland reflects on the conflict between religious belief and secular law, starting with a reference to the recent introduction of same-sex marriage legislation, but moving on to close textual analysis. Karamanou evaluates Euripides’ reception of Sophocles’ play and how it influenced his own Phoenissae and Antigone, the latter extant only in fragments. She posits that Euripides’ portrayal of Antigone in Phoenissae as a ‘bacchant of the dead’ was influenced by references to Dionysus within Sophocles’ play. Foley explores the fact that characters fail to agree with one another or to communicate effectively with one another throughout the play. She investigates the voices of different characters in detail, before looking at a number of modern versions of the play. To complete the volume, van Zyl Smit considers how the play was reproduced and revised from the 16th century to the present day.
This book is a thought-provoking and useful addition to the scholarship on Antigone, the most often performed and re-worked of all the Greek tragedies.
Marion Gibbs