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11/21/21: I recently saw a production of Antigone, the daughter of Oedipus who defied King Creon to bury her brother, knowing that to obey divine law in this moment was the right and just thing to do. It's a little complicated from her on in, but what follows is a review of a kind of adaptation of the Antigone story set in Nazi Germany. Antigone is about family, pride and its difference from arrogance, about the assumption of political (and male) dominance, and about love. I reflect in the following about Sophocles' Antigone through this adaptation, which is a model for young people and old about doing the right thing, about resistance, and activism for justice. I have since read a few books about The White Rose, Sophie Scholl, and German resistance within Germany to Nazi fascism.
Original review, 5/29/19: Seeing a Middle School Production of Antigone in Munich: The Sophie Scholl Story and Reflecting on How to Foster Youth Resistance in Meaningful Ways: A Meditation
“I am not afraid of the danger. If it means death, it will not be the worst of deaths--death without honor”--Antigone
Antigone: We begin in the dark and birth is the death of us.
Ismene: Who said that?
Antigone: Hegel.
Ismene: Sounds more like Beckett.
Antigone: He was paraphrasing Hegel--The chorus in Anne Carson's translation of
Sophocles’ Antigone, to make the point that many writers and thinkers across time were and still are paraphrasing Sophocles
I just saw a middle school production of a play of which I had never heard, Antigone in Munich: The Sophie Scholl Story, by Claudia Haas, about a high school girl, Sophie, who follows her college philosophy student brother Hans in getting involved in a German student resistance organization, The White Rose Society, that courageously opposed Hitler. My daughter was in the crew for the production (stage left props), as I once was for a production of Antigone when I was in college decades ago. Like Antigone, Sophie was a teenager who defended her brother honorably, following in their activist footsteps, doing the right thing in the face of a patriarchal authority who, like King Lear, raged with demands of loyalty.
“All men make mistakes, but a good man yields when he knows his course is wrong, and repairs the evil. The only crime is pride”--Antigone
I thought the play was ambitious for a middle school, as it circled back from Nazi resistance to Sophocles’ play about the daughter of Oedipus and Jocasta who insisted on defying King Creon’s order to bury her brother Polynices. Creon’s law forbidding the public mourning and burial of a member of one’s own family, maybe especially one seen as resistant to the state, punishable by death, is inhuman, it’s immoral. I listened to a translation of the original play and also read some of Anne Carson’s adaptation of the play, and of course saw (and read) Claudia Haas’ play.
Philosophy professor Hans Huber, who guided The White Rose Society, was executed for resistance to the Nazi state:
"And thou shalt act as if
On thee and on thy deed
Depended the fate of all Germany,
And thou alone must answer for it."
The Nazi regime also executed Huber’s student Hans and his younger sister Sophie Scholl on February 22, 1943.
I admired my daughter’s drama department’s ambition to stoke student activism through the production. The student body of my daughter’s school had staged a walkout this year protesting political inaction on school shootings. They made signs, wrote and signed petitions, and some of them were interviewed by the media. When I was in high school we shut down the school on a couple occasions, insisting that the curriculum reflect growing concerns with the Vietnam War, racism, the environment. We made signs, we wrote pamphlets, we created sit-down strikes, and we got some concessions and curricular changes. I lived to tell my tale, but four students were killed for protesting the Vietnam War at Kent State (and more students across the country were also killed for protesting that war) during my time in school:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRE9v...
Here’s some recent Chicago student climate change protesters:
https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/c...
“Do not fear for me. Make straight your own path to destiny”―Antigone
Original review, 5/29/19: Seeing a Middle School Production of Antigone in Munich: The Sophie Scholl Story and Reflecting on How to Foster Youth Resistance in Meaningful Ways: A Meditation
“I am not afraid of the danger. If it means death, it will not be the worst of deaths--death without honor”--Antigone
Antigone: We begin in the dark and birth is the death of us.
Ismene: Who said that?
Antigone: Hegel.
Ismene: Sounds more like Beckett.
Antigone: He was paraphrasing Hegel--The chorus in Anne Carson's translation of
Sophocles’ Antigone, to make the point that many writers and thinkers across time were and still are paraphrasing Sophocles
I just saw a middle school production of a play of which I had never heard, Antigone in Munich: The Sophie Scholl Story, by Claudia Haas, about a high school girl, Sophie, who follows her college philosophy student brother Hans in getting involved in a German student resistance organization, The White Rose Society, that courageously opposed Hitler. My daughter was in the crew for the production (stage left props), as I once was for a production of Antigone when I was in college decades ago. Like Antigone, Sophie was a teenager who defended her brother honorably, following in their activist footsteps, doing the right thing in the face of a patriarchal authority who, like King Lear, raged with demands of loyalty.
“All men make mistakes, but a good man yields when he knows his course is wrong, and repairs the evil. The only crime is pride”--Antigone
I thought the play was ambitious for a middle school, as it circled back from Nazi resistance to Sophocles’ play about the daughter of Oedipus and Jocasta who insisted on defying King Creon’s order to bury her brother Polynices. Creon’s law forbidding the public mourning and burial of a member of one’s own family, maybe especially one seen as resistant to the state, punishable by death, is inhuman, it’s immoral. I listened to a translation of the original play and also read some of Anne Carson’s adaptation of the play, and of course saw (and read) Claudia Haas’ play.
Philosophy professor Hans Huber, who guided The White Rose Society, was executed for resistance to the Nazi state:
"And thou shalt act as if
On thee and on thy deed
Depended the fate of all Germany,
And thou alone must answer for it."
The Nazi regime also executed Huber’s student Hans and his younger sister Sophie Scholl on February 22, 1943.
I admired my daughter’s drama department’s ambition to stoke student activism through the production. The student body of my daughter’s school had staged a walkout this year protesting political inaction on school shootings. They made signs, wrote and signed petitions, and some of them were interviewed by the media. When I was in high school we shut down the school on a couple occasions, insisting that the curriculum reflect growing concerns with the Vietnam War, racism, the environment. We made signs, we wrote pamphlets, we created sit-down strikes, and we got some concessions and curricular changes. I lived to tell my tale, but four students were killed for protesting the Vietnam War at Kent State (and more students across the country were also killed for protesting that war) during my time in school:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRE9v...
Here’s some recent Chicago student climate change protesters:
https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/c...
“Do not fear for me. Make straight your own path to destiny”―Antigone
