This is a tremendously powerful reworking of Sophocles' Antigone written and first performed in German occupied France. Antigone decides to bury her dead brother despite the order of the city's conquerors not to do so. Antigone is morally right of course but she brings down tragedy upon herself.

Anouilh's very clear style makes this play a logical choice for any French Lit course aimed at Anglophones. It has great emotional impact and delivers a stark message to the young reader that being in the right sometimes bears a very heavy price.

واقعاً یکی از زیبا‌ترین اقتباس‌هایی بود که تا حالا خوندم. بیشتر به این خاطر که نیومده بود روی داستان اصلی سوار شه و حرف خودشو به کرسی بشونه بلکه فقط اون رو گسترش داده بود.

آنتیگون سوفوکل که چند هزار ساله داره موشکافی میشه و به نظر می‌رسه هر چیزی که میشه راجع بهش فهمید رو می‌دونیم، یه تقابل تراژیک می‌سازه برای مخاطب یونان باستان از دو اصل خانواده (به نمایندگی آنتیگون) و قانون یا دولت (به نمایندگی کرئون). کاری که سوفوکل خیلی خوب انجامش داده بود و الان ژان آنوی به نظرم تونسته بود ازش به خوبی تقلید کنه این بود که نتیجه نهایی این تقابل رو واگذار می‌کرد به مخاطب و ازش درس اخلاقی نمی‌ساخت.

اینکه ژان آنوی کار سوفوکل رو گسترش داد به نظرم تو این مورد بود که از این دو شخصیت دنیایی از مفاهیم رو ساخته بود. من از کرئونِ آنوی فقط حس مرد قانون رو نمی‌گرفتم و برام تصویر حیات و بقا بود که در مقابل مرگ قرار گرفته بود. احساس کردم تمام عمر کرئون رو از بچگیش تا جوونیش و پیریش تونستم ببینم و درک کنم جوری که مثه بچه‌ها از قشنگی‌های زندگی می‌گفت و مثه پیرمردا از عمر به باد رفته صحبت می‌کرد. حتی می‌شد سیر رشد تفکر بشریت رو هم ازش دید که ذره ذره به سمت عقل‌گرایی می‌رفت با مثال داروینیستی‌ای که از تولید مثل و بقا آورد.

در مقابلش آنتیگون انگار مثل خود مرگ سیاه بود و با هر حرفش بیشتر عمق تاریکیش رو نشون می‌داد. مثل خشک‌های مذهبی گوشش رو به حرفای کرئون بسته بود، مثه شاعرا و نویسنده‌ها تو عالم احساسات و عقاید خودش سیر می‌کرد و من این حس رو گرفتم که داشت از ترحم و دلسوزی برای خودش بیشتر از هر چیزی لذت می‌برد. جوری که تک و تنها بودنش دم مرگ رو تکرار می‌کرد و سعی داشت تا لحظه آخر بر خلاف جریان حرکت کنه برام درست شبیه فعل مردن بود که آخرین اعلام وجود ما تو عالمه و باید تا جایی که می‌تونیم پر هیاهو انجامش بدیم.

A perfect ode to the teenage spirit.

The story and character of Antigone in general and this version of her tragedy in particular has a very special place in my heart. I first read it in high school with the rest of my sophomore English class, and it had an incredibly strong effect on me that I can only describe as lifechanging. I had been struggling through a very dark period in my life, and this play was one of the first works of classic literature introduced to me through school that was able to reach through the psychological confines I had put up around myself and throttle me back to awareness with the emotional significance of its words and characters. Antigone's gutwrenching fate was something I could focus my own emotional turmoil on in order to take a step back from the precipice of self-destruction I was headed towards. But it wasn't only that I saw myself in this tragedy, the truly lifechanging aspect of it was that it helped me to become aware of the cultural and political importance the play had in France when it was published, that my eyes were opened to the full scope of suffering and fight for survival under oppressive circumstances that greatly surpassed my own juvenile misery. And while in many ways I am still struggling through that same dark period as before, I truly believe Antigone had a hand in shaping the good parts of me, expanding my mind as both a reader and a person, and that is something I can say of very few works.

Read this French text while listening to an English-language audiobook. (translated by Christopher Nixon).

Luckily for me I got the audiobook as when I turned to the print edition I had checked out from the library, it turned out to be in French!! My French isn't good enough to have read this alone but was good enough to attempt reading it with the help of an English translation in audio :) It was an interesting experience! The L.A. TheatreWorks audiobook doesn't include stage directions so I would pause momentarily while I read these.

One thing that I noticed is that while Creon talks to Antigone in the familiar (tu), she responds to him in the formal (vous). This difference gives a spin to their relationship which cannot easily be duplicated in English.

Reading this knowing that it was written & first performed in Vichy France gives certain phrases and actions a special significance. However, even without that Anouilh's version of this story had some interesting twists to Sophocles' original. Creon is a more ambivalent character; he seems more reasonable, more caring and less stubborn than the one in either the Sophocles or Heaney versions. Antigone's relationships with Haemon (Creon's son) and her sister Ismene are both expanded but her motivation for her actions in this version is much more murky. By lessening the contrast between the 2 characters you would expect that the tension would be less but Anouilh manages to make their confrontation even more heartbreaking as it has overtones of a family feud (and of course, if you read into it Creon as the French colloborator acting for the Nazis and Antigone as the Resistance fighter, then the drama is heightened even further).

Auf meinem Bücherregal neben Camus und Sartre ist Jean Anouilh dazugekommen :). Purer Existentialismus. Ich könnte mich theoretisch mit jedem Charakter identifizieren, außer den drei Wachen.

(Gelesen für Alex)

One of my favourite books. I don't read a lot of theatre plays, but this one is special for me. I almost know it by heart.

ای بابا. انتیگونه اینجوریه که همه زنده‌‌ن بعد همه میمیرن

بیش تر از همه شخصیت های چندبعدی ش بودند که نظر منو جلب کردند: کریونی که یک لحظه عمیق و فلسفی می شد - و خداییش جالب ترین دیالوگ های تمام نمایشنامه مربوط به کریونه - و یک لحظه بعد یک دیکتاتور تمام عیار که فقط می خواد آنتیگون رو "ساکت کنه"، یه هیتلر واقعی. از اون طرف هم آنتیگون ه که حرف هاش هم به نظر کاملاً درست و پرشور و منطقی میان، هم کاملاً پوچ و بی معنا
و باید اضافه کنم واقعاً، واقعاً دم نشر نی گرم با این مجموعه ی "دور دنیا با نمایشنامه" ش که هم ترجمه هاش بی نقصه هم طرح جلدهاش هم قطع و شکل کتاب هاش و هم حتی جنس صفحه هاش! بیش از حد دوست داشتنی

Bloody hell, what a fantastic book.

I think I'm becoming a little bit obsessed with this play, which is kind of fun. It's at the point now where I am actually very keen to learn Ancient Greek so I can read the original Sophocles. In the meantime, though, I would like to read an English translation of Anouilh, and then read the French again, or perhaps read them concurrently.

This was very interesting, not least because all the data points fitted. I think just about everything from Sophocles' original Antigone was included: every character inconsistency, every strange piece of dialogue. This is quite impressive, as there are a lot of odd character traits in Sophocles' version, which is partly what makes it great; one can never quite be sure what the characters' motives are.

Anouilh's Antigone (the character) does not at first appear to be the headstrong, stubborn, impetuous, temperamental young woman of Sophoclean fame. She seems quiet, demure, and her actions seem well thought-through. She seems to understand why Creon feels it necessary to leave Polynices' body rotting in public, and her actions seem not to be motivated so much by an incestuous obsession with her brother as by a true dedication to the cause of justice.

At first I was rather disappointed by this; Sophocles' characters act irrationally, which is more fun, and also I think more realistic. But eventually I realised that so do Anouilh's; Antigone is above all an unreliable narrator, and by the end it is clear that she is perhaps just as mad and death-obsessed as she is in Sophocles. In fact, in this version Creon comes across as by far the more reasonable; the more detailed exposition of Polynices and Eteocles' characters and actions made it much more difficult to sympathise with Polynices and Antigone (and I suspect their actions were taken directly from Ancient Greek accounts, so exactly the same thing would have happened in Sophocles' Antigone, just not mentioned in the play).

I found that in this specific instance, it is difficult not to understand Creon's actions: Polynices and Eteocles were both absolute bastards trying to unseat their father from the throne so that they could be ruler of Thebes; both died in battle while fighting each other; Creon chose at random one to be buried in state and the other to be left to rot as an example for the populace. This makes a lot of sense to me, and given how terrible their actions were I can understand why a ruler would want to do such a thing. This is not really made clear in Sophocles. But when you think about it on a more abstract level, this is bad, bad, bad! No ruler should deprive any citizen of their rights for any reason, no matter how horrible they are, no matter how much they harm the state! So interesting.

I question the wisdom of leaving out Tireisias and his prediction, and Creon's attempts to undo what he has done. In Sophocles, this has the effect of evening out the responsibility, because Creon redeems himself in a sense but is still punished harshly by the deaths of his son and wife. In a way, though, it makes sense, because then both Creon and Antigone stick stubbornly to their beliefs until the end. Also possibly it helped get this play past the German censorship.

The portrayal of the sentry was very interesting. In Sophocles' version, the sentry is funny, witty, clever, compassionate. He acts as a foil to Creon; ironically so, since he displays the qualities of 'noble blood' much more clearly than Creon ever does. Anouilh's sentry, however, is an imbecile; morally stunted, stupid, ignorant, uneducated. A much more accurate portrayal of a sentry, in other words. And he does still provide comic relief! The scene where Antigone is trying to dictate her final letter to Hémon is both hilarious and tragic.

Manny makes much of the beautiful writing in this play, and I did like a lot of it - simple language, but used well. I did feel like a lot of the arguments between Antigone and Creon went a bit crazy, though. Around and around in circles, constantly - they reminded me of nothing so much as my exchange partner arguing with her mother: "Mais si!" "Mais non!" "Mais si!" "Mais non! Tais toi!" "Non!" and so on and so on, ad infinitum. And then Antigone came up with this zinger of a line: - "Oui, je suis laide! C'est ignoble, n'est-ce pas, ces cris, ces sursauts, cette lutte de chiffoniers." And later, "C'est trop laid, tout cela, tout est trop laid." And I loved that about this version: everything in Sophocles seems very noble and virtuous - everything takes place on a level above that of normal huamn activity,everything has a kind of tragic beauty. Anouilh's version was so much more earthy, more realistic. There is really nothing beautiful about a situation like this, and there was no idealisation of anything. Which was beautifully mirrored by the simple, everyday language - none of Sophocles' poetic flights of fancy for Anouilh.

The thing which is most important about Antigone, though, is retained by Anouilh. You're not supposed to be able to choose between Creon and Antigone; the Ancient Greek audience wasn't supposed to either. They are both wrong and they are both right, and this we should never forget.

Jean Anouilh’s Antigone was first published and went to stage in 1944 during the Nazi occupation of France. Anouilh’s interpretation of Sophocles' Greek tragedy soon became a symbol for the French Resistance as freedom fighters saw the heroine's civil disobedience and defiance to tyranny as a condemnation of collaboration with the Nazis. Creon, the Tyrant of Thebes, took on the role of the Vichy Government while Antigone took on the role of the French Resistance.