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The Tragedy Of Sophocles ' Antigone Essay

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Antigone is the main character of the homonymous tragedy of Sophocles. The play follows the formal conventions of Greek tragedy and it is composed of seven scenes (opening scene, prologos), five scenes and a final scene (exodus), which are divided noticeably by six choral songs (opening lyric, parodos) and five choral songs (stasima) which have some relevance to the dramatic situation. As Aristotle distinguishes in his work of literary criticism, Poetics, part of the excitement of a tragic performance comes from the skillful structuring of the plot (muthos). In Antigone, the way in which the play is built through a series of climaxes and confrontations that culminate in the revelation of Creon’s mistake and the disclosure of the multiple deaths is characteristic. The tragedies often are named after female figures, which may seem a paradox with the absolute lack of power of women in a patriarchal society. One of the theories that have been advanced is that even at that time there was the idea that a female figure can be reason of change and transformation. Hegel, regarding to this, defined woman as the weak ring of the chain, which from an ideological point of view can be considered either positive or negative: the woman is fragile, weak, unreliable. At the beginning of the nineteenth century Hegel also saw foreshadowed the conflict between Antigone and Creon, the conflict between the needs of the family and those of the state. In fact, in the gracious gesture of Antigone,

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