AntigoneANCIENT

Sophocles' great play was produced in 442, at least a decade before Oedipus the King.

"While her story is unlikely to be pure invention by Sophocles, there is no definite evidence as to her earlier history." (OCD)

A study of this play's lengthy reception-history must include George Steiner, Antigones (Oxford UP, 1984).
cf. productions by Brecht, by Anouilh, and others.

Image at right was an advertising poster for the British National Theatre's production of Antigone in the summer of 2012.

Sophocles' play is one of the most enduring of all Greek tragedies. "In a time of protests and the fall of tyrants Sophocles' Antigone seems both timely and timeless. At its root are the basic conflicts between individual and state, human and divine law, logic and passion, conflicts between the genders and generations." Westminster Greek Theatre website

"Representing the triumphant voice of individual conscience in defiance of the state, Antigone's story has enjoyed a renaissance in [the 20th] century — particularly in theatre, dance, and music — as a response to dictatorship in Europe.

Euripides wrote an Antigone, now lost.