Dramatic irony is a literary device
used by play writers in order to give the audience a sense of knowledge and
even an ability to apply emotions to a certain character and explain his or her
actions before they even take place. The
idea of this irony is well developed in Sophocles’ Antigone, where multiple characters are depicted to have less
knowledge than the audience, giving them a more helpless or even fate bound
appeal to them. Once a character,
possibly a tragic hero, makes a choice, the audience knows exactly what is
about to unfold while the characters are still quite clueless. The use of dramatic irony adds to the effect
that the characters are destined to act upon something while the audience is
well aware of what is going to happen, therefore, Sophocles is successful in
creating an ironic setting for his characters who find themselves falling into
their own demises.
Throughout
all of Antigone, Sophocles implements
a multitude of ironic situations in which either Creon or Antigone are both in
danger of making mistakes that they are blind to. Creon, by himself, is an extremely
controversial character. He is both
blinded by pride and power, and even though the audience knows that there will
be bloodshed for his actions, Creon is completely oblivious to it all. Even when he wants to send Antigone to the
cave where she commits suicide, he does not understand the consequences that
that may bring him. Imagine that he is sending
the fiancé of his only son to her death, if anything, that should send up some
sort of warning in his mind. Other than
that, Sophocles depicts him as an old man who has finally got what he did not
want, the throne. Something that Creon
is not known for is his small role in Oedipus Rex, even though he was Oedipus’
brother and “son,” as Oedipus was exiled, “[Creon] grants his wish [to succeed]
and takes the throne in his stead” (Wikipedia.org 1). It was not like Creon had a choice in the
matter, without him, there would be no King of Thebes and the city would have
been torn to shreds by the civil war that was going on.
On
top of all of his faults and failings, Creon could never resist defying a
source of power, whether it be fate or any prophets that he may see fit. While arguing about what to do with Antigone, Creon
states that him and his son, Haemon, “will know [the truth] better than the
prophets” (Sophocles 680). How ironic
can this be? He clearly states that he has better vision than those who can see
the past, present, and future, all while he is plotting to kill his niece and
allow both his son and wife to commit suicide, whether they be accidents or
not, still they will be lost. Where does
Creon go wrong in his plight to be the best leader he could possibly be? It all starts with his edict. The law he passed to disallow anyone to bury
Polyneices’ body, someone who used to be his nephew and a great warrior of
Thebes, turned rouge after losing the rights to the throne. Creon goes against family code and tradition
in order to put this in place, and above all, he does this not only to his own
nephew, but ruins any chances that Antigone has to be at peace with both of her
deceased brothers. This then defined him
and his fate was sealed, even though he did not know, the people know
everything that will happen to him and his loved ones; they will all perish
because of his selfish and impulsive act of placing such an absurd law in
place.
Antigone,
the girl who fed the fire that was already lit by Creon’s idiocy and
pride. Because of her actions after
Creon pushing the first domino, she let the rest all fall down behind her. Antigone being a martyr, probably not, she
may have buried Polyneices, but she definitely did not mean to stir up such a
ruckus after doing so. Most likely she
wanted to just get her final good deed to him before all hope was lost and she
was caught in the crossfire of something much bigger than herself. Even though she died for what she may have
believed in, she died because of her own stupidity and pride. Even though Creon may have been the one who
blew the cinders to kindle the fire, Antigone had to come and pour gasoline all
over it. Yes, she did the right thing by
her brother. Yes, she did take all the blame and not lay even a single bit of
it on her sister, Ismene. And yes, she
did die to prove the point that not just one man should rule a whole
city-state. But, it was doubtable that
it was her intention to bring such chaos in the wake of her suicide. Even though the people knew that she was dead
the second she dusted that corpse with sand, she was fated to become the
so-called “martyr” many people believe her to be. After she plans to bury Polyneices, she even
tells her sister to “shout it out! [and she would] hate [her] still worse for
silence” (Sophocles 99-100) thus defining her personality, bold and very out
there. Her main goal, as stated, is to
prove that she can do what she wants with her brother’s body, even if a big bad
king is in her way, she could still fight and be the woman that stands up to
the tyrant. She even wanted to die, she
could care less if Creon had spared her or not, she was game for life or death,
yet nonetheless; she was going to die any way that the situation was handled.
On
the contrary, there are a large number of places that point in the opposite
direction, to show she may be a martyr, and that she may have known all along
that she was going to die. Not as
blinded as one may think, Antigone say that she is “led along the road ready
before [her]” and her “fate claims no tears” (Sophocles 923-926). Antigone is a definite believer in fate; she
knows that something will happen to her, yet she is quite vague in her
description of her so-called “fate.”
Even though she may be somewhat of a radical, she does give many valid
points to why she does what she does, even though Antigone may be slightly out
of her mind, she has a valid point.
Sophocles, among many other Greek philosophers and authors at the time,
were questioning the systems by which their governments and all of their
political figureheads were based. It is
one ruler, a monarch or even a demi-god in some cases, that is practically
worshipped by the people and that ruler’s word was like the words of the
gods. Therefore, they were always
followed and anything they said was law, for example, Creon’s edict. Antigone
is the symbolic representation of all of those people who questioned the
government. She is the one part that
keeps the gears from turning and the people’s voice that shouts “Enough!” to
the false prophets and outlandish rulers of the time. And by that fact alone, Antigone may in fact
be a martyr.
Both
Antigone and Creon serve their purposes in Antigone,
being led blindly into the unknown and the vicious thing we call the
future. Their fates were both sealed
from the beginning once the edict was put in place, but the beauty of it all is
that the dramatic irony is defined as what Creon and Antigone embodied all
along, the conflict between monarch and freedom. Without either character, this play would not
have had the same effect on the people as it did those thousands of years ago,
and maybe, without plays like Antigone,
we may not have the world as it is today.
Works Cited
"Creon." Wikipedia.
Wikimedia Foundation, 22 Oct. 2012. Web. 23 Oct. 2012. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creon>.
Sophocles, Alison Booth, and Kelly J. Mays. Antigone.
New York: W.W. Norton &, 2011. Print.
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