Plays of Sophocles: Oedipus the King; Oedipus at Colonus; Antigone

And hence depart nor seek to witness sights Unlawful or to hear unlawful words. Nay, go with speed; let none but Theseus stay, Our ruler, to behold what next shall hap.” So we all heard him speak, and weeping sore We companied the maidens on their way. After brief space we looked again, and lo The man was gone, evanished from our eyes; Only the king we saw with upraised hand Shading his eyes as from some awful sight, That no man might endure to look upon. A moment later, and we saw him bend In prayer to Earth and prayer to Heaven at once. But by what doom the stranger met his end No man save Theseus knoweth. For there fell No fiery bold that reft him in that hour, Nor whirlwind from the sea, but he was taken. It was a messenger from heaven, or else Some gentle, painless cleaving of earth’s base; For without wailing or disease or pain He passed away—and end most marvelous. And if to some my tale seems foolishness I am content that such could count me fool. CHORUS. Where are the maids and their attendant friends? MESSENGER. They cannot be far off; the approaching sound Of lamentation tells they come this way. [Enter ANTIGONE and ISMENE] ANTIGONE. (Str. 1) Woe, woe! on this sad day We sisters of one blasted stock must bow beneath the shock, Must weep and weep the curse that lay On him our sire, for whom In life, a life-long world of care ’Twas ours to bear, In death must face the gloom That wraps his tomb. What tongue can tell That sight ineffable? CHORUS. What mean ye, maidens? ANTIGONE. All is but surmise. CHORUS. Is he then gone? ANTIGONE. Gone as ye most might wish. Not in battle or sea storm, But reft from sight, By hands invisible borne To viewless fields of night. Ah me! on us too night has come, The night of mourning. Wither roam O’er land or sea in our distress Eating the bread of bitterness? ISMENE. I know not. O that Death Might nip my breath, And let me share my aged father’s fate. I cannot live a life thus desolate. CHORUS. Best of daughters, worthy pair, What heaven brings ye needs must bear, Fret no more ’gainst Heaven’s will; Fate hath dealt with you not ill. ANTIGONE. (Ant. 1) Love can turn past pain to bliss, What seemed bitter now is sweet. Ah me! that happy toil is sweet. The guidance of those dear blind feet. Dear father, wrapt for aye in nether gloom, E’en in the tomb Never shalt thou lack of love repine, Her love and mine. CHORUS. His fate— ANTIGONE. Is even as he planned. CHORUS. How so? ANTIGONE. He died, so willed he, in a foreign land. Lapped in kind earth he sleeps his long last sleep, And o’er his grave friends weep. How great our lost these streaming eyes can tell, This sorrow naught can quell. Thou hadst thy wish ’mid strangers thus to die, But I, ah me, not by. ISMENE. Alas, my sister, what new fate * * * * * * * * * * * * Befalls us orphans desolate? CHORUS. His end was blessed; therefore, children, stay Your sorrow. Man is born to fate a prey. ANTIGONE. (Str. 2) Sister, let us back again. ISMENE. Why return? ANTIGONE. My soul is fain— ISMENE. Is fain? ANTIGONE. To see the earthy bed. ISMENE. Sayest thou? ANTIGONE. Where our sire is laid. ISMENE. Nay, thou can’st not, dost not see— ANTIGONE. Sister, wherefore wroth with me? ISMENE. Know’st not—beside— ANTIGONE. More must I hear? ISMENE. Tombless he died, none near. ANTIGONE. Lead me thither; slay me there. ISMENE. How shall I unhappy fare, Friendless, helpless, how drag on A life of misery alone? CHORUS. (Ant. 2) Fear not, maids— ANTIGONE. Ah, whither flee? CHORUS. Refuge hath been found. ANTIGONE. For me? CHORUS. Where thou shalt be safe from harm. ANTIGONE. I know it. CHORUS. Why then this alarm? ANTIGONE. How again to get us home I know not. CHORUS. Why then this roam? ANTIGONE. Troubles whelm us— CHORUS. As of yore. ANTIGONE. Worse than what was worse before. CHORUS. Sure ye are driven on the breakers’ surge. ANTIGONE. Alas! we are. CHORUS. Alas! ’tis so. ANTIGONE. Ah whither turn, O Zeus? No ray Of hope to cheer the way Whereon the fates our desperate voyage urge. [Enter THESEUS] THESEUS. Dry your tears; when grace is shed On the quick and on the dead By dark Powers beneficent, Over-grief they would resent. ANTIGONE. Aegeus’ child, to thee we pray. THESEUS. What the boon, my children, say. ANTIGONE. With our own eyes we fain would see Our father’s tomb. THESEUS. That may not be. ANTIGONE. What say’st thou, King? THESEUS. My children, he Charged me straitly that no moral Should approach the sacred portal, Or greet with funeral litanies The hidden tomb wherein he lies; Saying, “If thou keep’st my hest Thou shalt hold thy realm at rest.” The God of Oaths this promise heard, And to Zeus I pledged my word. ANTIGONE. Well, if he would have it so, We must yield. Then let us go Back to Thebes, if yet we may Heal this mortal feud and stay The self-wrought doom That drives our brothers to their tomb. THESEUS. Go in peace; nor will I spare Ought of toil and zealous care, But on all your needs attend, Gladdening in his grave my friend. CHORUS. Wail no more, let sorrow rest, All is ordered for the best. FOOTNOTES 4 (return) [ The Greek text for the passages marked here and later in the text have been lost.] 5 (return) [ To avoid the blessing, still a secret, he resorts to a commonplace; literally, “For what generous man is not (in befriending others) a friend to himself?”] 6 (return) [ Creon desires to bury Oedipus on the confines of Thebes so as to avoid the pollution and yet offer due rites at his tomb. Ismene tells him of the latest oracle and interprets to him its purport, that some day the Theban invaders of Athens will be routed in a battle near the grave of Oedipus.] 7 (return) [ The Thebans sprung from the Dragon’s teeth sown by Cadmus.] ANTIGONE Translation by F. Storr, BA Formerly Scholar of Trinity College, Cambridge From the Loeb Library Edition Originally published by Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA and William Heinemann Ltd, London First published in 1912 ARGUMENT Antigone, daughter of Oedipus, the late king of Thebes, in defiance of Creon who rules in his stead, resolves to bury her brother Polyneices, slain in his attack on Thebes. She is caught in the act by Creon’s watchmen and brought before the king. She justifies her action, asserting that she was bound to obey the eternal laws of right and wrong in spite of any human ordinance. Creon, unrelenting, condemns her to be immured in a rock-hewn chamber. His son Haemon, to whom Antigone is betrothed, pleads in vain for her life and threatens to die with her. Warned by the seer Teiresias Creon repents him and hurries to release Antigone from her rocky prison. But he is too late: he finds lying side by side Antigone who had hanged herself and Haemon who also has perished by his own hand. Returning to the palace he sees within the dead body of his queen who on learning of her son’s death has stabbed herself to the heart. DRAMATIS PERSONAE ANTIGONE and ISMENE—daughters of Oedipus and sisters of Polyneices and Eteocles. CREON, King of Thebes. HAEMON, Son of Creon, betrothed to Antigone. EURYDICE, wife of Creon. TEIRESIAS, the prophet. CHORUS, of Theban elders. A WATCHMAN A MESSENGER A SECOND MESSENGER ANTIGONE ANTIGONE and ISMENE before the Palace gates. ANTIGONE. Ismene, sister of my blood and heart, See’st thou how Zeus would in our lives fulfill The weird of Oedipus, a world of woes! For what of pain, affliction, outrage, shame, Is lacking in our fortunes, thine and mine? And now this proclamation of today Made by our Captain-General to the State, What can its purport be? Didst hear and heed, Or art thou deaf when friends are banned as foes? ISMENE. To me, Antigone, no word of friends Has come, or glad or grievous, since we twain Were reft of our two brethren in one day By double fratricide; and since i’ the night Our Argive leaguers fled, no later news Has reached me, to inspirit or deject. ANTIGONE. I know ’twas so, and therefore summoned thee Beyond the gates to breathe it in thine ear. ISMENE. What is it? Some dark secret stirs thy breast. ANTIGONE. What but the thought of our two brothers dead, The one by Creon graced with funeral rites, The other disappointed? Eteocles He hath consigned to earth (as fame reports) With obsequies that use and wont ordain, So gracing him among the dead below. But Polyneices, a dishonored corse, (So by report the royal edict runs) No man may bury him or make lament— Must leave him tombless and unwept, a feast For kites to scent afar and swoop upon. Such is the edict (if report speak true) Of Creon, our most noble Creon, aimed At thee and me, aye me too; and anon He will be here to promulgate, for such As have not heard, his mandate; ’tis in sooth No passing humor, for the edict says Whoe’er transgresses shall be stoned to death. So stands it with us; now ’tis thine to show If thou art worthy of thy blood or base. ISMENE. But how, my rash, fond sister, in such case Can I do anything to make or mar? ANTIGONE. Say, wilt thou aid me and abet? Decide. ISMENE. In what bold venture? What is in thy thought? ANTIGONE. Lend me a hand to bear the corpse away. ISMENE. What, bury him despite the interdict? ANTIGONE. My brother, and, though thou deny him, thine No man shall say that _I_ betrayed a brother. ISMENE. Wilt thou persist, though Creon has forbid? ANTIGONE. What right has he to keep me from my own? ISMENE. Bethink thee, sister, of our father’s fate, Abhorred, dishonored, self-convinced of sin, Blinded, himself his executioner. Think of his mother-wife (ill sorted names) Done by a noose herself had twined to death And last, our hapless brethren in one day, Both in a mutual destiny involved, Self-slaughtered, both the slayer and the slain. Bethink thee, sister, we are left alone; Shall we not perish wretchedest of all, If in defiance of the law we cross A monarch’s will?—weak women, think of that, Not framed by nature to contend with men. Remember this too that the stronger rules; We must obey his orders, these or worse. Therefore I plead compulsion and entreat The dead to pardon. I perforce obey The powers that be. ’Tis foolishness, I ween, To overstep in aught the golden mean. ANTIGONE. I urge no more; nay, wert thou willing still, I would not welcome such a fellowship. Go thine own way; myself will bury him. How sweet to die in such employ, to rest,— Sister and brother linked in love’s embrace— A sinless sinner, banned awhile on earth, But by the dead commended; and with them I shall abide for ever. As for thee, Scorn, if thou wilt, the eternal laws of Heaven. ISMENE. I scorn them not, but to defy the State Or break her ordinance I have no skill. ANTIGONE. A specious pretext. I will go alone To lap my dearest brother in the grave. ISMENE. My poor, fond sister, how I fear for thee! ANTIGONE. O waste no fears on me; look to thyself. ISMENE. At least let no man know of thine intent,