Introduction & Overview of Antigone by Sophocles

Antigone Introduction

Greek playwright Sophocles wrote the last play in the Theban Trilogy, Antigone, around 442 B.C. The Theban Trilogy consists of Oedipus Rex (Oedipus the King), Oedipus at Colonus, and Antigone, but the play considered the last of the three was, ironically, written first. Only seven of Sophocles's one hundred twenty three tragedies have survived to the modern era with the trilogy surviving the ages intact. These three plays are perhaps the most famous of the seven, with Antigone performed most often.

Antigone tells the story of the title character, daughter of Oedipus (the former king of Thebes, who unknowingly killed his father and married his mother, and who renounced his kingdom upon discovering his actions), and her fight to bury her brother Polyneices against the edict of her uncle, Creon, the new king of Thebes. It is a story that pits the law of the gods"unwritten law"against the laws...
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