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essays about the honor code
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essays about the honor code
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The belief and concept of dishonor in the Greek and Colombian culture of ‘Antigone,’ by Sophocles, and ‘Chronicle of a Death Foretold,’ by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, is a deciding aspect that blinds characters moral values. It is evident that in both societies Greek and Colombian, a family or an individual without honor is an outcast to the community. As honor plays a drastic role in outlining the culture of the society. Therefore the belief that a perpetrator has brought dishonor upon the family, or community foreshadows punishment for the individual, often conveyed through death. Sophocles provides a setting in his play, Antigone, where the honor code of rules and principles that govern the Greek community, are based upon Creon’s patriarchy of immoral natural law. Where the worst death is a ‘clouded’ (97) one whose foggy setting brings dishonor upon the individual, and his family. Polynecies is an example; Sophocles uses to highlight the significance of a burial, in the Greek society. Polynecies is a victim of Creon's code of honor, which through grotesque diction, Sophocles describes his body as being immorally exposed the “vultures” left “unwept and unburied’ (29) after miserably fighting turning against his brother in a battle for Thebes, in which he turned against him. Causing him to ’[die] outside the law’ (59) bringing great dishonor to the corpse as it is with a lack of respect, left unburied due to tyranny, but also damns it for all time and dishonors his family. Creon’s laws are flaw, harsh and immoral, they take on the ‘gods who live forever’ (788), up to the point were his actions ‘seize [his] good mind,’ (791) and deprive him of moral thought. Creon’s restrictive democracy motivates Polynecie’s sister Antigone, who... ... middle of paper ... ...reshadow a death through the blinding process of moral values and actions taken by an individual that has, or whose family has been dishonored and wishes to regain their dignity. Sophocles in Antigone portrays the theme of dishonor through the cultural value of burial in the Greek society; Gabriel Garcia Marquez on the other hand, condemns the legate of marriage to honor in Chronicle of a Death Foretold. Both cultural norms manage in context to inflict with the character’s family honor, which leads them into taking immoral and ruthless actions that lead to the innocent death of Antigone and Santiago Nasser, both innocent individuals. Works Cited García, Márquez Gabriel, and Gregory Rabassa. Chronicle of a Death Foretold: A Novel. New York: Vintage International, 2003. Print Sophocles, and Paul Woodruff. Antigone. Indianapolis: Hackett Pub., 2001. Print
Oedipus accidentally killed his father and married his mother. Because of that act, Oedipus ended up cursing his family and died a horrible death. After his death, his sons inherited his kingdom and in a power struggle ended up killing each other. One of the sons, Polynices attacked the city to try and claim power from his brother. But since both of the brothers died and the city was not taken Polynices was labeled as a traitor whereas the other brother who died defending the city was celebrated as a hero. Creon decreed at the beginning of the play Antigone that no one was to bury the body of traitorous Polynices. Antigone felt that it was here responsibility to bury the body because he was still a member of her family. This led to a huge argument with Creon who felt he shouldn’t be crossed because he was the leader of the state. Eventually both Creon and Antigone are destroyed by the gods (and by each other) through their own actions.
In Sophocles’ Antigone, the most prominent theme is the concept of divine law versus human law. The play opens with the debate between the sisters Antigone and Ismene concerning which law comes first- the devout obligations of citizens, or civic duty. Antigone requests for Ismene to assist her in burying their brother Polyneices, though the new king Creon, has prohibited burial on pain of death. It can be argued that Creon’s edict, which deprived Polyneices of his funeral rites, is understandable. The young man had been killed perpetrating the most atrocious crime of which a citizen could be guilty, and Creon, as the responsible head of state, naturally supposed that exemplary punishment was the culprit’s right...
...Kinship, Justice, and the Polis,” and “Assumptions and the Creation of Meaning: Reading Sophocles’ Antigone,” it is evident that few of the aspects of this play are divine law, kinship morality, and the rights of woman. Furthermore, John D.B. Hamilton, and Christiane Sourvinou-Inwood support the notion that the one of the purposes of the Greek play Antigone was to demonstrate how Antigone performs not only the role of kinswoman, but warrior as well.
The opening events of the play Antigone, written by Sophocles, quickly establish the central conflict between Antigone and Creon. Creon has decreed that the traitor Polynices, who tried to burn down the temple of gods in Thebes, must not be given proper burial. Antigone is the only one who will speak against this decree and insists on the sacredness of family and a symbolic burial for her brother. Whereas Antigone sees no validity in a law that disregards the duty family members owe one another, Creon's point of view is exactly opposite. He has no use for anyone who places private ties above the common good, as he proclaims firmly to the Chorus and the audience as he revels in his victory over Polynices. He sees Polynices as an enemy to the state because he attacked his brother. Creon's first speech, which is dominated by words such as "authority” and "law”, shows the extent to which Creon fixates on government and law as the supreme authority. Between Antigone and Creon there can be no compromise—they both find absolute validity in the respective loyalties they uphold.
This sibling relationship should be further examined, because it has been largely ignored by other scholars and this relationship is rich with literary and political significance. “Most contemporary political theorists… have focused on the fearsome clash between Antigone and Creon. The relationship between Antigone and her weaker, more cautious sister Ismene has not garnered similar attention” (Kirkpatrick, 2001). Though Antigone as a character can be analyzed through the lens of law and political science, her relationship to a weaker sister is more than interesting. As Antigone is willing to use civil disobedience to live by her own morality, the reader must also examine how a weaker and fearful person might not be able to use their own judgment and Ismene is a perfect exam...
Throughout the world, there are many different cultures, most of which have evolved over time. One of an author’s jobs is to capture the culture of the novel’s setting, and allow the readers to experience it. Gabriel Garcia Marquez does an excellent job of recreating Colombia’s culture in his novel Chronicle of a Death Foretold by using each of his characters to portray one aspect of the culture.
The play Antigone by Sophocles is a Greek tragedy that focuses on a family and a city that has experienced great upheaval in recent years. Out of the ashes of war fought between two brothers, Eteocle and Polynice (sons of Oedipus), their uncle Creon is now ruler of the city of Thebes. Creon’s first order as the new king is that Polynice, the rebel brother, will not be sanctified by holy rites and will lie unburied on the battlefield whereas Eteocle will be honored and buried with respect. Oedipus’s two surviving children, Ismene and Antigone, remain in Thebes and under their uncle’s care. When hearing Creon’s decree that Polynice is forbidden to be buried, Antigone decides to ignore this law and honor her fallen brother by burying him. In doing
Sophocles’s Antigone is a play revolving around the concept of death that takes place in the world of the living. The play begins in the shadow of the death and destruction wrought by the brothers Eteocles and Polyneices. It ends, as one would expect of a tragedy, with the king, Creon, grieving over three tragic losses that have decimated his family. The titular character has an especially unique relationship with the two contrasting elements of life and death. For most of the play, she exists in a state of “limbo” between the two. A further analysis of Antigone’s relationship with death and life reveals a deeper dimension to her character progression.
The failures of Creon leadership represent the limitations of autocratic government and thereby serve to promote democracy. At the play’s opening, Creon is portrayed sympathetically. He presents his decree preventing the burial of Polynices as just retribution for his crimes against Thebes and as an effective way to prevent pollution (Sophocles 62). He feels further vindicated because the chorus, consisting of elder representatives of the populace, supports the decree. Even Antigone’s impassioned defence, which invokes the “unwritten and unfailing” (73) laws of the gods, appears to have no impact on the chorus, who states that “she does not know how to bend amidst her troubles” (74). This perception of Creon begins to shift upon Antigone’s death sentence. Although the punishment seems as cruel and excessive, Creon firmly believes it to be a necessary deed. He is “eager to display his full control of a crisis barely averted...
One major theme in Antigone is the abuse of power. Creon and Antigone cause doom to their lives as they display resistance to power. The two characters attempt to override divine law with the law of the states, which leads to ruin. Creon, displaying a resistance to moral law, denies Antigone the opportunity and rightfulness to bury her brother, Polynices. This is due to Polynices’ rebellion against Creon, the King of Thebes. Antigone serves as a threat to the status quo. She gives up her life out of her commitment to principles above human law—moral law. Creon believes that the laws created by the King must be obeyed no matter how big or small they are. Creon argues that the law created by the King is the platform for justice. On the other hand, Antigone feels that there are unjust laws, despite who made them. She believes she has a moral obligation t...
Antigone, as a character, is extremely strong-willed and loyal to her faith. Creon is similarly loyal, but rather to his homeland, the city of Thebes, instead of the gods. Both characters are dedicated to a fault, a certain stubbornness that effectively blinds them from the repercussions of their actions. Preceding the story, Antigone has been left to deal with the burden of her parents’ and both her brothers’ deaths. Merely a young child, intense grief is to be expected; however, Antigone’s emotional state is portrayed as frivolous when it leads her to directly disobey Creon’s orders. She buries her brother Polynices because of her obedience to family and to the gods, claiming to follow “the gods’ unfailing, unwritten laws” (Sophocles 456-457). CONTINUE
The notion of honor and justice is prevalent throughout all types of literature. In Greek culture, honor is essential for creating a solid foundation within a society and family. Honor will follow you until the day you perish, and beyond. The honor for men in Greece is spiritual in that loved ones show respect to the deceased by giving them a proper burial. Nevertheless, when a man acts upon betrayal of the city, that man looses the privilege to die in such honor. This is evident in the life of Antigone when her two brothers, Polyneices and Eteocles, both die at each other’s hands at war when deciding the ruler of Thebes. Polyneices cannot have a proper burial, because the new king, Antigone’s uncle, Creon created a law that decrees that anyone who tries to give Polyneices a proper burial will have a dire consequence: death. In Sophocles’ Antigone, the quest that Antigone endures to stay true to her pure intentions of honoring Polyneices by giving him a proper burial is in juxtaposition with the fact that her defiance towards Creon is not only to do with Polyneices, but also to show appeasement to the gods.
In the play Creon goes against the Gods by making it illegal to bury Polyneices, Antigone’s brother because he is deemed a traitor. The burying of a dead body is seen as a necessity by all of Greece as it is an unspoken law of the Gods. Antigone goes to bury her brother so his afterlife will be better. She does it in spite of the law that Creon has made. “It is the dead, not the living, who make the longest demands” (192) She tries to explain to her sister, Ismene, that they must bury Polyneices, but even that close relationship has trouble because of the law. Ismene is unwilling to suffer the consequences of the law, to save her brother’s soul “Forgive me but I am helpless: I must yield to those in authority” (192) Even the two sisters who have just lost both of their brothers have different views on the matter. One will not stray from the law and what is deemed right by their king, while the other will accept any punishment, even death just to do what she believes is right.
In The Chronicle of a Death Foretold, religion acts as a foremost determinant of the meaning of Santiago’s murder and parallels biblical passages. Gabriel García Márquez employs religious symbolism throughout his novella which alludes to Christ, his familiars, and his death on the cross. There are many representations throughout the novella that portray these biblical references, such as the murder of Santiago, the Divine Face, the cock’s crowing and the characters, Bayardo San Roman, Maria Cervantes, Divina Flor, and the Vicario children.
Chronicle of a Death Foretold is a novella written by Gabriel Garcia Marquez taking place in twentieth century Colombia. Marquez recalls the events of a murder twenty years in the past. The victim, who is named Santiago Nasar in the novella, faces prosecution from his twin friends because the twins’ sister states Santiago took her virginity. As honor was greatly valued in the Colombian society at the time, their worldview led to the requirement for their family’s honor to be restored by killing Santiago. The result is an impending murder that almost everyone, except for a small group including Santiago himself, knew about. The result is Santiago’s death as he never knew what was coming.