A Humorous Distillation of Antigone by Maurice Sagoff

A Humorous Distillation of Antigone by Maurice Sagoff

This poem is

quite successful in getting the plot across to the reader.

Unfortunatly, that is all he can get across because of his

beleif that, "inside every fat book is a skinny book trying to

get out." Sargoff cannot have character descriptions, themes,

or any real detail in his "skinny book" because of his beleifs.

Sargoff leaves off why Polynices should not be burried and

why his brother, who is not even menchoned, can be

burried. This is important to building the feelings of contempt

towards Creon and an understanding of what Antigone is

doing. Also, because this is a "Humorous Distillation," the

tone of the play is lost. Instead of being a dramatic play

about obeying a higher law, it is a comical, rhyming poem

about what happened. This may cause it to lose the impact it

had. Sargoff reduces important and pivotal points in the

story to a sentence such as, "Creon wilts, and tries to bang a

U-ee." This sentence does not tell of Creon's attempt to

repent for what he! has done by burrying Polynices and then

going to free Antigone. Even if Sargoff gets all of the plot

across, that is not enough to tell the whole story. Aristotelian

Unities Yes, Antigone does follow the Aristotelian Unities.

The play occurs in the same place and roughly the same

time. Things that happened before the play or outside of the

place, was told by a messenger or a character themself. The

action was all centered around Antigone's actions. Her

actions were the sole cause of everything that happened.

Greek Tragedy Antigone does follow the Greek definition of

tragedy. Tragedy is a story or play that has a signifigant

conflict of morals, with a noble protagonist displaying a

tragic flaw that is their strength but leads to their downfall.

The exposition of the story is when Antigone is talking with

her sister and we learn of what has happened. The turning

point of this play is when Creon tries to mend his wrongs by

burying Polynices and freeing Antigone. Antigone herself is

the tragic hero because she dies for what she believes

morally right. Antigone's tragic flaw is that she has only sees

her point of view which leads to her death. The denouement

of this story is everybody dying and then Creon realizing

what he has caused. The song of the story is attenden to

throuhg the chorus' comentating on what is happening or