Creon The Tragic Hero In Sophocles Antigone

Do they fly around in capes? Are they capable of leaping tall buildings in a single bound? Maybe they have super powers obtained after a nuclear accident? Or just maybe they’re normal people who do extraordinary things? There are many types of heros in society, some with happy endings and some have tragic endings. A tragic hero is a literary character who makes a judgment error that inevitably leads to his/her own destruction. In reading Antigone by Sophocles there is one hero that is truly tragic in nature, Creon.

Creon’s flaw was that he had been too prideful.
In the book Antigone, on page 1060 it states“I have killed my son and wife. I look for comfort; my comfort lies here dead. Whatever my hands have touched has come to nothing. Fate

has brought all my pride to a thought of dust.”
“But it worse to everything for stubborn pride” (1055)
Pride is the most horrible of flaws. It makes people in our society do foolish things, and they often end up in dangerous or unwanted situations. People in society express their pride in different ways, an example of this would be if a coach started to verbally abuse his or her team because they wanted the team to succeed.

In his rage after Antigone disobeyed him by trying to pay her respects to her brother, he decided to indirectly murder her by locking her into a vault.
”I will carry her far away, out there in the wilderness, and lock he living in a vault of stone.” 1045
“Take her, go! you know your orders: take her to the vault and leave her alone there. And if she lives or dies, that's her affair, not ours.” 1050
People in today's world often let their emotions control their actions, which isn't very good, considering we might do something we regret later on. They may unwitting hurt a family member or friend because they made them upset in some way or they may damage property and or themselves.

Creon decides to try and fix his own mistakes because he does not want to be punished by the gods.
“ Choragus: Go quickly: free Antigone from her vault and build a tomb for the body of Polyneices.” 1055
“Come with me to the tomb. I buried her; I will set her free.” 1055
Society always tries to fix their mistakes, but more often than not, society as a whole, is consistently failing at fixing things they've done. Just look at global warming, which we have only just started fixing although it is almost an irreversible thing to fix.

Creon has to deal with the fact that his actions inadvertently killed his son and wife.
On page 1059 it says: Messenger: “ The queen is dead.” Creon: “O port of death, deaf world, is there no pity for me? And you, angel of evil, I was dead and your words are death again.” 1059
“I have killed my son and my wife. I look for comfort; my comfort lies here dead.” 1060
Society as a whole knows, but often forgets that every action you choose to do sets off a chain reaction.

If one person decides to drive home drunk from a party then that person has a chance of getting into a head on collision with others. That choice to drive drunk has just endangered countless lives of innocent people on the road.

Certainly, some may believe that it is not Creon but Antigone who was the tragic hero, because she was the one who got locked in a vault for trying to bury her brother,and she later killed herself because she thought that she was never going to escape the vault. But the tragic hero is indeed Creon. An example of this is on page 1059 which states:“My own blind heart has brought me from darkness to final darkness. Here you see the father murdering, the murdered son-And all my civic wisdom! Haemon my son, so young, so young to die, I was the fool not you.”

Whether they have super powers, capes, or extraordinary mental and physical abilities, heros are among us. Sometimes they’re truly just great people who do amazing things and have a happy ending. But other times they’re just normal people who are flawed and go on to do some heroic deeds. Often times these tragic hero's go unrecognized. Because Sophocles wrote Antigone, we will forever see that Creon is a true tragic hero that we will recognize and read about

forever.