''Antigone'', also known as ''The Antigone of Sophocles'', is an adaptation by the German dramatist
Bertolt Brecht of
Hölderlin's translation of Sophocles'
tragedy
Tragedy (from the grc-gre, τραγῳδία, ''tragōidia'', ''tragōidia'') is a genre of drama based on human suffering and, mainly, the terrible or sorrowful events that befall a main character. Traditionally, the intention of tragedy ...
. It was first performed at the Chur Stadttheater in
Switzerland in 1948, with Brecht's second wife
Helene Weigel
Helene Weigel (; 12 May 19006 May 1971) was a German actress and artistic director. She was the second wife of Bertolt Brecht and was married to him from 1930 until his death in 1956. Together they had two children.
Personal life
Weigel was bo ...
, in the lead role.
This was Brecht's first directorial collaboration with
Caspar Neher Caspar Neher (born Rudolf Ludwig Caspar Neher; 11 April 1897 – 30 June 1962) was an Austrian-German scenographer and librettist, known principally for his career-long working relationship with Bertolt Brecht.
Neher was born in Augsburg. He a ...
.
Productions
Ratan Thiyam
Ratan Thiyam (born 20 January 1948) is an Indian playwright and theatre director, and the winner of Sangeet Natak Akademi Award in 1987, one of leading figures of the "''theatre of roots''" movement in Indian theatre, which started in the 1970s ...
directed a
Meitei language
Meitei (), also known as Manipuri (, ), is a Tibeto-Burman language of north-eastern India. It is spoken by around 1.8 million people, predominantly in the state of Manipur, but also by smaller communities in the rest of the country and in p ...
-adaptation of the play in 1986.
[ Cody, p. 1348]
A 1951 production of ''Antigone'' at the Griez showed a new prologue written by Brecht in which Antigone, Tiresias, and Creon appear onstage and Tiresias gives an explication of the play. He instructs the audience to analyze the play and observe how humanity rose up against barbarism.
Differences from the original ''Antigone''
The play begins with a modern World War II scene in which two sisters discover that their brother, a soldier, has returned from the front. They feed him but it turns out that he is a deserter and he is lynched from the lamppost. This first scene is intended to draw the parallel between the death of Polynices, that marks the first and dramatically key event in Sophocles' Antigone, with that of the deserting soldier in World War II.
Creon is played as a Nazi-style dictator, and the cast in most productions wear either modern or World War II German costume to make the parallel more obvious.
Theatrical style
Cultural influences
* ''Die Antigone des Sophokles nach der Hölderlinschen Übertragung für die Bühne bearbeitet von Brecht 1948'' (1992), a film from
Straub-Huillet.
References
*
''Educational Theatre Journal'', Vol. 24, No. 1 (Mar., 1972), pp. 47–68
''The Tulane Drama Review'', Vol. 2, No. 1 (Nov., 1957), pp. 39–45
Plays by Bertolt Brecht
1947 plays
Plays based on Antigone (Sophocles play)
Modern adaptations of Antigone (Sophocles play)
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