21:30, Thu 24th – Sat 26th November 2016 at Pembroke New Cellars
Michaelmas Week 7

“It wasn't Zeus, not in the least,
who made this proclamation—not to me.
Nor did that Justice, dwelling with the gods
beneath the earth, ordain such laws for men.”

Raging against the unfair treatment of her traitorous brother Polyneices’ corpse, Antigone defies the proclamations of the state forbidding any burial and gives Polyneices all the funeral rights appropriate for a man killed in military combat. When her despotic and newly-crowned uncle Creon discovers the betrayal, he sentences her to an agonising and irreligious execution, despite the protestations of his son Haemon and his political advisers.

Over the course of this fast-paced, ever-relevant Greek drama, we see the unyielding defiance of the individual will and the crushing tyranny of an authoritarian state come into conflict, resulting in (needless to say) tragic consequences.