Fighting The Man

When placed in a modern context, the Ancient Greek play Antigonê can be viewed as a struggle between a dictatorial state that strives to control absolutely in the name of stability and a strong-willed individual with the strength to challenge that totalitarian body. Though the individual is destroyed in this fight against the injustices of the state, the dictatorial entity itself is consumed by the consequences of its own decisions. Antigonê therefore reveals the inevitable self-destructive fate of totalitarian regimes.
In the play, Antigonê herself takes on the role of a freedom fighter against the unjust law-making control of Creon, who himself takes on the role of The Man. In his first speech in Scene I, the effective dictator espouses his dedication to the “public welfare” while maintaining that only those who show absolute commitment to the state “shall have [his] respect” and “reverence.” Through such orations that reverberate with twentieth-century fascist ideology, The Man binds the opinions of the Choragos and the Chorus, who in the action of the play are the Theban elders; Creon, therefore, controls the ideas of his people and forces them into line with his own. Furthermore, he overrules the edicts of the gods by forbidding the burial of Polyneicês and effectively declares that the ruling of the state is above the workings and desires of those deities. The Man nullifies the influence of religion, claims a monopoly on ideology, builds fear in his people with the specter of anarchy, and requires loyalty to the state above dedication to the family; he even admits his own dictatorship when he proclaims “[t]he State is the King!”
Antigonê arises as a challenging force to Creon’s totalitarian control through her defiance of his mandate against burial of her supposed-traitor brother. She restores the power of the individual by openly legitimizing the will of the gods, by challenging The Man’s doctrine, and by committing herself to her brother over her government; these actions inspire the people of Thebes to start “[m]uttering and whispering in the dark about this girl” and her fight against the injustices of The Man. Antigonê’s insubordination calls into question the validity of Creon’s rule and begins the destruction of Creon’s power. Her disobedience also imposes an ultimate authority over the treacheries of his regime: love. In Ode III Sophocles establishes love as the ultimate power in human existence; it is love that leads Antigonê to effectively stick it to The Man in the first place, and it is love that leads Haimon and Eurydicê to commit suicide at the end of the play. Their suicides finish the process started by Antigonê initial defiance and bring an end to Creon’s unjust and unreasonable rule. The restoration of individuality through love therefore destroys the totalitarian state.
Perhaps the greatest modern lesson to be learned from Antigonê is the solemn truth that the individual must and will always come before the ruling body. The Choragos finishes the play with this warning: “There is no happiness where there is no wisdom… Big words are always punished.” Indeed, the big words and controlling ideals of strong government never come with the wisdom to avoid their own demise; they cannot stand in the face of individual will and truth. The individual must always overcome the system. (545)

The Restoration of Spirituality through Religion

Leo Tolstoy’s The Death of Ivan Ilych recounts the life story of a man who, while in his final days of life, realizes his life had been worthless and subsequently rectifies his lost and broken soul. The fundamental cause of Ivan’s empty existence, which is characterized by a dynamicity of values, a fulfillment of self-interest, and a desire to conform to what others view as right, is the main character’s lack of spiritual connectedness with himself, with others, and with “He whose understanding matters.” Through the restoration of spirituality through a religious awakening, Ivan fixes his life, transcends death, and emerges into light.
While the physical cause for the main character’s decline may be his hurting his side, the condition is advanced towards death by Ivan’s superficial connections with others and with God. As he faces the fading of his life, the main character’s spiritual disconnectedness becomes apparent as he sees nothing but insincerity within the actions of his family and his doctors. His only comfort comes in Gerasim, who provides a beacon of kindness and understanding in a household surrounded by self-concern. As Ivan battles with the “cruelty of man,” which in the story is typified by a lack of human interconnectedness, he also battles with a perceived abandonment by God. He believes that God brought him to his state of torment and left him to suffer; indeed, Ivan’s acknowledged creator did effectively leave the sufferer, but only because Ivan distanced himself from any semblance of spirituality and instead grounded himself in the trifles of the earthly world and in a preoccupation with death. By worrying purely about the approval of his superiors and by adopting a moral-relativistic attitude towards his beliefs, Ivan succeeds in severing any connection to the metaphysical that is necessary for a healthy life. In his anger at God, Ivan reflects upon his desire to return to his pleasant normal life, yet he realizes that his life prior to his illness had not been what he had believed it to be. He quickly realizes that, because he was grounded in the conformity to the upper classes and in his own self-fulfillment, his life had been a waste.
At the climax of his illness, Ivan takes communion and becomes reconnected with God. In a symbolic alleviation of his pain by religion, the main character re-establishes his spirituality and thereby comes to the firm realization that his life was “all not the right thing.” Ivan accepts his life as such, and he then proceeds to rectify his great error by for once truly caring about his family. He reclaims the spiritual bond between him and his family and reaches out to God for understanding. Through this spiritual rebirth in God, Ivan can accept death and move beyond to light.
By ending his novella with Ivan’s salvation through a spiritual reconnection, Tolstoy demonstrates the importance of God and spirituality in life. The characters in the story all fear death and all waste their lives in a physical, material existence; they believe themselves to be happy and immortal, yet in actuality they are plagued by a concern for only oneself that produces a consuming fear about one’s standing in the world. By transcending a flawed material world and connecting to a redeeming spiritual world, Ivan is able to overcome that fear and receive Jesus’ promise of an end to death. By restoring his spirituality, Ivan effectively saves his life. (570)