Antigone (Sophocles) practice questions and exam guide

Antigone's refusal of Ismene's offer to share blame is best read as:

1. Petty rivalry left over from their childhood
2. Cruelty toward the last of her family
3. Her insistence that only the one who acted should bear the act
4. Evidence that she never wanted anyone's help

Answer: C — Her insistence that only the one who acted should bear the act

A/B/D) Misread the speech. C) Correct — she protects the integrity of the deed itself.

Leadership as a theme is dramatized in:

1. Antigone's mournful chorus song before her death
2. Haemon's prolonged and painful silence in front of his father
3. Ismene's quiet exit from the central action
4. Creon identifying the city with himself and refusing counsel

Answer: D — Creon identifying the city with himself and refusing counsel

A/B/C) Wrong. D) Correct — Haemon's warning that no city belongs to one man is the diagnosis.

A late-recognition tragedy is one in which:

1. The entire chorus perishes onstage before the final scene concludes
2. The protagonist understands only after catastrophe is already irreversible
3. The play resolves happily with reconciliation between all the surviving characters
4. No character ever reaches a moment of genuine tragic recognition

Answer: B — The protagonist understands only after catastrophe is already irreversible

A/C/D) Wrong. B) Correct — Antigone is the type-case for many later readings.

Haemon's death is dramatized as:

1. Entirely anonymous, unmarked by any name or ceremony
2. Offstage and never directly reported to the audience
3. Nearly a parricide, turning into a suicide beside his fiancée
4. A ritual sacrifice deliberately offered up to the god Apollo

Answer: C — Nearly a parricide, turning into a suicide beside his fiancée

A/B/D) Wrong. C) Correct — the missed sword stroke at his father turns inward, fusing rage and grief.

A common misconception is that Antigone is the unambiguous hero of the play. The play actually:

1. Endorses her position entirely and without any reservation from start to finish
2. Forgets her character completely by the middle of the third act
3. Treats her consistently as a villain deserving of her eventual punishment
4. Shows her right in her cause but tragic in her zeal

Answer: D — Shows her right in her cause but tragic in her zeal

A/B/C) Wrong. D) Correct — being right and being tragic are not mutually exclusive in Sophocles.

The theme of time and timing is dramatized in:

1. The chorus's brief song describing the break of dawn
2. Eurydice's advanced age compared to the other characters
3. Antigone's relative youth compared to Creon's experience
4. Creon's reversal coming just too late to help

Answer: D — Creon's reversal coming just too late to help

A/B/C) Wrong. D) Correct — Sophoclean tragic timing is the engine of the play's last act.

In the order it was written, Antigone is:

1. Written after Oedipus Rex, continuing the chronological order of composition
2. Written before Oedipus Rex, though its plot unfolds later in the story
3. Written at the same time as Oedipus Rex, as part of one trilogy
4. Impossible to date relative to the other Theban plays

Answer: B — Written before Oedipus Rex, though its plot unfolds later in the story

A/C/D) Wrong. B) Correct — Antigone (c. 441) was written before Oedipus Rex (c. 429). Treat the trilogy as autonomous plays.

When questioned by Creon, Antigone:

1. Openly admits the act, calling it no crime
2. Denies everything and blames the guards instead
3. Begs Creon for mercy and forgiveness
4. Claims that Ismene forced her into it

Answer: A — Openly admits the act, calling it no crime

B/C/D) Wrong. A) Correct — her open avowal is what makes Creon's edict and her sentence inevitable.

Antigone's appeal at trial is to:

1. An appeal to the city's written law and civic justice
2. An appeal to the unwritten, eternal laws of the gods
3. An appeal grounded only in loyalty to family blood
4. A claim that she acted in self-defense

Answer: B — An appeal to the unwritten, eternal laws of the gods

A) The opposite. B) Correct — 'agrapta nomima,' the unwritten + eternal law. The play's central philosophical move.

Civil disobedience as a theme is dramatized when Antigone:

1. Knowingly breaks the law and accepts the penalty
2. Formally petitions the king to change his mind
3. Quietly flees Thebes before she can be caught
4. Secretly bribes the guards to look away

Answer: A — Knowingly breaks the law and accepts the penalty

B/C/D) Wrong. A) Correct — the open avowal and acceptance of consequence is the disobedience pattern.

Creon's hubris is most precisely his:

1. His personal bravery in leading Thebes through years of war
2. His refusal to listen to Haemon, the chorus, or Teiresias
3. His cruelty alone, without any deeper flaw
4. His excessive pride in his family's name

Answer: B — His refusal to listen to Haemon, the chorus, or Teiresias

A/C/D) Reductive. B) Correct — refusal of counsel is Sophocles's careful diagnosis of how authority destroys itself.

Antigone has been invoked in twentieth- and twenty-first-century arguments about:

1. The precise technical history of ancient Greek astronomical observation and instrument-making methods
2. The right of families to bury relatives killed by state violence, including the disappeared
3. The formal rules governing athlete eligibility in the ancient Olympic competitions
4. The economic incidence of taxation across different social and economic classes

Answer: B — The right of families to bury relatives killed by state violence, including the disappeared

A/C/D) Wrong. B) Correct — the play's most enduring civic afterlife.

Why does Antigone insist on burying him?

Unburied dead cannot enter Hades. Familial + religious duty + the unwritten 'agrapta nomima' of the gods outweigh Creon's edict.

Creon's reversal?

After insulting Teiresias, Creon panics + listens to the chorus. Decides to bury Polynices first + then free Antigone.

Creon's sentence?

To bury Antigone alive in a sealed stone tomb. Avoids the religious pollution of a direct execution.

The first burial?

Antigone sprinkles dust on Polynices in secret. Guards uncover the body + report to Creon. Sentry returns terrified.

Theme: family vs. state.

Antigone speaks for blood, the dead, + the gods. Creon speaks for the city. Sophocles refuses to let either claim absorb the other.

Who is Creon?

Antigone's uncle, now king of Thebes after Eteocles + Polynices killed each other. Enforces his edict + becomes the play's tragic figure.