Citing “Antigone” Properly

1.                  “Antigone” is a PLAY, NOT a book.

2.                  Sophocles wrote “Antigone” and the other plays in The Theban Legend.

3.                  When referring to the title of the play, write it as:

“Antigone”

Reason:  the play “Antigone” is part of the three plays encompassed in The Theban Legend; because it’s a portion of an entire piece, it needs quotation marks instead of italicization

4.                   The correct entry in the Works Cited for the play:

Sophocles. “Antigone.” The Theban Legend. Trans. E.F. Watling.

London: Penguin Books, 2003. 126-162.  Print.

5.                   To cite one person’s speech (less than four lines long), you can:

Antigone feels the law against burying her brother Polynices is unjust. She decides to bury him even though Creon has forbid it.  She states, “But Polynices just as unhappily fallen- the order says he is not to be buried, not to be mourned; to be left unbarred, unwept, a feast of flesh for keen-eyed carrion birds’’ (Sophocles 126).* This quote is an example of Antigone’s emotions… 

OR

She knows people will realize that she did an honorable act by burying Polynices. She can go to her death without any regrets. In the face of death, Antigone showed the greatest amount of honor:

                      Antigone: I do admit it. I do not deny it. (Sophocles 138)*.  

This showed Antigone’s willful act of civil disobedience because she refused to back down even at the threat of death.

*Normally in classic plays like this (written in verse), you’d cite the LINE NUMBER of the quotation; however the line numbers are not conveniently located next to the text, so we’ll just use the page number!

6.                  To cite more than one person’s speech (any length), you should block quote and include their names before quoting their line(s):

Furthermore, a bright sense of morality shined through Antigone, causing her to be looked upon as a woman of virtue, as evidenced in the confrontation between Antigone and Creon:

Creon: He will, if you honour him no more than the traitor.

Antigone: It was not a slave, but his brother, that died with him.

Creon: Attacking his country, while the other defended it.

Antigone: Even so, we have a duty to the dead.

Creon: Not to give equal honour to good and bad.

Antigone: Who knows? In the country of the dead that may

          be the law.

Creon: An enemy can’t be a friend, even when dead.

Antigone: My way is to share my love, not share my hate.

Creon: Go then, and share your love among the dead. We’ll

          have no woman’s law here, while I live (Sophocles

          140).

Antigone and Creon were discussing their views on what was right to do regarding the issue of burying the body of Polynices.  Creon falls back on the fact that she is a woman, and therefore her morality is not as valid as his law.