Sophocles' play Antigone focuses on a conflict between Oikos and Polis. Oikos, “home”, is the concept of the home, dominated by women and kin; polis, "city", is the concept of a collective city-state, dominated by men and power or money. Antigone, bound by the family duty of a proper burial, comes into deep conflict with King Creon, obsessed with personal control of the state. These characters, symbols of the oikos and the polis, are so diametrically opposed that no one seems to be able to reconcile them or convince Creon to spare Antigone, who buried her brother in defiance of Creon's proclamation. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay The play's last hope for deliberative reconciliation is Haemon, Creon's devoted son and Antigone®'s loving fiancé. Haemon's views on the oikos and polis are not as extreme as either Creon's or Antigone's, but his love for Antigone draws him to his side. The subtle interplay of oikos, polis and love, which is seen as a power that women, creatures of oikos, exercise over men, is painfully evident in the argument between Creon and Haemon and in the following choral stasima (Antigone, 701-899). ). While love leads to both the origin and the outcome of the dispute between Creon and Haemon, the differences in the fundamental conceptions of the polis and the oikos doom the reconciliation from the start. Love is the reason why Haemon approaches his father to plead for Antigone's life. Although he feels obligated to prevent his father from committing a great injustice, the place Antigone occupies in his heart compels him to plead for her life and join her in death. Like many fathers, Creon warns his son to “never lose his sense of judgment with regard to a woman” (Antigone, 723) and assumes that love is the only reason for his son's protest. This hypothesis is based on the Creonian notions of oikos and polis, making it deaf to Haemon's reasoning. Creon views the struggle between the civilized order of the polis and the clannish chaos of the oikos as a battle between men and women. He tells Haemon his truth that woman is oikos, and oikos is Anarchy in no uncertain terms: Anarchy? show me a greater crime on all the earth! She destroys cities, demolishes houses? We must defend men who live according to the law, never let a woman triumph over us. Better to fall from power, if we must, into the hands of a man? never be judged inferior to a woman, ever. (Antigone, 752-761, emphasis mine) That Haemon dares to defend Antigone's right to bury her brother in violation of Creon's law is a betrayal of his sex, making him a "slave of female ". (Antigone, 847) Furthermore, it is a double sacrilege that Haemon contravenes the authority of his father and his king. Creon's vision of the oikos is his vision of the polis in miniature. Just like “is the city the king’s?” it is the law” (Antigone, 825, emphasis in original), the goal of a father is “to produce good sons” who “submit in all respects to the will of [their] father.” (Antigone, 714-715) After the choirmaster declares that Creon and Haemon "both speak with good sense", (Antigone, 813) Creon complains that the elders of the choir and he, a grown man, do not should not be “raised by a boy”. The age [of Haemon]." (Antigone, 814) Creon's will is absolute: even the prospect of bending to the will of the Theban people irritates him (Antigone, 821). The prospect of following the advice of his son, advice that will lead to the victory of awoman over his decree against a traitor, so offends and outrages Creon that he cannot seriously consider the merits of Haemon's argument on its merits. Haemon's ideas on the oikos and polis are different from his father's and therefore it is difficult for them to find common ground in their argument. Although Haemon's first words to Creon are: "Father, I am your son." ? I obey you” (Antigone, 709-710, italics in the original) and he prefaces his argument by saying that he is not a man to correct his father. (Antigone? 766-769), he abandons this way of criticizing the way Creon treats Antigone. As a dutiful son, Haemon wants to give his father advice that will help him in the long run while embarrassing Creon when he takes it. Haemon's version of the polis is one where the ruler, sensitive to the practical requirement of respect for the oikos, is not too proud of following good advice or complying with demands. Haemon uses a beautiful image of trees in a winter storm to illustrate that even kings must “bend or break,” lest they break because of their rigidity. Continuing the comparison, he says that a man who always hoists “a taut sail, never giving an inch” will capsize his ship (Antigone, 794-804). This refers to Creon's speech calling the city a "ship of state." (Antigone, 180) In this way, Haemon cleverly implies that killing Antigone will lead to the ruin of Thebes. After arguing that Creon should listen to his advice, Haemon grounds his argument in the language of the oikos and his more reactive view of the polis. He never explicitly praises the actions of Antigone himself, but tells Creon that the people whisper their displeasure at his treatment because they sympathize with his dilemma of having to disrespect his brother's memory or die and think she deserves “a shining crown of gold” for her actions (Antigone). , 775-783). This praise, which may well be in part a projection of Haemon's view, is based on the sacred duty of burying the dead, a concern of the oikos. When the polite argument deteriorates into a violent back-and-forth, Haemon calls his father unjust by killing Antigone, which Creon sees as "protecting his royal rights" (Antigone, 833) because in doing so he is "trampling on [s] to the honors of the gods” (Antigone, 835), notably the burial of the dead of the family so important to the oikos. Finally, when Creon says that Haemon is only pleading for Antigone, Haemon interrupts him by saying that he is pleading for her "and for you, and me, and the gods under the earth." (Antigone, 840-841) This, the last important point made by Haemon, is an appeal to his house and to the gods of the oikos. These are the concerns of Haemon, irreconcilable with those of his father. Differences in worldview mean that Haemon fails to convince Creon not to kill Antigone, but it is love that determines how the argument ends. Hémon's argument pleases the choir director but has no effect on his father, who sees him only as an adolescent upstart trying to save the vixen who has trapped him in her sexual web. Enraged that his father still condemns his fiancée to death, the argument turns into a stichomythium, with father and son hurling one-line insults at each other. Returning to the misogynistic language of his father, Hémon even calls Creon a “woman!” » (Antigone, 829) Angered by his father's threat to kill Antigone immediately, before his eyes, Haemon flees saying that Antigone "will never die by my side". (Antigone, 855). This cry from the depths of a lover's despair is the height of irony: Antigone does not die next to Haemon; Haemon dies next to Antigone, kissing her white cheek with a bloody mouth (Antigone, 1363-1671). Keep in mind: this is just a sample.!