Week 7 Blog
Feb. 26th, 2012 04:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ecoirie1. Reflection
Antigone is the tragic hero by defiantly standing her ground against an unjust law that leads to her death, while Creon is an arrogant and paranoid leader that feels he is supporting the state and the gods by following through with his laws, but these actions are paid back twofold upon his life. By burying her brother, Antigone feels she is justifiably overriding the “mortal laws” of Creon and fulfilling those “great unwritten, unshakeable” ones of the gods. As she states:
“they are alive, not just today or yesterday: they live forever, from the
first of time, and no one knows when they first saw the light. These
laws—I was not about to break them, not out of fear of some man's
wounded pride, and face the retribution of the gods.”(496)
With the will of the gods on her side, Antigone does not “bend before adversity”(467) when facing Creon by exchanging blows of accusations and character degradation, which is evident in her statement: “and if my present actions strike you as foolish, let's just say I've been accused of folly by fool.”(496) This infuriates Creon who feels that he is protecting everyones interests though his laws, and so hands her death sentence down. In his mindset, if he lets up, the weakness shown and disrespect for the law will unravel Thebes society and eventually lead to it's demise, but he's also worried about tarnishing his reputation too. “Imagine it: I caught her in naked rebellion, the traitor, the only one in the whole city. I'm not about to prove myself a liar, not to my people, no, I'm going to kill her!” (502). This repeats itself again as Creon exchanges words with Haemon:
“Creon. Am I to rule this land for others—or myself?
Haemon. It's no city at all, owned by one man alone.
Creon. What? The city is the king's—that's the law!
Haemon. What a splendid king you'd make of a desert island---you and you alone.”(504)
And again with Tiresias, whose wisdom falls on Creon's deaf ears:
“All men make mistakes, it is only human. But once the wrong is done, a man can turn
his back on folly, misfortune too, if he tries to make amends, however low he's fallen,
and stops his bullnecked ways. Stubbornness brands you for stupidity—pride is a
crime. No, yield to the dead.” (511)
This repeated advice many times over unfortunately isn't taken to heart by Creon, and instead lashes back with brash acusations of corruption of bribes taken to bring down the state. In essence, Creon is an overbearing fool that lets his newfound power blind him of the truth that Haemon, Tiresias, and Antigone try to show him. I'm torn whether to pity him for his dire mistakes in judgment, or scorn his irate egotistical mannerisms. In the end, it's hard not to feel some sympathy as he loses his entire family in one tragic moment that deadens him with regret, guilt, and a lifetime of greiving solitude. Power is a delacite balance, and if one forgets to listen and follow reason from those around him or her, their role will be short lived.
2. Looking ahead
Extended Meaphor:
http://grammar.about.com/od/e/g/extmetterm.htm
A comparison between two unlike things that continues throughout a series of sentences in a paragraph or lines in a poem.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extended_metaphor
A metaphor that continues into the sentences that follow. It is often developed at great length, occurring frequently throughout a work, and are especially effective in poems and fiction.
In Kogawa's “Obasan”, extended metaphors are used to describe the painful internalized grief Obasan experienced through the World War II Japanese Internment camps. For Obasan, “the memories are drowned in a whirlpool of silence”(Kogawa, 4), which eventually erodes her and her daughters spirits. There's no escaping Obasan's grasp of dispair since her “Grief inside her body is fat and powerful. An almighty tapeworm.” (Kogawa, 4) Images continue through her pain accumulates through the the years as “grief has roamed like a highwayman down the channel as her body with its dynamite and it's weapons blowing up every moment of relief that tried to make it's way down the road. It grew rich off the unburied corpses inside her body.” (Kogawa, 4) With no end in sight for an outlet to express her feelings, grief “claimed her kingdom fully, it admitted no enemies and no vengeance. Enemies belonged in a corridor of experience with sense and meaning, with justice and reason. Her Grief knew nothing of these and whipped her body to resignation until the kingdom was secure.” (Kogawa, 4) Not only was Obasan trapped, but her daughters paid the price as well, which is why they “fled to the ends of the earth” (Kogawa, 5) in an attempt to:
“live a life in perpetual flight from the density of her inner retreat-- from the rays of her
inverted sun sucking in their lives with the voracious appetite of a dwarf star.
Approaching her, they become balls of liquid metal—mercurial--unpredictable in their
moods and sudden departures. Especially for the younger daughter, departure is as
necessary as breath. What metallic spider is it her night that hammers a constant
transformation, lacing open doors and windows with iron bars.” (Kogawa, 5)
Whether it's a whirlpool, tapeworm, dwarf star, or iron bars spun from a metallic spider, the extended metaphors run deep in portraying the inescapable magnitude that grief played in Obasan's life.
Antigone is the tragic hero by defiantly standing her ground against an unjust law that leads to her death, while Creon is an arrogant and paranoid leader that feels he is supporting the state and the gods by following through with his laws, but these actions are paid back twofold upon his life. By burying her brother, Antigone feels she is justifiably overriding the “mortal laws” of Creon and fulfilling those “great unwritten, unshakeable” ones of the gods. As she states:
“they are alive, not just today or yesterday: they live forever, from the
first of time, and no one knows when they first saw the light. These
laws—I was not about to break them, not out of fear of some man's
wounded pride, and face the retribution of the gods.”(496)
With the will of the gods on her side, Antigone does not “bend before adversity”(467) when facing Creon by exchanging blows of accusations and character degradation, which is evident in her statement: “and if my present actions strike you as foolish, let's just say I've been accused of folly by fool.”(496) This infuriates Creon who feels that he is protecting everyones interests though his laws, and so hands her death sentence down. In his mindset, if he lets up, the weakness shown and disrespect for the law will unravel Thebes society and eventually lead to it's demise, but he's also worried about tarnishing his reputation too. “Imagine it: I caught her in naked rebellion, the traitor, the only one in the whole city. I'm not about to prove myself a liar, not to my people, no, I'm going to kill her!” (502). This repeats itself again as Creon exchanges words with Haemon:
“Creon. Am I to rule this land for others—or myself?
Haemon. It's no city at all, owned by one man alone.
Creon. What? The city is the king's—that's the law!
Haemon. What a splendid king you'd make of a desert island---you and you alone.”(504)
And again with Tiresias, whose wisdom falls on Creon's deaf ears:
“All men make mistakes, it is only human. But once the wrong is done, a man can turn
his back on folly, misfortune too, if he tries to make amends, however low he's fallen,
and stops his bullnecked ways. Stubbornness brands you for stupidity—pride is a
crime. No, yield to the dead.” (511)
This repeated advice many times over unfortunately isn't taken to heart by Creon, and instead lashes back with brash acusations of corruption of bribes taken to bring down the state. In essence, Creon is an overbearing fool that lets his newfound power blind him of the truth that Haemon, Tiresias, and Antigone try to show him. I'm torn whether to pity him for his dire mistakes in judgment, or scorn his irate egotistical mannerisms. In the end, it's hard not to feel some sympathy as he loses his entire family in one tragic moment that deadens him with regret, guilt, and a lifetime of greiving solitude. Power is a delacite balance, and if one forgets to listen and follow reason from those around him or her, their role will be short lived.
2. Looking ahead
Extended Meaphor:
http://grammar.about.com/od/e/g/extmetterm.htm
A comparison between two unlike things that continues throughout a series of sentences in a paragraph or lines in a poem.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extended_metaphor
A metaphor that continues into the sentences that follow. It is often developed at great length, occurring frequently throughout a work, and are especially effective in poems and fiction.
In Kogawa's “Obasan”, extended metaphors are used to describe the painful internalized grief Obasan experienced through the World War II Japanese Internment camps. For Obasan, “the memories are drowned in a whirlpool of silence”(Kogawa, 4), which eventually erodes her and her daughters spirits. There's no escaping Obasan's grasp of dispair since her “Grief inside her body is fat and powerful. An almighty tapeworm.” (Kogawa, 4) Images continue through her pain accumulates through the the years as “grief has roamed like a highwayman down the channel as her body with its dynamite and it's weapons blowing up every moment of relief that tried to make it's way down the road. It grew rich off the unburied corpses inside her body.” (Kogawa, 4) With no end in sight for an outlet to express her feelings, grief “claimed her kingdom fully, it admitted no enemies and no vengeance. Enemies belonged in a corridor of experience with sense and meaning, with justice and reason. Her Grief knew nothing of these and whipped her body to resignation until the kingdom was secure.” (Kogawa, 4) Not only was Obasan trapped, but her daughters paid the price as well, which is why they “fled to the ends of the earth” (Kogawa, 5) in an attempt to:
“live a life in perpetual flight from the density of her inner retreat-- from the rays of her
inverted sun sucking in their lives with the voracious appetite of a dwarf star.
Approaching her, they become balls of liquid metal—mercurial--unpredictable in their
moods and sudden departures. Especially for the younger daughter, departure is as
necessary as breath. What metallic spider is it her night that hammers a constant
transformation, lacing open doors and windows with iron bars.” (Kogawa, 5)
Whether it's a whirlpool, tapeworm, dwarf star, or iron bars spun from a metallic spider, the extended metaphors run deep in portraying the inescapable magnitude that grief played in Obasan's life.
