Carson Anne - Antigonick

ALSO BY ANNE CARSON AVAILABLE FROM NEW DIRECTIONS the albertine workout glass, irony & god nox Copyright 2012, 2015 by Anne Carson All rights reserved. Except for brief passages quoted in anewspaper, magazine, radio, television, or website review, no part of this book maybe reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, includingphotocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system,without permission in writing from the Publisher. Manufactured in the United States of America First published clothbound by New Directions in 2012 First published as a New Directions Paperbook (ndp1322) in2015 Design by Erik Rieselbach The Library of Congress has cataloged the printed edition as follows: Sophocles, author. [Antigone. English] Antigonick / Sophokles ; translated by Anne Carson. ISBN 978-0-8112-2292-1 ISBN 978-0-8112-2293-8 (e-book) I.

Carson, Anne, 1950 II. Title. PA4414.A7C37 2015 882'.01dc23 2014046878 New Directions Books are published for James Laughlin by New Directions Publishing Corporation 80 Eighth Avenue, New York 10011 the task of the translator of antigone dear Antigone: your name in Greek means something like against birth or instead of being born what is there instead of being born? its not that we want to understand everything or even to understand anything we want to understand something else I keep returning to Brecht who made you do the whole play with a door strapped to your back a door can have diverse meanings I stand outside your door the odd thing is, you stand outside your door too that door has no inside or if it has an inside, you are the one person who cannot enter it for the family who lives there, things have gone irretrievably wrong to have a father who is also your brother means having a mother who is your grandmother a sister who is both your niece and your aunt and another brother you love so much you want to lie down with him thigh to thigh in the grave or so you say glancingly early in the play but no one mentions it again afterwards oh you always exaggerate! my father used to tell me and lets footnote here Hegel calling Woman the eternal irony of the community how seriously can we take you? are you Antigone between two deaths as Lacan puts it or a parody of Kreons law and Kreons language so Judith Butler who also finds in you the occasion for a new field of the human? then again, an exemplar of masculine intellect and moral sense is George Eliots judgment, while to several modern scholars you (perhaps predictably) sound like a terrorist and iek compares you triumphantly with Tito the leader of Yugoslavia saying NO! to Stalin in 1942 speaking of the 40s, you made a good impression on the Nazi high command and simultaneously on the leaders of the French Resistance when they all sat in the audience of Jean Anouilhs Antigone opening night Paris 1944: I dont know what color your eyes were but I can imagine you rolling them now lets return to Brecht, maybe he got you best to carry ones own door will make a person clumsy, tired and strange on the other hand, it may come in useful if you go places that dont have an obvious way in, like normality or an obvious way out, like the classic double bind well thats your problem my problem is to get you and your problem across into English from ancient Greek all that lies hidden in these people, your people crimes and horror and years together, a family, what we call a family one of my earliest memories, wrote John Ashbery in New York magazine 1980, is of trying to peel off the wallpaper in my room, not out of animosity but because it seemed there must be something fascinating behind its galleons and globes and telescopes this reminds me of Samuel Beckett who described in a letter his own aspirations toward language to bore hole after hole in it until what cowers behind it seeps through dear Antigone: you also are someone keeping faith with a deeply other organization that lies just beneath what we see or what we say to quote Kreon you are autonomos a word made up of autos self and nomos law autonomy sounds like a kind of freedom but you arent interested in freedom your plan is to sew yourself into your own shroud using the tiniest of stitches how to translate this? I take inspiration from John Cage who, when asked how he composed 4'33", answered I built it up gradually out of many small pieces of silence Antigone, you do not, any more than John Cage, aspire to a condition of silence you want us to listen to the sound of what happens when everything normal/musical/careful/conventional or pious is taken away oh sister and daughter of Oidipous, who can be innocent in dealing with you there was never a blank slate we were always already anxious about you perhaps you know that Ingeborg Bachmann poem from the last years of her life that begins I lose my screams dear Antigone, I take it as the task of the translator to forbid that you should ever lose your screams cast Antigone Ismene sister of Antigone Kreon king of Thebes Haimon son of Kreon and Eurydike Eurydike wife of Kreon, mother of Haimon Teiresias blind prophet of Thebes [led by a boy] Boy Guard Messenger Chorus of old Theban men Nick a mute part [always onstage, he measures things] set Palace of Kreon at Thebes antigonick [enter Antigone and Ismene] Antigone: we begin in the dark and birth is the death of us Ismene: who said that Antigone: Hegel Ismene: sounds more like Beckett Antigone: he was paraphrasing Hegel Ismene: I dont think so Antigone: whoever it was whoever we are, dear sister ever since we were born from the evils of Oidipous what bitterness pain disgust disgrace or moral shock have we been spared and now this edict youve heard the edict Ismene: Ive heard no edict that our two brothers are dead by one anothers hands and the Argive army gone from this city is all I know Antigone: thats what I thought thats why I called you out here Ismene: whats the matter you have your thunder look Antigone: Kreon is resolved to honour one of our brothers with burial the other not Eteokles he has laid in the ground in accordance with justice and law Polyneikes is to lie unwept and unburied sweet sorrymeat for the little lusts of the birds noble Kreon draws our attention to this edict yours and my attention whoever transgresses it gets death so what do you say Ismene: what could I say what could I do Antigone: if you join me if you join my action Ismene: at what risk where is your mind Antigone: if you help me help me lift the corpse Ismene: Kreon says unlawful to do so Antigone: Antigone says unholy not to Ismene: O sister, dont cross this line Antigone: dear sister, my dead are mine and yours as well as mine Ismene: whoever we are think, sister fathers daughter daughters brother sisters mother mothers son his mother and his wife were one! our family is doubled tripled degraded and dirty in every direction moreover we two are alone and we are girls girls cannot force their way against men Antigone: yet I will Ismene: sweet sister, you aim too high Antigone: true sister, yet how sweet to lie upon my brothers body thigh to thigh Ismene: your heart so hot, thou sister Antigone: O one and only head of my sister whose blood intersects with my own in too many ways the dead are cold theyll welcome me Ismene: you are a person in love with the impossible Antigone: and when my strength is gone Ill stop Ismene: its wrong Antigone: dont say that or Ill have to hate you he will hate you too just let me go for Ill not endure anything so grievous as what robs me of a noble death Ismene: go then but know you go as one beloved although you go without your mind [exit Antigone and Ismene] [enter Chorus] Chorus: the glories of the world come sharking in all red and gold we won the war salvation struts the streets of sevengated Thebes the man from Argos fled the one who swung above our land on snowhite screams the one who overweened our walls seven spears in his mouth instead of teeth that one fled before filling his cheeks with blood before any fire the noise of war was stretched along his back the boaster fled Zeus hates a boaster saw an ocean of them coming at us raised his hand they hit the ground they were the man from Argos war made them all insane seven gates and in each gate a man and in each man a death at the seventh gate two brothers grew into each others hearts as pain now victory is ours let there be forgetting let Thebes shake with joy here comes Kreon rowing his new powerboat [enter Kreon] Kreon: here are Kreons verbs for today Adjudicate Legislate Scandalize Capitalize here are Kreons nouns Men Reason Treason Death Ship of State Mine Chorus: mine isnt a noun Kreon: it is if you capitalize it [enter Guard] Guard: well Kreon: well what Guard: well we Kreon: well we what Guard: well we saw someone Kreon: saw someone what Guard: or actually no one Kreon: was it someone or no one Guard: well hypothetically Kreon: