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Hello, Antigone by Sofaklis, 496-406BC, is reputedly the most performed of all Greek

tragedies today and perhaps the most powerfully ambiguous.

Our uncle, Crayon, King of Thieves, decrees that nobody should bury Antigone's brother

a traitor on pain of death.

She defies him.

And this conflict between generations between the state and the individual, uncle and niece

or toccrously an openness releases an enormous tragic energy that brings sudden death and

for Crayon a living death of grief.

With me to discuss Antigone, our Lindsey Koo, senior lecturer in ancient Greek language

and literature at the University of Bristol.

Phil the Chaplin, emeritus professor of classics, University of Oxford and Edith Hall,

professor of classics at Durham University.

Edith Hall, what should we know about Sofaklis at the time when he wrote this play?

Sofaklis is a well-born Athenian.

We don't know exactly when he wrote it, but his life was pretty much from the Persian

Wars in around 4, 8, 5 until his death just before the turn of the century.

He probably wrote it in his prime in middle age.

...