In Sophocles' Antigone (tr. F. Storr), Creon says, "Not even death can make a foe a friend." Antigone answers, "My nature is for mutual love, not hate." What competing values does the exchange set against each other?

After Teiresias leaves, Creon says, "I know it too, and it perplexes me. / To yield is grievous, but the obstinate soul / That fights with Fate, is smitten grievously." Which type of conflict does this moment turn on?

Ismene refuses to help bury Polyneices: "weak women, think of that, / Not framed by nature to contend with men. / Remember this too that the stronger rules." What motivation does she give?

The Guard reports Antigone at the stripped corpse: "A piercing cry she uttered, sad and shrill, / As when the mother bird beholds her nest / Robbed of its nestlings." How does the reader learn what she feels?

Creon says of Antigone, "But this proud girl, in insolence well-schooled, / First overstepped the established law." Which method of characterization is at work?

Antigone tells Creon, "Nor did I deem that thou, a mortal man, / Could'st by a breath annul and override / The immutable unwritten laws of Heaven." Which contrasting pair of ideas is this built on?

Creon rules that "Whome'er the State / Appoints must be obeyed in everything, / But small and great, just and unjust alike." How does this complicate the pair justice and obedience?

Creon finally says, "'Twas I that bound, I too will set her free. / Almost I am persuaded it is best / To keep through life the law ordained of old." What does this crossing do to the play's opposition?

Teiresias tells Creon, "To err is common / To all men, but the man who having erred / Hugs not his errors, but repents and seeks / The cure, is not a wastrel nor unwise." How does the play treat this rule?

At the close of Antigone the Chorus says, "Of happiness the chiefest part / Is a wise heart: / And to defraud the gods in aught / With peril's fraught." What claim about living does this put forward?

Antigone reports the edict on her brother: "Whoe'er transgresses shall be stoned to death." Why is her struggle best called character versus society rather than only a quarrel with Creon?

Led toward the rock tomb, Antigone says, "Unwept, unwed, unfriended, hence I go, / No longer may I see the day's bright eye." What does she name as the cost of her choice?

Haemon tells his father, "A State for one man is no State at all." What value is he setting against Creon's?

Creon says, "Better, if needs be, men should cast us out / Than hear it said, a woman proved his match." What does this reveal about what is now at stake for him?

Brought before Creon, Ismene says, "I did the deed, if she will have it so, / And with my sister claim to share the guilt." What has changed in her?

In the tomb speech Antigone says, "Alas, my piety is impious deemed. / Well, if such justice is approved of heaven, / I shall be taught by suffering my sin." Which conflict surfaces in these lines?

In Sophocles' Antigone, which clash is the central conflict of the play?

Over the body of his son, Creon cries, "The fault was mine, mine only, O my son!" Which method of characterization is at work in this moment?

The Chorus sings of man, "He hath provision for all: fell plague he hath learnt to endure; / Safe whate'er may befall: yet for death he hath found no cure." Which claim about human experience is this?

In Sophocles' Antigone, Creon changes his mind and goes to free Antigone, but she is already dead when the tomb is opened.