Creon: Not I, thy life is mine, and that’s enough.
Antigone: Why dally then? To me no word of thine Is pleasant: God forbid it e’er should please; Nor am I more acceptable to thee. And yet how otherwise had I achieved A name so glorious as by burying A brother? so my townsmen all would say, Where they not gagged by terror. Manifold A king’s prerogatives, and not the least That all his acts and all his words are law.
Creon: Of all these Thebans none so deems but thou.
Antigone: These think as I, but bate their breath to thee.
Creon: Hast thou no shame to differ from all these?
Antigone: To reverence kith and kin can bring no shame.
Creon: Was his dead foeman not thy kinsman too?
Antigone: One mother bare them and the self-same sire.
Creon: Why cast a slur on one by honouring one?
Antigone: The dead man will not bear thee out in this.
Creon: Surely, if good and evil fare alike.
Antigone: The slain man was no villain but a brother.
Creon: The patriot perished by the outlaw’s brand.
Antigone: Nathless the realms below these rites require.
Creon: Not that the base should fare as do the brave.
Antigone: Who knows if this world’s crimes are virtues there?
Creon: Not even death can make a foe a friend.
Antigone: My nature is for mutual love, not hate.
Creon: Die then, and love the dead if thou must, No woman shall be the master while I live.
Enter Ismene.
Chorus: Lo from out the palace gate, Weeping o’er her sister’s fate, Comes Ismene; see her brow, Once serene, beclouded now, See her beauteous face o’erspread With a flush of angry red.
Creon: Woman, who like a viper unperceived Didst harbour in my house and drain my blood, Two plagues I nurtured blindly, so it proves, To sap my throne. Say, didst thou too abet This crime, or dost abjure all privity?
Ismene: I did the deed, if she will have it so, And with my sister claim to share the guilt.
Antigone: That were unjust. Thou would’st not act with me At first, and I refused thy partnership.
Ismene: But now thy bark is stranded, I am bold To claim my share as partner in the loss.