ABSTRACT
Antigone is the daughter of Oedipus Rex, King of Thebes. Four children were born of his incestuous marriage to Jocasta: Polynices, Eteocles, Ismene, and Antigone. Creon decides that Eteocles should be buried with full honours, whereas Polynices should be condemned to the worst of all fates for any Greek man. Antigone then decides to disobey Creon and bury Polynices. Ismene and Eteocles take sides with King Creon. Obliged to maintain his word, Creon orders that, in punishment, Antigone be buried alive. The important factor is the reversion between hero, the supposed agent, and sovereign of his acts, and what Jacques Lacan, in reference to Antigone, calls “dejecta”, or waste matter, the residue of a story that cannot be entirely absorbed into the field of meaning. An alternative interpretation might have it that Antigone stood up for her individual morality, decidedly refusing to be included in the ethical sphere either of personal family relationships, of economic relationships, or political relationships.
