Κλέος at the End of Tragedy:
​Antigone Between Agony and the Impossible

Joseph Richard

This essay is an attempt to re-contextualize Antigone as a play situated 'at the end of tragedy'. The centerpiece of this re-contextualization is the idea of desolation--that is to say, the desolation of a character left behind in the aftermath of tragic experience. Reflecting on a few key passages in the play, I consider the 'why' of Antigone's behavior hid behind her exoteric statements of intent, the irrationalism--in the truest sense of that word--inherent in her project, and the ultimate nullification of her character in the act of preaching.