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Lord Creon The Tragic Hero In Sophocles Antigone

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In the play Antigone, Lord Creon was portrayed as the tragic hero. A tragic hero makes a poor decision which ultimately leads to his own downfall. Lord Creon had special characteristics which led him to be the tragic hero in the play. Creon has a few weaknesses, the greatest being his excessive amount of pride which was known as hubris. He was also faced with a major life changing decision.
In this tragedy written by Sophocles, the tragic hero was portrayed as being the root to his own downfall. Lord Creon was the tragic hero in the play Antigone. Creon’s greatest weakness was his excessive amount of pride. He could not bear to be disobeyed by anyone because that would hurt his reputation. When he decided to leave Polyneices to rot on the battlefield, he told everyone in the city that they should not dare to go bury him. If anyone disobeyed this law they would be punished. After hearing about Creon’s new law, no one dared to try to bury him except Antigone. When Creon found out about this he said, “You know I caught her in the sight of all,/ Alone of all our people, in open revolt./ And I will make my word good in Thebes/ By killing her” (l. 655-658). If Creon did not abide by his rulings, then the people would deem it unfair. With this ruling, Creon was faced with a major …show more content…

A major characteristic of a tragic hero is that he understands his doom and knows the cause of his own actions. Antigone did a noble deed in burying her brother. She knew she would face death if she did this, but she did it anyways. She was not afraid of the consequences. However, Antigone’s fate was not greater than she deserved. She willingly buried her brother, so she deserved the consequences. Antigone had her mind set from the beginning and she knew she wasn’t changing it. Unlike Antigone, Creon’s story arouses fear amongst the people because he was a strict leader. His story also aroused empathy because of the loved ones he

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