IRWLE VOL. 9 No. II July 2013 1 Creon in Jean Anouilh’s Antigone: The Ancient Tyrant in Modern Dress – A Study Sayyed Rahim Moosavinia Introduction The aim of this paper is to examine Creon’s character in Jean Anouilh’s Antigone and view how Anouilh through his subtle changes has made a powerful ruler out of the ancient tyrant. Since Sophocles presented Antigone at the festival of Dionysus in 441 B.C , Creon became an example of a tyrant ruler. He is 1 known as a stone hearted ruler with a commonplace mind, and narrow sympathies (Winngton Igram, 1980: 127) The only motives he can understand are lust for power and greed for money. However, Jean Anouilh in the midst of World War II, surprisingly adapts Sophocles’ Antigone, and presents a different picture of Creon. Jean Anouilh sympathizes with Creon, and many critics especially the German audience came to admire him and saw him as the real hero of the play (Robert Loppe de, 1968: 79). In Sophocles’ Antigone our first meeting with Creon is when he makes his declaration; he has just entered from the battleground, as the new king. He gathers the council of elders, in the civil sphere and pronounces his decree. At the beginning of his speech, he gives out a statement of principles. In the principles he states what would be acceptable to the fifth century Athenians. Part of his character is reveled through his statements. Winnington Ingam (1980: 128) explains that from his speech we come to understand that he knows that his own wellbeing was bound up with that of the polis, and he knows the difference between a patriot and a traitor. Winnington Ingam (1980: 128) adds that funeral rights are nothing to him except as a reward to be conferred upon the patriot and as for the traitors, they should not be given an honorable burial. Through his speech, he presents himself as the man in authority, by virtue of which, and in the interests of the state, he demands absolute obedience. He preaches order and discipline, to the exclusion of all else. Discipline in the city, in the army, in the household: all the same thing, and anarchy equally fatal to all (1980: 129). Creon speaks, mostly of his office, but actually he thinks of himself. His demands belong to an absoluter, his attitude those of a tyrant or well on the way to be a tyrant. But he is not the mere stereotype of a tyrant. He is a recognizable human being, stone hearted, with commonplace mind and narrow sympathies (1980: 128). He is a "realist", for whom only the visible is real. The only motives he can understand are lust for power and greed for money. He must accept death, but unable to understand the invisible realm of dead. He believes in the efficiency of the threat of death that is everyone should choose death not in deference of the state but in opposition to the state, not for money but for emotion and principle. But this matter is far outside his own experience. Winnington Ingam (1980: 129) concludes that his cruel heartiness is revealed once he takes no notice of other people's feelings, and especially in his attitude towards Haemon's marriage and feeling towards Antigone To him all women are much the same. He underestimates Haemon's feelings towards Antigone. Some have said to be in 443 B.C 1 Sayyed Rahim Moosavinia & Faezeh Pipelzadeh