"Antigone" by Sophocles

         Antigone is the story of a strong-willed girl, determined to do moral good and preserve respect for her late brother. After the death of Antigone’s father Oedipus, her two brothers, Eteocles and Polynices were assigned to take over the throne. The position was supposed to be shared between the brothers, until they killed each other in battle after the decision of Eteocles to remain in higher power and reject the idea of stepping down from the throne. 

         After the death of Oedipus’ sons, Creon, Antigone’s uncle, was appointed King. The authoritative King permitted the burial of Eteocles, but not that of Polynices. Ismene, Antigone’s sister confesses to her the intentions of Creon to not permit the burial of Polynices, and Antigone is not at ease with the news. Antigone is determined to give Polynices a proper burial, and she informs her sister of her intentions. Ismene is in disbelief that Antigone will go as far as to defy the King’s authority, but her primary duty is to her family. When Creon discovers that the body of Polynices has been buried, he is astonished to find that Antigone, basically one of his own, had committed the act. Antigone’s marriage to Haemon was far more important than her death. Creon ordered her to her bedroom, and for the act to be covered up. 

        After Antigone makes matters more difficult, Creon sentences her to death, by which she will rot in a cave, buried alive. Haemon, pleads to his father for him to alter the sentencing of his soon-to-be fiancé, but his actions are useless until Creon is warned about his decisions and is obliged to go release Antigone in fear of what we know today as “karma.” The king arrives to release Antigone, but finds his son Haemon, clinging to her lifeless body. In anger, Haemon lashes at his father, but turns the sword on himself. Creon, standing before his deceased son and niece, although never directly assisting in either of their deaths, should for fully responsible for both. Eurydice, Creon’s wife, upon hearing of her son’s death, also kills herself, leaving Creon to mourn the death of his family. 

         Although Creon feels some remorse for these multiple deaths, all could have been prevented. The cascade of deaths from Antigone to Eurydice exemplified acts of true love and passion. Creon’s main focus was to maintain his position of power and loyalty to the law, and in the end, that is what he maintained. He had lost everyone in his life that had brought him happiness or benefit. As mentioned previously, the idea of karma in today’s society is related to the events in Antigone, and I believe that Creon got what he deserved. In debating the actions of Creon and Antigone throughout the play, many ethical and political issues arise regarding the proper burial of a family member and the obedience to law. 

"A Doll House" by Henrik Ibsen

“A Doll House” by Henrik Isben is play about the marriage of a husband and wife, Nora and Torvald Helmer. The opening scene tells us that it is Christmas Eve and Torvald is sort of mad at his wife for spending so much money on the presents this year, but he just received a new job at the bank and they can spend their money more freely now. A friend of Nora’s that she hasn’t seen in a few years shows up to their house and they talk for a while. Nora reveals a secret to her friend, telling her that she illegally borrowed money so Torvald and she could take their trip to Italy so Torvald would get over his illness. She told Torvald that the money came from her father, but she forged her father signature and says the debt is almost paid off. Krogstad, who works at the bank under Torvald, knows about this and blackmails Nora by telling her that he will reveal her secret is she doesn’t make sure is job at the bank is secured, because Torvald threatens to fire him.

Nora keeps this secret from Torvald for a long time and tries to talk him in to not firing Krogstad because she doesn’t want him to know. As she finally tells him, he flips out. Telling her that his reputation is in jeopardy and that she could be in big trouble if anyone every found out about this. Torvald says very mean things to Nora, calling her a hypocrite and a liar and tells her he doesn’t want her to raise his children. But soon after all of this is said, Krogstad’s mail to Torvald contains the forged signature and he is happy again. Torvald attempts to apologize to Nora and take back everything that he said. But something about the way Torvald snapped at her made her realize that they aren’t right for each other anyways. He treats her like a “doll” to be played with. Nora decides that the nanny can take care of the children. Torvald wants her to stay, but she says that she can’t and slams the door behind her, and leaves.

In my opinion both of them were wrong. Marriage is all about honesty and if they cannot be honest with one another then their marriage would never last. Torvald was wrong to snap at Nora that way, especially because the illegal crime that she committed was for him and he didn’t realize that. But Nora was also wrong to abandon her family at the end like she did. I could see her not wanting to be with Torvald anymore because she doesn’t want to be treated that way, but she shouldn’t just run out on her kids like that. A parent leaving their spouse because they don’t feel like they love them anymore is one thing, but saying you don’t want to have anything to do with the children is just flat out wrong and cold.

"Forgiving My Father" by Lucille Clifton

“Forgiving My Father” by Lucille Clifton is a poem about a daughter who believes that he dad owes money for what she has put her and her mother through. The speaker constantly uses words throughout the poem that have to do with money; words like payday, bills, rich, pocket, bargain, collection, debtor, and accounting. The speaker also uses the word “Friday” a few times because she understands that her daddy is supposed to get paid on Fridays.

The speaker is very harsh towards her father in the beginning of the poem. In lines 3 and 4 it says, “All week you have stood in my dreams like a ghost, asking for more time.” She says “like a ghost” indicating that her father is dead to her at this point. It is very hard for the speaker to forgive her father at this point because he has ruined their family and that lead to the cause of the mothers death. But the speaker does not put all of the blame on the father; she also blames the mother for letting things go this far and lead to such tragedy. Even after the mother’s death, the daughter (speaker) comes to collect from her father. In line 10 and 11 she says, “I wish you were rich so I could take it all and give the lady what she was due.”

In line 12 of the poem the speaker takes some of the blame off of the father when she says, “But you were the son of a needy father, the father of a needy son.” She is going back to the childhood of her own father and saying that his father may be responsible for his actions because he was raised in a similar household.

One of the problems I think the speaker bounces back and forth from throughout the poem is whether or not she should forgive her father for what he has done, or if she should try and get even with him. From the speaker’s point of view, I wouldn’t blame her for being harsh to her father and coming to collect from him. If you look at it from her angle he affected her life tremendously so why wouldn’t she want to even the scores with him? But on the other hand, it is her father. Nobody wants to be fighting with their father no matter how much they have done wrong. I know from personal experience that fathers can be a pain in the neck, especially to their sons. I went through a time where I saw my dad everyday then we got in one little fight and didn’t speak for 6 months. It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to go through and there wasn’t 1 day out of those 6 months that I didn’t look at his name in my phone and want to call him. The love is there no matter what the child may think of the father. So I can see Lucille Clifton wanting to be upset, but I think in the end it isn’t worth it.

"My Papa's Waltz" by Theodore Roethke

           “My Papa’s Waltz” by Theodore Roethke is a poem that may have to be read a few times to be understood. Even then it is still a little unclear as to what is actually happening in the poem. It is about a father who comes home after a hard day’s work a little drunken up and is waltzing or dancing with his son. In the first stanza the narrator uses words that rhyme such as “breath” and “death” and “dizzy” and “easy”. I believe that it is no coincidence that he uses words like this to express his childhood. Theodore Roethke’s father died of a heart attack when Theodore was only fifteen years old. Fifteen is a hard age for a boy to lose a father, especially just starting high school. I think Theodore is reminiscing back to the times he had with his father and those were his most prized and memorable moments.

            The second stanza is one that kind of stood out to me. Lines 5 through 8 say “We romped until the pans Slid from the kitchen shelf; My mother’s countenance Could not unfrown itself.” When I read this at first it seemed to me like the father was dancing with his son. Instead he was coming home drunk and throwing him around the kitchen and beating him up. The reason I thought this was because the mother’s facial expressions were sad ones. But after reading it again I came to the realization that the mother may just be sad because that is the only time the father spends with the boy, and he’s drunk when he is doing it. Or she could be in “aw” because she sees the father and son’s waltzing as being very sweet.

            In the last two stanzas a couple of different lines stood out; the first one being about the battered hand that the father had. This again led me to believe that the father had been beating his child, but in fact he wasn’t. His hands and knuckles were beat up from his job. And when it says “At every step you missed My ear scraped a buckle,” that is not the father whooping his child with a belt. That is merely showing the height difference between the father and son. Another interesting line in the last stanza was when he said, “You beat time on my head With a palm caked hard by dirt.” This again makes it believeable that the father is beating his child, but the palm caked hard by dirt again reflects the hard work that is being done during the day by the father. And when he says you beat time on my head he may be referring to the “beat time” of the music and the father tapping him on the head as they waltz.

            I liked this poem because it was very real and made a person think a lot. Roethke confused the readers by making them think that the father was just a drunk and coming home and beating up his child. But as it turns out the father is expressing his love for the child by dancing with him after he’s had a little whiskey.

"A Raisin in the Sun" by Lorraine Hansberry

“A Raisin in the Sun” by Lorraine Hansberry is a play that talks about the life of a particular African American family in the South Side of Chicago. They live in an old raggedy apartment with two bedrooms for five people. They share a bathroom with the neighbors and the only window in the apartment is in the kitchen. The opening scene of the play tells us that the family is receiving $10,000 of inheritance money because of Mr. Younger’s death, who was the father. The family is excited with this good news and they all have plans of what they want to do with it. Mama wants to buy a house so they can move out of the neighborhood they are in now into a bigger and nicer home. Walter Lee, Mama’s son, wants Mama to give him the money to invest it in a liquor business. He believes that he and a few of his friends can open a liquor business and they will make a killing, providing his family with whatever they want. Beneatha, Mama’s daughter, has plans of using the money for going to school and becoming a doctor. Beneatha and Walter Lee seem to be a little selfish with thinking the money should go to them, but Mama on the other hand makes a decision for the whole family when she buys a house. Mama bought a house in a white neighborhood but she didn’t spend all of the money. She gave the rest of the money to Walter Lee and told him to split it with his sister. Walter Lee being selfish, did not split it with his sister, but instead took it to his “friend” for the liquor business and he ran away with the money. The family moved into their nice house in the white neighborhood despite the treats they received from neighbors and even offerings of money to not move in.

“A Raisin in the Sun” shows the audience just a little taste of what it was like growing up for African Americans in that time period. The audience is exposed to the living conditions of the Younger’s. It is clear that their apartment is just not big enough for the five of them to live in; six if you count Walter Lee and Ruth’s baby that is on the way. The family also went through some racism and acts of discrimination. They were paid a visit by Mr. Linder, who was a white man speaking for the other white neighbors, and he told them he and the rest of the neighborhood would pay them to not move in. It’s sad to think that someone would actually pay someone else to not be their neighbor, but that’s how it went back then and there are still acts of discrimination today. Beneatha is one that stood out to me. She was proud to be an African American and she showed it. She cuts her hair and starts hanging out with an African American man. Beneatha stood up for who she was and I think in the end she had a lot to do with the Younger’s not selling out, but instead moving into their new home.

"Elegy for Alfred Hubbard" by Tony Conner

The poem “Elegy for Alfred Hubbard” by Tony Conner is a poem about an old plumber who has just died. The author describes Alfred as being a very genuine guy. He says “No other like him. Young men with knowledge of new techniques and theories from books may better his work, straight from college.” This is describing that he could be easily replaced when it came to getting the job done, but maybe not so much when it came to other things that may be more important to the customers. According to his customers; Alfred was not a very good plumber. The author hints this fact in a few different lines. One of the lines says “but who will challenge his squint-eyed looks in kitchen, bathroom, under floorboards, rules of thumb which were often wrong; seek as erringly stopcocks in cupboards, or make a job last half as long?” So the question to the customers then arises, if they knew that Alfred Hubbard was a bad plumber, then why didn’t they just fire him and get a new plumber?

               Alfred Hubbard was a people person. He enjoyed talking to his customers about things going on around town and around their neighborhoods. Although his skills as a plumber weren’t quite up to par, he still got hired by all of these people because he was a gossip king. He liked to tell the neighbors what was going on with the other neighbors and they enjoyed hearing about it. The author describes the old words as, “Seventy years of gossip muttered under his cap, his tufty thatch, so that his talk was slow and clotted, hard to follow, and too much.” This wise old man is making friends with his customers so they will keep hiring him to do the job. If you ask me it is genius. 

               I found the end of the poem very humorous. The stanza reads, “And the housewife banging his front-door knocker is not surprised to find him gone, and runs for Thwaite, who's a better worker, and sticks at a job until it's done.” I find it funny, but you still have to give props to the old man because the wife knows who the better plumber is all along, but she still picks Alfred. I think that the neighbors will be sad that they don’t have their old plumber around anymore to share the gossip with them. On the other hand, they will get their plumbing done correctly.

               Alfred Hubbard is a business man whether he does a good job with the plumbing or not. The only thing that “little man” (small businesses) can thrive on is having great customer relationships. It gives the consumer comfort in knowing that they don’t have to feel awkward about a stranger coming to their house. Alfred Hubbard knows that so he builds good customer relationships in the neighborhood by gossiping about the other neighbors. I also think that he gets a little bit of satisfaction out of this gossip as well though. 

"Trifles" by Susan Glaspell

The play “Trifles” by Susan Glaspell has a good bit of curiosity in it to say the least. The opening scene of the play is the sheriff, his wife, the court attorney, and Mr. and Mrs. Hale as they enter the Wright house; Mr. Hale explains how he had visited the house the day before and Mrs. Wright was still being nice, but acting out a little strange according to him. Mrs. Wright then confesses that her husband is upstairs, dead.

Mr. Hale was the first person to learn of the murder of Jon Wright, except for Mrs. Wright. Mrs. Wright claims that she was sound asleep when the murder took place and that she had no idea that her husband had been strangled. The male characters of the play, the sheriff, the court attorney, and Mr. Hale, automatically assume that she is lying to them and that she did in fact kill her husband. So Mrs. Wright is taken into custody until further investigation of the crime scene. Throughout the whole play the male characters kind of have an arrogant attitude towards the woman. Asking them why they are sticking up for Mrs. Wright, and acting like they know that she did it.

The men are looking around in the kitchen and they say, “Nothing here but kitchen things.” They seem to be degrading woman in society by saying this. Then they also criticize Mrs. Wright’s housekeeping skills, which kind of offends Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters. Then men believe that the women are of no importance in society, let alone a murder case. The men then leave to go upstairs and the women surprisingly notice little details that the men seemed to overlook. They noticed that there were ruined fruit preserves, the bread has been left out of its box, is an unfinished quilt, a messy table, and an empty bird cage. The men tend to focus on looking for the hard evidence when the women look at the things around them and see just how miserable Mrs. Wright really was.

            The women were cleaning up the quilting supplies as they discover a little box. Inside the box is a dead bird wrapped in silk; and all the sudden there is the evidence. They assume that the man didn’t enjoy his wife’s birds singing so he busted the cage and strangled the bird’s neck. Ironically, Mr. Wright was found dead, strangled. The women decide to not tell the men about what they found. Instead Mrs. Hale puts the box with the dead bird locked inside of it in her coat pocket. The play ends when they exit the kitchen and Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters discuss how Mrs. Wright’s sewing techniques. They say she “knots it” instead of saying she “quilts it,” another sign implying that she strangled her husband.

            The play to me was interesting but I still don’t think that the women made the correct choice by not telling the men what they had found. I could understand if it was something a little less serious, but it was murder. I know that the women were just defending their gender because they felt like the men were being disrespectful towards them, but I still don’t think its right.