ANTIGONISMS / Series of discussions

Resistance and Gender
Curated by Dionysis Kapsalis

There is no other female figure in ancient Greek drama on a par with Antigone, able to extend to her moral stature and sublimity. She is the heir of Prometheus in the realm of human freedom; the Maiden who willingly descents to Hades sanctifying the cycle of life; the Woman who articulates her discourse against the dominant male discourse.

Nevertheless, this explains why there has been no era that did not bow in awe and respect, admiration and wonder, to the allure of Antigone in philosophy, art, literature, theatre, or music.

The Athens Epidaurus Festival holds a series of lectures and discussions, split into four thematic units (Resistance and Gender, Law and Justice, Performances and Performers, Visions and Revisions), featuring speakers from the entire range of Humanities as well as the world of Theatre, the Arts and Letters.




Resistance and Gender

“My own flesh and blood, dear sister…”


Under a contemporary view, Antigone’s discourse is a discourse of resistance against “normality”; a physical and different discourse from its very inception. What can this mean for an approach to Antigone that takes into consideration the social stereotypes and violence of our times against what’s different? A discussion devoted to the gender dimension of Antigone and the women authors and creators inspired by Sophocles’ heroine.

 

Opening speech

Edith Hall, Professor of Classics, Department of Classics and Ancient History, Durham University, "Antigone and the Tyranny of Gender"

 

Speakers

Angeliki Spiropoulou, Professor of European Literature and Critical Theory, Department of Theatre Studies, University of the Peloponnese: “Antigone's Sentence, Woolf's Reading”

Elena Tzelepis, Assistant Professor of Philosophy, University of Thessaly: “Antigones: The Poetics of Citizenship”

Angela Dimitrakaki, author, art historian, Senior Lecturer in Contemporary Art History and Theory, University of Edinburgh: “Antigone as Possibility”

Evangelia Andritsanou, author, psychotherapist: “Symphilein: Psychological Relationship and Political Position in Antigone (and Beyond)”

Elli Papakonstantinou, theatre director, dramaturg: “The Girl and the Ambiguity of Becoming”

 

Moderated by Dimitra Kondylaki, Comparative Literature PhD, dramaturg, translator




PROGRAMME


7 June Resistance and Gender


 

22 June Performances and Performers


 

30 June Law and Justice


 

12 July Visions and Revisions