Tragedy and Theory: Antigone, Macbeth and Hedda Gabler

Three popular theorists when it comes to tragic theory are Aristotle, Hegel, and Nietzsche and each have distinct views on what are the important components of tragedy. Aristotle focuses on plot and the “tragic hero”, emphasizing hamartia and catharsis. Hegel coined the “Hegelian dialectic” that claims the conflict between a thesis and an antithesis creates a synthesis, in other words, there are two forces colliding within a play and neither is completely good or bad. Lastly, Nietzsche used the juxtaposition of the Greek gods Apollo and Dionysus as a metaphor for the tension of artistic forces within tragedy. The three plays we have read so far, Antigone, Macbeth and Hedda Gabler, could have any of these theories applied to them, but some work better than others. The combinations I think work best are: Antigone - Hegel, Macbeth - Aristotle/Nietzsche, and Hedda Gabler - Nietzsche.

Sophocles’ Antigone is, at its most basic, a play about family, religion, and politics. It is hard not to choose Hegel’s theory as the most appropriate considering it is a “prime illustration of his theory” (Wallace 123). There are two states of belief within the play: Antigone’s character represents family loyalty and religious faith whereas Creon’s character represents politics and state law. These two are “equally justified powers” in the sense that neither character is wrong in their belief, but they cause tension when brought together. In Antigone’s eyes, burying one of her brothers and not the other is not just a family betrayal but it's also a disregard of basic religious rituals. She buries Polynices despite Creon’s ruling to not, which Creon did not create out of spite for Antigone and her brother, but because Polynices had technically become an enemy of the state and to not treat him as such would have, in Creon’s eyes, shown weakness on his part as ruler. In The Cambridge Introduction to Tragedy, Jennifer Wallace says this about Hegel’s theory: “ Tragedy becomes not about the individual hero, in the Aristotelian or Romantic sense, but rather about the collision of powers, involving the whole of society, in which no one is at fault but all suffer” (123). This idea is appropriate when applied to Antigone because both Antigone and Creon are both lead characters in this play and their actions affect not only themselves but their entire society, reflected in the Chorus’ and their Leader’s lines, which call into question both Antigone and Creon’s stances.

Aristotle’s theory does not particularly apply to Antigone because Aristotle’s most basic principles of his tragic theory do not align with Antigone’s plot and character. For instance, the characters, particularly Antigone and Creon, do have what appears to be a “tragic flaw” (stubbornness on both ends) which lead to the actions of the play coming to be, but these actions (specifically Antigone burying her brother and Creon’s unbending of his law) are not “errors in judgement” or “wrong decisions” (Wallace 119) but are deliberate, justified actions. Also, the play involves two “tragic heroes” instead of just one as outlined in Aristotle’s theory, though both do portray the nature of the tragic hero in the sense that neither character is wholly good or bad, their misfortune is brought about by their own actions, and they are both “relatable” because the audience can relate to feeling  both of the pressures of religious beliefs and societal standards. However, there is another important aspect of Aristotelian tragic theory that Antigone doesn’t seem to get right: the epiphany. Antigone’s character never goes through an epiphany of any sort, but Creon’s character does towards the very end of the play, though it is not quite satisfying. In lines 1393 - 1399 when Creon finds his son dead, he says Haemon’s death is  “not through [Haemon’s] stupidity, no, my own” (1399), which seems as though Creon is taking responsibility for his actions when it came to punishing Antigone. But just a few lines later, after his wife, Eurydice, kills herself, Creon says “oh no, / another, a second loss to break the heart” (1420-21), meaning that Haemon was the first, and that Antigone’s death is not listed on Creon’s conscious. This causes me to question if Creon’s “epiphany” is valid if he doesn’t actually realize the cause of his own downfall, because it seems he thinks he brought about the deaths of his family through his own stubbornness when he didn’t budge at Haemon’s requests, rather than not listening to Antigone in the first place.

Antigone doesn’t seem to be working off of the idea of the Dionysiac drive versus the Apollonian drive as seen in Nietzsche’s theory. One could argue that Antigone’s character represents the Dionysian side of things and Creon is the Apollonian, (irrationality versus reason, religion versus law), but then one would be saying that Antigone was acting irrationally in her action to bury her brother and Creon was utilizing pure reason in his decision to pass the law forbidding Polynices’ burial. It would be hard to argue that Antigone did anything irrationally or simply on compulsion because her decision to bury Polynices was made with her being fully aware of the consequences of her actions. It is easier to argue that Creon was using reason when he passed the law, considering he was just following typical procedure for the type of situation, but later in the play, when he finds out Antigone is the one who defied his ruling, he seems to take it to personal offense and he attempts to degrade Antigone by calling her a “girl” and a “slave” (535-36). His ruling to punish Antigone is now corrupted in the sense that it is no longer a pure ruling against Antigone as a criminal, but now as a personal offender to Creon’s pride as a man. Also, Nietzsche’s theory says that “the chorus… represents the ritualistic groups of Dionysiac worship, not the people of the polis” (Wallace 127), but I think the chorus in Antigone very much so represents the mind of the state in the sense that the Chorus frequently comments on the actions of the play from an unbiased point of view. When Antigone is sentenced to die in the tomb alone, the Chorus says to her “Your own blind will, your passion has destroyed you” (961) and when discover’s Haemon’s dead body, the leader of the Chorus says “Clear, damning proof... proof of his own madness, no one else’s, no his own blind wrongs” (1391-93). The Chorus does not represent a Dionysiac mindset as Nietzsche’s theory posits but instead it holds more of an Apollonian view in that it doesn’t take sides with any of the characters but seems to be working off a higher order of reason.

Shakespeare’s Macbeth is a little harder to pin down when it comes to the tragic theories. At first, I thought Aristotle’s theory of tragedy would be the perfect fit for this play because it seems to fulfil most of Aristotle’s qualifications. Macbeth’s hamartia, or “fatal flaw,” (his “vaulting ambition” (1.7.27) and his impatience for power) ultimately leads to the actions that cause his downfall (killing Duncan, killing Banquo, killing Macduff’s family: all things that cause the people of Scotland to view Macbeth with mistrust and hatred). Also, Macbeth’s character does go through a change of fortune in a sense in that he was at the beginning of the play a well-respected, well-liked military figure but by the end of the play he is hated by most and considered a “tyrant” in the negative connotation of the word. The plot of Macbeth is also driven forward by the actions that Macbeth makes because every time he does one thing, for instance, initially killing Duncan, a new issue arises, a new fear of Banquo overthrowing his power, which leads to him killing Banquo and attempting to kill his son, which leads to Macduff’s flee to England, and so on until everything ultimately leads to his misfortune and death in the end of the play. Also, all of Macbeth’s misfortunes are brought about because of his initial lack of judgement when it came to the witches; Macbeth believed the witches’ prophecies, in both Act 1 and Act 4, at face value and believed he could easily get away with committing the “necessary” crimes to gain power since it was guaranteed to him by “fate”. However, as the play unfolds, Macbeth realizes the extent of his foolishness but only right before he is killed by Macduff, which is another aspect of Aristotelian theory (the hero realizing right before their death their mistakes). However, there are some downfalls to applying Aristotle’s theory because it is hard to argue that Macbeth is a “hero”. Macbeth is “relatable” in the sense that almost everyone has something they desire that might seem out of reach, but the extreme measures that Macbeth leaps to right from the start, specifically murder and treachery, causes the audience to distance themselves from his character. There is no slow build-up of action that would give the audience some understanding as to why Macbeth would be driven to commit murder, but instead Macbeth, murder seems like the most logical, and fastest, course of action.

This final point is what lead me to chose Nietzsche’s theory as more of a “perfect fit” in a ways. Macbeth, at its core, is a battle between the Apollonian and Dionysian forces: Macbeth represents the irrational, violent, lustful force of Dionysus and other characters, like Macduff and Malcolm, represent the order and structure of the Apollonian force. Macbeth has forced his way into the role of king, who should typically enforce Apollonian virtues but instead he creates chaos within the state, leaving everything to have to be fixed by Macduff and Malcolm in the end. Wallace says of Nietzsche’s theory that “motivation comes from irrational, atavistic compulsions, and not from careful, if erroneous, rational weighing of cause and effect” (127). This seems to fit Macbeth’s character perfectly because even though he does seem to realize what he is doing is wrong when it comes to Duncan’s murder, “this blow might be the be-all and the end-all” (1.7.5), as the play progresses, Macbeth leaps to murder as a solution for every problem that stands in his way, eventually leading to the nonsensical murder of Macduff’s family. This progress of character helps emphasize Macbeth’s descent into the depths of Dionysian motivations, where he acts out of primal instinct as if he were a scared animal striking out at any perceived threats.

I do not think that Hegel’s theory applies well at all to Macbeth because there are no two equal forces working opposite each other in this play. One could argue that the two equal forces influencing the play are the unnatural and natural. The juxtaposition throughout the play of what is real and what isn’t real seems to be interwoven into all corners of the play: “Is this a dagger which I see before me, the handle toward my hand?” (2.1.33-34), “look like the innocent flower, but be the serpent under’t” (1.5.65-66), and “Methought I heard a voice cry, ‘Sleep no more’” (2.2.36) are all examples of ambiguity between the real and the unnatural. However, despite this connection, there is no other character who is equal, and equally opposite, to Macbeth that appears throughout the entire play. One could argue that Malcolm, Duncan’s son, represents a foil character to Macbeth, but his character is not present throughout the entire course of the play neither does he help to drive the plot forward in every scene, like Creon does for Antigone in Antigone.

Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler is also a strong play to support Nietzsche’s theory of tragedy. The Apollonian forces in the play are presented through characters like Jörgen Tesman and Miss Tesman, who represent the structured society that Hedda is pressured by (“people don’t do such things!” (264)) and the Dionysian forces are presented through the characters of Mrs. Elvsted, Judge Brack, and Ejlert Löborg, who act against the regular societal standards (“what do you think people will say about you, Thea?” (189)). The two forces drive the play forward as a way of tension build-up. The play opens with Miss Tesman and Jörgen Tesman speaking about domestic matters such as sly hints at pregnancy, writing books, and other trivial things like Jörgen’s slippers and Miss Tesman’s hat. Then, as the play progresses, and each Dionysian character is introduced, the plot fades farther away from the Apollonian views of Jörgen and Miss Tesman and delves deeper into the darkness of the Dionysian. These two forces help us understand Hedda’s character as someone who sees herself as trapped in between these two stages: she is too free-spirited and stubborn to commit herself to the domestic life but she is also too big of a coward to make any stir against the societal expectations of a woman in her position. This double-edged sword is what causes Hedda’s extreme unhappiness and, ultimately, her suicide.

Hegel’s theory does not really apply to Hedda Gabler because there is not just two equal and opposite justified forces in this play. In fact, every character is an opposite version of Hedda. Like in the Nietzsche theory, the characters can be divided in terms of either conforming or opposing societal standards, with Jörgen, Miss Tesman, and Berte in one and Mrs. Elvsted, Judge Brack, and Ejlert Lövborg in the other, respectively. Jörgen opposes Hedda in the way that he is overly sentimental, as with his slippers and his interpretation of Hedda burning Lövborg’s manuscript as an act of love. Hedda is not a sentimental character; in her opening description, the stage directions describe her eyes as “steel grey, and cold, clear, and dispassionate” (175). It is clear that Hedda does not apply emotional value to small objects or gestures. This is obvious again when Hedda completely dismisses the fact that Miss Tesman bought a new hat to try and impress Hedda, and then when Hedda purposefully makes fun of the hat, calling it the maid’s, we see that Hedda also does not care for other’s emotions. This is where Miss Tesman and Berte are seen as opposites to Hedda because both are concerned with impressing Hedda and making her happy whereas Hedda couldn’t care less about either of them. Miss Tesman and Berte also represent two stereotypical images of women: the baby-obsessed, unconditionally kind mother figure (Miss Tesman) and the worried, well-meaning, and slightly unintelligent servant figure (Berte). The next character introduced is Mrs. Elvsted who opposes Hedda in the way that she is somewhat timid seeming, described in the scene directions as having a “scared, questioning expression” with “large, round, and somewhat protruding” eyes (181), whereas Hedda seems to carry an air of aloofness and confidence in herself. However, where Mrs. Elvsted seems timid she is actually more courageous than Hedda in the way that she leaves her unhappy marriage despite the social reactions. Judge Brack is also opposite Hedda in a similar way to Mrs. Elvsted in the way that he is willing to disregard social regularities by entering into a “triangular relationship” (203) with Hedda. Lövborg is probably the most important opposite character to Hedda because he is opposite in almost every way: he is male and has a different set of societal standards placed on him, he expresses his sexuality openly at at Mademoiselle Diana’s “boudoir,” he expresses himself creatively through writing, and he sees his past relationship with Hedda in a stronger way than she does. Hedda attempts to live vicariously through all of these characters by manipulating them into doing what she wants. While Hegel’s theory does have some presence, it ultimately cannot stand because there aren’t two main characters who represent two opposite beliefs, but rather every character is of almost equal importance in understanding Hedda’s character.

As for Aristotle’s theory, it really doesn’t apply to Hedda Gabler either. Hedda does not have a traditional “tragic flaw,” if we are to call her the tragic hero. There is much debate among scholars as to exactly why Hedda kills herself in the end and there are many different interpretations, making it virtually impossible to pin down one solid flaw. Also, Hedda does not technically fall in fortune within the play; she does marry lower than her class, but this happens before the play begins. And lastly, the play isn’t particularly driven forward by Hedda’s actions. The play takes course within little more than a day and Hedda seems to be a passive character who thinks she is manipulating all of the other characters within the play. However, in Act 4 she comes to realize that everything she thought was wrong: Mrs. Elvsted has moved on from helping Lövborg to helping Jörgen, even though Hedda thought she had ruined Mrs. Elvsted’s life by breaking apart her and Lövborg’s relationship, Miss Tesman says she will continue to take care of the needy even though Aunt Rina died and she continues to push the subject of pregnancy despite Hedda’s obvious uninterest in the topic, Lövborg does not commit suicide for Hedda but instead accidentally shoots himself while at at Mademoiselle Diana’s “boudoir,” and Judge Brack now has blackmail and leverage over Hedda that she cannot escape from. It could be interpreted that Hedda’s realization that her influence was not as strong as she originally thought, and that she has dug herself into a hole she can’t get out of, could be seen as her “epiphany” that leads her to kill herself in the end.   

For me, the combinations that work best for the plays and theorists we have discussed thus far are Antigone - Hegel, Macbeth - Aristotle/Nietzsche, and Hedda Gabler - Nietzsche. Although each of the plays do include some aspects of all three theories, there is still some that work better than others and it is important to choose the right theory because the support of a theorist can not only validate a critic's work, but can also provide topics for discussion on which a critic can provide new interpretations.