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Antigone and Ismene staging and script analysis lesson 1

 On Wednesday's lesson, as well as going over the scene with Nurse, we began to stage the scene with Ismene that follows it. We played around with a few different ideas for the initial position of Antigone and Ismene, one to show both their closeness and their differences, as they are quite opposing from one another. Ismene is a beautiful, well dressed and ladylike woman compared to the younger Antigone who sits in the dirt and cares much less about what's 'lady-like'. So we had Ismene sat on the nurses chair at an angle and Antigone sat below her with her head on Ismene's knee. Almost immediately in the conversation Antigone brings up how pretty Ismene is and it is clear they have had many similar conversations in the past as Ismene goes to stand up whilst saying 'don't make fun', but Antigone places her hand on her leg to stop her and reassures her that it's a 'comfort to me this morning' - which could perhaps be reffering to the fact that she buried her brother this morning, making her uncomfortable, or that she knows this is one of the last times she will see Ismene's beauty.   
Ismene is unaware that Antigone has already buried Polynices, Antigone has obviously previously encouraged Ismene to come with her, but knew Ismene would never have the determination to do it and so went alone without telling anyone. Ismene believes that if anyone is to get through to Antigone it would be her so she tries desperately to save her, but Antigone is aware of the machine of tragedy and she knows that nothing now can save her - she is going to die.
In this section I think the audience would definitely warm to Ismene over Antigone, and they can see for the first time how intense and determined Antigone's character is, calling 'the whole city howling for your blood' an 'excuse' to her loving sister is quite a vulgar thing to say.
 
At the end of this scene when Ismene says Antigone is beautiful in her own way, Antigone retreats to the chair and sits down, she carries on the rest of the scene there, telling Ismene to go to bed repeatedly. We can see the anxiety in Ismene, she knows Antigone is likely to go in search of her death while Ismene sleeps and Ismene wants to ensure that this won't be the last time she sees her little sister. 
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