Antigone Undone: Juliette Binoche, Anne Carson, and the Art of Resistance

by Will Aitken

Antigone Undone offers an urgent and mesmerizing account of the creative and destructive power of great art.

In 2015 Will Aitken journeyed to Luxembourg for the rehearsals and premiere of Anne Carson’s translation of Sophokles’ 5th-century BCE tragedy Antigone, starring Juliette Binoche and directed by theatrical sensation Ivo van Hove.

In watching the play, he became awestruck with the plight of the young woman at the centre of the action. “Look at what these men are doing to me,” An­tigone cries, expressing the predicament of the dispossessed throughout time. Transfixed by the strange and uncanny power of the play, he finds himself haunted by its protagonist, finally resulting in a suicidal breakdown.

With a backstage view of the action, Aitken illuminates the creative process of Carson, Binoche, and Van Hove and offers a rare glimpse into collaborative genius in action. He also investi­gates the response to the play by Hegel, Virginia Woolf, Judith Butler, and others, who too, were moved by its timeless protest against injustice.

Genres: Nonfiction, Classics, Theatre, Literary Criticism, Lit Crit

210 pages, Hardcover

First published January 13, 2018

Reviews

[Krista · Rating 3 out of 5]

It is at this precise moment that Antigone becomes a waking nightmare for me. Ivo's choice of modern dress for the actors, the sleek grey set, with its shelves of surveillance tapes that could be any contemporary despot's headquarters, the harsh colloquial savour of Anne's translation (has the word pissant ever occurred before in a translation of a Greek tragedy?), all of it becomes horrifyingly one with present reality, and the wall between the theatre and the world I know collapses. “Look at what is happening to me,” Antigone cries, “and look at the men who are doing it.” The cry of raped, beaten, murdered women everywhere, in every time.

And look at the men who are doing it.

Once you observe Sophokles's past bleed into our present, the oppressive power of rulers and the weightless cries of those who oppose them, Antigone becomes all people oppressed by power. Antigone and our world contiguous now – they happen simultaneously, transparently, layer over accreting layer of injustice and suffering.

In the winter of 2015, author Will Aitken was invited to Luxembourg by his friend Anne Carson to watch the final rehearsals and world premiere of her new translation of Sophokles's Antigone, starring Juliette Binoche in the lead role, and directed by Ivo van Hove (who then went on to make an even bigger splash on Broadway). As a travel writer, lecturer on cinema, and arts journalist, Aitken was well-suited to the experience, but he couldn't have anticipated that watching this phenomenal production would bring on a bout of his recurring depression; that it would lead to a suicide plan for him and his dog. While Aitken eventually weathered the depression with psychiatric help, Antigone's voice to power continued to haunt him and he decided to investigate the play further; Antigone Undone is the result of his research.

In a Preface, Aitken lays out the book's structure: Part I is in diary form, written while Aitken was in Luxembourg, and then briefly in Amsterdam. Part 2 is a “collage interview” with Carson, van Hove, and Binoche as they discuss the creative process behind bringing the play to stage (“collage” meaning that Aitken interviewed each of them separately and then spliced relevant parts together into one conversation). Part 3 traces Antigone's effect on thinkers throughout the years – from Hegel and Heidegger to Virginia Woolf and Judith Butler – and the book ends with a “coda”, wherein Aitken meets up again with Carson and Binoche after the play's final performance to learn how Antigone affected them. As might be expected, this format led to an uneven reading experience for me – I was interested in the personal bits (whether from Aitken or insight into the others' creative processes), and while I found the collage interview to be a dry format (like reading a transcript), I did like the diary format in the beginning:

This time round, alone in a distant city, the desolation feels different. The misery doesn't begin and end with me, as is customary. Instead it flows from the world and the clarity of great art. How comforting to label Sophokles's bleak vision phantasmagoric, demonic, hellish. Except it's nothing of the kind. Sophokles articulates suffering with a scary aplomb laced with scathing wit. That his world mimics my world terrifies me, for it flattens promise and any possibility of forward motion.

The third part was maybe the least interesting to me: Aitken goes both too lengthy and not deep enough into these other thinkers' writings on Antigone, almost like he was trying to stretch his admittedly intriguing personal experience out to book length...I did find it of interest to note that Sophokles set his story in Thebes, in a time that was ancient to his audience of the day, in order to comment on the despotic politics of his own day; a commentary that is still relevant to modern audiences, millennia later. In the end, it's as the chorus says:

many things strange
terrible
clever
wondrous
monstrous
marvellous
dreadful
awful
and
weird
there are in the world
but none more
strange
terrible
clever
uncanny
wondrous
monstrous
marvellous
dreadful
awful
and
weird
than Man.

Interesting concept; maybe didn't need to be padded out to (even short) book length.

[Dawn · Rating 5 out of 5]

A weird little book that was exactly what I wanted to read on a Sunday afternoon. Half memoirish theatre fanboy thinking, half interviews, half overview of Antigone scholarship. Most people say that’s too many half-things, not me. Not today.

[Véronique · Rating 3 out of 5]

Part-journal, part-interview and part essay, this book is an engaging reflection around Antigone, both the Sophocles play and character. I have not seen or read the play in Carson's translation and in this particular production, but i have read the Sophocles's, in French, and Anouilh's Antigone, several years ago; it had impressed me in many ways, and reading this book has reawaken the fascination i felt at the time. I enjoyed the insights this book provides on translation, acting & drama, though i preferred the discussion on Antigone, as seen by several intellectuals & writers. Aitken's inclusion of these plural voices seem to point to the fact that Antigone cannot be fixed. She is to be re-appropriated and re-interpreted, each of her incarnation as unique and valid as were each of her incarnations on the stage in Juliette Binoche's performance(s).

[Vicki · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book comes at Antigone from many intriguing angles, from behind-the-scenes insights into Anne Carson's translation, how it was mounted as a production by Ivo Van Hove and how the role was interpreted by Juliette Binoche ... to how the figure of Antigone has profoundly affected and obsessed everyone from the troubled author to myriad philosophers, Virginia Woolf and more.

[I read a hardcover edition of this book that used the artwork shown for the Kindle edition here.]

[Chris]

I thoroughly enjoyed this mix of memoir, travelogue, theater review, and philosophy.
Aitken is invited to accompany Anne Carson to the rehearsals and performances of her retranslation of Sophocles’ Antigone. The themes of the play move Aitken’s own depression which he discusses while trying sampling the pot in Amsterdam’s coffee shops. Written with wit and with gravitas, Aitken explores the history of the play and its interpretation through the centuries. The main section of the book analyses the interpretations of Hegel, Kierkegaard, Virginia Woolf, Judith Butler, and Bonnie Honig.
I gained an appreciation for the timelessness of this tale, whether it pits family against the State, womanhood against man, aristocratic standing against democratic movement, or represents the purest expression of freedom.
Aitken’s account of his interviews with lead actor, Juliette Binoche, gave me a deep appreciation for the actor’s craft. Aitken recounts his meetings with Binoche, and is not above sharing his adoration of her in humorous passages.
He gives her the final word in the book. After a discussion of her performance, Binoche sums up her work:
“As an actor you have to go there. You must embrace your character’s pain and the pain of the world. You must do that, or why bother?”

[maya · Rating 3 out of 5]

i think it's interesting how the book was split up; part one turned more into a travel journal than anything, which was just alright.

the interview section was probably my least favourite part, but my favourite was the last one, which delves into different philosophers and thinkers' views and opinions on not just the play but the girl herself and how they manipulated antigone's character to fit their own objectives.

also very intellectual at times, quoting poems and difficult books. and philosophers duh.

another thing i did like is how the sheer fascination with this play that was written more than 2000 years ago persists on throughout the whole book, in every person that's introduced in the writing.

[George]

Reading this made me want to revisit the rich theatrical and epicly-themed work of my filial and philosophical ancestors. Aitken keeps me in his pocket through Luxembourg; through wet streets and dark alleys although I realize one could be talking about his mind all the same. But the psychogeography works in the inverse here: topos and tropos (place and behavior for the non-Hellenistic) imprint themselves via Carson's words Sophokles' drama, and the vessel that is a luminous Juliette Binoche, painted in an almost mythic, mercurial light. A surprising read

[Anicka Austin · Rating 5 out of 5]

It was easy to breeze through this book. The author is very personable, making the journal-style entries all the more captivating. The combination of journaling and theater criticism is what really drew me in, especially since the author was given so much insight into the creation of the work. The history of Antigone and all of the references Aitken provides weren't overly intellectual, just enough. I read it before seeing choreographer Annie-B Parson's Antigone and having background from the book gave me wider perspective.

[Kevin · Rating 2 out of 5]

A few things that really stood out for me in this pocket-sized memoir that will probably double as a required reading in a few avant-garde university theatre courses:

1) The chapters need to be interwoven. The tone was too similar in each of the distinct parts and so it felt like three stitched-together essays.
2) We need to know more about Antigone from a lay perspective. It dives into the meat of the play without guiding us in. Should there be a disclaimer asking us to please read Antigone first?
3) I really liked how the whole book seemed impromptu. It just came together via an experience, which meant that it wasn't wholly contrived... there's an air of discovery and casualness to it which I appreciated. You felt the author's journey (though we struggle to see who the main character really is at times...)

[Joanna · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a strange little book, an unlikely confluence of some intriguing personalities -- Juliette Binoche, Anne Carson, and Antigone herself. Aitken has a strong grounding in the literary tradition as well as the popular culture iterations of the Antigone figure, and he combines them in ways that are unexpected but not jarring. This book gives a solid reading of Woolf, and it will make you hate Kierkegaard.
The weakness of this book is that it doesn't seem to be sure what it wants to be. Even though I enjoyed each element of the text, I found it difficult to continue reading because I had no feeling of the story's forward momentum. In retrospect , I'm glad I persevered, especially for the part about Aitken's dog.

[ger · Rating 2 out of 5]

Antigone fascinates me and Anne Carson's translation is superb which is why I thought this might be interesting. It should have been. It reads like a magazine piece, descends into a terrible travelogue and fails to address in any depth the question posed by the author. Binoche comes across as intelligent and some of the discussion of various interpretations of the play are good but it just dwindled into nothing.

[Lynnie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating journal of an unconventional production and the history and many observations of those who have studied this play and especially if you have played this role or want to.

[kit · Rating 3 out of 5]

hi um WHAT

[Marcus · Rating 1 out of 5]

Violently boring.

[Camille🪼]

Ptn le beef entre Juliette Binoche et Anne Carson c’est pr me tuer