Sophocles: A Very Short Introduction

Sophocles helped define Athenian tragedy, and seven of his plays survive complete, including Antigone, Oedipus the King, Electra and Ajax. Edith Hall introduces the dramatist within the political, religious and theatrical world of fifth-century Athens, explaining how Greek tragedy worked in performance and what distinguished Sophocles’ approach to plot, character, language and stagecraft.

Hall also traces the qualities that have kept the plays alive far beyond antiquity: morally difficult conflicts, formidable personalities, memorable female characters and questions about responsibility, authority, family and suffering. By treating the dramas as works written for the stage rather than only as literary texts, this Very Short Introduction provides an accessible guide to Sophocles’ surviving plays, their ancient context and their continuing influence in theatre and culture.