Burghers, my noble friends, ye take alarm At my approach , Fear nothing and refrain from angry words. I come with no ill purpose; I am old, And know the city whither I am come, Without a peer amongst the powers of Greece. It was by reason of my years that I Was chosen to persuade your guest and bring Him back to Thebes; not the delegate Of one man, but commissioned by the State, Since of all Thebans I have most bewailed, Being his kinsman, his most grievous woes. O listen to me, luckless Oedipus, Come home! The whole Cadmeian people claim With right to have thee back, I most of all, For most of all I mourn for thy misfortunes, seeing thee An aged outcast, wandering on and on, A beggar with one handmaid for thy stay. Ah! who had e’er imagined she could fall To such a depth of misery as this, To tend in penury thy stricken frame, A virgin ripe for wedlock, but unwed, A prey for any wanton ravisher? Seems it not cruel this reproach I cast On thee and on myself and all the race? Aye, but an open shame cannot be hid. Hide it, O hide it, Oedipus, thou canst. O, by our fathers’ gods, consent I pray; Come back to Thebes, come to thy father’s home, Bid Athens, as is meet, a fond farewell; Thebes thy old foster-mother claims thee first.

Creon Monologue from Antigone

Rehearse Creon's monologue