June Pick (Book Drop Day 2025)
Two Plays
Welcome to Reading Revisited, a place for friends to enjoy some good old-fashioned book chat while revisiting the truth, beauty, and goodness we’ve found in our favorite books.
Here at Reading Revisited we have a lot of ways to participate in the reading life. But, our favorite way is our in person (and virtual) book clubs. Here’s what one of our in person book club members has to say…
I love how RR has exposed me to new books as well as getting to reread some classics I’ve enjoyed. The best part is the discussion that points out things I never would’ve caught on my own.
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Welcome to June!
We all know how busy the end of the school year/the beginning of summer can be. Because of that we are picking a short book/play for June of this coming year…
Here are some other plays we’ve done in the past1…
Our Town by Thornton Wilder (RR 2022)
The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde (RR 2022)
This year we are going to read Oedipus Rex and Antigone by Sophocles
For this month’s book, I (
) have the pleasure of being your guide for the weekly Read Along Guides.Assigned reading in high school can be hit or miss for many of us. Whether due to our immaturity, our being inundated with homework, or our struggles to understand a difficult text, it can be hard to enjoy what might be an objectively excellent work of literature. Thankfully, when I first read Oedipus Rex and Antigone as a high school freshman, it was indeed a hit. It helped that I’d devoured greek mythology from a young age (thanks to D’Aulaires Book of Greek Myths). That background aside, I was stunned by both the beauty and readability of these two plays. I found the characters fascinating and the tragedy absolutely gut-wrenching. Furthermore, my freshman year English teacher did an excellent job of helping my fellow students and I see how truly “Great Books” can resonate with readers across time and space. Specifically, she had us read a rewriting of Antigone by Jean Anouilh, performed and written during the Nazi occupation of Paris. Her example, and that of many other English teachers, inspired my love of classic literature and my own desire to become a teacher. When, years later, I was able to teach Oedipus Rex and Antigone to my own freshman, I found the plays as captivating and thought-provoking as ever. And judging by the heated discussions and emotional reactions of many of my students, they did too.
If the thought of reading ancient literature still intimidates you, read
’s (of Gathering Light Substack) excellent reflection.
It is a failing in me that I have frequently approached ancient literature with reluctance. Too often I feel that reading works so removed from the present day will prove to be a dry academic exercise. So it was a surprise to me when I read Oedipus Rex for the first time as a high school teacher (somehow managing to skate by it in high school and college) to find how alive and frantic and immediate the play felt. So too was I enthralled by the heroine of Antigone when I finally came to her story as an adult. It's true that familiarizing yourself with the Theban plays is academically helpful in grasping allusions to them strewn throughout the Western canon. Indeed, they recast so much that crops up in later literature in a terribly poignant light. It is all the more gripping to watch Othello make the same dark descent as proud Oedipus or to behold the beauty and destruction of clear-sighted Cordelia in a manner that echoes that of Antigone. Likewise, C.S. Lewis' worlds of Charn and Glome take on more resonance for knowing the famine-ravaged Thebes. They are proud and cruel forces that govern the universe in Sophocles' tragedies. His heroes find themselves helpless against the immovability of fate and the ire of the gods. It takes a brutal purging to keep that world from "chthonic domination" as Bainard Cowan puts it in his essay "Through the Unlit Door of Earth". It is, consequently, in light of my Christian beliefs that I find reading Sophocles' especially significant and moving. The Gospel message can seem quaint to the modern mind but descending with Oedipus and Antigone into the abyss underscores just how meteoric for the ancient world was the coming of Christianity with its "God [who] became man so that man might become God". It is one thing to read Oedipus Rex and Antigone for the overwhelming emotional power and aesthetic mastery they possess, but another thing entirely to read them knowing that the catastrophe they culminate in reverses stunningly in the eucatastrophe of the Cross.
Oedipus and Antigone Tentative Schedule
Friday, May 15th: Introduction and Schedule
Monday, May 18th: ep. ##: Introduction to Oedipus and Antigone (and Greek Tragedy)
Wednesday, May 20th: Oedipus 1
Wednesday, May 27th: Oedipus 2
Wednesday, June 3rd: Antigone 1
Wednesday, June 10th: Antigone 2
Thursday, June 25th: Virtual Book Club
Monday, July 6th: ep. ##: Revisiting Oedipus and Antigone
Next book to be announced will be our contemporary novel…stay tuned!
Check out the previous Book Drop Day Posts:
Welcome to Book Drop Day
September (Book About Books)
October (American Classic)
November (Gothic Novel)
December Part 1 (Book About Poetry)
December Part 2 (Book of Poetry)
January (Shakespeare)
February-April (Long Book)
May (Detective Novel)
Until next time, keep revisiting the good books that enrich your life and nourish your soul.
In Case You Missed It:
On the Podcast:
ep. 55: Introduction to Trust and Contemporary Novels w/ Sean Johnson
ep. 57: Bookish Bio of Griffin Gooch (a Bookish PhD Student)
ep. 58: One Year Anniversary of the Reading Revisited Podcast
What We’re Reading Now/Next:
June
Trust by Hernan Diaz
July
Everything Sad is Untrue by Daniel Nayeri
August
Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen
A Few Reminders:
If you are wanting to get in on the in person or virtual community please contact us!
We have turned on paid subscriptions which will allow you to support the work we are doing here as well as receive Read Along Guide PDFs each month and voice recordings of the Read Along Guides.
If you would like to make a small contribution to the work we’re doing here at Reading Revisited, we invite you to do so with the Buy (Us) a Coffee button below. We so appreciate your support!
*As always, some of the links are affiliate links. If you don’t have the books yet and are planning to buy them, we appreciate you using the links. The few cents earned with each purchase you make after clicking links (at no extra cost to you) goes toward the time and effort it takes to keep Reading Revisited running, and we appreciate it!
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Ha, do I get half credit🤣🤣
One of my absolute favorites!