What We Lose When We Abandon the Classics

Many left-wing scholars argue that the Western literary canon, including ancient Greek and Roman drama, promulgates racism against non-white people and cultures, and so it needs to be reinvented, decolonized, or abolished altogether. Yet many classical works contain enduring values transcending national and cultural barriers, such that they are not only essential to the study of classics and literature but also useful in fields as varied as political science and law. The Western canon thus helps foster unity and cohesion and prevents division and tribalism caused by identity politics-driven curricula.

Ancient Greek playwright Sophocles’ Antigone is a great example of how teaching a ‘white’ classical play does not at all reinforce racism or white supremacy but enables students to discover universal principles and humanistic values. After a civil war in Thebes, King Creon allows the burial of Eteocles but forbids the burial of Polynices, whom he deems a traitor. Their sister Antigone defies his decree, insisting that divine law and basic human dignity stand above the commands of any ruler. Creon reacts with absolutism by condemning her to death. By the time he realizes his error, Antigone, his son Haemon, and his wife Eurydice have all killed themselves, leaving him alone to face the consequences of pride and injustice.

One would be hard pressed to find any hint of racism or white supremacy in Antigone’s defiance. The idea of the natural law, which finds its secular origin in ancient Greece, informed medieval theologians Thomas Acquinas’ and St. Augustine’s writings, and later, the American civil rights movement and Martin Luther King’s famous statement from “Letters from Birmingham Jail,” “An unjust law is no law at all.” . This same idea has inspired many civil disobedience movements and social reforms all over the world. The natural law perspective also sheds light on the varying degrees of injustice in colonial regimes and thereby informs anti-colonial struggles.

Antigone has been an essential part of the classics and literature curricula and can come in handy in the teaching of law, politics, and social studies in both high schools and universities.  Teachers of classics and literature primarily focus on its text and historical significance. In my law class, I asked students to reflect on whether they in the past ‘played Antigone’ by defying what they considered unjust laws or regulations. I also asked them to examine safer but no less heroic ways of ‘playing Antigone’ and resisting unjust rules and regulations. An impassioned Ukrainian student said she would try to kill Creon, which caused a stir, while another student calmly presented a stealthier wait-and-see approach to usurp his power. In a history or politics class, students can be asked to imagine an alternative scenario in which Antigone follows Creon’s advice to marry Haemon and to assess whether the city-state would still collapse under Creon’s reign, despite Antigone’s obedience, and, if so, what would be the likely factors causing its demise.

Just as great literature touches readers on different levels, King Creon’s self-righteousness and his oblivion to basic justice and decency resonate with me in a deeply personal and unexpected way. A few years ago, I travelled from Hong Kong to Vancouver after my father’s passing and before his funeral to meet with an academic with whom I had been working. This academic was a passionate advocate for people living with HIV/AIDS, and her compassion shone at every gathering with them. At our meeting, she reprimanded me for my subpar work. Attributing it to my lack of dedication, she rolled her eyes at me and blurted out, “Don’t be so lazy!” Looking back, I still marvel at my ability to hold back my tears: I had never been called “lazy” in my whole life; on the contrary, I have been told not to “work so hard.”

This academic reminded me that many people, like Creon, who obsess over politics and ideology, arrogantly believe that dedication to social activism makes them good people, and revel in their grandiosity. Their self-conception as morally enlightened prompts them to exercise cruelty. This bad example also sheds light on how genuinely good people would behave, which is to show basic respect and decency to all people—decent enough not to reprimand a colleague whose beloved just passed away—rather than playing Mother Teresa only to those they consider ‘victims.’ While I did not play Antigone at the time, I cut off all ties with her after our work relationship ended.

‘Decolonization’ of the canon is not inherently a bad thing. Students should be allowed, or even encouraged, to rewrite canonical texts to question any cultural or racial norms hidden in the originals and empower what they deem marginalized or oppressed voices to speak. Students may even want to reinvent and adapt canonical texts to promote respect for non-Western cultures. In fact, rewriting and reinventing the canon has become a popular practice by literary writers and theater producers over the past decades. However, such practices, as witty and satisfying as they may be, by no means justify abandoning the canon. Far from it.

Excluding the Western canon and emphasizing minority writers would force students to dwell on identity politics until it became an empty obsession. While a student, I admired Toni Morrison, an exemplary author in her own right, whose work enables readers to perceive the reality of racial and sexual oppression through an African American woman’s perspective and innovative writing style. However, another reason for my appreciation for Morrison was precisely because I was not forced to read only her or any minority writer’s work. My younger self would never have imagined devoting all my time to minority writers and fighting white supremacy and the patriarchy. 

By the same logic, disciplines like African Studies, without core classes on Western civilization and canonical texts, instill lopsided worldviews and produce activists who see themselves and people primarily as members of racial and gender groups, while forgetting that we are first and foremost individuals who deserve the same rights and dignity. I recall seeing upper-year students in similar specialties on a top Canadian university campus who plastered their social media platforms with “F**k the patriarchy” and “f**k white supremacy.” You would expect students from a top university to have received a well-rounded education and to appear more thoughtful, wouldn’t you?

An education that values diversity and inclusion should ultimately help people find their moral vocabulary by focusing on what is common among them and not only on what sets them apart. To exclude from the curricular canonical texts, which speak to our souls is to deny the humanistic values that bind us all. This will lead to a society more tribal, more fragile, and more willing to treat people as symbols rather than souls.