Although scholars disagree on when the feminist movement began, most agree that it was within the last two centuries. The feminist movement has generally, and often successfully, sought equality between the sexes. For example, the feminist movement gave women the right to vote, kept them out of the kitchen, and in many ways made them socio-economically competitive with men. However, all of this progress, as well as the women's (or feminist) movement itself, is largely a product of the last 200 years. However, feminist women per se have been around much longer. A classic feminist example might be Antigone, a fictional woman written by Sophocles in the fifth century BC. In a way, Antigone even exhibits some characteristics of a modern feminist. Antigone first demonstrates feminist logic when she chooses to challenge a powerful masculine establishment. This establishment, personified by his uncle Creon, has an entire army to defend it, and it is usually challenged by entire city-states like Argos, not by a single "fire-breathing" woman (3) and her clumsy sister . The defiance presents itself both as a challenge to Creon's laws during Antigone's burial of Polyneices and as a direct verbal assault on Creon himself. Antigone bluntly says to Creon as he questions him: Excuse me, who made this edict? Was it God? Is not the human right to burial decreed by divine justice? I do not consider your statements so important that they may simply . . . nullify the unwritten laws of heaven. [original ellipses] You are a man, remember. . . .I dare say you think I'm stupid. Perhaps you are not very wise yourself. (12) [ellipsis added]The last three lines suggest Antigone's feminist position: she almost calls Creon a...... middle of paper ......erms, 7th ed. New York: Harcourt Brace College Publishers, 1999.Kitto, HDF “Sophocles' invention of the third actor expanded the scope of theater. » In Readings on Sophocles, edited by Don Nardo. San Diego, CA: Greenhaven Press, 1997. Segal, Charles Paul. “Sophocles’ Praise of Man and Antigone’s Conflicts.” In Sophocles: A Collection of Critical Essays, edited by Thomas Woodard. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1966. Sophocles. Antigone, Trans. by Dudley Fitts and Robert Fitzgerald. Adventures in Appreciation/Pegasus Edition. Orlando: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, Publishers, 1989. “Sophocles” in Literature of the Western World, edited by Brian Wilkie and James Hurt. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., 1984. Watling, E.F. Introduction. In Sophocles: The Theban Plays, translated by EF Watling. New York: books about penguins, 1974.