mirror, mirror

Recently, I’m reading back all the play that I we study for our drama class just for the fun of it. The first play that I read was Anike, a play wrote by Malaysian playwright, Wong Pui Nam. He is actually quite famous poet.
As I read the play, I cannot help but notice how similar the play is with the other play that we learn which is, Antigone written by Sophocles. Even though the settings are according to local setting, but the storyline is the same. It’s a about a sister who was willing to against the law of the ruler, in order to do her responsibility as a family member to a person who was considered as betrayer of the kingdom.
By not abiding the rulers’ law, she abides the law of gods’. Her action caused her, the death of her fiancée, and the mother of her fiancée who was devastated at her son’s sudden death. Even though, those famous local names in the history of Malaya such as, Nadim and Tuah are used. It’s quite easy to relate the characters that we can find in Antigone. Maybe the one of the differences is that, in the Antigone, it was the two brothers in blood that fight and killed each other. But in Anike, it was between two close friends that have relationship that almost like brother. And the other difference is the reason of the fight between Sirat and Tuah-that part is like the exact copy of the fights between Hang Jebat and Hang Tuah during the period of Sultanate of Malacca.
In my opinion as reader and with not so much knowledge on the play, Anike is basically, a reflection of the play Antigone. Nevertheless, the playwright was able to integrate it into the local setting in a very interesting way that, the reader might assume it as an original play without any adaptation from other play, if they never read or heard of the Antigone.