Frogs and Wasps by Aristophanes

Satire is a literary manner built on wit and humor with a critical attitude directed to human institutions and humanity.  A successful satiric play will show certain truths about society and then try to improve upon them.  Satire is meant to be constructive rather than destructive.  Aristophanes uses satire in Lysistrata to convey many different themes such as war and peace, the struggles of power and class, and the life and death issues that are seen in war.  Satire is successfully used and seen in Lysistrata by stereotyping women in general and then the different classes of women as well.  Double entendres are seen throughout the play to help add humor to the play.  Sex is

Aristophanes wrote The Acharnians at a time where the world he saw around him was changing. Athens had been at war for six years with no end in sight, the leader who started the war has been killed by a plague, and just three years prior Athens almost voted to kill off one of its allies for trying to leave the Delian League. He was seeing a whole new side of Athens. A side in which the concept of an independent polis has been lost and Athens is at war with its former allies. These are the things that inspire Aristophanes’ Greek comedy to be born. He uses the theater to address the questions he has about what is

During the time of Euripides, approximately the second half of the fifth century B.C., it was a period of immense cultural crisis and political convulsion (Arrowsmith 350). Euripides, like many other of his contemporaries, used the whole machinery of the theater as a way of thinking about their world (Arrowsmith 349). His interest in particular was the analysis of culture and relationship between culture and the individual. Euripides used his characters as a function to shape the ideas of the play (Arrowsmith 359).

But then one must consider the very end of the Symposium: the Final Dialogue. The party is effectively over. The main event is finished. The dawn is just about to break, and the roosters are crowing. In effect, Socrates and his two listeners have just pulled an all-nighter, and as many college students can attest, there is nothing quite like the feeling of buzzed haziness that arises as the sun creeps up and the world springs to life. Yet the ineffable Socrates still has something to say: “that authors should be able to write both comedy and tragedy: the skillful tragic dramatist should also be a comic poet” (223D). Even as he says this, “Aristophanes fell asleep in the middle of the discussion…Agathon also drifted off.” So the Symposium ends, not on a grand oration or a rousing round of applause, but on a quiet comment to a barely awake audience. What then, is the connection between comedy/tragedy and “suddenness”?

Aristophanes was not a proponent of the majority of Athenian culture, as well as other aspects of Greek life as whole. He despised the political, educational, and societal views that remained persistent throughout Athens. While his plays may be comedies, he uses them in an assortment of ways. His plays are used to demonstrate a purpose far beyond that of entertainment. He uses his writing for voicing the problems that lie in Ancient culture.

     Amidst the tone of war around us, and speak of possible defeat, the festival of Dionysos will be held the fall of this great year, 411 BCE. Many ideas of entertainment have been suggested, most of which plays from various credible playwrights. One that has caught my eye in many ways is a work by Aristophanes. It is titled Lysistrata, and is a comedy based on our current status of war. Now considering our present situation, this may seem like a ludicrous idea. The wrong choice of words in a public address can result in a revolt, let alone a play that will be seen by many more citizens than will a public speaking. Why choose such an idea? Well, there are many reasons, and I intend to explain them to you.

The affairs in Oedipus the King, authored by Sophocles, show a relentless desire to discover the truth around Laius’ murder and the question neighboring his own birth, force him to the awful realization of his dreadful deeds. Oedipus’s pride depicts the distrust in the gods and the expedition for the truth, leave the king restless. The idea of fate and free-will which the Greeks believed to guide everything in creation to a balanced direction. The choices a manmade was simply accountable for his own actions. The concept of both fate and free-will play a extensive role in Oedipus’s destruction. Even Though, Oedipus was the sufferer of his fate, his intentions were

Aristophanes and Agathon were peers in Ancient Greece. Aristophanes was the master of comedy, and Agathon was the master of tragedy. They traveled in the same circles and are present in the same works. In looking through the comic lens at Agathon in Aristophanes’ Women at the Thesmophoria, the reader is presented with a portrayal of an effeminate man with a flair for the dramatic and a queenly attitude. Aristophanes’ Agathon is a comic character to be laughed at, a man that is more female than male. In looking at this view of Agathon, Greek views of homoeroticism are brought up and Agathon’s reputation and character in the world of Ancient Greece is brought into question. How much of

Aristophanes paved the way for comedy and how it would be viewed by citizens in ancient Greece. By incorporating satire and comedy, Aristophanes portrayed the social and political climate of the time. More specifically, Lysistrata, a play by Aristophanes, gives insight into the role women have in the Athenian society. The theme of gender roles in the play, Lysistrata, has evolved to parallel the social norm of feminism by women today. Lysistrata is a satirical comedy and portrays the women are at odds with man regarding several different matters, most notably the waging war on itself. The role Aristophanes embellishes within the characters are reversed between man and woman. The women, who were largely subservient to the needs and whims of

“Since his [Aristophanes’] plays were often sharply critical of Athenian policies, his ability to make people laugh was essential to conveying his message. He was a practitioner of what we now call Old Comedy, an irreverent form that ridiculed and insulted prominent people and important institutions” (80).

In this paper, I will discuss a play by Athenian playwright Aristophanes, The Wasps. First, I shall give a brief overview of the The Wasps. Then, I will examine the courtroom scene of the play and argue that Philocleon is not an impartial juror. Next, I will discuss generational gap in Athens. Finally, I will conclude the paper with my outcome of the investigation of the conflict between Misocleon and Philocleon.

Aristophanes’ Clouds, if read hastily, can be interpreted as a mindless satyr play written in 419 BCE. Yet the chorus warns the reader not to expect the play to have farcical ploys like “a hanging phallus stitched on” the actors to evoke a laugh, but has underlying seriousness as “she [the play] comes in trusting only her words” (Clouds 538-44). Even if the play does use some low devices, the play’s message is sophisticated and can be read as a warning to Socrates. Aristophanes is a “friendly critic” of Socrates and warns Socrates to change his ways for Athens and for the good of himself (Whidden). Plato’s Symposium and especially his Apology of Socrates justify the claims made in Clouds about the dangers of philosophy and Socrates to

Now, using Bergson’s theory of laughter to analyze The Birds, it confirms the previously stated hypothesis, that the play applies as an aspect of Anthropocene laughter. The points made in the paragraphs above are extremely evident all throughout the text of the play. In The Birds, the two main characters, Pisthetaerus and Euelpides are fleeing Athens because of its current problematic status in politics, in search for something better, where they can have a brand new beginning. The two men sought out a new city, built by the influential birds, that was not tainted by man and his all too powerful hand. This is already quite similar to that of the Anthropocene, an age of wanting and needing change in order to survive after being naïve to humankind’s power of destruction. This is an example of imitation, something that sparks laughter as stated by Bergson. This telling statement from The Birds confirms this: “Weak mortals, chained to the earth, creatures of clay as frail as the foliage of the woods, you unfortunate race, whose life is but darkness, as unreal as shadow, the illusion of a dream, hearken to us, who are immortal beings” (75). There is laughter within this because it reflects aspects of humankind. In order to even understand the comedy in this play, a degree of intelligence is absolutely necessary. Aristophanes makes little jokes everywhere, for example that fact that those in power are birds and the names of the main characters. This is something an ordinary person

II. Sallis concludes from Book V that the very creation of this city in speech is paradoxical – and thus comedic – for both its inability to adequately account for the humanity of its proposed occupants and for placing over it to rule a philosopher, despite the inability of the city to produce or include philosophy due to that lack of humanity; specifically, due to a lack of consideration given to ἔρως in the formation of the city. Sallis notes that the rhetoric used in Book V consisting of comical terms – explicitly stating, “laughed at,” (Sallis, 373) and Glaucon responding on occasion with laughter (451 B) – suggesting that there may be an overall comedic tone to Book V. Further, there is the somewhat comedic imagery of the results of ignoring ἔρως, chiefly with regards to the gymnastic program (452 A-E) and the imagery of three progressively more tumultuous waves constituted of manifestations of ἔρως which Socrates must overcome – made even more comedic by Socrates’ suggestion of waiting for a dolphin to pick he and his interlocutors up on its back to rescue them (453 D). This evidence all supports Sallis’ claim on its most basic level, that the text itself throughout Book V is presented such that it includes comedic elements.

Comedy was a popular type of play in Ancient Greece, only second to Tragedy. These types were described in many details in Poetics, by Aristotle. He expressed that a comedy is “an imitation of inferior people - not, however, with respect to every kind of defect: the laughable is a species of what is disgraceful. The laughable is an error or disgrace that does not involve pain or destruction” (Aristotle 9). In plainer words, Aristotle is saying that as long as no one becomes hurt, it can be funny, and that everyday misfortune is, or can be humorous. Comedies are also plays that deal with common folk, and common events. (Simpson). Tragedy is almost the exact opposite.