Aristophanes, Four Comedies

“Lysistrata” is the first play in the book. Lysistrata summons the women from Athens and women representatives from neighboring Sparta and Beotia to meet in front of the Acropolis at Athens. The purpose of this meeting is to get all the women to support her plan to end a war that she finds to be senseless.

Kleonike, the first woman to get to the meeting, is curious about the purpose of the meeting. Lysistrata fills her in on her plan to have all women abstain from sex to convince the men to end the war. Kleonike is skeptical about this because she does not believe it’s the woman’s job to interfere with these issues. In her view

Dionysos decides that he is going to go to Hell and bring Euripides back. At the shores of the Infernal Lake, Charon, the ferryman of Hades, awaits Dionysos and his slave Xanthias. Dionysos is very rude and cruel to Xanthias, however Xanthias just makes his cruelty humorous throughout the play. Because he was a slave Xanthias could not ride in the boat, so therefore Charon made Dionysos row. This angered Dionysos who felt rowing was a menial job. As he is rowing, frogs are croaking and the more annoyed Dionysos gets, the louder they croak.

When Paxagora returned home, her husband, Blepyros was waiting for her extremely agitated. He wondered why she was carrying his cloak, shoes, and cane. She told him that one of her friends went into labor in the middle of the night and she had taken his clothing in order to keep warm and to scare off robbers. Blepyros was also upset because he was unable to attend the Congress meeting because he couldn’t find his clothing and therefore he did not get his pay.

Soon after they locked the gates, a Chorus of Old Men arrived carrying fire-pots and heavy sticks, threatening to burn the women out of the Acropolis. As the men are lying down the logs, a Chorus of Old Women came with pitchers of water and dump it on the Chorus of Old Men after hurling nasty insults were exchanged. The magistrate arrived, criticizing the women. He then instructed the men to force open the gates. Lysistrata calls a halt to the forcing open of the gates, using common sense instead of violence. The Chorus of Old Men feared that the women had been conspiring with Sparta. The women assured them that they are loyal to Athens, just sick of the wars.

When Dikaipolis finally returns wearing his beggar clothes he begins explaining how he will always be a Spartan-hater, but that they’re only human. He feels that they are too hard on them. He sees no reason why they should blame all their troubles on them, for it was their own gentlemen that are the cause of this war. When they cut the Magarians off from trade they were starving and slowly and painfully dying until they had to apply to Sparta for help. The Spartans tried to make a deal with the Athens in order to help out the Magarians, but the Athenians refused. This forced Sparta into a position of action.

Some topics in this essay:
Athens Paxagora, Acropolis Athens, Aristophanes Dionysos, Athens According, Athens Athenian, Dikaipolis Dikaipolis, Comedies Comedies, Charon Dionysos, Aristophanes Athenian, Athens Sparta, “the congresswomen”, “the frogs”, vintage peace, run city, athenian society, city athens, relates humanities, bring euripides, women conservative, play relates humanities, athenian women, thirty-year vintage peace, norms athenian society, “the congresswomen” “the, “lysistrata” “the congresswomen”,