Aristophanic Poetry 3525251645, 9783525251645

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HYPOMNEMATA 68

HYPOMNEMATA U N T E R S U C H U N G E N ZUR ANTIKE UND ZU IHREM NACHLEBEN

Herausgegeben von Albrecht Dihle / Hartmut Erbse / Christian Habicht Hugh Lloyd-Jones / Günther Patzig / Bruno Snell

H E F T 68

V A N D E N H O E C K & R U P R E C H T IN G Ö T T I N G E N

CARROLL MOULTON

Aristophanic Poetry

V A N D E N H O E C K & RUPRECHT IN G Ö T T I N G E N

CIP-Kurztitelaufnahme

der Deutschen

Bibliothek

Moulton, Carroll: Aristophanic poetry / Carroll Moulton. — Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1981. (Hypomnemata ; H. 68) ISBN 3-525-25164-5 NE: GT

© Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht in Göttingen 1981 — Printed in Germany Ohne ausdrückliche Genehmigung des Verlages ist es nicht gestattet, das Buch oder Teile daraus auf foto- oder akustomechanischem Wege zu vervielfältigen Gesamtherstellung: Hubert & Co., Göttingen

TO ERNIE J O E

HULSEY

Preface I am indebted to Princeton University for leave time and research funds furnished by the endowment of the Arthur Scribner Bicentennial Preceptorship in 1977—78. The assistance was invaluable for the preparation of this book. Permission to reprint the brilliant translations of Β. B. Rogers, which were collected in the Loeb Classical Library edition of 1924, has been graciously granted by the Harvard University Press. Minor discrepancies between the translations and the Budé text of V. Coulon have been allowed to remain. The spelling of Greek names is cheerfully inconsistent. The first chapter of this book appeared in somewhat different form in Museum Helveticum 36 (1979). In connection with the material on the Birds in that chapter, I am grateful for the stimulus provided by working with the first New Jersey Scholars' seminar program and with their production of the Birds in July 1977. Two substantial contributions to Aristophanic studies appeared while this book was in press, and I have been unable to take account of them here: Kenneth McLeish, The Theatre of Aristophanes (London 1980) and Jeffrey Henderson, ed. Aristophanes: Essays in Interpretation (Yale Classical Studies 26, Cambridge 1980). Once again, I am very grateful for the support and encouragement of my family and friends, and especially to Ernie Hulsey, to whom this book is dedicated. Southampton, New York 14 July 1980

C. Moulton

7

Contents Principal Abbreviations

10

Introduction

11

Chapter 1. The Lyric of Insult and Abuse

18

A. B. C. D.

The Misfortunes of Antimachus (Acharnions The Spurious Invitation (Lysistrata 1043ff) The Wonders of the World [Birds 1470ff) Conclusion

1150ff)

Chapter 2. Poetic Structure and Political Reference in Lysistrata A. B. C. D.

The Wool Simile ( 5 6 7 - 5 8 6 ) The Parabasis ( 6 1 4 - 7 0 5 ) The Concluding Scenes ( 1 0 7 2 - 1 3 2 0 ) Conclusion

Chapter 3. Festive Imagery in the Peace A. B. C. D.

The Feast of Polemos (236ff) Hórai Philai: Elements of Pastoral Tolmema Neon: Elements of Romance Conclusion

Chapter 4. Poetry and Imitation in the Thesmophoriazusae A. B. C. D.

The Prologue and the Motifs of the Play The Women and the Festival Poetry and Imitation Conclusion

18 24 28 46 ...

48 49 58 68 80 82 85 92 101 107 108 110 123 135 142

Conclusion

144

Selected Bibliography

146

Index of Passages

149

9

Principal Abbreviations I. Books Cornford = F. M. Cornford, The Origin of Attic Comedy 2 (Cambridge 1934, repr. Garden City, N.Y. 1961). Dover = K . J . Dover, Aristophanic Comedy (Berkeley 1972). Gelzer = T. Gelzer, Aristophanes der Komiker (Stuttgart 1971). van Leeuwen = J . van Leeuwen, ed. Aristophanes (11 vols., Leiden 1893—1906). Whitman = C. H. Whitman, Aristophanes and the Comic Hero (Cambridge, Mass. 1964).

II.

Journals

AJP = American Journal of Philology BICS = Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies CP = Classical Philology CR = Classical Review HSCP = Harvard Studies in Classical Philology JHS = Journal of Hellenic Studies Mus. Helv. = Museum Helveticum REG = Revue des Études Grecques Rhein. Mus. = Rheinisches Museum TAPA = Transactions of the American Philological Association

10

Introduction The title of this study directs attention to its principal objective: analysis of the language of Aristophanes' comedies and their appraisal as poetic drama. Admiration for Aristophanes' lyrical powers is recorded as early as Plato, and the observation that the plays contain a unique mixture of sweetness and ribaldry remains a critical commonplace. Yet any review of the scholarly literature in the past century will show that the emphases of Aristophanic studies have largely been placed elsewhere, on political and theoretical issues. The corpus of eleven surviving plays has served as a source-book for inference on the origins of Greek comedy, as a companion to Thucydides' historical record of the Peloponnesian War, and as a sociological primer on every-day life in late fifth-century Athens. Important progress has been made in each of these areas of study. In the first, the origins of comedy, the theories of F. M. Cornford, which embraced much that was valuable along with much that is now largely discredited, encouraged a broad view of the genre which, in combination with Freud's Wit and its Relation to the Unconscious, enlarged comparative studies. Although the origins of comedy remain obscure, the combination of anthropological and psychological approaches forms the basis for most current theories of the genre, in which Aristophanes, as its oldest extant exponent, must assume an important place. And attempts to isolate and analyze the original "parts" of comedy, which have always received impetus from the peculiar and comparatively consistent structure in Aristophanes' plays, have resulted in productive analyses of the text itself. In the second field, that of Aristophanes' political and historical relevance, the old orthodoxies of the poet as political pamphleteer (Couat, M. Croiset) have long been laid to rest, and more sophisticated methodologies for probing the plays' relation to contemporary events have evolved. Since Gomme demonstrated the deficiencies of an approach that ignored the comedies as essentially fictive, dramatic creations, the plays have been treated with more caution in this area (Reinhardt, de Ste. Croix, Connor). Finally, in the third field, that of every-day life, where the comedies furnish valuable evidence for fifth-century law, social mores, and domestic arrangements, the work of Ehrenberg, who subtitled his book The People of Aristophanes with the explanation "a sociology of Old Attic Comedy," remains pre-eminent, and its influence is reflected in the orientation of more recent commentaries on the plays, which have increasingly taken advantage of archaeological and epigraphical finds to clarify for us the 11

oikeia pragmata of late fifth-century Athens. As interest in this sphere has grown, so comment has increased on the circumstances of theater production; and the plays have been ransacked for evidence on questions such as the number of actors, the position of the stage, the use of the mêchanê and the ekkyklema, the wearing of the phallus, and the presence of women as spectators. All this has engendered lively and voluminous debate, and has impelled more attention by commentators to dramatic questions, as well as to philological and textual ones. But despite the progress of research on all these fronts, Greek Old Comedy has still not received the attention it deserves as poiesis. The oikeia pragmata and the colloquial or obscene features of the plays' diction (the latter received systematic cataloguing by Henderson only in 1975) have doubtless been partially responsible for this neglect. As recently as 1964, Whitman pointed to the odd absence of detailed analysis of the plays as poetry. Whitman's book went some way toward filling the gap, although it was primarily concerned with arguing the thesis of "comic heroism." Within the past twenty years, there have been other scholars who have provided useful prolegomena to the study of Aristophanic poetry: one thinks of Newiger's treatment of metaphor and personification in the plays, of the book by Rau on parody, and of the catalogue of images compiled by Taillardat. Yet these have till been specialized studies, and their emphasis has inevitably been narrower than a concentration on the full range of Aristophanes' poetic techniques. What is needed now is analysis of the plays as poetry which, without ignoring the progress we have outlined above in other areas of Aristophanic research, and while relying on the advances in more specialized literary studies, may hope to account in more detail for Aristophanes' extraordinary power as comic poet: in short, analysis of a broad range of poetic techniques in the text itself. Through analyzing closely continous and diverse passages of the text, we may hope to gain further insight into the playwright as poetic artist, in the same fashion as we have come to view the masters of Greek tragedy. The evidence of the text itself provides one justification for this approach. For Aristophanes is keenly aware of his status as poiêtës, and of his place in the tradition of comic poets down to his own day. To be sure, this status is inextricable from his profession as dramatist; it is well to remind ourselves that neither the Greeks nor the Romans were aware of the possibility of writing drama in prose, and the modern separation of "dramaturgy" and "poetics" would have been meaningless to them. The numerous exploitations of dramatic conventions in the comedies, and the complex network of vaunting and lyrical images which Aristophanes applies to his own poetry, are thus aspects of the same, self-conscious perception of the poet vis-à-vis his precursors and contemporaries. He exhibits a thoroughly developed artistic persona which, when judged by its concern for influence on present 12

reality and for shaping of a new aesthetic reality, is comparable to the poets of many modern traditions and which, if we possessed more evidence, we might well analyze after the pattern of the work of W. J . Bate and Harold Bloom on British and American writers. But there is a second, more compelling argument which justifies our approach, and which transcends Aristophanes' conception, evident in the plays, of his own poetic persona. That conception, after all, is only intermittently explicit in the text, usually in the parabasis. The more immediate impulse for close analysis of Aristophanes' poetic art derives from its union of creative fantasy and a simultaneous, overt appeal to the topical. The blending of the fantastic and the realistic is an undisputed feature of Aristophanic comedy; it parallels, to some degree, the combination of the lyrical and the obscene which we mentioned earlier. How do the techniques of comic poetry effect these unions? Do they result, in each pair, in the domination of one element over the other, either generally or in individual plays? To select one play as an example, is the Birds to be read as an escapist, fantastic romance, or as a satirical allegory? Only analysis of the poetic technique in detail is likely to hold the answers to these questions. And it is painfully apparent that the lack of such analysis has been responsible for the unbridgeable gulf between interpretations of many of the plays, especially the "political" comedies, and for acute confusions with respect to literary genre. The chapters which follow, then, have as their primary objective the critical exploration of the plays' poetic artistry. Such analysis should supply a methodological paradigm for the task of interpretation. For this purpose, a selection of plays and passages has had to be made, with the hope that the focus accurately reflects the diversity of the whole. The study which follows progresses from examination of a particular group of short lyrics to analysis of selected scenes, and finally to an interpretation of two relatively neglected plays, Peace and Thesmophoriazusae. The study is sequential, in that many of the poetic techniques which may be observed within the compass of a brief lyric poem are brought to bear on the symbolic structure of an entire comedy. The first chapter is concerned exclusively with lyrics in which the conjunction of satire and fantasy may be expected to exist in pointed and concise fashion: the poems of insult and abuse. The chapter analyzes three representative songs from three different plays: Acharnions, Lysistrata, and Birds. Here our method most resembles that of an explication du texte, since we try to comment on all the significant features of theme, structure, meter, and imagery in the lyrics, and to determine to what extent they are integrated into the larger symbolic structure of their plays. The motif of abuse, common to these lyrics, may seem in our day a rather unlikely starting point for the investigation of poetic art. But we must not overlook the importance of the satiric mode in Old Comedy, even though we do not 13

formally label the plays satires (except perhaps the Clouds). Aristophanes is not primarily a satirist. But it is precisely where the tradition of όνομαστί κ ω μ ψ δ ε ί ν is exploited in the form of lyric verse that we may learn a great deal about his poetic art. Among our three examples, the richest fusion of satire and fantasy is exhibited by the lyric in the Birds. Recent literary theory has much to teach us about the use of the fantastic in various genres; one may note particularly the study of Eric Rabkin, The Fantastic in Literature. Polar reversals of ground rules characterize most Aristophanic plots; in the abuse lyric of the Birds, such reversals are a paradigm for the play as a whole. Our conclusions on Aristophanes' use of metaphor to effect a synergetic combination of satire and fantasy may be generalized to the consideration of other plays, including those which are more overtly political. In the second chapter, these conclusions form the basis for an investigation of the relationship between poetic structure and political reference in one fantasy as a whole, the Lysistrata. The formal range of the passages examined here is broader. The first section of this chapter analyzes the interrelation of terminology in Lysistrata's celebrated image of wool-working. We proceed in the second section to study the significance of structural symmetry in the parabasis. The final section focuses on a group of scenes at the end of the play, and attempts to assess the role of historical reference in a portion of the text which is itself remarkably varied, consisting of bantering argument, formal speeches, lyric abuse, and lyric hymns. The conclusion from this study of three varied scenes in one comedy reinforces the results of the first chapter, which concentrated on lyrics from three different plays: the analysis of Aristophanes' technique clearly demonstrates its bias toward the integration of political and historical reality with the comic premises of fantasy. The two chapters which follow are studies of plays which have received less than their share of comment from Aristophanes' critics, the Peace and the Thesmophoriazusae. Whatever the reasons for their neglect, these two comedies present a remarkably rich field for the testing and extension of our thesis; our aim throughout is to explore the coherence of the plays' dramatic and symbolic structure. The following three considerations have been largely responible for their selection. First, both plays, in different fashions, signal the importance for Aristophanic criticism of a more adequate understanding of the idea of "festival." Since the early part of this century, of course, the concept of festival, in as much as it overlaps with ritual celebrations of fertility, has been regarded as significant for the orgins of comedy, and recrudescences such as Dikaiopolis' Country Dionysia in the Acharnions have been remarked. But the tendency has been toward evaluation of such passages as "survivals," or primitive anachronisms. If the concept of festival is enlarged to include the festivals of the Athenian calendar celebrated by Aristophanes' contemporaries, as well 14

as the more informal gatherings of social subsets (such as women's parties and men's symposia) which enjoyed quasi-institutional status in the late fifth century, we may find its application to Aristophanic comedy valuable and enlightening. C. L. Barber's seminal study, Shakespeare's Festive Comedy, has shown the integral relation of the structure of Shakespearean comedy to the "holiday" tradition of native English festivals. Although the evidence for social practice on Greek holidays is sketchy at best, it is part of our purpose in this essay to demonstrate that the festival tradition is highly significant for Aristophanes as well. The third chapter focuses on the idea of festival, in a number of forms, as central to the dramatic and symbolic structure of the Peace: festivity, in other words, informs and to some extent directs the comedy's poetic art, and provides the principal field for its imagery. The fourth chapter attempts to show how Athenian practice at one particular festival, the Thesmophoria, is central to an understanding of the main themes of the Thesmophoriazusae. Since the name of the festival is incorporated in the comedy's title, it ought to have been obvious before that all we can reconstruct of the practice of the women at the Thesmophoria might be brought to bear on the literary criticism of the comedy. But the social background of this, and other plays, has been almost completely ignored, at least in this respect. Recent resurgence of interest in the social anthropology of fifth-century Athens, and its relationship to myth, to ritual observances, and to literary texts, holds some promise in this area. Likewise, the recent work on the study of women in antiquity bids fair to widen our perspectives on the sociology of fifth-century Athens. The chapter on the Thesmophoriazusae in this study attempts to demonstrate the usefulness of such social perspectives, when integrated with analysis of the play's language, in the apprehension of Aristophanes' poetic art. In addition, the Peace and the Thesmophoriazusae have been chosen because they confront us with important problems of literary genre: the first, because it appears to include elements of both pastoral and romance; the second, because its parodie impulse plays on the quite untraditional merging of comedy and tragedy in the final decades of the fifth century. If the two plays teach us anything, it may be that notions of genre, among classical scholars at any rate, are not flexible enough. Inherited as they are from the late classical and Hellenistic periods (and later), these notions may be inadequate for the criticism of a literature that was still largely oral, and which freely merged with comedy an indulgence in what we have come to call the modes of pastoral, romance, and satire. Here the work of critics of British and American literature has again been useful, particularly that of Northrop Frye, on the theory of genres and on the range and structure of romance. The problem of genres must concern the critic of Aristophanes, if for no other reason, because of his self-consciousness 15

as a poet. In the Thesmophoriazusae, indeed, the theater itself, both comedy and tragedy, assumes its place, along with other types of mimesis, as a poetic image for change and metamorphosis. Finally, the Peace and the Thesmophoriazusae may be regarded as thematically representative: the Peloponnesian War, Euripidean tragedy, and the woman's world are all major subjects in the extant Aristophanic plays. The two works are also representative of the poet's technical artistry, in that both present major examples of the "re-working" of material: the metaphorical personification of Polemos in the Peace, and the parody of Euripides' Telephus in the Thesmophoriazusae (both anticipated in the Acharnians). The re-use and variation of old material is a stock feature of any comedian's technique, as study of comedy's exponents from Menander and Shakespeare to modern television entertainers will show. Emphasis in previous criticism on the uniqueness and exoticism of Aristophanic plots has tended to obscure the fact that the playwright's claims to fertile invention and originality have to be interpreted largely within the framework of the original variation of old material. Our study of the Peace begins with an examination of how Aristophanic poetry responds to this challenge. The "feast" of Polemos, besides furnishing a case study in this respect, is an index to symbolic structure of the play as a whole: under the headings of "elements of pastoral" and "elements of romance," we explore the play's festive imagery. The fourth chapter, on the Thesmophoriazusae, proceeds rather differently. Here we begin with the prologue as an index to the principal motifs and images of the play as a whole. The second section examines what we are able to reconstruct of the social circumstances of the festival of the Thesmophoria, and applies that reconstruction to the symbolic structure of the comedy. Analysis of the themes and imagery of the parabasis complements study of the festival background. The final section examines the use of the theater itself as a poetic image, and demonstrates the co-ordination of paratragodia with the comedy's other leading motifs. Thus this study proceeds from smaller texts to larger ones, from a focus on the technique in one particular type of lyric to the examination of the symbolic structure in entire plays, and analysis of social background and questions of genre. The latter two chapters are necessarily broader in scope than the first two, since they attempt to apply the method of poetic analysis to interpretation of whole plays, as well as to confront some salient issues of Aristophanic criticism. Our objective, however, is the same throughout: exploration of Aristophanes' poetic artistry in the plays, as they unfold as imaginative experiences. The appeal of the fantastic in literature may be explained, at least in part, by its very scope. Once removed from the bonds of the real and the logical, plot and imagery in comedy may convey, even more than is usual in lite16

rature, an abundance of multi-valent, even contradictory meanings. Thus our interest, at least in the beginning, is less in a comprehensive reading of the plays than in an exposition of the ways in which Aristophanes' poetry functions. As we have noted, the readers of the same Aristophanic comedies have wound up in very different places indeed. This is a risk encountered by every author of comedy (Molière's Tartuffe is b u t an extreme example), and is to some extent incurred by the very choice of comedy as a genre in which to write. The emphasis of the pages which follow, then, is not on Aristophanes' opinions or with any message that can be extracted from the comedies, but rather with his poetic art as entertainer. Aristophanes' gnòme is probably irrecoverable. His technë is open to us all to enjoy and to celebrate.

2 Moulton (Hyp. 68)

17

CHAPTER 1

The Lyric of Insult and Abuse

Toward the end of several plays, we find brief lyrics of invective, with varying degrees of thematic relevance to the main action. 1 This type of stasimon is most fully developed, and most remarkable, in the Birds, but other interesting examples exist in Acharnions and Lysistrata. The targets of insult and abuse may differ: in Acharnians the comic butt is the obscure Antimachus, in Birds various persons are lampooned (Cleonymus, Socrates, Chaerephon, Peisander, Gorgias, Philip), in Lysistrata it is the audience that is mocked. Certain cömmon motifs recur in these lyrics, and we shall have occasion to note them in the course of the analysis. 2 Yet the chief impression is of diversity. Our purpose in examining the rich variations of this "type ode" in detail will be to gain insight into the poetic technique of Aristophanes, particularly in contexts where the lyric impulse is conjoined with the satiric mode. 3

A. The Misfortunes

of Antimachus

(Acharnians

1150ff)

The ode in Acharnians is the shortest. The previous scene in stichomythic dialogue has shown the departure of Lamachus and Dikaiopolis, the general for battle and the old man for his feast. After a kommation in anapests emphasizing the disparity of the two men's prospects (1143—1149), the chorus sings one strophic pair lampooning Antimachus, a man of obscure 1 See the structural analyses of Aristophanic plays in F. M. Cornford, The Origin of 1 Attic Comedy2 (Cambridge 1934, repr. Garden City 1961). On the chorus in Acharnians and Birds see G. M. Sifakis, Parabasis and Animal Choruses (London 1971) 26, 28. 2 For example, puns are common: cf. the comments on Antimachus' name in section A below on Acharnians, and note the puns on proper names in each of the four stanzas of the lyric in Birds·. Kardia, Orestes, Peisander (which, like Pisthetairos, connotes persuasion), Phanai, Gorgias, and Philip. Orestes the hooligan figures in both Acharnians and Birds. The motif of free food is common to the lyrics of Acharnians and Lysistrata. However, the differences revealed within the genre of the abuse lyric are perhaps more significant than the similarities. 3 For other examples of lyrics of abuse, see Knights 284—302, 973—996; Frogs 416— 430; Lysistrata 6 1 4 - 7 0 5 .

18

provenance who is mentioned only once elsewhere in Aristophanes. 4 The meter is choriambic. 5 The chorus prays that Zeus may crush Antimachus for his stinginess in sending t h e m away hungry from a recent Lenaian festival. 6 T w o accidents are to befall him. The first, described in the strophe, involves his being defrauded of that great delicacy, the sizzling squid: Άντίμαχον τον Ψακάδος, τον ξυγγραφή, τον μελέων ποητήν, ώ ς μεν ά π λ φ λ ό γ ψ κακώς έξολέσειεν ό Ζεύς · ος y' έμέ τον τλήμονα Αήναια χορηγών άττέλυσ' άδειπνον. Ό ν ετ'έπίδοιμι τενθίδος δεόμενον, ή δ' ώπτημένη σίξουσα. πάραλος ètri τραπέξχι κεψένη όκέλλοί- KCLTCL μέλλοντος λαβείν αυτού κύων άρπάσασα φεύ^οι.

1150

1156

1160

Pray we that Zeus calmly reduce to destruction emphatic and u t t e r That meanest of poets and meanest of men, Antimachus, offspring of Sputter; The Choregus w h o sent me away w i t h o u t any supper at all At the feast of Lenaea; I pray, two Woes that Choregus befall. May he hanker for a dish of the subtle cuttle-fish; May he see the cuttle sailing through its brine and through its oil, On its little table lying, h o t and hissing from the frying, Till it anchor close beside him, when alas! and woe betide him! As hefor reachés forththehisGods handprovide him, the meal 4

Cf. Clouds 1022. For the identity of Antimachus and the suspicion that he served as the choregos of Cratinus the comic playwright, see the notes of van Leeuwen ad locc. The situation is not helped by the corrupt text at Acharnions 1150, where Antimachus is introduced. 5 For an analysis, see C. Prato, I Canti di Aristofane (Rome 1962) 28—29. 6 On the provision of dinner by the choregos, see A. W. Pickard-Cambridge, The Dramatic Festivals of Athens2 (Oxford 1968) 89, and K. J. Dover, "Notes on Aristophanes' Acharnions", Maia Ν. S. 15 (1963) 23.

19

May a dog snatch and carry off the spoil, off the spoil, May a dog snatch and carry off the spoil. 7 The theft of food by a dog was to be elaborated by Aristophanes later in his career into a highly developed incident (cf. Wasps 836ff); the threat involving the squid, or cuttle-fish, is turned in a different way by the Sausage-Seller in the Knights, who hopes that Kleon may choke on the food in his haste to devour it (cf. Knights 927ff). In Acharnions, the emphasis is on the frustration of Antimachus, deprived of his food just as he reaches out to grasp it (μέλλοντος λαβείν, 1159). His disappointment must be heightened by the contrasting ease with which the delicacy arrives at his table: in an imaginative personification, involving an absurd pun on the official Athenian state galley (Πάραλος, 1158), Aristophanes has the fish drawn up to its "anchorage" (όκέλλοι). A metrical pause, after the bacchius and before the change to the lekythion in 1159, emphasizes the arrival of the squid, roasted and sizzling, ready to eat. The juxtaposition of sudden good fortune and deuced bad luck is also stressed by the construction of the verse: the chiming optative verbs όκέλλοι and φεύ-γοι are placed in the final positions in their syntactic units, and in prominent positions in their rhythmical cola. 8 So far, Antimachus has incurred only disappointment. But the second strophe goes further. The next "accident" to befall him is actually a series of cumulative misfortunes and frustrations. At the beginning of the stanza, the chorus rather misleadingly refers only to "another evil," which is to occur by night: Τ οϋτο μεν αύτώ κακόν ëv, καθ ' 'έτερον νυκτερινό ν -γένοιτο. Ήπιαλών yàp οϊκαδ ' έξ ιππασίας βαδίζων 1165 etra πατάξειέ τις αύτοΰ μεθνων την κεφαλήν 'Ορέστης μαινόμενος· ò δε λίθον λαβείν βουλόμενος εν σκότίρ λάβοι τχι χειρί πέλεθον άρτίως κεχεσμένον 1170 έπάζειεν δ "έχων τον μάρμαρον, κάπειθ ' άμαρτών βάλοι ΚρατΙνον. Duly the first Woe is rehearsed; attend whilst the other I'm telling. It is night, and our gentleman, after a ride, is returning on foot to his dwelling; 7

The text printed here, as in all subsequent citations where no exception is noted, is the Budé edition of V. Coulon (originally published Paris, 1923—1930, and revised and corrected in subsequent editions). The translations of Aristophanes are those of Β. B. Rogers. 8 For the emphasis and careful arrangement of the final cola in stanzas of the abuse lyric, where the joke reaches a climax, compare especially the four stanzas of the lyric in the Birds, discussed below in section C.

20

With ague he's sorely bested, and he's feeling uncommonly ill, When suddenly down on his head comes Orestes's club with a will. 'Tis Orestes, hero mad, 'tis the drunkard and the pad. Then stooping in the darkness let him grope about the place, If his hand can find a brickbat at Orestes to be flung; But instead of any brickbat may he grasp a podge of dung, And rushing on with this, Orestes may he miss, And hit young Cratinus in the face, in the face, And hit young Cratinus in the face. In spite of the formal parallelism (τούτο ... κακόν εν, Kq-Θ' ετερον) indicated by the first line of the antistrophe, the lyric surprises us by detailing a sequence of disasters in an ascending order of absurdity. First, Antimachus is to be suffering from a chill (ήπιάλών, 1165). Then he is to meet a drunken mugger, named Orestes, who will bash him in the head. 9 He will grasp at a stone to throw in revenge, but instead his hand will alight upon a fresh turd (1168—1170). Rushing forward with this epic "boulder" (μάρμαρον, 1171), Antimachus will hurl it at Orestes, but miss and hit Cratinus instead. Just as the misfortunes of Antimachus suddenly gather momentum, so the poetry seems to run haywire half-way through the stanza. The transition point, at 1167, is clearly integrated with the structure of the first stanza. Antimachus will stretch out his hand, eager to grasp a stone, as he was eager to grasp the cuttle-fish for his dinner (cf. λαβεïv at 1167 and 1159). But in the antistrophe, instead of the mere bathos of thin air, the lyric fancifully provides a substitute, the πέλεθον. It is a perfectly credible absurdity; such things, after all, may happen in the darkness (èv σκότίψ, 1169)! But Aristophanes is far from through. He heaps additional ridicule on Antimachus through the parodie usages of έπάξειεν and μάρμαρον, words that describe the movements and missiles of Homeric warriors. 10 And then the final hamartia is supplied: Antimachus cannot even strike the proper target, but hits Cratinus instead. The word order of the poem incongruously emphasizes parallelism, regularity, and rhyme even as the content becomes more unpredictable. This is particularly evident in the colometry of Coulon's Budé edition: βουλόμενος parallels μαινόμενος in the previous line; λάβοι repeats λαβείν; άμαρτών parallels έχων, homoioteleuton highlights the ridiculous effect of the last three lines. 9 10

For Orestes, see Birds 712 and 1491, discussed below, and cf. notes 45 and 46. For example, cf. Iliad 5.584 and 12.380.

21

The lyric thus ends with an absurdly unexpected twist. Althought the main focus of abuse (and the first word of the poem) has been Antimachus, we are suddenly presented with a new butt for the satire. 11 Whether Cratinus is the rakishly tonsured adulterer or the comic poet who was Aristophanes' rival matters as little at this point as it does at his previous mention in the play (cf. Acharnions 848). Plainly, Aristophanes' main purpose is the frustration of Antimachus; he derives an additional, incongruous effect from distracting our attention at the last minute. Indeed, it may be argued that if the name Cratinus is left deliberately ambiguous, the poet maximizes his ridicule; he simultaneously achieves an absurd turn of events, the utter humiliation of the principal target, and two secondary "hits" on men who are both called Cratinus. It is this sparkling, climactic stroke—at once brilliantly right for the main subject and cleverly ambiguous—which best evidences the lyric's imaginative compression. What is the relation of this short poem to the play as a whole? Though scarcely profound, it is surely more than an "irrelevant little lampoon," in the words of one recent scholar. 12 The echoes of motifs found elsewhere in Acharnions do not cohere with absolute consistency. Yet consistency is not always to be expected in comedy, and the following observations are pertinent. First, Antimachus' name, like that of Lamachus, is a compound of the word for battle. Not only has the general's name been a subject for broad puns earlier in the play, 1 3 but the entire point of the scene preceding the abuse lyric has been his hard lot in contrast to Dikaiopolis, who casts virtually all his rejoinders to Lamachus in the form of comments on the feast he is preparing. The soldier laments that his marching orders do not permit him to join the festival (1079), and when he does mention food it is only t o order the miserable military rations of salt, onions, and some rotten fish (1099—1101). His exit without dinner at 1141 contains a parallel motif to the fate of Antimachus in the abuse lyric's first strophe (cf. 1159—1160). Secondly, the significance of food and cooking in the Acharnions as a whole is hinted at with the mention of the sizzling, roasted cuttle-fish at 1156—1158. As Whitman has shown, the coals of the Achamians represent a "lyric image" that is gradually manipulated in the course of the play. At first, the coals smolder in the threatening context of pro-war zealotry in the agon. They are then assimilated to the spark of the Acharnian Muse in the para-

11 Van Leeuwen aptly compares the shift from Peisander to Chaerephon at the climax of the stanza at Birds 1564ff. 12 A. M. Dale, in "Old Comedy: The 'Acharnians' of Aristophanes", printed in Collected Papers (Cambridge 1969) 292. 13 See Acharnians 2 6 9 - 2 7 0 , 1071, 1080.

22

basis; this fire is used to fry the fish of feasts in peacetime (cf. 665ff). 1 4 Dikaiopolis' feast at the end of the play, with its fire for roasting delicacies (1102), brings the image to its culmination: the fires emblematic of war have been transformed to domestic fires that roast the food for a banquet which celebrates peace. Returning to Antimachus, it is poetically just that, a skinflint with food, he be deprived of his dinner. Within the larger context of the play as a whole, that deprivation has its equivalent: as Antimachus is obnoxious, so is Lamachus—they will both thus be denied the feast prepared with fire in its peacetime use. Thirdly, on a broader level, the connections between politics and poetry that are so consistently exploited in the Achamians receive a fillip in this poem. At the play's beginning, the meeting on the Pnyx suggests a "theatrical" experience. Dikaiopolis' opening monologue, for instance, conflates the outrage of the common citizen with that of the disappointed theatergoer (cf. 5ff). 1 5 The curious assimilations, effected by the use of the firstperson pronoun, of Dikaiopolis and the playwright are well known (cf. 502ff). That Antimachus is a stingy choregos turns out to be particularly appropriate, since the first-person pronoun in the abuse lyric (έμέ, 1152) has certain advantages: it may refer to a member of the chorus (or to the chorus collectively), or it may hint at Aristophanes himself. Although we know that the latter possibility is historically unlikely, 16 the poetic advantages of repeated identification of the playwright with the characters are more relevant here. Aristophanes' troubles with Kleon at a previous production are openly referred to earlier, as is the Lenaia itself (502ff). What better ploy than to refer to the Lenaia again (at which we known the Acharnians to have been produced, cf. 504), with a paradigmatic anecdote about the troubles befalling a man who does not treat the chorus (or the playwright) well? Thus, some members of the audience may be prompted by implication to recall Aristophanes' previous troubles in real life; others may reflect on awarding the current play first prize in the dramatic competition; still others may think of Antimachus and his treatment of Cratinus (if indeed the former served as Cratinus' choregos). No matter: the poet achieves his effect with any one, or any combination, of these responses, and incidentally succeeds in lightly calling our attention to the importance of comic theater production. 1 7 The theatrical motif is surely accented by the sprightly ambiguity of the names in our lyric's 14

See C. H. Whitman, Aristophanes and the Comic Hero (Cambridge, Mass. 1964) 70— 71. One may also note that the charcoal-scuttle is linked with the cuttle-fish, σπίτια, in a simile at Ach. 3 5 0 - 3 5 1 ; cf. Whitman 71. 15 Dikaipolis seems equally displeased by the slovenly assembly and by the hack dramatists in his opening m o n o l o g u e : cf. especially Ach. 9—12, 17—27. 16 Cf. the remarks of Dover (note 6, above). 17 For the comic p o e t as political teacher in Acharnians see the assertion of Dikaiopolis at 5 0 0 and those of the chorus at 6 2 8 f f .

23

second stanza: Orestes, a famous tragic hero (from whose name Aristophanes is to derive more fun in the Birds) as well as a well-known hooligan, or the stereotyped name for a hooligan, in Athens; Cratinus, the adulterer, as well as the elderly rival of the comic poet himself. 1 8 If the connection between poetry and politics is suggested by considering the abuse lyric in light of what has preceded, it is emphasized further by the entrance of the messenger at 1174. His speech, if all of it is genuine, 19 seems almost a displaced fulfillment of the chorus' prayer for bad luck in the lyric, in that is details in para-tragic language an absurd series of misfortunes that have befallen Lamachus. He has impaled himself on a vine-pole while leaping over a ditch, turned his ankle, and bashed his head on a stone. 2 0 The collocation with the misfortunes of Antimachus once again draws our attention to the parallel in the play between the worlds of drama and politics: the bellicose general comes to a fate that is appropriate for the obnoxious choregos. The arrangement of scenes, verbal punning, parodies of epic and tragic diction, and slight coincidences of detail do n o more than lightly underscore this point; 2 1 nevertheless, such connections do establish a cogent thematic framework for the abuse lyric. The poem is a type of spin-off from the thread of the principal action, but there is a method to its digressive madness; enough links exist to the principal motifs of Acharnions to establish some ludicrous reverberations. The features of the poem to which I wish to draw primary attention, however, are those elements of the poetic technique responsible for the lyric's comic absurdity and skilful compression. B. The Spurious Invitation

(Lysistrata

1043ff)

It might be argued that the first three quarters of Lysistrata consist largely of abuse, and that the short strophe at 1043—1071, together with its res18

With regard to the suggestion that there may be some covert denigration of Aristophanes' rivals in the actual Lenaian competition of 425, and some implicit threat or plea for the first prize (such is common enough in other plays: cf. Birds l l O l f f ) , it is to be noted that Cratinus competed that year, and received second prize with his Cheimazomenoi: cf. Hyp. 1 to Acharnions. One may also note that there is a further reverberation to the name Orestes in the context of the play as a whole; in the Telephus parody (318ff), the charcoal-scuttle is comically substituted for the hostage who was, in Euripides' tragedy, the infant Orestes. Given this absurd transposition, it is just possible that the pseudo-heroic aspect of Antimachus' battle with the hooligan Orestes in the abuse lyric may have seemed even more vividly amusing to the audience. 19 See the discussion of M. L. West, "Aristophanes, Acharnions 1178—86", CR 21 (1971) 1 5 7 - 1 5 8 . 20 The authenticity of these details, and of the passage as a whole, is well defended by Whitman 7 4 - 7 5 . 21 Compare της κεφαλής Karéaye περί λίθον ττεσών (1180) with κατάξειέ τις αύτοΰ ... της κεφαλής Όρέστης ... ό δε λίθον βάλείν βουλόμενος (1166-1169).

24

ponding stanza at 1189—1215, actually represent an intermission in the play-long agon between men and women, Athenians and Spartans. Indeed, the semi-choruses of men and women unite at 1043 for the first time in the comedy, 2 2 and the personification of Diallagë, introduced in the scene with the ambassadors which divides the two portions of the lyric, is anticipated as early as 1 0 2 I f f , where the women clothe the men in the himation and pluck out the gnat from their eye. 23 The women grumble that man is δύσκολος and πονηρός (1030, 1035); the men reflect, a bit sourly, on the truth of the old proverb "You can't live with women, or without t h e m " (1039). But the two groups are substantially reconciled and, as the men say, a truce is on; neither party will suffer or do anything φλαϋρον (1040— 1041). The choruses then join to sing a four-part lyric in trochaics. The strophe and antistrophe are each divided into two parts; since the second section of each stanza corresponds metrically with the first, one may better speak of four distinct stanzas comprising a monostrophic lyric. The first two stanzas are separated from the final two by over one hundred verses, devoted to the negotiations between Athenian and Spartan ambassadors, a meeting for which Lysistrata serves as the arbitrator. The lyric's first lines echo the sentiments of the chorus of men at 1040, when they proclaimed the truce: ού παρασκευαζόμεσθα των πολιτών ούδέν', ώνδρες, φλαϋρον ειπείν ούδε εν, άλλα πολύ τοϋμπαλιν πάντ' άγαθά και λέγειν και δραν· ¿κανά γαρ τά κακά και τά παρακείμενα.

1045

Not to objurgate and scold you, Not unpleasant truths to say, But with words and deeds of bounty Come we here to-day. Ah, enough of idle quarrels, Now attend, I pray. In line 1043 some critics have detected the voice of Aristophanes himself; 24 it is not difficult to believe that Athenian troubles were sufficient (ικανά) by 411 Β. C. The unity of man and woman continues to be stressed by the phrase πάς άνήρ και γυνή in the following lines, which develop an invitation to the audience to borrow money from the chorus:

22

As in Coulon's arrangement of the lyric, as opposed to that of van Leeuwen. The former is supported by KOlVfl at 1042, and by the lack of clear identification of gender in the content of the lyric: such identification has typically marked the choral lyrics up to this point in the play. 23 On the symbolic significance of this last act, see the discussion of Whitman 213. 24 Cf. van Leeuwen ad. loc., who quotes the scholiast.

25

Αλλ' έιταγγελλέτω πάς άνηρ και *γννή, el τις àpyvpidiov δεϊται λαβείν, μνας ή δύ' η τρεϊςώς 'έσω 'στίν κάχομεν βαλλάντια. Käu ποτ' ειρήνη φανη, όστις άι> νυνί δανείσηται παρ' ημών ήν λάβη μηκέτ' ά π ο δ φ .

1050

1055

Now whoever wants some money, Minas two or minas three, Let them say so, man and woman, Let them come with me. Many purses, large and—empty, In my house they'll see. Only you must strictly promise, Only you indeed must say That whenever Peace re-greets us, You will—not repay. So far, there has been little in the poem's content that will pass for abuse. But the structure of the whole, as it unfolds, indicates that the audience has been "set u p . " For several other invitations will follow: to dinner, for example, although it turns out what the host's door will be tightly shut when the visitors arrive (1058—1071). In the second half of the poem, an offer of clothing is cut short with the remark that the putative beneficiaries will have keener eyes than the chorus if they can find any garments at all (1189—1202). Another tempting invitation to the poor to come to the house for food closes with the admonition to beware of the dog guarding the door (1203—1215). The equivocations are those of the Mad Hatter's party ("Have some more tea . . . There isn't any!"), and are endemic to Aristophanic comedy, in which the audience is frequently abused. Here the tone is lightly, even playfully, insulting; one may compare the more scurrilous allegations at Clouds 1096ff or Ecclesiazusae 436—440. In Lysistrata, the audience is titillated with the prospects of food, money, clothing, and then again food in the four stanzas. In all but the first, they are flatly disappointed at the end of the stanza, and the invitation turns out to be spurious. 25 The invitation to dinner, rescinded παρά προσδοκΐαν, is varied

25

The conjecture of P. Mazon at 1055—1057, αν λάβχί γ' ού μη άποδφ, attempts to transform the joke so that it will be consistent with the form of the other three stanzas: the borrower is defied to return the money because there will be none, i.e. no loan will be made in the first place. See the comments in van Leeuwen's note ad loc.

26

at Ecclesiazusae 1 1 4 4 f f , where B l e p y r u s invites the audience t o share in a feast—at their own h o u s e s ! 2 6 In s u m m a r y , we c a n n o t describe the p o e m in Lysistrata as a lyric o f a b u s e . Its p l a y f u l n e s s suggests rather that the tone is i n t e n d e d t o b e teasingly insulting. A s with A n t i m a c h u s in the Achamians, the chorus at first conjures up a b e n e f i t , which it then rudely snatches a w a y . B u t whereas A n t i m a c h u s m u s t s u f f e r p a i n f u l humiliation in addition t o being f r u s t r a t e d , the c h o r u s in Lysistrata is c o n t e n t t o leave the audience d i s a p p o i n t e d . D e s p i t e differences of s u b s t a n c e a n d tone, however, the similarities of detail, structure, a n d p l a c e m e n t in the c o m e d y j u s t i f y our brief consideration o f the p o e m in Lysistrata together with the lyrics of the Achamians a n d the Birds. T h e division of the lyric in Lysistrata into f o u r s y m m e t r i c a l sections is varied, with even greater structural ingenuity, at a c o m p a r a b l e p o i n t in the Birds: see the analysis in section C b e l o w . A s in Achamians, there is an implicit c o n t r a s t in the p l a y as a w h o l e b e t w e e n the characters w h o feast and t h o s e w h o d o n o t ; the a u d i e n c e m u s t g o h u n g r y , whereas p a r t of the celebration of the successful n e g o t i a t i o n s involves s o m e sort of b a n q u e t at the e n d o f Lysistrata (cf. 1 2 2 3 — 1 2 2 4 ) . T h e c h o r u s e x c l u d e s the s p e c t a t o r s f r o m a free meal, a f t e r the initial p r o m i s e t o lend them m o n e y for the d u r a t i o n o f the war. T h e i m p o r t a n c e o f m o n e y , as well as o f f o o d , is clear in the main p l o t o f Lysistrata: it is for the p u r p o s e o f s t o p p i n g the war that the w o m e n t a k e over the treasury on the A c r o p o l i s . T h e r e n e w e d availability of m o n e y (with the e x a g g e r a t e d a n d f a n t a s t i c c o n d i t i o n t h a t there will b e n o r e p a y m e n t n e c e s s a r y ) is a m e t a p h o r f o r the success o f their plan and the c o m i n g o f p e a c e . T h e strongest c o n n e c t i o n b e t w e e n the lyric and the main b o d y of the play is c o n s t i t u t e d b y the series o f vignettes of h o u s e h o l d life: the purses (1052— 1 0 5 3 ) , the f o o d f o r the Carystians ( 1 0 6 1 f f ) , the f a m i l y b a t h i n g b e f o r e going o u t t o dinner ( 1 0 6 5 f f ) , 2 7 the j e w e l r y and clothing for the d a u g h t e r w h o carries the b a s k e t in the festival p r o c e s s i o n ( 1 1 8 9 f f ) , the sealed chests ( 1 1 9 6 f f ) , the hunger of servants and small children ( 1 2 0 2 f f ) , the w a t c h d o g ( 1 2 1 2 f f ) . T h e o d e exhibits a rich c o n s p e c t u s o f d o m e s t i c life, the province of the m o s t fertile imagery in Lysistrata,28 In the later s t a n z a s , s o m e t h i n g of the m i x t u r e o f p a t h o s and hard realism typical o f the t o n e o f the p l a y as a whole emerges f r o m the vignettes of the y o u n g d a u g h t e r a n d her clothes, and o f the p o o r trying t o get s o m e t h i n g for nothing. This t o n e is also m a r k e d b y dry irony. F o r e x a m p l e , the C a r y s t i a n s , called άνδρας καλούς r e κάλαθους at 1 0 6 0 , were a n y t h i n g b u t gentlemanly allies 2 6 S e e the c o m m e n t o f R . G. U s s h e r ad loc. (ed. Ecclesiazusae, Oxford 1973), who c o m p a r e s P l a u t u s , Rudens 1 4 1 8 . F o r a g e n u i n e invitation t o the a u d i e n c e , see Peace 1115. 27 28

C o m p a r e the l a n g u a g e of the i m a g i n a r y invitation at Birds F o r s o m e a n a l y s i s o f this i m a g e r y , c f . W h i t m a n 2 0 5 f f .

130ff.

27

of Athens. Thucydides reports their complicity in the oligarchic revolution a few months after Lysistrata was performed, and the scholiast comments on their fondness for adultery. 29 They are mentioned again in an unflattering context at Lysistrata 1181, and their name possibly affords Aristophanes the chance for a sexual double-entendre.30 In such circumstances the dinner invitation of the second stanza is suspect from the beginning, and the slamming of the door in the audience's face has its subtle preparation. The repeated and insulting frustration of the audience is Aristophanes' main purpose in this poem; he has taken what was in all probability a stock motif in comedy, the imaginary dinner for the spectators, and interspersed the closing scenes of the play with four imaginative variations on a theme. C. The Wonders of the World (Birds

147Off)

The most sophisticated version of the lyric of insult or abuse is found in the Birds. In this play the invective is focused on individual personalities, as in Acharnions. But in structure, inventiveness of imagery, placement of the stanzas, and the sheer number of persons lampooned, the lyric of the Birds succeeds as comic poetry that for sheer brilliance far surpasses the Antimachus lyric. And the thematic connections with the comedy as a whole are far better established than in either Achamians or Lysistrata,31

» Cf. Thuc. 8.69.3. Cf. van Leeuwen ad loc. 31 For the bird's persona and t h e integration of the chorus as a whole in this play, see H.-J. Newiger, Metapher und Allegorie (Munich 1957) 80ff, and the same author's essay. "Die 'Vögel' u n d ihre Stellung im Gesamtwerk des Aristophanes," in Newiger, ed. Aristophanes und die Alte Komödie (Wege der Forschung CCLXV, Darmstadt 1975) 275. The lyric of insult and abuse in the Birds raises in its imagery the topic of fantasy and the fantastic in literature. For some discussion, see the chapter of Whitman, "Discourse of Fantasy" (note 14, above) 259—280. Whitman emphasizes the structural aspect of the fantastic: " A fantasy, then, is a structure, an imaginatively erected reality akin in a way to the mind's erection of intelligible o r d e r " (261); adopting Baudelaire's distinction in "The Essence of Laughter" between the "significantly c o m i c " (e.g. the mode of satire, directly relevant to reality) and the "absolutely comic" (e.g. the mode of the farcical, the grotesque, or the fantastic poetic creation), Whitman squarely places Aristophanic comedy in the realm of the "absolutely c o m i c " (267ff). He criticizes interpretations of Aristophanic comedy which stress a psychotherapeutic, or cathartic, function as "missing the wholeness" of Aristophanes' "higher slapstick" (274ff); here he prefers to emphasize the "absolutely comic," and perhaps allows the "significantly c o m i c " less importance than it deserves in Aristophanes. Fantasy and the fantastic have also been analyzed recently by T. Todorov, in The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to a Literary Genre, tr. R. Howard (Ithaca 1975), and by Eric S. Rabkin, The Fantastic in Literature (Princeton 1976). The wide variety of texts subjected to analysis in b o t h works, rather curiously, does n o t include Aristo30

28

The first two stanzas of the poem occur after the second series of alazones at 1470ff. The Prometheus scene follows, and is capped by a third stanza (1553ff). A longer scene, containing the embassy of the three gods to Pisthetairos, follows the third stanza, and is itself succeeded by the fourth and final section of the lyric (1694ff). This in turn leads directly to the messenger speech announcing the wedding of Pisthetairos, and to the triumphant finale (1706ff). The lyric is composed predominantly in trochaics. For convenience of inspection and analysis, the poem follows as a whole: Πολλά δή και καινά και θαυ1470 μάστ' έπεπτόμζοθα και δεινά πράγματ' είδομεν. "Εστί yàp δένδρον πεφυκός πωτέρω, Κλεώνυμος, χρήσιμον μεν ούδέν, άλλως δε δειλοί και μέγα. Τούτο μεν ήρος άεί βλαστάνει και συκοφαντεί, τού δε χειμώνος πάλιν τάς άσπίδας φυλλορροε'ι.

1475

1480

"Εστί δ' αύ χώρα προς αύτφ τ φ οκότ(ψ% πόρρω τις èv phanes, but constitutes impressive evidence for the scope of the fantastic. Todorov's work is the narrower of the two, since he defines the fantastic as existing in that moment of uncertainty experienced by a reader who " k n o w s only the laws of nature, c o n f r o n t i n g an apparently supernatural event" (op. cit. 25). The fantastic is nearly allied to the "neighboring genres" of the uncanny and the marvelous, to which it passes after the duration of the reader's uncertainty (ibid). Rabkin's definition of the fantastic, and his description of the range of genres in which it functions, is more satisfactory: " T h e fantastic is a quality of astonishment that we feel when the ground rules of a narrative world are suddenly made to turn about 1 8 0 ° " (op. cit. 41). His discussions of the function of the fantastic in satirical and escape literature are particularly suggestive for Aristophanes. Note particularly the following: "Fantasy is not random freedom from restraint, b u t the continuing diametric reversal of the ground rules within a narrative world. When escape literature is not random b u t is rather the establishment of a narrative world that offers a diametric reversal of the ground rules of the extra-textual world, then escape literature is to an important degree fantastic, and, for its audience, psychologically useful. If we know the world to which a reader escapes, then we know the world from which he c o m e s " (op. cit. 73). The birds' declaration at Birds 755—756 may be regarded as a crystallization of Rabkin's definition of the fantastic, at least in the moral terms applicable to Athens and to Cloudcuckooland. In aesthetic terms, Rabkin's insistence on an ordered reversal of ground rules in the fantastic, and the inverse relationship of the form with the real world, is an important theoretical statement with major implications for the poetics of Aristophanic comedy, since it points to the potential junction of the satirical and the fantastic in a comically multi-valent text.

29

τχι λύχνων έρημίη., 'ένθα τοις ήρωσιν άνθρωποι ξυναριοτώσι και ξύνεισι πλην τής εσπέρας. Ύηνικαϋτα δ' ούκέτ' ην άσφαλές ξυντυγχάνειν. Εί yàp έντύχοι τις ηρω των βροτών νύκτωρ 'Ορέστη, γυμνός ην πληγείς ύπ' αύτοϋ πάντα τάπί δεξιά. *

*

*

*

*

*

Προς δέ τοις Σκιάποσιν λίμνη τις εστ', άλουτος ού φυγαγωγεί Σωκράτης. 'Ένθα και Πείσανδρος ήλθε beò μένος ψυχή ν ίδείν ή ξώντ' è κ. e ίνον προϋλιπε, σφάγι' έχων κάμηλον άμνόν τιν', ής λαιμούς τεμών ωσπερ Ούδυοοεύς άπήλθε, κς,τ άνήλθ' αύτφ κάτωθεν προς τό λαιμά κ της καμήλου Χαιρεφών ή νυκτερίς.

"Εστί δ' έν Φ avalo ι προς τη Κλεψύδρα πανοϋργον έγγλωττογαστόρων γένος, οι θερίξουσίν τε και σπείρουσι και τρυγώσι ταΐς γλώτταιοι συκάξουσί τεβάρβαροι δ' είοίν γένος, Γοργία ι τε και Φίλιπποι. Κάπό των έγγλωττογαστόρων έκείνων των Φιλίππων πανταχού της Αττικής ή γλώττα χωρίς τέμνεται. We've been flying, we've been flying Over land and sea, espying Many a wonder strange and new. First, a tree of monstrous gi'rth, Tall and stout, yet nothing worth,

For 'tis rotten through and through: It has got no heart, and we Heard it called "Cleonymus-tree." In the spring it blooms gigantic, Fig-traducing, sycophantic, Yet in falling leaf-time yields Nothing but a fall of shields. Next a spot by darkness skirted, Spot, by every light deserted, Lone and gloomy, we descried. There the human and divine, Men with heroes, mix and dine Freely, save at even-tide. 'Tis not safe for mortal men To encounter heroes then. Then the great Orestes, looming Vast and awful through the glooming, On their right a stroke delivering, Leaves them palsied, stript, and shivering. *

*

*

Next we saw a sight appalling, Socrates, unwashed, was calling Spirits from the lake below, ('Twas on that enchanted ground Where the Shadow-feet are found). There Peisander came to know If the spirit cowards lack Socrates could conjure back; Then a camel-lamb he slew, Like Odysseus, but withdrew, Whilst the camel's blood upon Pounced the Vampire, Chaerephon. *

*

In the fields of Litigation, Near the Water-clock, a nation With its tongue its belly fills; With its tongue it sows and reaps, Gathers grapes and figs in heaps, With its tongue the soil it tills. For a Barbarous tribe it passes,

*

Philips all and Gorgiases. And from this tongue-bellying band Everywhere on Attic land, People who a victim slay Always cut the tongue away. The parallelism of stanzas is explicit: note the four-fold εστί used to introduce each geographical oddity (cf. 1473, 1482, 1554, 1694). Although the third and fourth stanzas are separated by increasing intervals from the poem's beginning, it is clear that all four are intended to comprise a unit. Indeed, I shall argue that the placement of the stanzas is an important technical feature in the over-all comic design. Before we examine the question of placement, and several other features which contribute to the lyric's unity, let us analyze its sections separately in detail. The Cleonymus Tree, as Whitman rightly remarks, is one of Aristophanes' finest comic images, at once "lyrical, grotesque, and satiric." 3 2 The playwright harps frequently on Cleonymus' cowardice, and sometimes metamorphoses the character: in Acharnians he is linked with a large bird, the φέναξ (88—89), in Clouds the clouds change into deer when they catch sight of him (353—354), in Wasps his name is the answer to the riddle, "What is the same animal that throws away its shield on the earth, in the sky, and on the sea?" (20ff). 3 3 Here he is a tree, located far from the city of Kardia ("Fortitude")—the very idea of specifying a location as άπωτέρω (1474—1475) from somewhere else is slightly absurd—a tree that is big and good-for-nothing. Like almost everything else in the Birds, this wonder can be described as πεφυκός εκτοπον (1473—1474). For, although a strange fantastical creation, the Cleonymus Tree is imagined to obey the laws oiphysis: it blossoms (and battens) in the spring and in the winter it sheds. The superbly humorous concision of the last line is elegantly captured in Whitman's translation: "It leaves—shields."' 34 That the birds commence their strange survey of wonders with a description of an 'έκτοΈον bévbpov is one more illustration of the careful, integrated treatment of the persona of the chorus in this play: they are almost always portrayed in character. 3 5 What other topographical feature on earth would stand out for them more prominently in their fly-overs?36 And the language of the stanza links the choral abuse with the main plot of the comedy. The 32

Whitman 195. For a fuller list of Cleonymus' appearances, see Whitman 184—185. He oddly omits the prior mention of Cleonymus at Birds 289—290: see below. 34 Whitman 185. 35 See note 31, above. 36 Indeed, a single tree is the only prominent feature of the stage setting in the prologue: cf. Birds 1. 33

32

pun on συκοφαντεί (1479), suggesting figs on a tree and also the dastardly activities of Cleonymus, is related to a favorite verbal complex in Aristophanes, in which the evil doings of informers may be conjured up by a mere form of the verb φαίνω: cf. Phanai, the land of the Englottogasters in the fourth stanza of this poem (1694), and compare συκάξουσι. at 1700. An actual scene with a συκοφάντης—the lengthiest of the alazon scenes in the play (1410—1469)—has immediately preceded the strophe itself. This cowardly interloper seeks to be provided with wings, and Pisthetairos ironically grants his wish twice, each time in a metaphorical sense. First he "wings" the informer with words (1437ff), and then with a whip, which has the συκοφάντης "winging away" like a whirling top (1464ff). The informer is good for nothing but arpeφοδικοπανουρΎία (1468); when asked by Pisthetairos why he follows such a dishonest trade, he replies that he knows no other. He cannot even dig; and, besides, informing is the family business! 37 All of which is neatly paralleled by the chorus' remark about Cleonymus and the tree: χρήσιμον ... ούδέν (1476). 3 8 We should also note the precise pairing of gluttony (associated with battening on the proceeds of sycophancy and the growth of the tree) and cowardice (associated with the deciduous leaving of shields) in the poem's first stanza. The last two periods of the verse balance both elements perfectly. For example, τού μεν ηρος (1478) is offset by του δε χειμώνος (1480). The verbs βλαστάνει. and φυΧΚορροεϊare each of interest: βλαστάνει, an uncommon word in prose, had by this date a respectable history of metaphorical usages in serious poetry (cf. Pindar, 0.7.69, N.8.7; Soph. Ant. 296), and so may hint at the more explicit metaphors to come in our passage, whereas φυΧΚορροεϊ seems unparalleled in the fifth century, except in the comic poet Pherecrates. 39 These words, ostensibly describing the life of the tree, neatly frame συκοφαντεί and άσπιδας, terms which are more directly applicable to Cleonymus qua human being, while the pun in συκοφαντεί, hinting at figs sprouting on a tree, serves explicitly to emphasize what M. S. Silk has called the "interaction" of the imagery. 40 Gluttinous growth and cowardice are concisely combined, just before the elaborate working out of the principal image, in the phrase δειλόν και μέγα (1477). Van Leeuwen notes that we might well, like the author of the Suda, have expected δεινόν here (cf. δεινά at 1472), just as, two lines later, the predictable phrase would be σϋκα ... φύε ι, if we should be thinking of the 37

Cf. Birds 1432, 1452. For the verbal possibilities of connecting informing, the verb ^aivoj, and a certain type of bird, compare Acharnians 725—726, and cf. Clouds 109 and Birds 68. 39 See LS] ad loc, which refers to Pherecrates 130.10 (Kock). 40 See M. S. Silk, Interaction in Poetic Imagery (Cambridge 1974). Silk defines interaction as "any local cross-terminological relation between the tenor and vehicle of an image" (79). Unfortunately his perceptive analysis of Greek poetry in this book does not include the plays of Aristophanes. 38

3 Mouhon (Hyp. 68)

33

tree. 41 But if we are thinking of Cleonymus, the substitutions are exactly right, and Aristophanes has taken care to insure that we have him in mind in a particular way. Earlier in the play, an especially remarkable bird has made its appearance (287—290): Ευ. ώ Tìòoeiòov, ετερος αν τις βαπτός όρνις ούτοσί. τις όνομάξεταί ττοθ' ούτος; Επ. ούτοσί κατωφα·γάς. Ευ. εστι yàp κατωφαγάς τις άλλος η Κλεώνυμος; Πι. πώς âv ούν Κλεώνυμος y' ών ούκ άπέβαλε τον λόφον,

290

—Ο Poseidon, here's another; here's a bird of brilliant hue! What's the name of this, I wonder. —That's a Glutton styled by us. —Is there then another Glutton than our own Cleonymus? —Our Cleonymus, I fancy, would have thrown his crest away. Here the same combination of gluttony (κατωφα·γάς) and cowardly behavior (άπέβαλε τον λόφον) is ascribed to Cleonymus. Having visualized him momentarily as a bird, we may be surprised to see him now as a tree; his distinctive traits, however, remain the same. The earlier mention of Cleonymus and the long scene with the sycophant are important anticipations in the play of our poem's first stanza. A more indirect, but thematically significant, resonance of earlier material is also sounded in the first period sung by the chorus: πολλά δη και καινά και θαυμάστ' έπεπτόμεσθα και δεινά πρά-γματ' εϊδομεν.

1470

This can hardly help but recall the opening phrase of Sophocles' celebrated Ode on Man: πολλά τα δεινά κούδέν άνθρώπου δεινότερον πέλει. (Ant. 3 3 2 - 3 3 3 ) Something of an ironic reversal of these lines, in turn, is contained in the skeptical lyric of the chorus of birds near the beginning of the agon (Birds 451-452):42 δολερόν μεν άεί κατά -πάντα δή τρόπον πέφυκεν άνθρωπος. See his note ad loc. Oddly enough, van Leeuwen comments on the echo of Sophocles in the agon, but is silent on the later passage, whose phrasing is much closer to the Sophoclean model. 41

42

34

Full of wiles, full of guiles, at all times, in all ways Are the children of Men. What is the purpose of this two-fold reminiscence by the chorus of the Sophoclean homage to human progress? On one level, of course, the birds are getting their own back. Athenians who knew the poem from Antigone would have recalled that the first antistrophe dealt with man's taming of the animal kingdom, and commenced with the lines: κουφόνων re φνλον òpνίθων άμφφαλών àypeï

... {Ant.

342-343)

The subjugation of men by the birds is part of Pisthetairos' ostensible aim in establishing Cloudcuckooland. But in fact, the play ends with one man's triumph over the birds, just as Sophocleans might have expected. This quizzical irony is confirmed by the substitution of καινά at Birds 1470 for δεινά in Sophocles' poem (although the phrase δεινά πράγματ' at 1472 is added by Aristophanes for good measure). The word καινός recurs throughout the play (only the Clouds presents more occurrences in the Aristophanic corpus). In the Birds the following passage seems particularly to sum up the new and strange qualities of the fantasy of Cloudcuckooland (255-257): ηκει yáp τις δριμύς πρέσβυς καινός -γνώμην καινών ëpycov τ' èyχειρητής For hither has come a shrewd old file, Such a deep old file, such a sharp old file, His thoughts are new, new deeds he'll do. The birds are referred to twice, in close succession, as the καινοϊς θεοις (848, 862); and in a passage that might come from the Clouds Kinesias tells Pisthetairos that he wants wings so that he may hang suspended in the air and pluck soaring, snow-clad preludes for his dithyrambs—so, they will be καινάς ( 1 3 8 3 - 1 3 8 5 ) . But the irony possesses a more acerbic dimension. Everyone knew that Sophocles' praise had its own literary pedigree, since it was to some extent a re-casting of Aeschylus' more somber prelude in the Choephoroe: πολλά μεν yä τρέφει δεινά δειμάτων άχη

... (Cho. 5 8 5 - 5 8 6 )

This stasimon, which compared the ferocity of earth's monsters with dangerous human pride, and proceeded to exemplify the latter with mythological paradeigmata, may be recalled in a stroke of dark humor by the 35

chorus when they sing of man's δολερός τρόπος at Birds 4 5 I f f . The tone is lighter toward the end of the play, where Aristophanes has chosen to open the abuse lyric with a phrase more overtly reminiscent of Sophocles, only to deflate our expectations with a catalogue of human fakes, imposters, and masters of gab. If the Sophoclean echoes are taken half seriously, we are back to that Aristophanic stand-by, the abuse of the audience. For the birds, ostensibly declaiming the wonders of the world with a solemn literary allusion, manage by their mythological paradeigmata to convince us more than ever that the world is full of warts. The second stanza of the poem (1482ff) is devoted to abusing another of the poet's favorite targets, the ruffian Orestes. 43 Like Cleonymus, he has been mentioned before in this play, in the parabasis, when the birds proclaim the useful skills they are able to teach mankind (712): είτα δ' Όρέστχι

χλαϊναν

ύφαινε ιν, ϊνα μή ρ ι γ ώ y άποδύχι

And Orestes may weave him a wrap to be warm, when he's out on his thievish excursions. Orestes, according to the scholiast, "feigned madness and robbed people of their clothes in the dark." 4 4 This provided Aristophanes with the opportunity for a joke on Orestes μαινόμενος in the second stanza of the abuse lyric in the Achamians (1166ff). Here the street ruffian is called η ρ ω ς ; his nocturnal assaults, which apparently involved beating people up and stripping them, are playfully associated with a peculiar folk belief that it was dangerous to "encounter" a hero returned from the dead at night. 4 5 A " h e r o " in this sense was a revenant, from whom brutality and perhaps even paralysis could be expected. The motif of the ghost will be more fully exploited in the third stanza of our poem, where the cowardly Peisander is cast in the role of the heroic Odysseus, attempting to summon his own spirit from the underworld (cf. 1553ff). Here it is sufficient to note that the treatment of Orestes, though not as imaginatively conceived as that of Cleonymus, contains at least one similar motif. With Cleonymus there was an ironic contrast between the size of the impressive tree and its useless, deciduous nature: with Orestes a similar irony is evoked when the pleasant 43

See the discussion above on Orestes at Achamians 1166ff. On the scholia here, however, see the comments of H. Hofmann, Mythos und Komödie·. Untersuchungen zu den Vögeln des Aristophanes (Spudasmata XXXIII, Hildesheim 1976) 200ff. 45 See the discussion of this passage by J. Taillardat, Les Images d'Aristophane2 (Paris 1965) 238—239, with his citation of the scholion to Birds 1490 and later texts from Menander and Athenaeus. Hofmann (note 44, above) asserts that popular beliefs about the ήρωες are parodied here; normally agents of good will, the heroes are contrasted with Orestes, the stereotype of a ruffian with a heroic name. Much of Hofmann's argument, however, depends on the attribution of a papyrus fragment to Aristophanes' lost play, Heroes·, cf. Mythos und Komödie 200—206. 44

36

association of heroes by day (cf. 1485ff) is shattered at night, when "Orestes" (probably a nickname or a typical name for a hooligan) turns out to be a " h e r o " in a special sense. 46 The opening words of this stanza are parallel in structure to the introduction of the Cleonymus Tree in the strophe. First the locus of the satire is given: έ'στι γαρ δέδρον ... τι for Cleonymus ( 1 4 7 3 ) , έ'στι δ' αύ χώρα . . . τις for Orestes ( 1 4 8 2 ) . In both instances, there follow more "specific" geographical indications: cf. Καρδίας άπωτέρω (1474—1475) with προς αύτφ τ φ σκότω πόρρω ... è ν τχι λύχνων έρημίφ (1482—1484). From here on the two stanzas proceed rather differently, since the Cleonymus Tree serves as an immediately compressed image which can be manipulated from the start (and his name is therefore introduced comparatively soon), whereas Aristophanes must lay more groundwork for the joke involving Orestes. Still, it is interesting that balanced periods of exactly the same length are used in the final four lines of each stanza to clinch the satirical joke (cf. 1478ff with 1490ff). The Orestes stanza contains more of a surprise, since it is only with the second mention of ηρως at 1490, the word νύκτωρ at 1491, and the mention of Orestes' name ( 1 4 9 1 ) that the joke is fully under-way. Yet there is a sense of climactic (or anti-climactic) fun as well, since the silly geographical description at the start should signal us that some prankster is afoot in the darkness. The pleonasm προς αϋτφ τ φ σκότψ . . . έν τχι λύχνων έρημία, in its second phrase, perhaps echoes the opening of Aeschylus' Prometheus Bound: χθονός μέν εις τηλονρόν ήκομεν πέδον, Σκύθην ές οΐμον, äßporov e£ç έρημίαν. {P.D.

1-2)47

Aristophanes had in fact used something like this phrase before at Acharnions 7 0 4 (τχι Σκνθών έρημúj), and variations of it may have become proverbial to describe an utterly deserted locale. 4 8 If an echo of Prometheus is present, it is not only generally appropriate to the mock-heroic motif in the stanza as a whole, but is consonant with the spoofing of Sophoclean poetry in the strophe, and with the amusing entrance of Prometheus, cowering under a parasol (σκιάδειον), immediately after the Orestes passage at 1494ff.49 Whether or not we are reminded for a moment of a setting for Prometheus, the absurdly overblown metaphor of an exotic land located near darkness Orestes' real name may have been Diocles; cf. Isaeus 8.3, and van Leeuwen's note to Acharnions 1166ff. 4 7 I have used the text of D. Page (Oxford 1972). 4 8 Cf. van Leeuwen's note to Acharnions 704. 4 9 On the allusion to Antigone, see the discussion above; we will comment below on the mock-heroic content of the Prometheus scene, which is consistent with the tone of both of the stanzas which frame it. 46

37

itself, far away, and in a country barren of lights (all this, as we shall soon realize, amounts to saying "the streets of Athens by night") is hard to reconcile with the phrase πλήι> της èanépaç at 1487; by rights, it should be dark all the time in this country! That we are not in fact in an exotic land, but right at home in Athens, becomes rapidly clear, and the useful ambiguity of the name Orestes contributes to Aristophanes' satiric point: ordinary men may think they are enjoying the company of heroes, only to be robbed and paralyzed by the same "heroes" in the dark. If this sentiment is intended to apply to Athenians and their actual contemporaries, we may have something of a foreshadowing of the third stanza, where Peisander, a politican in real life, is absurdly imagined as a cowardly, mock-heroic Odysseus. But this is to j u m p forward, and to interpret the abusive fun of the second stanza rather more in terms of what follows. For the moment, it remains a light-hearted spoof. In a country of perpetual gloom, a Hyperborean moment of happy concourse between men and heroes is disrupted by a common thief, bearing a heroic name, springing out of the darkness. 5 0 Orestes, like Cleonymus, turns out to be no hero; as in the first stanza, our expectations are deflated, this time with the addition of the element of physical violence. The scene between Pisthetairos and Prometheus now interrupts the abuse lyric, and in the course of it the altruistic Titan gives the hero of the play some important advice. Zeus is at his wit's end: all the gods are starving since the birds' blockade has deprived them of sacrifices from earth. A divine embassy is on its way to sue for peace; Pisthetairos is in a commanding position to acquire the ultimate power (Basileia). Once again, as Promethus says himself, he is εϋνους to men (1545) and has taken the risk of incurring Zeus' anger by visiting Pisthetairos. All this is superb parody, of course: Prometheus is portrayed as a rather rambling, pretentious sneak, and a bit of a coward as well. In fact he reminds us of the alazones earlier in the play. Although he is not ejected by force, there is a buffoonish quality to his exit as well as his entrance, as he hides under a parasol (σκιάδαον: 1508 and 1550) so that Zeus will not notice him. As he leaves, he thinks he may pass for the maidservant of a κανηφόρος in the festival procession (1551) and Pisthetairos offers him a δίφρος to make the act more realistic (1552). As in the second stanza of our poem, legendary "heroism" has turned out to be something very different from what we expected. The next scene will carry the debunking even further, since the embassy reveals the gods themselves as fools. But first the chorus intervenes to tell us of their third wonder of the world, the country of the Shadow-feet (1553ff). 50

The suggestion that the locale of the second stanza may be the land of the Hyperboreans is put forward by Hofmann (note 44, above) 203.

38

The introduction to this stanza displays a simple variation of the usual structure: geographical detail (προς δέ τοις Σκιάποσιν), given first this time, and then the actual locus (λίμνη τις). Once again, the setting is exotic, and, as in the second stanza, dark. We are informed about the Shadow-feet by the scholiast and by Pliny: they were a remote tribe in Libya, who used one of their web-footed legs (according to Pliny, their only one) as a parasol to protect them from the burning sun. 5 1 If we may judge from references in Ktesias, Archippus, and Antiphon the Sophist, this exotic people had provoked considerable notice in Greece by the end of the fifth century, perhaps in the course of the growing interest in ethnography sparked by the sophists. 52 Their comic possibilities would not have been lost on Aristophanes' sense of fantasy, especially if he knew the report available to Pliny of unidexters employing their limb alternately as a leaping-pole and as a sunshade. Perhaps the element of the parasol, common to all accounts of the Shadow-feet, is meant to remind us of Prometheus' absurd use of that item in the scene that has just preceded. But we have barely begun. For what we are shown in this remote land is a sand-storm of absurdities. The third stanza contains far more disparate material than either of the first two, but is to be compared with the Cleonymus image in the fertility of imagination and suppleness of technique that it displays. Socrates is balanced by Chaerephon, Peisander by Odysseus. A strange psychagogic rite links the unwashed philosopher and the cowardly politician, and it is set simultaneously in the ambiance of a) Odysseus' fabulous, heroic adventures and b) the equally exotic and semibestial barbaroi of Libya. The focus of abuse is plainly Peisander, but the lyric tails off to an absurd anti-climax with a slap at Socrates' hanger-on, Chaerephon. 5 3 The syntax helps to impose a desperate logic on this crazy pot-pourri. As in the second stanza, 'ένθα fixes our attention on the locale after the threeline geographical description (cf. 1556 with 1485). The three main verbs that convey the chief actions in the vignette of Peisander/Odysseus are ηλθ€ (1556), άπήλθ€ (1561), άνηλθ' (1562). 5 4 And a set of semi-logical associations is imposed on the account itself. The dim setting of the underworld is suggested by the lake, the "shadow" component in Σκώ/ποσιν, and the act of psychagogy (1553—1555). This fits well with the parody of the nekuia in Odyssey 11, where Odysseus, after performing a sacrifice at a trench, is visited by the souls of the dead who ascend to him from

si Cf. Pliny, N.H. 7.2.23. 52 See Antiphon, FVS 87 Β 45, a one-word fragment; cf. Kranz' note ad loc. 53 Compare the structure of the second stanza of the Antimachus lyric in the Acharnians. 54 If the mss. are correct at 1561.

39

Hades.55 Peisander, some may recall, is also the name of an obscure suitor who is sent to the underworld in the epic's great battle. 56 After the mention of Odysseus at 1561, the appearance of Chaerephon the bat in the last verse—anti-climactic in the extreme—has its own literary appropriateness, since a famous simile compared the souls of the slain suitors to squeaking νυχτερίδες at the beginning of Homer's second nekuia.57 Chaerephon is also a "logical" companion for Socrates, and his well-known pallid appearance had been spoofed in the Clouds in terms that virtually linked him with the underworld (501—504): Στ. ην επιμελής ώ και προθύμως μανθάνω, τω τών μαθητών έμφερής -/ενήσομαι; Σω. ούδέν διοίσεις Χαιρεφώντος την φύαιν. Στ. ο'ίμοί κ,ακοδαίμων ήμιθνης ^ενήσομαι. —If I'm extremely careful and attentive, Which of your students shall I most resemble? —Why, Chaerephon. You'll be his very image. —What! I shall be half-dead! O luckless me! But the logic I have described is rather flimsy, as it ought to be. Disturbing inconsistencies, all with an abusive or satiric purpose, continue to impinge on this shadowy world. Socrates is pictured as ψυχαγωγεί^; the poem plays off the word's old meaning of "conducting souls" against the rather more recent metaphorical meaning in philosophy and rhetoric, "leading" or "charming" souls by persuasion.58 The former sense is appropriate to the Homeric ethos, the latter to the efforts of the charlatans Socrates and Peisander. The philosopher stands by a lake, and yet is άλουτος (1554), a slap at the indifference to personal appearance that is relentlessly lampooned in the Clouds. Indeed, in the very expression Σκιάποσιν there may be a sly poke at Socrates' lack of shoes (cf. Clouds 103, and compare 363 and 835ff): his feet are shadowy because they are dirty. 59 But the most imaginative, and devastating, incongruities concern Peisander. His sacrifice of a camel-kid is ludicrous, although perhaps appropriate in a remote, desert land. Best of all, he differs from both Socrates and Odysseus in that he is a very special type of psychagogue: he needs to catch sight of his own φνχή, which has abandoned him while he is still alive (1557—1558)!

In the Homeric episode, darkness is emphasized at the beginning; cf. Od. 11.12ff. 56 Cf. Od. 22.243, 268. " Od. 24.6ff. 5 8 For the contrast, see Plato, Laws 909b. 5 9 This is one of the two direct mentions of Socrates in Aristophanes outside the Clouds. The other is at Frogs 1491, where he is chattering. Earlier in Birds (1282), the poet coins the verb έσωκράτων, again in the context of shabbiness, to describe men in their newfound ornithomania. 55

40

Here the range of meaning of ψυχή is doubly advantageous, since metaphorical interpretation of the scene can simultaneously convey that a) Peisander is a coward and b) he belonges to the realm of the "living d e a d : " He is indeed an exotic creature, a fitting personality for the birds' catalogue of wonders, since the desertion by his soul seems to put him on earth and in Hades at the same time. 6 0 Peisander's cowardice links him with Cleonymus, and the paradox of the third stanza—a man whose ψνχή has abandoned him while he is still alive— reminds us to some extent of the paradox of the first: a tree/man that abandons leaves/shields. The mock-heroic ethos derived from references to the Odyssey parallels the pseudo-heroic elements in the second stanza, which abused Orestes. Clearly, in addition to the parallels that emerge from meter, syntax, and the general content of each section of the p o e m , there exist continuities in specific motifs as well. 6 1 L e t us continue our analysis of the lyric, and consider its final segment, as well as the embassy scene which directly precedes it. The Shadow-feet, an exotic, remote tribe, give way to the Englottogasters in the final stanza, an even more fabulous people who are all tongue, and who are specifically called βάρβαροι ... yévoç ( 1 7 0 0 ) . The stanza follows the embassy of the gods, in which Pisthetairos accomplishes his ultimate work of persuasion: heeding Prometheus' advice, he prevails on Poseidon, Herakles, and the barbaric Triballian to agree to his marriage with Basileia (1565—1693). It is significant that the art of persuasion in this scene involves sophistry at two crucial points. First, the tie-breaking vote is cast by the Triballian, whose nonsensical esperanto (1678—1679) is rapidly converted by Herakles into a " y e s " vote. Poseidon objects, but his sarcastic comment on swallows ( 1 6 8 1 ) is turned around on him by Pisthetairos, who remarks that the Triballian doubtless meant to enjoin them to give Basileia to the swallows, i.e. to the birds ( 1 6 8 2 ) . 6 2 J u s t before this, Pisthetairos has secured Herakles' vote by some legal razzle-dazzle, in which he interprets for him Solon's law on inheritance, and tricks him into believing that he will never inherit anything from his father Zeus because he is a bastard (1649—1675): he may as well vote to surrender Basileia now. Pisthetairos' sophistic use of his tongue is significant as background for our lyric's fourth stanza on the Englottogasters; but this feature of the embassy A similar m e t a p h o r inspires a passage in an a b u s e lyric in the Frogs s o m e years later, when the chorus refers to " t h e corpses o f the u p p e r w o r l d " , i.e. the audience. Cf. Frogs 4 2 4 : èv τοις άνω vex. polo ι. 61 F o r example, the m o t i f of sacrifice is shared by the third and fourth sections of the p o e m , the motif o f shadowy darkness by the second and third. S e e further H o f m a n n (note 4 4 , above) 2 1 4 . 6 2 U n f o r t u n a t e l y , Poseidon's c o m m e n t is not fully intelligible b e c a u s e o f textual corruption. 60

41

scene should also be interpreted in the context of the play as a whole, in which the manipulation of logoi and nomoi is a particularly important motif. We may remember the chorus' assertion of the benefits of Cloudcuckooland in the parabasis (Birds 755—756): baa yàp ένθάδ' έστίν αισχρά τ op νόμορ κρατούμενα, ταύτα πάντ' èariu nap' ήμίν TOIOLV ορνιοιν καλά. All that here is reckoned shameful, all that here the laws condemn, With the birds is right and proper, you may do it all with them. And Pisthetairos comments on the uses of logoi to the incredulous informer ( 1 4 4 6 - 1 4 5 0 ) : Συ. λόγο un τ dpa και πτεροϋντα ι; Πι. φήμ' έγώ. ύπό yàp \óyu)V ò ι>ούς (re) μετεωρίζεται έπαίρεταί τ' άνθρωπος· οϋτω και σ' έγώ άναπτερώσας βούλομαι χρηστοϊς λόγοις τρέψαι προς ëpyov νόμιμον.

1450

—So then by talk they are winged. —Exactly so. Through talk the mind flutters and soars aloft, And all the man takes wing. And so even now I wish to tum you, winging you by talk, To some more honest trade. That Pisthetairos' practice in the embassy scene is less idealistic than his intentions for the informer scarcely matters: in the self-aggrandizing world of Aristophanic heroes, Pisthetairos is simply the biggest alazon of all. 63 What is important is his emphasis on the power of the logos: the panegyric above might come from Gorgias the sophist, who is mentioned by name in the final stanza of our lyric. 64 The Englottogasters are thus prepared for thematically by a striking example of the use of logos in the embassy scene, and their connection with the law-courts (directly conveyed by their location near the Klepsydra: cf. 1694—1695) is foreshadowed by Pisthetairos' insistence on nomos in the preceding scene (cf. 1650, 1656, 1660ff). There may be further echoes of the embassy scene in the overtones of gluttony involved in the name èyyλωττo-yaστόpωv, and in the activities listed at 1697—1699, all having Compare the general appreciations of Whitman and K. J . Dover of the Aristophanic hero; cf. the latter's Aristophanic Comedy (Berkeley 1972) 30ff. 6 4 See W. Arrowsmith, "Aristophanes' Birds: The Fantasy Politics of Eros", Arion N.S. 1/1 (1973) 119—167. Arrowsmith well emphasizes the importance of logoi in his interpretation of the play. 63

42

to do with the cultivation of food; during the embassy, Herakles' gluttony and stupidity so annoy Poseidon that he impatiently exclaims at 1604: ηλίθιος και γάστρις et. In addition, the Englottogasters, at least ostensibly, are non-Greek-speakers (cf. βάρβαροι... -γένος at 1700); the Triballian in the embassy is one of the gods of the βάρβαροι, as Prometheus has informed us earlier (1525ff), and we have just been exposed to his strange "language" (cf. 1615, 1 6 2 8 - 1 6 2 9 , 1 6 7 8 - 1 6 7 9 ) . The focus of the final stanza of the abuse lyric is the pair of sophists, Gorgias and his son (or disciple) Philip. Though little is known of the latter, he and his master, the famous rhetorician who had caused a sensation in Athens on his visit thirteen years before, are selected to typify the Englottogasters, who feed their stomachs by using their tongues, viz. grow rich by informing. The two sophists had already been mentioned together at Wasps 421, where it appears that Philip had recently lost a legal case. From the beginning of the stanza, we are made aware that the Englottogasters, ostensibly a barbarian tribe, are Athenian in spirit. The geographical details, Phanai and Klepsydra (1694—1695), once again introduce this section of the poem. Phanai, a city on Chios, sets up the pun on informers which is clinched by συκάξουσι at 1699; this variation of a favorite Aristophanic joke may be compared with συκοφαντεί in the first stanza, of Cleonymus (cf. 1479). The technique is similar in both stanzas: Phanai, like the city Kardia at 1474, is part of a pun that is crucial for the satire. But unlike Kardia, which was in the Thracian Chersonese, Phanai may have had certain topical overtones: the Chians have already been mentioned at Birds 879—880, and we know that they enjoyed special status as Athenian allies. 65 The Klepsydra was an Athenian landmark whose very mention suggests the law-courts; at Wasps 93, for instance, Philokleon's mind is said to fly to the Klepsydra by night. The word navovpyov (1695) shows us in advance what legal maneuvers to expect from the Englottogasters; they are "tongues" that manipulate the law for their own profit, chopping logic for criminal ends. 66 The compact structure of the verse insures that a rapid series of double entendres is appreciated. Repetition of words is prominent: cf. έγγλοττο-γαστόρων at 1 6 9 5 - 1 6 9 6 and 1 7 0 2 - 1 7 0 3 , γένος at 1696 and 1700, 7 λ ώ τ τ α ι ο ι at 1698—1699 and γ λ ώ τ τ α at 1705, Φίλιπποι at 1701 and Φιλίππων at 1703. Alliteration is also an effective device to fix in our minds the very name of this wondrous race: πανοϋρ-γον έγγλωττογαστόpων γένος (1695—1696). Alliteration is combined with syntactical parallelism in the list of the tribe's "agricultural" activities, culminating in the term which clinches their identity as a race of informers (1697—1699): 65 66

See van Leeuwen's note to Birds 8 7 9 f f , and Thuc. 6.85.2. Compare οτρεψοδικοπανουρητία of the informer at 1468.

43

ol θβρίξουαίν ρουοι

re

και

oiréí-

κ α ί τ ρ ν γ ώ σ ι τ α ϊ ς

jraioi

γλώτ-

συκάξουσίτ€·

Line 1700 further specifies that they axe a race of βάρβαροι, an ingenious touch, since the word primarily signifies "non-Greek-speaking," a nice detail for a tribe that uses the tongue so much. With the punning mention of Vopyiai re και Φίλιπποι (which may suggest γεωργοί re και φίλιπποι, perfectly logical epithets for an agricultural people), we are back to Athens again. Although Gorgias came from Sicily, he could scarcely be called "nonGreek-speaking;" the other, less neutral sense of βάρβαρος surfaces by implication. As in the first two stanzas, the coup-de-grâce is administered, almost literally, in the last four lines of the lyric, forming a complete sentence divided into two equal periods, and further emphasized by alliteration ( 1 7 0 2 - 1 7 0 5 ) :

πανταχού

έγγλωττογαστότων Φιλίππων της Αττικής ή

Ύλώττα

χωρίς

κάπό

των

ρων

έκείνων

τέμνεται.

A double meaning lingers even here, since the words can be taken as a metaphor ("the tongue of Attica is everywhere cut out," i.e. because of the Englottogasters/informers/sophists, Athens is reduced to a stunned silence, and must suffer the fate of a sacrificial animal), or as a humorous reference to the ritual practice of dedicating the tongue of sacrificial victims to either the priest or a deity. 6 7 Furthermore, even if we adopt the second interpretation and consider the lines a humorous, aetiological absurdity whose principal effect is bathos, there may lurk a further, less frivolous hint. The audience will have known that Philip lost his law-suit, and Aristophanes' repetition of his name (1703) as well as his emphasis on γλώττα in the stanza as a whole may lead some in the audience to understand the conclusion thus: "The sophists have given rise to the Attic custom of cutting out the tongue, because it is what they themselves deserve." 6 8 The mention of Attica in the penultimate line makes explicit the earlier hints of a topical concern with Athenian politics, and it is significant that in this stanza of the abuse lyric we come closest to an overt denunciation of contemporary Athenians. The earlier stanzas treated Cleonymus, Orestes, and Peisander under the humorous mask of exotic wonders, located far away; despite the presence of an absurdly named "tribe," the climactic

« Cf. the priest's remark at Peace 1060: ή Ύλώττα χωρίς τέμνεται. 68 The hint is essentially proleptic: if the sophists deserve this punishment, they may receive it. Such an interpretation is fully reconcilable, in comedy at least, with the more obvious "aetiology" of the passage.

44

stanza, at both its beginning (Κλεψύδρα) and its conclusion (Αττικής), virtually drops the mythological mask and directly abuses contemporary personalities. 69 It may be no accident that certain sections of the embassy scene, which has directly preceded this stanza, resemble nothing so much as the sophistic debates of Thucydides' History, in which real states bargain for alliance in their pursuit of power during the Peloponnesian War. 70 The hint of punishment for the Englottogasters at the conclusion of the abuse lyric is not to be taken very seriously, however. The greatest tonguewagger of the play, Pisthetairos, is permitted his triumphal apotheosis in the éxodos which follows: he may even say ά-γαμαι 8è λόγωι» (1744) as he thanks the chorus for their encomiastic wedding-hymn. The thematic relevance of the lyric, in so far as we may detect irony and acerbity in its content, is complemented by the general good fun of abuse. This complementarity may strike some as illogical. But such illogic permeates Aristophanic comedy. It permits, for example, bigger alazones to punish smaller ones, as in the long series of imposter scenes in this play. The Birds as a whole, in company with Lysistrata and other Aristophanic comedies, displays a mixture of topical satire and unadulterated fantasy, elements which can co-exist fully and constructively. The abuse lyric we have analyzed is an especially good illustration of this feature of Aristophanic poetry. The poem shows us a climactic movement from relatively harmless cowardice (Cleonymus), through random private violence (Orestes), to the insidious aspects of public life (the cowardly Peisander and the vicious sophists/informers). 7 1 Clearly the abuse lyric contains an element of serious satire, and the ominous note in one interpretation of the close underlines it for us. But even the conclusion, as we have seen, is a double entendre. Just as clearly, the lyric is also meant as a jeu d'esprit, a fabulous recital of "wonders" fully appropriate to the bird-chorus that utters it. 7 2 The climactic sense we derive from the stanzas' content may be compared,

69

On the probable effects of the "decree of Syrakosios" on the poet's freedom of speech in 414 B.C., see the contrasting opinions of W. W. Merry, ed. Birds4 (Oxford 1904) 3ff, and H.-J. Newiger, in his Wege der Forschung essay (note 31, above) 277. I incline toward Newiger's view, i.e. that the decree has little relevance for the thematic interpretation of the Birds. 70 See particularly Pisthetairos' statements on the origins of war and on to dikaion at 1596ff, and compare the speeches in Thuc. 1. 71 There is, of course, no evidence whatever that Gorgias, at least, was an informer; and we know a considerable amount about him, thanks to Plato. This sort of inaccuracy, as any reader of the Clouds will know, would have been the last thing to bother Aristophanes. It suffices that the connection between courts, informers, and sophists be established as credible: logoi are important for all three. 72 Cf. Whitman 194.

45

too, with the comic effect achieved by the placement of the poem's separate parts. In the first regard, the increasingly acerbic tone of the satire resembles a crescendo; but the stanzas' placement produces a sense of humorous anti-climax, in a staccato pattern. Two stanzas establish the groundwork, and insure that those parallels which are essential for appreciating the entire poem as a unit will be understood upon their recurrence (e.g. the opening geographical details, the mock-heroic motifs). After a comparatively short scene (Prometheus), the chorus plunges back in with a third stanza. Will they never give up? The longer embassy scene intervenes, and we hear the chorus once again—now like Henri Bergson's "Jack-in-thebox"—reasserting itself for the conclusion of the catalogue. 73 The splitting of the stanzas, a technique we noted above in the discussion of the lyric from Lysistrata, is here employed to maximum advantage for comic effect. In the end, our assessment of the poem's tone, and of its relation to the main action, need not proceed from a forced choice between serious satire and comic fantasy. Such a choice has led too many critics of the Birds badly astray, and has hampered such analysis as there has been of Aristophanic poetry. The structure and content of the lyric we have just analyzed plainly refute the necessity for such reductionism, and the poetic techniques we have observed rather affirm that Aristophanes' peculiar gift is to have wedded the two elements of satire and fantasy so indissolubly that they are synergetic. It is the very fusion of topical reference and mythological travesty, achieved through a riot of puns and through the poet's metaphorical imagination, that gives the lyric in the Birds its distinct power and charm.

D.

Conclusion

This introduction to Aristophanic poetry has analyzed the playwright's technique in one particular section of three plays: the lyric of insult and abuse placed near the comedies' conclusion. We have tried to explicate in detail the features of each poem that render the lyrics especially illustrative paradigms of the techniques of comic poetry, and so have emphasized the poems' structure and imagery in the analysis. Our conclusions about the thematic relevance of the lyric in the Birds are especially important for a balanced, comprehensive assessment of Aristophanic comedy, although they must of necessity remain preliminary, since we have not attempted to offer a full-scale interpretation of that play. The fusion of satire and fantasy which is consistently exhibited at every level of the text, and which is purposefully enlarged from the smallest verbal units (e.g. individual puns) to greater ones (e.g. one individual stanza, or the lyric in its entirety, and its relationships

73

46

See H. Bergson, Le Rire (Paris 1900).

with the surrounding scenes), would require a central position in any such full-scale reading. Our focus here, however, has been on a group of relatively short texts from several plays, which seemed to merit consideration together. We have reviewed evidence which clearly establishes that the poems are carefully composed and structured, and that they contain a variety of motifs and details which link them to the main action of their respective plays. These connections are especially skilful and suggestive in the case of the abuse lyric in the Birds. In addition, our analysis has demonstrated the artistry with which the poems, and their separate parts, are arranged to lead to a comic climax, or to anti-climactic bathos. The unity and compression of the poems have been examined and appraised. And we have seen how, through several techniques, Aristophanes is able to re-use his own materiell, and imaginatively to vary the tone and content of abuse, some form of which was probably an ancient constituent of comedy. 7 4 Let us turn now to a more intensive examination of poetic structure in comedy and political reference in the Lysistrata.

74

For comment, see Cornford (note 1, above) 83—91.

47

CHAPTER 2

Poetic Structure and Political Reference in Lysistrata Lysistrata is not as overtly political as earlier plays, in that fewer individual public figures are specifically satirized; for instance, in the abuse lyric at Lys. 1043ff, the audience is the lampoon's target, and there is little topical reference. 1 But, in the sense that Lysistrata is a "peace play" and is replete with allusions to a century of Greek history, the comedy surely contains a significant political dimension. As has been recognized by some critics, this dimension has little to do with a specific program or policy, even though the play plainly advocates an end to the war and contains a number of explicit references to panhellenism. 2 Aristophanes, however, bothers himself as little with the real means to be employed for these ends as he does with the logic of the sex strike (how can the women withhold themselves from absent husbands?), or with a coherent program for revising the status of women in Athens. 3 In Lysistrata real problems are "solved" through fantastic means, whose plausibility is achieved through an array of imaginative techniques in the drama's poetry. The structure of the play depends on an elaborate series of parallels between the political sphere (war between Athens and Sparta) and the domestic sphere (conflict between male and female). 4 The semi-choruses of old men and old women, which do not unite until late in the play, constitute a visual emblem of strife; they are balanced by the contingents of Athenian and Spartan negotiators in the final episodes. 5 Political ens is plausibly blamed by Lysistrata for the destruction of domestic erös(99ff); her plan entails the use of domestic ens t o create political diallagë, and to restore erös ( 5 5 I f f ) .

1 Cf. Chapter 1, section B. The only overt political reference in the abuse lyric is to the Carystians at 1059ff, and this is colored by ironic politeness; cf. Thuc. 8.69.3. 2 For a comprehensive and sensible appraisal of the political references in Lysistrata see the recent article of A. H. Sommerstein, "Aristophanes and the Events of 411", JHS 97 (1977) 112—126. For the general ethos of politics, as opposed to any specific "program" see Whitman 214. 3 K . J . Dover, Aristophanic Comedy (Berkeley 1972) 160. 4 The balanced structure of Lysistrata has been noted in general by many critics: see, for example, Wilamowitz, Lysistrate (Berlin 1927) 52; T. Gelzer, Aristophanes der Komiker (Stuttgart 1971) col. 1483. For comment on the peculiar structure of the parabasis, see T. Gelzer, Der epirrhematische Agon bei Aristophanes (Munich 1960) 210, note 4. 5 See C. W. Dearden, The Stage of Aristophanes (London 1976) 1 6 7 - 1 6 9 .

48

A. The Wool Simile

(567-586)

Lysistrata's ambitions are not limited to the sex strike. In her conversation with the Proboulos, she scarcely mentions women's denial of men. Instead, she presents an indictment of men's management of state affairs, and a justification for women's taking over the treasury to become the saviors of Greece (cf. 41, 498). The women will become public stewards, as they have all along been stewards of the household (493ff). The core of Lysistrata's presentation is her elaborate comparison of government with the preparation of a ball of wool that will be made into a chlaina, or cloak, for the demos. This extended simile, which runs for twenty verses, is the longest explicit comparison in Aristophanes' extant plays. Lysistrata's explication is interrupted twice by the Proboulos, who asks incredulously for further details (cf. 571—572, 574). At the end of the simile, the Proboulos impatiently dismisses the heroine's version of a purified state; he puns on τολυπεύειν (587), charging the women with deception and adding that they have nothing to do with war anyway (588). At this point, the argument mounts to an abusive climax, with Lysistrata at first describing the suffering for women in the war, and then driving off the Proboulos with a mocking invitation to his own funeral (599ff). The long simile's closest analogue in Aristophanes is the image of true and counterfeit coins at Frogs 718ff, and it is illuminating for our analysis of Lysistrata's comparison to consider the later passage first in some detail (Frogs 7 1 8 - 7 2 6 ) : πολλάκις y' ήμίν εδοξεν ή πόλις ττεπονθένai ταύτόν εις τε τών πολιτών τούς καλόνς re κά-γαθούς ε'ίς τε τάρχαϊον νόμισμα και το καινόν χρυσίον. οϋτε yàp τούτοισιν ούσιν ού κεκφδηλευμένοις, άλλά καλλίστοις άπάντων, ώς δοκει, νομισμάτων και μόνοις όρθώς κοπεϊσι και κεκωδωνισμένοις èv τε τοις Έ λ λ η σ ι και τοις βαρβάροισι πανταχού χρώμεθ' ούδέν, άλλα τούτοις τοις πονηροίς χαλκίοις χθες τε και πρώην κοπείσι τφ κάκιστη κομμάτι.

720

725

Often it has crossed my fancy, that the city loves to deal With the very best and noblest members of her commonweal Just as with our ancient coinage, and the newly-minted gold. Yea for these, our sterling pieces, all of pure Athenian mould, All of perfect die and metal, all the fairest of the fair, All of workmanship unequalled, proved and valued everywhere Both amongst our own Hellenes and Barbarians far away, These we use not: but the worthless pinchbeck coins of yesterday, Vilest die and basest metal, now we always use instead. 4 Moulton {Hyp. 68)

49

Advice on state affairs is here too delivered within the context of a comparison to οικεία πράγματα; the chorus develops their plea to honor the nobler elements in Athens for eleven more verses, to line 737. As in Lysistrata, there is an exhortation to weed out insidious troublemakers from the city. But there are considerable differences between the two images in context, purpose, and effect. First, the passage in the Frogs occurs in the parabasis, where the poet is ordinarily expected to offer advice, rather than in dramatic dialogue. The comparison is preceded by a rather portentous introduction (πολλάκις γ ' ήμίν έ'δοζεν, 718) and is somewhat static. One basic similarity is stated, and then expanded; in Lysistrata, as we shall see, several different stages comprise the whole image (washing, beating, plucking, carding, weaving), and the rhetoric's climactic effect is greater. The most significant difference between the two passages is one of tone. The advice in the Frogs has always been interpreted as serious; indeed, the antepirrhema in which it appears corresponds structurally to an even more urgent passage pleading for political unity: both sections close with dark hints of the possibility of disaster for Athens (cf. 703— 705 and 736). The coin comparison displays no whimsical, imaginative leap into the fantastic, and one may note the number of terms which connote Athenian social distinctions in real life. 6 We shall see that the passage in Lysistrata is not purely whimsical either. However, its ingenious method, which combines state affairs and private matters far more subtly, produces an image that is at once kinetic and organic. Lysistrata's speech actually involves two main similes (note ω aire ρ at 567 and 574), and a short internal comparison (ώοπερ at 583). The first simile occurs after the Proboulos inquires how the women are capable of resolving τεταραγμέι>α πράγματα πολλά (565): Πρ. πώς ούν ύμείς δύναται παϋσαι τ er αραγμένα 565 •πράγματα πολλά èv ταΐς χώραις και διαλϋσαι; Αυ. φαύλως πάνυ. Πρ. πώς; άποδειξορ. Αιι. ώσπερ κλωστήρ', όταν ήμίν y rerapayμένος, ώδε λαβοϋσαι, ùneveynoûaat τοϊοιν άτράκτοις το μεν ένταυθοϊ, το δ' έκεϊοε, όντως και τον πόλεμον τούτον διαλύσομεν, ην τις έάσχι, διενζΊΚοϋοαι διά πρεσβειών το μεν ένταυθοϊ, τό δ' έκεϊσε. 570 —You, I presume, could adroitly and gingerly settle this intricate, tangled concern: You in a trice could relieve our perplexities.

6 Cf. τους κάλους re κάγαθοϋς (719, 728); πονηροίς (725); eùyevek (727); ξένοις (730); πονηροίς κάκ πονηρών ... ύστάτοις cupiyßivotmv (731—732); χρηοτοίσιν (735).

50

—Certainly. —How? Permit me to learn. —Just as a woman, with nimble dexterity, thus with her hands disentangles a skein, Hither and thither her spindles unravel it, drawing it out, and pulling it plain. So would this weary Hellenic entanglement soon be resolved by our womanly care, So would our embassies neatly unravel it, drawing it here and pulling it there. The simile is tightly constructed: τεταραγμένος (567) responds to τ er αραγμένα (565); διαλύσομεν (569) echoes διαλϋσαι (566). These correspondences relate the simile closely to the occasion, i.e. the question of the Proboulos. In addition, syntactic parallelism within the image itself creates the impression of inexorable logic: imeveyKoiioai at the beginning of 568 is counterbalanced by 5t£veynovoai in the same position of 570, and the two verses are identical in their endings (TO μεν ένταυθοϊ, το δ' έκεϊσε). The passage's formal economy seems to supply additional confirmation to Lysistrata's emphatic φαύλως πάνυ (566), uttered before the image unfolds: unraveling the tangled skein of state affairs, she says, will be "simplicity itself." It is a simplicity beyond the understanding of the Proboulos, however. Incredulously, he asks Lysistrata if the women think they can put an end to state calamities through the use of wool, fleece, and spindles. Lysistrata answers that, if the men were sane, 7 they would conduct all their political affairs on a pattern derived from wool-working: έκ τών έρίων (573) picks up the Proboulos' sarcastic βξ έρίων δή (571): Tip. έξ έρίων δη και κλωστήρων καί άτράκτων πράγματα δεινά παύσειν οΐεσθ'; ώ ς άνόητοι. Αυ. κάν ύμϊν y' εϊ τις ένην νους, έκ τών έρίων τών ημετέρων έπολιτεύεσθ' äv απαντα. —Wonderful, marvellous feats, not a doubt of it, you with your skeins and your spindles can show; Fools! do you really expect to unravel a terrible war like a bundle of tow? —Ah, if you only could manage your politics just in the way that we deal with a fleece! The Proboulos' outright skepticism sparks an even more substantial claim by Lysistrata: a program directed not just at solving a crisis, but at efficient 7

Note the sharp response to άνόητοι (571) with καν ύμχν y el τις ένην νους (572), and

cf. Lysistrata's emphasis on νούς at the beginning of the scene: où yàp μοχλών

Sei

μάλλον

ή νού και φρενών (432).

51

management of the state at all times. The heroine, instead of backing down, elaborates her second plan in another, more extensive simile, with a vehicle, or content, identical to the first: wool-working. Before we proceed to an analysis of the second comparison, let us assess further the plausibility of Lysistrata's mingling of political and domestic concerns. To the Proboulos, her first comparison is clearly outlandish. But his own use of the word ταράττω at 565, as well as the vignettes which have immediately preceded, should have better prepared him for Lysistrata's "logic". Both the heroine and one of her supporters have pointed to the absurd spectacle of soldiers in full military dress buying food in the marketplace (557—564). Lysistrata terms this conflation of όπλα and άγορά "insane" (μαινομένους, 556) and "ridiculous" (πράγμα yeXoïov, 559). The intrusion of the army into the market-place is, as the Kinsman says of Agathon's mingling of male and female attributes in another play, a τάραξις τον βίον (Thesm. 137). For Lysistrata and the women, the war has produced consequences that may properly be described as τεταραγμένα πράγματα; ironically, Lysistrata proposes as a solution what the Proboulos must view as another "tangled disorder", the conduct of statecraft after the pattern of women's weaving. The connotations afforded by the linguistic choice of τεταρα·γμένα as Vergleichspunkt for the whole passage are admirably exploited, and a full appreciation requires that we briefly review the background of the word as it is used by Aristophanes. The verb is frequently present in political metaphors, especially in the Knights. In fact, the same verb is employed in a significant political context, also involving embassies, later in Lysistrata,8 Two passages from the Knights are especially illuminating. Early in the play, the Sausageseller wonders out loud to the servant how he will be able to lead the people (.Knights 2 1 1 - 2 1 6 ) : Αλ.

τά μεν λογι' aùcàXXei μβ· θαυμάζω δ' όπως τον δήμον οϊός τ' έπιτροπεύειν e (.'μ' έγώ. OLA.' φανλότατον è'pyov ταύθ' dire ρ ποεϊς πόε ι· τάραττε και χόρδευ' όμοϋ τά π ρ ά γ μ α τ α άπαντα, και τον δήμον àei προοποιού ύπο-γΧυκαίνων ρηματίοις μαγειρικοϊς. —I like the lines: but how can I, I wonder, Contrive to manage Demus's affairs. —Why nothing's easier. Do what now you do: Mince, hash, and mash up everything together. Win over Demus with the savoury sauce Of little cookery phrases.

215

See Knights 66, 251, 431, 692, 840; Acharnions 621; Lysistrata 1232 and the comments in section C below; cf. J . Taillardat, Les Images d'Aristophane2 (Paris 1965) 409ff. 8

52

The cooking metaphor dominates this passage (cf. χόρδευ' at 214, ύπογλυκαίνων and μαγειρικούς at 216, and the pun on δημος/δημάς at 215). However, τάραττε ... τά πράγματα άπαντα (214—215) is clearly useful advice for an unscrupulous politician: stir up everything, with the result that it is agitated and disorganized. 9 Likewise, the Sausage-seller later accuses the demagogic Kleon of acting like eelfishermen, who agitate a muddy lake to bring their prey nearer the line (Knights 864—867): οπερ yàp οί τάς βγχελεις βηρώμενοι πέπονθας. οταν μεν η λίμνη καταστη, λαμβάνουσιν ουδένέάν δ' άνω τε και κάτω τον βόρβορον κυκώσιν, αίρονοι• και συ λαμβάνεις, ην την πάλιν ταράττης.

865

Ο ay, you're like the fisher-folk, the men who hunt for eels, Who when the mere is still and clear catch nothing for their creels, But when they rout the mud about and stir it up and down, 'Tis then they do; and so do you, when you perturb the town. 1 0 These examples suffice to illustrate the political overtones of ταράττω: Aristophanes metaphorically associates the action with demagogues, who stir up (incite) the people, and simultaneously throw them, and the issues, into confusion for their own profit. 1 1 These motifs are thoroughly apposite to the text in Lysistrata, since ταράττω serves at once to convey: a) the confusion of political affairs due to the war; b) the strange appearance of soldiers in the agora pouring soup into their helmets (562) and shaking their javelins to frighten away vegetable-hawkers (563—564); and c) the tangle of the wool in Lysistrata's image. The "logic" of comparing domestic affairs to matters of state is all the more impregnable, since Lysistrata may take her cue from b) in the list above: the behavior of the soldiers already evinces a τάραξις of public and private. The second simile, considerably longer than the first, is an imaginative, complete re-constitution of the state (Lysistrata 574—586): •πρώτον μέν χρήν, ώσπερ πόκον, έν βαλανείιψ έκπλύναντας την οίσπώτην έκ της πόλεως, έπί κλίνης έκραβδίξειν τούς μοχθηρούς και τούς τρφόλους άπολεξαι, 9

Compare the use oí ταράττω

575

at Thuc. 2.65.11, also in a context of political dema-

goguery: . . . άλλα κατά τάς ίδιας διαβολάς περί της τού δήμου προστασίας τά Te έν τω στρατοπέδω άμβλύτερα έπο ίουν και τά περί την πάλιν πρώτον έν άλλήλοις έταράχθηααν. The events are clearly after 415 B.C., since the subject of the sentence is the organizers of the Sicilian expedition. It is interesting that φαύλως is capable of a double meaning at both Knights 213 and at Lysistrata 559. 10 The eel simile apparently became notorious: Aristophanes accuses other dramatists of having plagiarized it at Clouds 559. 11 For the notion of confusion in the eel image, cf. the mud, βόρβορον, and the phrase

άνω και κάτω

(866).

53

και τούς je συνισταμένους τούτους και τούς πιλούντας εαυτούς ètti τάίς άρχαϊσι διαζήναι και τάς κεφαλάς άποτΐλαιeira ξαίνεLU εις καλαθίσκον κοινην εϋνοιαν απαντας καταμενγνύνταςτονς τε μετοίκους κει τις ξένος η φίλος ύμϊν, 580 κεΐ τις όφείλχι τώ δημοσιψ, και τούτους ¿Ύκαταμείξαι· και νή Αία τάς ye πόλεις, όπόσαι της γης τήσδ' είσίν άποικοι, δω-Ύ^νώσκειν οτι ταϋθ' ήμίν ωσπερ τά κατάγματα κείται χωρίς εκαοτον· KÇ.T' άπό τούτων πάντων το κάταγμα λαβόντας δεϋρο Çvvàyeiv και ζυναθροίξειν εις εν, κάπειτα ποήσαι 585 τολύπην μεγάλην κψτ' έκ ταύτης τώ δήμω χλάίναν ύφηναι. First, in the washing-tub plunge it, and scour it, and cleanse it f r o m grease, Purging away all the filth and the nastiness; then on the table expand it and lay, Beating o u t all that is worthless and mischievous, picking the burrs and the thistles away. Next, for the clubs, the cabals, and the coteries, banding unrighteously, office to win, Treat t h e m as clots in the wool, and dissever them, lopping the heads that are forming therein; Then you should card it, and comb it, and mingle it, all in one Basket of love and of unity, Citizens, visitors, strangers, and sojourners, all the entire, undivided c o m m u n i t y . K n o w y o u a fellow in debt to the Treasury? Mingle him merrily in with the rest. Also remember the cities, our colonies, outlying states in the east and the west, Scattered about to a distance surrounding us, these are our shreds and our fragments of wool; These to one mighty political aggregate tenderly, carefully, gather and pull, Twining them all in one thread of good fellowship; thence a magnificent bobbin t o spin, Weaving a garment of c o m f o r t and dignity, worthily wrapping the People therein. This image is presented in one syntactic unit. All the important verbs (έκραβδίξεIV, άπολέξαι, διαξήναι, άποτΐλαι, ξαίνειν, έyκaτaμeïξaι, διαγιyvùoKeiv, Çvvàyeiv, ξυναθροίξειν, ποηοαι, ύφηναι) d e p e n d on the initial χρήν (574); when we add the participles έκπλύναντας (575) and καταμενγνύντας (580), we have a complete picture of the phases of Lysistrata's " p r o g r a m " . The rhetorical force of the passage is considerable. Starting with πρώτον μέν (574), we proceed in the first period t o άποτΐλαι (578); 54

this section focuses on "impurities" which must be removed (οίσττώτην, μοχθηρούς, τρφόλους, συνισταμένους). The second period, introduced by είτα (579), shifts the emphasis to unification, and culminates in έγκαταμεϊξαι (581). At 582—584, the idea on the political level is expanded from the metics, friendly foreigners, and public debtors to include the cities of the empire. With another etra (584), the last period begins, again urging the cities' inclusion; this final section is more rapidly punctuated (cf. κώπειτα at 5 8 5 , KÇT' at 5 8 6 ) , and rises to a rhetorical climax: ξυνάγειν and Συνάθροιζειν share the same intensifying prefix, and are themselves strengthened by the phrase etç ëv (585), while ποήσαι (585) and ύφήναι (586), practically the only simple infinitive forms in the passage, reverberate forcefully at the end of the final tetrameter. Some or all of these rhetorical features might have been expected of a gifted prose orator. 1 2 But what is especially striking about the skilful compression and poetic charm of the simile is Lysistrata's constant juxtaposition of terms. The source of the image's momentum is the rapidity with which political motifs are, indeed, gathered up into the skein of her discourse. Consider the alternation in the first period, for example: phrases with primarily domestic connotations are artfully interspersed with phrases whose overtones are primarily political. The following table illustrates this alternation: I Domestic

I

Political

575: έκπλύναντας την οίσπώτην . . . έπί κλίνης i . . . έκ της πόλεως 5 76: . . . καί τούς τρφόλους άπολέξει ¡ έκραβδίζειν τούς μοχθηρούς ... 577: ι καί τούς ye συνισταμένους τούτους ¡ καί τούς πι Χούντας èαυτούς 578: . . . διαξήναι καί τάς ¡ έπί ταϊς άρχαϊσι ... κεφαλάς άποτΐΚαι. \

The next verse (579) offers another illustration of the interplay between domestic and political "fields" that continues throughout the image: £atVew etç καλαθίσκον is succeeded by κοινήν eüvoiav. What M. S. Silk has called the "ground" of the metaphor is firmly established by this point, 1 3 and Lysistrata's language can remain overtly political until 583, when an internal simile within the larger image compares the πόλεις to κατάγματα. This word is repeated for emphasis at 5 8 4 , and the speech concludes with another effective juxtaposition of the "fields"; (ποήσαή/τολύπην μεγάλης ... τ φ δήμίψ

χλαΐναν

ύφήναι

(586).14

1 2 Cf. C. Τ. Murphy, "Aristophanes and the Art of Rhetoric", HSCP 49 (1938) 93ff, who calls the image an "extended παράδειγμα". 1 3 See M. S. Silk, Interaction in Poetic Imagery (Cambridge 1974). 14 For mention of " a cloak for the people" later in the play, see Lys. 1156 and the comments in section C, below.

55

Thus the second, longer simile extends the first in a number of ways. The vehicle is more ambitious; the structure, instead of simple parallelism, exhibits a syntactical tour-de-force that is carefully controlled by a rhetorical progression; the political and metaphorical terms are constantly juxtaposed, occasionally several times within one verse. 15 The effect is to integrate thoroughly the political and domestic spheres; again, Lysistrata's "logic" is strengthened as a result, and the comic effect of her prosposai augmented. Even though the integration of public and private is carried out on a metaphorical plane, and the sharp οϋκουν beipòv (587) of the Proboulos will shortly break the spell of Lysistrata's imaginative rhetoric, her elaborate είκών is compelling in its fusion of comic whimsy and political reality. There is a sufficient element of "real" political content in the image to insure it can be taken half-seriously. For example, everyone w h o heard mention of the πόλεις . . . άποικοι knew that revolts of the cities had been a major political concern in Athens for several years. 16 Furthermore, the words και τούς ye συνισταμένους έπί ταϊς άρχαϊσι ...

τούτους και τους πιΧούντας

έαυτούς

at 577—578 could be understood to hint at oligarchic synomosiai whose members conspired at internal revolution. 1 7 Lysistrata's words are effectively removed from specific political figures, but not from specific, contemporary political concerns. Her "program" for internal and external harmony may have seemed whimsically Utopian by the winter of 411 B.C.; 18 but this may not have been especially troublesome in a play that addresses real issues in a fantastic fashion. Let us conclude this section of the analysis with two observations. First, unlike the coin comparison in the Frogs which we discussed earlier, Lysistrata's wool simile is structured in a number of stages. Each phase affords the poet more opportunities to reinforce the "ground" of the image through linking political with domestic terms. The passage thus unfolds in a kinetic, imaginative series of equations and parallels that can be manipulated for a rhetorically climactic effect. Secondly, the wool image is organic in so far as it serves as the centerpiece for a number of briefer references to wool and weaving throughout the play.

15 The technique of successive similes, with the second longer comparison of a series elaborating upon the first, is of course to be found in Homer: cf. C. Moulton, Similes in the Homeric Poems (Göttingen 1977) 19ff. 16 Cf. Thuc. 8.2.2, etc. 17 Cf. Thuc. 8.54 and van Leeuwen, ad loc. 18 The evidence for the dating of Lysistrata has been carefully reviewed by Sommerstein (note 2, above); I incline with him to the Lenaia of 411 as the most probable date, with Thesm. placed at the Dionysia of the same year.

56

Each reference manages to touch significantly on the relations between men and women. As Whitman has noted, care for the wool is the female, domestic concern used as an excuse by the women who wish to sneak off from their posts on the Acropolis for sexual fulfillment (728ff); in this passage, "spreading it on the b e d " (διαπετάσασ' επί της κλίνης, 732) is a transparent double entendre.19 In the next scene, Kinesias charges Myrrhine with being inattentive to her weaving (896—897); she answers that she cares about neither the household nor their marriage as long as the war continues. In the scene between Lysistrata and the Proboulos, the heroine pictures her husband as reprimanding her for her interest in state affairs: she is to tend to her spinning, he says, as he quotes the Homeric Hector: πόλεμος δ' ävbpeaoi μελήοει.20 Shortly afterwards, when the Proboulos objects to Lysistrata's order to be silent, she threatens to dress him up as a woman at the loom; in conclusion, she ironically alters the Homeric tag (Lysistrata 5 3 1 - 5 3 8 ) : άλλ'

ei τοϋτ'

π α ρ ' έμοϋ è'xe και

τουτί

περίθου

έμπόδών

σοι,

το κάλυμμα περί

την

λαβών κεφαλήν,

κατα σιώπα. και τούτον κξ,τα

τον καλαθίσκον

ζαίνειν

[O.C.T.]

535

ξυξωοάμενος

τρώγων πόλεμος δέ γυναιξί

κυάμους

μελήσει.

Do not, my pretty one, do not, I pray, Suffer my wimple to stand in the way. Here, take it, and wear it, and gracefully tie it, Enfolding it over your head, and be quiet . . . (Here is an excellent spindle to pull.) Here is a basket for carding the wool. Now to your task. Haricots chawing up, petticoats drawing up, Off to your carding, your combing, your trimming, War is the

care

and

the

business

of

women.

Finally, when the women are reconciled to the men, the former clothe the latter in a poor tunic, the έξωμι'ς : although it is not the χλαίνα of the wool simile, the garment prompts an echo of earlier passages (Lys. 1019— 1021): . . . νϋν •γυμνόν

άλλα 19 20

ονθ' την

δ ' ούν ον σε οϋτως.

έξωμίδ'

opa ένδύσω

περιόψομαι yàp

ώς σε

κατα^έλαατος

εΐ.

1020

προσιοϋσ' έ γ ώ .

Cf. Whitman 2 0 7 - 2 0 8 . Cf. Iliad 6 . 4 9 2 .

57

Meanwhile you're all undressed. I really can't allow it, you are getting quite a joke; Permit me to approach you and to put you on this cloak. The men's answer (1022—1023) shows that this is literally the tunic which they strippied away in anger at the start of the parabasis (662). But on a symbolic level the clothing of the people by the women fulfills Lysistrata's earlier metaphorical vision of harmony at the end of the wool comparison: τφ δήμω χΚαΙναν ύφήναι (586). The formal parallelism and imaginative interweaving of terms in the structure of the wool simile are stylistic devices which typify Aristophanes' technique in handling the mainspring of the play: the symmetry of the political and domestic fields. Let us now turn to an analysis of a second, more extensive text, the parabasis, which exemplifies similar technique.

B. The Parabasis

(614-705)

The parabasis in Lysistrata is unique in structure among the surviving Aristophanic comedies. 21 Kommation, parabasis proper, and pnigos have all disappeared; the parabasis consists of two epirrhematic syzygies, each of the form: ode (O), epirrhema (E), antode (AO), and antepirrhema (AE). In each syzygy, O and E are given to the semi-chorus of men, AO and AE to the women. Furthermore, the typical motifs of the Aristophanic parabasis are absent: for example, there is no serious political advice delivered directly to the audience, no flattery of the public or the judges, no invocations of the Muse or of the gods.22 The parabasis resembles a second agon between the men and the women; as an extended version of the lyric of abuse, its primary focus is on hostility in the battle of the sexes. 23 Just as the unusual form of the parabasis and the staging arrangements presumably accented for an audience the theme of sexual strife, so the structuring of language and motifs contributes to the same end. A remarkable variety of content (broad insults, appeals to history, physical threats, whimsical rejuvenation, charmingly absurd personification) produces the illusion of spontaneity. But the content is carefully regulated, and the result, even in the context of such abuse and aggression, is again to interweave political and domestic matters, so that the first shall seem a natural complement of the second. First, let us sketch the elaborate succession of motifs. In the opening syzygy, political and civic affairs are uppermost. See G. M. Sifakis, Parabasis and Animal Choruses (London 1971) 104, 115 (note 10). Sifakis presents a comprehensive analysis of the typical motifs in the parabasis; cf. ibid. 4 I f f . 2 3 For an extreme interpretation of the antiphonal choruses, see Cornford 95 ff. 21

22

58

ούκέτ' 'έργον έγκαθεύδειν όστις έ'στ' έλεύθερος. άλλ' έπαποδυώμεθ', (άνδρες, τουτωί τύρ πράγματι, ήδη γάρ ϋξει ταδί πλειόνων και μειζόνων πραγμάτων μοι δοκεί, και μάλιστ' όσφραίνομαι της Ίππίου τυραννίδοςκαι πάνυ δέδοικα μη των Αακώνων τινές δεύρο συνεληλυθότες άνδρες εις Κλεισθένους τάς θεοίς έχθρας γυναίκας έζεπάρωσιν δόλορ καταλαβείν τά χρήμαθ' ημών τόν τε μιαθόν, ενθεν εζων εγώ.

615

620

625

This is not a time for slumber; now let all the bold and free, Strip to meet the great occasion, vindicate our rights with me. I can smell a deep, surprising Tide of Revolution rising, Odour as of folk devising Hippias's tyranny. And I feel a dire misgiving, Lest some false Laconians, meeting in the house of Cleisthenes, Have inspired these wretched women all our wealth and pay to seize, Pay from whence I get my living. O 1 (614—625): The men urge each other to defend their freedom: this is no time to sleep. They will strip for the matter at hand. There is a smell of tyranny in the air (cf. οξει, όσφραίνομαι at 616, 619); the men fear that certain Spartans, meeting at the house of Kleisthenes, will concoct treachery with the women, and re-enact the tyranny of Hippias. The women may steal the money in the public treasury, the source of the men's livelihood. δεινά γάρ TOI τάσδε γ' ήδη τους πολίτας νουθετείν, και λαλειν γυναίκας ονσας άσπίδος χαλκής πέρι, και διαλλάττειν προς ημάς άνδράσιν Αακωνικο'ις, οίοι πι στον ούδέν et μή περ λύκορ κεχηνότι. άλλα ταϋθ' ϋφηναν ήμϊν, ώνδρες, επί τυραννίδι. άλλ' εμού μεν ού τυραννεύαουσ', έπεί φυλάγομαι και 'φορήσω τό ξίφος' το λοιπόν 'έν μύρτου κλαδί'. άγοράσω τ' εν τοις οπλοις έξης Άριστογείτονι, ώδέ θ' έστήξω παρ' αυτόν αυτό γάρ μοι γίγνεται. της θεοίς έχθρας πατάζαι τήσδε γραός την γνάθον.

630

635

Gods! to hear these shallow wenches taking citizens to task, Prattling of a brassy buckler, jabbering of a martial casque! 59

Gods! to think that they have ventured with Laconian men to deal, Men of just the faith and honour that a ravening wolf might feel! Plots they're hatching, plots contriving, plots of rampant Tyranny; But o'er us they shan't be Tyrants, no, for on my guard I'll be, And I'll dress my sword in myrtle, and with firm and dauntless hand, Here beside Aristogeiton resolutely take my stand, Marketing in arms beside him. This the time and this the pleace When my patriot arm must deal a—blow upon that woman's face. E 1 (626—635): The women are shamelessly acting the part of men in entering politics and military affairs. They are treating with the treacherous Spartans and plainly aiming toward tyranny. But the men will resist, playing the part of Aristogeiton the tyrannicide. And for now, they will punch one old woman right in the jaw. The first two sections of the parabasis display a carefully balanced continuity. The ode shows the men's fears, the epirrhema their outraged reaction and determination to resist. The whole section concludes with an absurd stroke of bathos; after the portentous phrase 'όζει ταδί πΧειόνων και μειζόνων πραγμάτων ("more than meets the nose") at 616, and a series of references to the famous expulsion of the tyrants from Athens a century before, the men's aggressive response is to knock one old woman in the jaw. The tyranny is emphasized three times: τυραννίδας (619), τυραννίδι (630), ού τυραννεύοουσ' (631). The Spartans are mentioned in both stanzas (Αακώνων at 620, άνδράσιν Λακωνικοϊς at 628). And parallelism appears in the close of each section as well; the women are hateful to the gods (τάς θεοΐς έχθράς, 622), as is, more particularly, the old crone whom the men propose to strike (της θεοίς έχθρας . . . τήσδε γραός, 635). Furthermore, some nuances suggest continuity with the preceding scene of the play, Lysistrata's interview with the Proboulos. The men's intention to arm themselves at 633 (áyοράσω τ' èv τοϊς ό'πλοις) recalls Lysistrata's comic description of soldiers in the market-place (περιέρχονται κατά την àyopàv ξύν οπλοις ώσπερ Κορύβαντες, 558). And the men's use of ΰφηναν to describe the women's sinister intentions at 630 cannot help but recall Lysistrata's long wool simile, which culminates in νφήναι (586). 2 4 oik äp είσιόντα σ' οϊκαδ' ή τεκοϋσα ^νώσεται. άλλα θώμεσθ', ώ φίλαι yράες, ταδί πρώτον χαμαί. ημείς yàp, ώ πάντες άστοί, λόyωv κατάρχομεν τη πάλει χρησίμων είκότως, έπεί χλιδώσαν άγλαώς εθρεψέ με. επτά μεν ετη yeyœo' εύθύς ήρρηφόρουν

640

2 4 For Aristophanes' use of the fear of tyranny as a democratic "bogy-word", see Sommerstein (note 2, above) 122 and note 66.

60

είτ' άλετρίς η δεκέτις ούσα τάρχηγέτικς,τ' έχουσα τον κροκωτόν άρκτος ή Βραυρωνίοις· κάκανηφόρουν ποτ' ούσα παις καλή 'χουσ' ίσχάδων όρμαθόν.

645

Ah, your mother shall not know you, impudent! when home you go. Strip, my sisters, strip for action, on the ground your garments throw. Right it is that I my slender Tribute to the state should render, I, who to her thoughtful tender care my happiest memories owe; Bore, at seven, the mystic casket; Was, at ten, our Lady's miller; then the yellow Brauron bear; Next (a maiden tall and stately with a string of figs to wear) Bore in pomp the holy Basket. AO 1 (636—647): The women reply to the men's threat with one of their own: their mothers will not recognize the oldsters when they return home (636). The chorus then exhorts its own members to strip (637). They will deliver χρήσιμοι λόγοι, they tell the citizens, as is only right: they have benefited from four civic honors (640ff); here they list the distinctions that young girls and women could expect at the festivals.25 άρα προύφείλω TL χρηστόν τχι πάλει παραινέσαι; ει δ' έγώ yvint πέφυκα, τούτο μή φθονε'ιτέ μοι, ήν άμείνω y' είσενέ·-γκω τών παρόντων πραγμάτων. τούράνου yáp μοι μέτεστι- και yàp άνδρας εισφέρω. τοις δε δνστήνοις yépovoiv ού μέτεσθ' ύμϊν, έπεί τον ερανον τον λeyόμevov παππώον έκ τών Μηδικών είτ' άναλώσαντες ούκ άντεισφέρετε τάς εισφοράς, άλλ' ύφ' υμών διαλυθήνιιι προσέτι κινδυνεύομεν. άρα γρυκτόν έστιν ύμϊν·, εϊ δε λυπήσεις τί με, τ ώδε α' άφήκτω πατάξω τφ κοθόρνψ τήν yvàOov.

650

655

Well may such a gracious City all my filial duty claim. What though I was born a woman, comrades, count it not for blame If I bring the wiser counsels; I an equal share confer Towards the common stock of Athens, I contribute men to her. But the noble contribution, but the olden tribute-pay,

2 5 It is usually the poet who claims to give useful advice to the city and boasts of his patriotism: cf. Sifakis (note 21, above) 3 7 f f .

61

Which your fathers' fathers left you, relic of the Median fray, Dotards, ye have lost and wasted! nothing in its stead ye bring, Nay ourselves ye're like to ruin, spend and waste by blundering. Murmuring are ye? Let me hear you, only let me hear you speak, And from this unpolished slipper comes a—slap upon your cheek! A E 1 (648—657): The women enter a slight disclaimer as to their sex (649), but insist they can improve the state of affairs. As to the treasury: the women can justly claim a share of the money, since they bring in men as tribute (by bearing sons and "contributing" them to the war: cf. Lysistrata at 589—590), whereas, conversely, the men have wasted the state's inheritance from the Persian Wars. If the men dispute them, the women will smash the jaw of one of their number with a slipper (656—657). The passage as a whole consists of a rejoinder to the charge of civic treachery: the women insist on their usefulness to the state, their civic honors, and their contributions to the general welfare. Several phrases recall the first section: the women address themselves as ypàeç (637), taking up the men's reference to ypaός (635); their exhortation to leave their clothes on the ground rather loosely parallels the men's exhortation to strip (cf. 637 with 615); the final threat at 657 (τφδε α' άψήκτορ πατάξω τφ κοθόρνφ τήν yνάθσν) directly echoes the men at 635 (τής θεσΐς έχθρας πατάξαι τήσδε ypaòs τήν y νάθον). Within the passage, χρηστόν in AE at 648 takes up χρησίμων in AO at 639. Prominent in the women's section is the notion of motherhood: cf. the references to the men's mother (ή τεκοϋσα) at 636, the city as the parent of the women (εθρεφέ με) at 640, and the metaphor of the women as tribute-playing allies, contributing sons to the city's service, concisely rendered in άνδρας εισφέρω at 651. It should be added, however, that the context of both sections of the first syzygy is largely public; the men charge the women with treachery and the intention to subvert the state in favor of tyranny, whereas the women reply by defending their patriotism and justifying their claim for control of the public treasury. ταύτ' OVV ούχ ύβρις τα πpay ματ' έστί πολλή; κάπώώσειν μοι δοκεΐ τό χρήμα μάλλον. άλλ' άμυντέυν τό πpäyμ' όστις y' ένόρχης εστ' άνήρ. άλλα την έζωμίδ έκδυώμεθ', ώς τον άνδρα δει άνδρός οξειν εύθύς, άλλ' ουκ έντεθριώσθαι πρέπει. άλλ' äyετε λευκόπσδες, οϊπερ έπί Αειψύδριαν ηλθομεν οτ' ήμεν έ'τι, νυν δεί, νυν άνηβήααι πάλιν κάναπτερώσαι πάν τό σώμα κάπσσείσασθαι τό yήpaς τάδε. Is not this an outrage sore? And methinks it blows not o'er, 62

660

665 670

But increases more and more. Come, my comrades, hale and hearty, on the ground your mantles throw, In the odour of their manhood men to meet the fight should go, Not in these ungodly wrappers swaddled up from top to toe. On, then on, my white-foot veterans, ye who thronged Leipsydrium's height In the days when we were Men! Shake this chill old Age from off you, Spread the wings of youth again. O 2 (658—670): The men open the second syzygy with a rhetorical question: does the women's last threat not amount to hybns? And the women's insolence seems to be growing (660). The men now urge whoever is truly virile (όστις y' ένόρχης έ'στ' άνήρ, 661) to rush to the defense: one may compare their exhortation to the free at the beginning of O 1 (cf. όστις εοτ' έλεύθερος, 614). As in Ο 1 they say they will strip off their tunics: this time, the έξωμις is specified (662). In their first ode, the men referred at this point to the sinister odor of tyranny; in O 2 the sense of smell is again introduced, but with a comic, and very private, twist: the virile odor of the naked men will go forth, presumably inspiring their own ranks and annoying the women. Several political references follow: the men address themselves as λευκόποδες (664), referring possibly to the Alcmaeonid exiles of a century before, 2 6 and then directly refer to Leipsydrion, thus paralleling their mention of the tyranny of Hippias in O 1 (619). We are now to assume, incongruously, that these very chorus members were active in the struggle against tyranny; this chronology is no great surprise, however, since the chorus has already boasted of its defense against Kleomenes (272ff) and of its trophy at Marathon (285). These very old men conclude the section with a wish for renewed youth (άνηβήσαι πάλιν, 669); metaphorically, they wish to "shake o f f " their old age and acquire "new wings" (669—670). e'i yàp ενδώσει τις ημών τ ala be καν σμικράν λαβή ν, ούδέν έλλείψουοιν αύται λιπαρούς χειρουργίας, άλλα και νανς τβκτανοϋνται, κάπιχεφήσουσ' eri ναυμαχείν και πλείν έφ' ημάς, ώοπερ 'Αρτεμισία. ην δ' έφ' ιππικήν τράπωνται, διαγράφω τούς ιππέαςίππικώτατον yàp έστι χρήμα κάποχον γυνή, κούκ àv άπολίσθοι τρέχοντος, τάς 'Αμαζόνας σκοπεί, ας Mi/cojf έ'γραψ' έφ' ίππων μαχομένας τοις άνδράσιν. άλλά τούτων χρήν άπασών εις τβτρημένον ξύλον έγκαθαρμόσαι λαβόντας τοντονί τον αυχένα. 26

675

680

Cf. Rogers, ad loc.

63

O these women! give them once a handle howsoever small, And they'll soon be nought behind us in the manliest feats of all. Yea, they'll build them fleets and navies and they'll come across the sea, Come like Carian Artemisia, fighting in their ships with me. Or they'll turn their first attention, haply, t o equestrian fights, If they do, I know the issue, there's an end of all the knights! Well a woman sticks on horseback: look around you, see, behold, Where on Micon's living frescoes fight the Amazons of old! Shall we let these wilful women, O my brothers, do the same? Rather first their necks we'll rivet tightly in the pillory frame. E 2 (671—681): The epirrhema offers a sprightly and whimsical portrait of the men's fears and expectations concerning the women, and is tinged with both a healthy respect for their abilities and an air of sexual banter. Only at the very end do the men break into abusive hostility. At 671—672, they reason that, if given the slightest opportunity, the women will succeed (and perhaps surpass the men?) at "persistent handiwork" (the rhetorical phrase λιπαρούς χειρουργίας at 672 injects a note of admiration). At 674—675, the men are more fearful, as they anticipate that the women will turn their talents to shipbuilding, and sail against them like Artemisia. It is possible that even here the audience may recognize a double entendre, since nautical metaphors for sexual intercourse are common in comedy. 2 7 Immediately afterwards, there is a patent sexual reference, when the men imagine that the women may turn to horsemanship (676ff). Again, sexual banter mingles with apprehension: the men linger on the women's ability t o " m o u n t " and not slip off (677—678), but they then turn to Mikon's paintings of the Amazons, mounted indeed, but on real horses and aggressively hostile toward men (678—679). This unsettling notion prompts in turn the final threat: the men will seize the nearest woman and torture her by fitting her neck into the pillory frame (680—681). The explicit menace directed against one woman parallels the threats at the conclusion of E 1 (a slap in the jaw, 635) and A E 1 (a blow on the jaw with a shoe, 658). ei νή τώ

λύσω

ύν έγώ

δή,

τήμερον

τούς

ά λ λ α χήμείς, ώς

θεώ

ρήσεις,

με

ξωττυ-

την

έμαυτής

και

ποήσω

δημότας

βωστρείν

ώ γυναίκες,

àv δζωμεν

γυναικών

σ' έ γ ώ πεκτούμενον,

θάττον αύτοδάξ

νυν προς ε μ' ϊτω τις, ϊνα μήποτε γη

27

σκόροδα,

μηδέ

κυάμους

ώ ς εΐ και μόνον

κακώς

αιετόν

κάνθαρός

τίκτοντα

έρείς,

685

έκδυώμεθα, ώργωμένων.

φά-

μέλανας. — ύπερχολώ

σε μαιεύσομαι.

690 γάρ,

— 695

See J. Henderson, The Maculate Muse (New Haven 1975) 161 ff, and his statement at 163 that νανμαχεIv κ ai rrXeiv is probably another double entendre.

64

If our smouldering fires ye wake, Soon our wildbeast wrath will break Out against you, and we'll make, Make you howl to all your neighbors. currycombed, poor soul, and tanned. Throw aside your mantles, sisters, come, a firm, determined band, In the odour of your wrathful snappish womanhood to stand. Who'll come forth and fight me? garlic, nevermore, nor beans for him. Nay, if one sour word ye say, I'll be like the midwife beetle, Following till the eagle lay. AO 2 (682—695): As at the corresponding place of the first syzygy (636), the women reply with a threat of their own: if their rage is kindled, they will release it (colorfully described in metaphor as a wild boar, 684), and the men will call to their fellow demesmen for aid (684—685). The women now urge themselves to strip, and to send forth their distinctive, female odor (cf. the men in O 2 at 6 6 2 f f ) : they are angry enough to bite ( 6 8 7 ) ! Let an assailant approach: he will never chew another piece of garlic or munch another bean (690). The women are so angry that they threaten to retaliate even for verbal abuse; in a reference to a fable of Aesop, they

proclaim aieròv τίκτοντα κάνθαρός oe μαιβύοομαι (695): "I'll play mid-wife to you the way the beede did for the pregnant eagle." Whatever the precise reference to the fable, the suggestion that the women's meaning is a general threat of revenge against powerful enemies is weak. 28 The phrase probably connotes castration (the beetle's destroying the eggs = the women's chewing the men's balls); the parallel structure we have observed throughout the poem lends support to this interpretation (pace the note of van Leeuwen, ad loc), since in O 2 the men have emphasized their manhood with ένόρχης at 6 6 1 ; they have also applied bird imagery to themselves with άναπτερώσαι at 6 6 9 . The women's reference to Aesop piquantly takes up these motifs and combines them with a sharp twist at the conclusion of the antode. 29

ov yàp υμών φροιπίσαιμ' &v, ην έμοί ξχι Λαμπιτώ η re Θηβαία φίΚη παις εύ-γενής Ίσμηνία. οι) yàp è'araL δύναμις, οι)δ' ην έπτάκις σι) φηφίση, όστις, ώ δύστην', άτιήχθου πάσι και τοις yeiroatv.

28

Cf. LSJ, s.v. μαιεύομαι.

For the motif o f bitting, cf. αύτοδάξ at 6 8 7 . Henderson (note 27, above) thinks the reference to castration certain ( 1 2 6 ) . 29

5 Moulton (Hyp. 6 8 )

65

ωστε κάχθές θήκάτη

ποιούσα παι^νίαν

ταίσι παισί την εταίραν έκάλεσ' παΐδα χρηστήν οί δέ πέμψειν

κά^απητην

των ψηφισμάτων

700

γειτόνων,

έκ Βοιωτών

ούκ 'έφασκον δια τα σά

κούχί μη παύσησθε τού σκέλους

έγώ

έκ τών

ëjxeXvv, ψηφίσματα. τούτων,

υμάς λαβών τις έκτραχηλίση

πριν αν

φέρων.

705

Yea, for you and yours I reck not whilst my Lampito survives, And my noble, dear Ismenia, loveliest of the Theban wives. Keep decreeing seven times over, not a bit of good you'll do, Wretch abhorred of all the people, and of all our neighbours too. So that when in Hecate's honour yesterday I sent to get From our neighbours in Boeotia such a dainty darling pet, Just a lovely, graceful, slender, white-fleshed eel divinely tender, Thanks to your decrees, confound them, one and all refused to send her. And you'll never stop from making these absurd decrees I know, Till I catch your leg and toss you—Zeus-ha'-mercy, there you go! AE 2 (696—705): The antepirrhema resembles the epirrhema in that only at the very end is a sharp threat issued. At the start, the women reflect on the strength lent by their allies, Lampito and Ismenia. Even if the men should pass seven decrees, it will do them n o good (ot) yap εσται δύναμις, 698— 699). The men are hateful to one and all, especially to their neighbors. As an illustration, the women tell the story of a domestic festival they had prepared, and to which they had invited a charming neighbor girl from Boeotia. The girl turns out rather unexpectedly to be an eel, and she cannot attend the party because she has been barred to Athenian commerce by the men's political decrees. 30 Unless they cease from such decree-making, the women will seize them and break their necks. 3 1 The final note of menace closely parallels the men's threat at the end of E 2 t o torture a woman by putting her neck in the pillory (680—681). The close of the parabasis, in which the women boast confidently of their strength, contrasts amusingly with the opening of the next episode, as Lysistrata declares that she fears treachery from the women on the Acropolis, since they will use any excuse to sneak away to satisfy sexual desire (706ff). But, at this point, let us try to evaluate the whole unit we have analyzed; and to assess the significance of the high degree of structural balance which the parabasis exhibits. 30

Note the humorously climactic position of ëyxeXw in the sentence at the end of verse 702. The Athenian fondness for this delicacy has already been referred to at Lys. 36. The eel is amusingly personified as a maiden by Dikaiopolis, who addresses her at Acharnions 885ff. 31 At Xen. Cyr. 1.4.8, the verb έκτραχηλίξω is used of a horse throwing its rider; if such a nuance is felt here, it is an appropriate inversion of the men's earlier reference to the women as equestrians.

66

The first syzygy focuses primarily on political and civic concerns. Public treachery is charged by the men; the women defend their patriotism. The men exaggerate the women's tyrannical designs, and their comic hyperbole extends to their own self-characterization as democrats in the age of Kleomenes, Hippias, and Aristogeiton. The women linger on their civic and religious honors at the festivals, and then charge the men with financial malfeasance. Their half of the syzygy is generally less self-inflated, and their time-scheme is adjusted to reality: when they refer to the treasury's resources they specify τον 'épavov τον Xeyößevov παππφον è κ. τών Μηδικών (653). In their mingling of childbirth and finance in the metaphor άνδρας βίσφέρω (651) there is a poignant and whimsical note entirely missing from the men's exaggerated bombast. The image serves to introduce a hint of the private and domestic world; a similar hint, perhaps, underlies the women's disclaimer early in AE 1 : ei δ' èyù yvvfì πέφνκα, τούτο μη φθονεϊτέ μοι (649: "But if I was b o m a woman, don't hold that against me.") In summary, this section of the poem is predominantly public, except for the hint of the women's domestic world and the directly abusive threats that close E 1 and AE 1 . There is little sexual abuse or double-entendre. The second syzygy provides a contrast, in that the men's political emphasis gives way to a series of personal apprehensions, sexual jokes, and generili abuse. Granted, they mention Leipsydrion (665), and the reference to Artemisia (675) would recall the Persian Wars. But their focus is predominantly on their own masculinity, and on the fears and desires that women excite in them. The women, too, dwell less on political matters, and more now on their rage against the men (AO 1 is probably the most abusive section of the whole poem), and on their strength in resisting them. The vignette of the paignia for Hecate in AE 2 affords a pleasant, nostalgic glimpse of the women's domestic world, shattered by the foolishness of the men's decrees. The emphasis on ψηφίσματα (repeated at 703 and 704, and cf. ψηφίση at 698) reminds us of the political sphere; but the most striking motif is surely the festive party for the children, with the humorous bathos of ëyxekvv at 702. In the second syzygy, sexual abuse and double entendre are much in evidence; for example, both men and women ostentatiously threaten each other at the beginning of their respective sections by disrobing and using the smell of their gender as an encouragement to themselves (and, presumably, as a provocative "weapon" against the other sex). The first syzygy thus balances the second, to a considerable degree. The political crisis (Athens vs. Sparta, democracy vs. tyranny or oligarchy) is juxtaposed with the domestic crisis (men vs. women), and the symmetries we have observed in our detailed analysis of the motifs of each section are further structural elaborations of this balance. The parabasis as a whole emerges as a multi-valent composition, since in each syzygy there are elements of the other. Amid the political motifs of the first, the women pro67

vide a significant domestic theme; in the second, the emphasis on decreemaking reminds us of the political world in the midst of the sexual hostility and buffoonery. The achievement of the parabasis as a poetic composition in the play as a whole is thus comparable to the effect of the long wool simile earlier: political and domestic motifs are skilfully interlaced to buttress the comedy's central premise, the equation of civil conflict with the war between the sexes. In the wool simile, this is acomplished through the manipulation of terms as the image unfolds. The parabasis achieves the same objective on a wider scale, through the strict parallelism of threat and counterthreat, the balanced form of twin syzygies, and the distribution of motifs and images. Let us turn now to the concluding episodes of Lysistrata, where we may discern a similar poetic fusion within the context of dramatic dialogue and action.

C. The Concluding

Scenes

(1072-1320)

Although the text at the end of Lysistrata is sufficiently problematic to raise serious questions about the identity of speakers in some places, and to make the order of certain passages doubtful, we are still in a position to analyze important features of Aristophanes' technique as the play moves to its joyful conclusion. 3 2 The chief aspect to be emphasized is the role of historical allusion at the end of the play: the final two hundred and fifty verses are crowded with references to Athenian and Spartan history, both political and military, recent and remote. To a certain extent, these references have a rhetorical purpose: the most obvious illustration is the rather selective group of historical examples deployed by Lysistrata in her great speech pleading for unity at 1112 ff. But her recollections of the Athenian tyrants and of the helot revolt by n o means exhaust the repertory, and rhetorical persuasion is not the only, or even the chief, context in which historical reference appears. The mutilation of the Hermae, four years before Lysistrata's production, is mentioned in an atmosphere of sexual banter at 1094; 3 3 Megara and Pylos, two of the most controversial place-names of the Peloponnesian War, figure among the geographical-anatomical puns at 1163ff; the Spartans commence their first lyric (1247ff), addressed to Mnamona (Mnemosyne), with reminiscences of the Persian Wars. 32

In what follows, I have adopted the ordering of lines in the Bude text, but have not always agreed with Coulon's assignment of speakers. Thus, for example, I assign 1273ff to Lysistrata, rather than to the Prytanis. I find van Leeuwen's transpositions of the lines in the final scenes eccentric, despite the recent arguments of S. Srebrny, "Der Schluss der 'Lysistrate'", Eos 51 (1961) 39—43, repr. in H.-J. Newiger, ed. Aristophanes und die Alte Komödie (Wege der Forschung CCLXV, Darmstadt 1975) 3 1 7 - 3 2 3 . 33 Cf. Thuc. 6.27ff. The Sicilian expedition (and disaster) are referred to twice earlier in Lysistrata·. cf. 391ff and 590. Cf. Sommerstein (note 2, above) 1 2 2 - 1 2 3 .

68

The objective of many such references is clear: through emphasis on AthenianSpartan co-operation and unity in the past, the present reconciliation may be more firmly grounded and more joyously celebrated. Aristophanes, however, casts his net far wider than this explanation alone would imply, since instead of limiting himself to examples of co-operation between Athens and Sparta, he also includes mention of personalities, places, and events which might be expected to evoke discord: examples are the Spartans' reference to Helen, cause of yet another war (1314), or their two-fold reference to Athena of the Brazen House (1300, 1320), with whom an important dispute just before the current war, the curse of Pausanias, was linked. 3 4 We must also consider the wide variety of styles in which the closing scenes of the play are composed: bantering argument, which scarcely masks the comic sexual frustration of the Athenian and Spartan envoys; the formal speeches of Lysistrata, which themselves include some rhetorical parody of Euripides; 3 s the final two stanzas of an abuse lyric by the chorus; 3 6 a peculiar speech of fantasy by an Athenian concerning embassies; and the final lyrics, in the form of prayers. During all this, as has been widely noted, Lysistrata herself seems to fade into the background, even if we assign her (probably rightly) the speech at 1273ff {d'ye νϋν έπζώή räWa πεττόηται καλώς), or even if we move that speech, with van Leeuwen, nearly thirty lines further on toward the end. 3 7 With the objective of peace accomplished, the play's close seems to transcend its protagonist. The references to history are relevant here, since they have the effect of "generalizing" the concluding scenes' scope. Individual characters are submerged, and the play's action is sundered from the dramatic "present"; a long arc of peace in the past is described, and extended into the future. In this sense, the achievement of the last scenes is essentially a poetic vision, rather than a historical one, and Aristophanes' aim is to transform history, rather than to descry it analytically; the end of Lysistrata is another illustration of the metamorphosis of political reality through 34 Cf. Thuc. 1.128ff, and the comments below. D. M. Lewis has raised the intriguing possibility that Lysistrata herself is modeled on one Lysimache, who was priestess of Athena Polias toward the end of the fifth century: see "Notes on Attic Inscriptions (II)", Annual of the British School at Athens 50 (1955) 1—12. If he is correct, another significant dimension for the audience's appreciation of many details of language and setting in the play must be reconstructed (for some examples, see Lewis, op. cit. 3); and the praise of Athena Chalkioikos at the conclusion will have been more emphatically balanced through the evocation of Athena Polias (see the remarks on the play's concluding scenes below). 35 See P. Rau, Paratragodia (Munich 1967) 201. Lys. 1124 is quoted from Eur. Melanippé Sophë, Lys. 1135 from Eur. Erechtheus. 36 For an analysis of the lyric, which begins at Lys. 1043, see Chapter 1, section B. 37 In van Leeuwen's text, verses 1273—1294 (the speech of Lysistrata and the lyric of the Athenians) are transposed to the end of the play; verses 1295 — 1320 ( in the conventional order) are moved back to precede them.

69

poetic techniques. Let us analyze the separate scenes in more detail, focusing on the long speech of Lysistrata, the speech of the Athenian on embassies, and the final lyrics. Lysistrata's speech is elaborately introduced: the Athenian claims that she is the only person who can reconcile both sides (1104), and the chorus, greeting her with the notorious χαίρ', ώ πασών άνδρειοτάτη (1108), 3 8 urge her to rise to the occasion, since all Hellas turns to her as arbitrator: χαίρ, ώ πασών άνδρειοτάτη, del δή νυνί oe yevéadai δεινην (μαλακήν>, àyaO-qv φαυλήν, σεμνή ν àyairfv, πολύπειρον. ώς οί πρώτοι τών Ελλήνων τη σή ληφθέντες ïvyyi 1110 συνεχώρησάν

σοι και κοινή

τáyκλήμaτa

πάντ'

έπέτρεψαν.

Ο Lady, noblest and best of all! arise, arise, and thyself reveal, Gentle, severe, attractive, harsh, well skilled with all our complaints to deal, The first and foremost of Hellas come, they are caught by the charm of thy spell-drawn wheel, They come to Thee to adjust their claims, disputes to settle, and strifes to heal. Although the chorus emphasizes Lysistrata's charm ('ivyyi), they humorously resort to paradox in the unexpected salutation άνδρειοτάτη, and in their inj u n c t i o n t o b e δεινήν

(μαλακήν>,

àyad^v

φάυλην,

κτλ.

at 1 1 0 9 . Structurally,

their excited prelude corresponds to the choral incitement of characters in the agon of other plays (e.g. Clouds 9 5 2 f f and 1024ff), and one suspects they will not mind a bit of sophistic rhetoric, if it is presented with grace and charm. This is exactly what Lysistrata provides. Her speech is in three parts ( 1 1 1 2 - 1 1 3 5 , 1 1 3 7 - 1 1 4 6 , 1 1 4 9 - 1 1 5 6 ) , with a short coda for a concluding plea (1159—1161). Lysistrata devotes a considerable portion of the first section (1112—1127) to a careful mollification of her listeners. Diallagë is to bring both parties closer, grasping them by the hand in a kindly fashion, not as the men have done in the past, but οίκείως, as women would do (1115—1118): πpóσaye

λαβούσα

κ α ι μή χαλεπή μηδ'

ώσπερ

άλλ'

ώς yvvaÏKaq

ημών

τούς Λ α κ ω ν ι κ ο ύ ς ,

πρώτα

τη χεψί

μήδ'

άνδρες εικός,

άμαΒώς οίκείως

1115

αύθαδικη, τοϋτ'

εδρών,

πάνυ.

Bring those Laconians hither, not with rude Ungenial harshness hurrying them along, Not in the awkward style our husbands used, But with all tact, as only women can. 3 8 The word is surely to be interpreted as "courageous" rather than as "virile". For comment on Lys. 1105, where a Spartan joke involves the phrase τον Ανσίοτρατον, see Whitman 202.

70

The final verse again reminds us of the coalescence of the domestic and public worlds; but solemnity is promptly dispelled when, in the next line, Lysistrata tells Diallagë to lead the Spartans over by the phallus, if necessary. She is to follow the same procedure with the Athenians (1120ff). Standing near, they are to hear her words (1122—1123). By now, Lysistrata has created some anticipation herself, but instead of addressing the parties immediately on the issue of peace, she enters a disclaimer concerning her sex ( 1 1 2 4 - 1 1 2 7 ) : έγώ γυνή μέν ε'ιμι, νους δ' ενεστί μοι. αύτη δ' έμαυτής ού κακώς -γνώμης εχω, τούς δ' έκ πατρός τε και γεραιτέρω λόγους πολλούς άκούσασ' ού μεμούσωμαι κακώς.

1125

I am a woman, but I don't lack sense; I'm of myself not badly off for brains, And often listening to my father's words And old men's talk, I've not been badly schooled. This brief digression serves at least three humorous purposes: it increases the suspense, parodies a Euripidean play, and artfully contrasts with the more critical comment on men at 1117 (cf. άμαθώς). At last, at 1128ff, Lysistrata gets down to business, employing the strong verb λοιδορήσαι, tempered in the following verse with κοινή δικαίως. Her point is panhellenic: how can Athenians and Spartans, celebrating the same festivals throughout Greece, destroy Greek men and cities, with a barbarian enemy standing by? λαβούσα δ' υμάς λοιδορήσαι βούλομαι κοινή δικαίως, οΐ μιας έκ χέρνιβος βωμούς περιρραίνοντες ωοπερ ξυγγενείς Όλυμπίασιν, έν Πυλαις, ΠυΟοϊ — πόσους εϊποιμ' äv άλλους, εϊ με μηκύνειν δέοι; — εχθρών παρόντων βαρβάρω οτρατεύματι "Ελληνας άνδρας και πόλεις άπόλλυτε. εις μέν λόγος μοι δεϋρ àeì περαίνεται.

1130

1135

And now, dear friends, I wish to chide you both, That ye, all of one blood, all brethren sprinkling The selfsame altars from the selfsame laver, At Pylae, Pytho, and Olympia, ay And many others which 'twere long to name, That ye, Hellenes—with barbarian foes Armed, looking on—fight and destroy Hellenes! So far one reprimand includes you both. Rhetorical artifice is mingled with sober exhortation: the interruption at 1131—1132, including the prosaic (in this sense) μηκύνειν, is shortly fol71

lowed by another quotation from Euripides ( 1 1 3 5 ) . 3 9 Lysistrata also indulges in ambiguity with the mention of "foreign armies" at 1133: this can only mean the Persians, from whom both the Spartans and at least some Athenians were hoping for co-operation. 40 In all, the substantive content of Lysistrata's first address may be reduced to about five verses: since both Athenians and Spartans participate at the festivals (Olympia, Thermopylae, Delphi), they should be ashamed to conduct a war against each other. 41 Two briefer and more direct sections of the speech follow, punctuated by scurrilous interruptions that are the funnier for word-plays on serious terms: cf. άπόΧλυμαί y at 1136, which picks up Lysistrata's άπόλλυτε (1134), and άδίκίομες at 1148, which transfers the Athenians' political άδικοϋσιν ( 1 1 4 7 ) to a sexual context. Lysistrata first reproaches the Spartans for forgetting Athenian help at the time of the earthquake and the helot revolt (1137ff). Conveniently, however, she omits to mention the dénouement of the affair, as reported by Thucydides; the Spartans, suspecting that Kimon's troops might co-operate with the rebels, sent them back to Athens, saying they were not needed after all. Athens was so offended that she concluded an alliance with Sparta's enemy Argos. Thucydides accords the incident some prominence within the narrative of the Pentacontaetia, and the emphasis of his account differs radically from that of Lysistrata as he describes an atmosphere of mutual fear and distrust: 4 2 και

διαφορά

èn ταύτης

ΛακεδαιμοΜαις και

της

οτρατείας

Άθηναίοις

πρώτον

φανερά

èyévero.

When Lysistrata turns to the Athenians, and reminds them of Spartan help in driving out the tyrants, she omits to mention Kleomenes' oligarchic designs. 43 Rather, she focuses on slavery and freedom, symbolized respectively by two garments, the κατωνάκη and the χλαίνα ( 1 1 4 9 f f ) : ύμας

δ' άφησε

ιν τους

ούκ ίσθ' οθ' υμάς κατωνάκας

Αθηναίους

οί Αάκωνες

φοροϋντας

έλθόντες

(μ) ole ι; αύθις

αύ

1150

δορί

For the usage of μηκύνω, cf. Thuc. 2.42, 4 3 ; 4.17; Soph. El. 1484. Cf. Sommerstein (note 2, above) 121 and note 60, as opposed to Dover, Aristophanic Comedy (note 3, above) 170. 4 1 It is interesting that the mention of Thermopylae, which appears as Πύλαίς (1131), is bracketed by two far better known sites of festivals, Olympia and Delphi. Aristophanes may be convertly playing with the similarity of the name to Pylos; for the explicit puns on this place-name, and the connection with a motif throughout the play, cf. 1163ff and the remarks below. 4 2 Thuc. 1.102.3. Note the emphasis on δείσαντες (102.3); cf. ύνοψίαν (102.3) and ύποπτου (102.4), and the comments below on the Athenian's speech on embassies. 4 3 Cf. Aristotle, Ath. Pol. 20. 39

40

72

πολλούς μεν άνδρας θετταλών άπώλεοαν, πολλούς δ' εταίρους Ίππιου κ,αί ξυμμάχους, και ξνμμαχοϋντες τχι τόθ' ή μέρα μόνοι ήλευθέρωσαν κάντί της κατωνάκης τον δήμο ν υμών χΚαιναν ήμπέσχον -πάλιν;

1155

And you, Athenians, think ye that I mean To let you off? Do ye not mind, when ye Wore skirts of hide, how these Laconians came And stood beside you in the fight alone, And slew many a stout Thessalian trooper, Full many of Hippias's friends and helpers, And freed the State, and gave your people back The civic mantle for the servile skirt? With her final words, she recalls the peroration of her great wool simile earlier in the play (cf. 586): ... κατ' έκ ταύτης τω δήμω χλαΐναν

ύφήναι.

Again, history has been transformed through rhetoric, and colored with a domestic tinge. The garments of the Athenians are indicative symbols of their political status, and in reverting to the motif of a χΚαινα for the δήμος, Aristophanes substitutes a metaphorical resonance for precise historical accuracy. 44 The references to clothes are also proleptic, since after a few lines of sexual banter and a short final plea from Lysistrata, the Spartan names as his first demand the εγκυκλον, or mantle, of Diallagë (1162). 4 5 This leads to the wellknown anatomical puns, on Pylos, Echinos, the gulf of Melis, and the Megarian "legs" (1164ff), in which place-names associated with the Peloponnesian War are suggestively designated on the nude figure of Diallagë. The pun on Pylos is particularly noteworthy, since it heads the series and is linked with double-entendre throughout the play. The women, we remember, forswear sexual relations, seize the Acropolis, and defend its gates against the men, who assault them with phallic intensity; in repeated sexual puns, the Propylaea are linked with the female genitials.46 The pun on Pylos, the most bitter Spartan defeat of the war, must be appreciated with this background: through verbal playfulness, the name is associated with the "gates of love" of Diallagë, but also with the women's sex strike in general, and with the symbol of Athens which the women have commanded, the Acropolis. 47 After the two stanzas of the abuse lyric (1188ff), which are sung during the feast for the envoys off-stage, the re-entry of the principals is preceded by a 44 45 46 47

For analysis of the wool simile, see section A above. The note of van Leeuwen ad. loc. observes this transition. Cf. Lys. 249ff, 265, 4 2 3 - 4 3 2 , and Henderson (note 27, above) 9 5 - 9 6 . Cf. note 41, above, for another resonance of the pun. 73

bit of comic business, 48 and then by an Athenian's account of the festivities. 49 This peculiar speech has provoked little critical comment, although it contains a sprightly and thematically significant summation of Lysistrata's efforts, and perhaps hints at the broader usefulness of comedy in general (1228ff): όρθώς y', οπή νήφοντες ούχ ύγιαίνομεν. ήν τους Αθηναίους éyù πείσω λέγων, μεθυόντες άεί πανταχοι πρεσβεύσομεν. νϋν μεν yàp όταν ελθωμεν εις Λακεδαίμονα νήφοντες, εύθύς βλέπομεν ο τι ταράξομεν ώσθ' ο τι μεν αν λέγωσιν ούκ. άκούομεν, à δ' ού λεγουσι, ταϋθ' ύπονενοήκαμεν, άγγέλλομεν δ' ού ταύτά των αύτών περί. νυνί δ' 'άπαντ' ηρεσκεν ώσθ' εί μέν yé τις φδοι Τελαμώνος, Κλειταγόρας §δειν δέον, έπχινέσαμεν àv και προς έπιωρκήοαμεν.

1230

1235

Ay, ay, 'tis when we're sober, we're so daft. Now if the State would take a friend's advice, 'Twould make its envoys always all get drunk. When we go dry to Sparta, all our aim Is just tö see what mischief we can do. We don't hear aught they say; and we infer A heap of things they never said at all. Then we bring home all sorts of differing tales. Now everything gives pleasure: if a man, When he should sing Cleitagora, strike up With Telamon's song, we'd clap him on the back, And say 'twas excellent; ay, and swear it too. Sobriety, exclaims the speaker, only brings trouble, and the topsy-turvy suggestion of conducting embassies when drunk accords well with comic fantasy in general. 50 Indeed, when we consider the evocation of previous incidents and motifs, the passage is marvelously compact. Lysistrata, too, has earlier recommended an unorthodox way of conducting embassies, as we remember from the first section of the great wool simile (567—570):

48

For a reconstruction of the difficult passage at 1216ff, see Dover (note 3, above) 10-12. 49 Although the ms. gives these lines to the chorus, the Oxford editors and van Leeuwen assign them to an Athenian, the Bude text to the Prytanis. so The success of comic heroes at the end of Aristophanic plays is typically associated with drunkenness: Dikaiopolis and Philokleon in Acharnions and Wasps are outstanding examples.

74

ώαπερ κλωστηρ', οταν ήμϊν fi rerapay μένος, ώδε λαβοϋσαι, ύπενεγκούσαι τola LU άτράκτοις το μεν ένταυθοϊ, το δ' έκεϊσε, οϋτως κ,αί τον πόλεμοι τούτον διαλύοομεν, ην τις έάσχι, διενεγκοϋσαι διά πρεσβειών το μεν ένταυθοϊ, το δ' έκεϊσε. 570 Her proposal was greeted with scorn by the Proboulos, both because of the suggestion of female envoys and because of the wool-working analogy. But the new proposal, of dispatching tipsy ambassadors, is formally recommended to the state by an Athenian male (cf. ήν τους 'Αθηναίους εγώ πείσω λέγων, 1229); by inference, it once again brings us round to the women, since drunkenness is a comic koinos topos for the character of women in general, and has been repeatedly emphasized in Lysistrata, both as a casual slur and in the elaborate oath-taking ceremony at 194ff. s i As it is the women who are the drunkards in the comic world, the Athenian's speech has the amusing consequence of implicitly confirming their credentials as ambassadors in the real world. On the political level, the elaborate puns on wine and peace in the Acharnions suffice to show that σπονδαί is a favorite Aristophanic notion; 5 2 although the word is not used in the Athenian's speech, it is not irrelevant to note that his comments follow a symposium at which peace has been concluded and everyone has gotten drunk (cf. 1227). Aristophanes exploited the idea in another fashion in previous plays, punning on the words for wine-lees (τρύξ) and comic drama (Tpvycp-Sia).53 The connection of both drama and wine with Dionysus is such a common one that we run the risk of ignoring its significance, even in passages where there is no explicit verbal pun. This is surely such a passage, although the notion of comedy is displaced by the singing of skolia, the "Cleitagoras" and the "Telamón" (1236ff). S 4 Poetry, wine, and peace are all present at this symposium; the topsy-turvy notions of diplomacy prompted by the party hint that comedy was there as well. The political overtones of the Athenian's speech are accentuated, not through any direct mention of war and peace, but through a pessimistic description of the cynicism of diplomacy in real life that parallels the emphases of Thucydides (1231—1235). It is when the Athenians are sober, paradoxically, that they distort reality, form unreasonable suspicions ex silentio, and come

Cf. Lys. 114, 233ff; Thesm. 347ff, 626ff, 733ff. 52 Cf. Ach. 178ff. 5 3 With the name Trygaios in Peace, compare ΛcA. 4 9 9 - 5 0 0 , 886, and Wasps 634, 650, 1537. 5 4 Although van Leeuwen is skeptical in his note ad loc, I agree with the comment of Bergler, who observes the humorous irony of singing war songs at a symposium celebrating the conclusion of peace. 51

75

home full of conflicting reports about the same events. 5S The illusions of sober diplomacy, in which accounts become muddled due t o both suspicion and antagonism (note the verb ταράξομεν at 1232), 5 6 are amusingly paralleled in the banqueters' confusion of skolia, which were greeted with praise at the symposium (cf. έτ^νέοαμβν, 1238), even at the price of a false oath in the service of conviviality (cf. και προς έπιωρκήσαμεν, 1238). S 7 Earlier, the idea of a false oath had been greeted with horror by Myrrhine (cf. έπιορκέω, 914); but now, with the conclusion of peace, the great "oath-taking" of the play, that of the women, may be forgotten. Thus, the verses of the Athenian on diplomacy are deeply integrated into the conception of the fantasy in Lysistrata, and the suggestion of drunkenness underlines the liberating force of comedy in general under the patronage of Dionysus. At the same time, the political context is distinctly sustained as a background feature for the speech, even as it is merged with the intoxicating good fellowship of the feast: vvvi δ' 'άπαντ ìjpeanev (1236). With the entrance of the principals, announced at 1241, the stage is set for the concluding lyrics. Of these the majority is given to the Spartan semichorus, however we order the lines (they sing 1247—1272 and 1297—1320 in the Budé text). The two semi-choruses obviously balance the earlier choruses of old men and old women, even though the latter re-united at 1043ff for the rather mild abuse lyric, directed at the audience. Perhaps we are meant to be reminded that the political reconciliation symbolized by Diallagë is still fragile, and contingent on continuing good will; after all, the lyrics are in the form of prayers. 5 8 Nevertheless, the chief emphasis is on harmony of the two great powers. The Spartans begin by recalling the battles of Artemisium and Thermopylae. In the first the Athenians are called "god-like" (atoet/ceXoi),59 while in the second Leonidas and his followers are accorded an elaborate, Homeric simile (1254—1258): 6 0 55

Compare the celebrated c o m m e n t of T h u c y d i d e s on the difficulties of establishing the truth in his chapter on historical m e t h o d ( 1 . 2 2 . 3 ) : έπιπόμως δ' ηύβίσκετο, διότι oi παρόντες τοις εργοις έκάστοις ού ταύτα nepi των αύτών eXeyov, άλλ' ώτ έκατέρων τις εύνοιας ή μνήμης εχοι. The rather rare, prosaic verb ύπονοέω (Lys. 1 2 3 4 ) is relatively c o m m o n in T h u c y d i d e s (cf. 1.68.2, etc.). This is not the only Aristophanic c o n t e x t which recalls T h u c y d i d e a n m o d e s of expression; cf. for example Birds 1 2 2 5 f f , 1 5 9 6 f f . 56 Cf. the c o m m e n t s o n ταράττω in political c o n t e x t s in section A, above. 57 Even though the oath-taking is n o w m e n t i o n e d in a trivial c o n t e x t (the behavior of m e n singing skolia at a symposium), the m e n t i o n of a "false o a t h " perforce recalls the great oath-taking scene at 2 0 3 f f and Lysistrata's subsequent efforts to make the w o m e n adhere to their agreement. 58 O n the prayers, w h i c h are customarily f o u n d in parabases, see T. Gelzer, "Tradition u n d N e u s c h ö p f u n g in der Dramaturgie des Aristophanes," in Newiger (note 32, above) 307. 59 Here I follow Meineke's text, as opposed to Wilamowitz' conjecture συβίκελοι, adopted by C o u l o n in the Budé text. 60 Van L e e u w e n compares Iliad 2 0 . 1 6 8 , where similar language is used in a lion simile for Achilles.

76

αμέ δ' αν Λεωνίδας àyev άπερ τώς κάπρως σάγο^τας, οίώ, τον οδόντα· πολύς δ' άμφί τάς yevvaq άφρός ηνσεεν, πολύς δ' άμα καττών σκελών ϊero.

1255

An' us Leonidas led out Like gruesome boars, I ween, Whettin' our tuskies keen. Mückle around the chaps was the white freath gleamin', Mückle adoon the legs was the white freath streamin' . . . In this passage, the Persian Wars are subsumed in an aura of co-operation between Athens and Sparta, and ornamented with linguistic evocations of glorious, antique heroism; we should contrast Lysistrata's ambiguous allusion to the role of the Persians in the current conflict (cf. 1133). The language for Leonidas and the epithet for the Athenians also recall the Iliadic narrative of Greek unity against the Trojans in a war yet more remote; but even that conflict, as we shall see, is romantically transformed in the Spartans' second lyric. 61 The first song closes with an invocation of Artemis, the virgin huntress (cf. 1271—1272). At 1273ff, Lysistrata commands the men and women to come together: 62 ä~fe νυν επειδή ταλλα πεπόηται καλώς, άιτά^εσθε ταύτας, ώ Αάκωνες, τασδεδί ύμείς• άνηρ δε παρά yvvaÎKa και yvvr¡ στήτω παρ' άνδρα, κφτ' è π' άγαθαίς ξυμφοραϊς όρχησάμενοι θεοίσιν εύλαβώμεθα το λοιπόν αύθις μη 'ζαμαρτάνειν ετι.

1275

There, all is settled, all arranged at last. Now, take your ladies; you, Laconians, those, And you, take these; then standing side by side, Each by his partner, lead your dances out In grateful honour to the Gods, and O Be sure you nevermore offend again. We have, of course, not heard of any Spartan wives on the embassy; Coulon and van Daele suggest in their stage direction at 1274 that the speaker motions toward Lampito and to the women who accompany her. 6 3 The speech 61

Note that the Spartans' dialect, doubtless a source of amusement to an Athenian audience throughout the play, is now employed in a lyric which stylistically echoes the elevated diction of Alemán: cf. van Leeuwen ad 1247ff. Yet the Homeric reminiscences, one may feel, are more significant thematically. 62 On the placement and attribution of these verses, see note 32, above. « Cf. Aristophane III (repr. Paris 1967) 176.

77

emphatically underlines the symbolic association of the two sets of semichoruses, since we are verbally reminded of what must seem graphically clear on stage: the Athenians and Spartans are imaginative transformations of the contingents of men and women who have battled each other in the earlier parts of the play. The next choral passage is sung by the Athenians. They invoke a long series of divinities; special emphasis is laid on the Graces (1279), who head the list, and on Hesychia and Aphrodite (1289—1290), who conclude it. Dionysus with his maenads is mentioned (1284—1285); this reference is complemented by the Spartans in their concluding song at 1312—1313. Cries of victory are raised (1291ff), but it is the victory of Hesychia that the chorus celebrates. 64 The last song (1297ff) invokes the Spartan Muse to celebrate Apollo at Amyklai (cf. 1298) and Athena of the Brazen House (1300, 1320). A charming picture of girls by the Eurotas is evoked; their chorus is like that of Dionysus' Bacchae. Leading this chorus is Helen, the daughter of Leda (1312-1315): ταί δέ κόμαι σείονται, änep Βακχάν θυρσαδδωαν

και

παώδωαν.

àyfjTCU δ' à Λήδας παις àyuà χοραγός ευπρεπής. Winsome tresses tossin', flyin', As o' Bacchanals at play. Leda's dochter, on before us, Pure an' sprety, guides the Chorus.

1315

Helen has been referred to once before in the Lysistrata, in a rather different context. When Lysistrata explains the plan of the sex-strike to the women, Lampito recalls that Helen's seductive charms sufficed to make ivlenelaus forget his rage after the Trojan war and forgo vengeance upon her (155-156): ò yùv Μενέλαος τάς Έλε^ας τά μάλά ira Ύυμνας παραϊδών

έξέβαλ',

155

οίώ, το ξίφος.

Sae Menelaus, when he glowered, I ween, At Helen's breastie, coost his glaive awa'. This tradition had been extensively exploited by Euripides in tragedies during the years immediately preceding Lysistrata's production. The year before Aristophanes' play, Euripides' Helen (412 B.C.) had dramatized the adven-

64

Some, such as van Leeuwen, think that these cries of victory close the play; yet the dramatic effect of the Spartans invoking Athena of the Brazen House is hardly negligible, and serves as a thematically suitable conclusion.

78

tures of Helen in Egypt; the play's humorous irony scarcely manages to dispel the grimness of the final slaughter (albeit of "barbarians"), for which Helen and Menelaus were responsible.65 More specifically relevant, however, is Hecuba's insistence on inescapable eros during the debate in the Trojan Women (415 B.C.): Menelaus, set up as the judge of Helen's guilt, is clearly shown to weaken, and although his actual reconciliation with his wife is not portrayed, the chorus prays apprehensively that the two may not return to Greece together on the same ship, thus allowing erös to thwart justice. 66 But in the context of Lysistrata and comedy, the "dropping of the sword," or the triumph of eros over eris, is decidedly desirable. This explains the mention of Helen by Lampito, and her evocation by the Spartan chorus at the play's conclusion. Her Spartan affiliations add, of course, to the romantic aura of the scene. More significantly, her mention is an emblem of war's exorcism. She is no longer the casus belli, but rather àyvà and ευπρεπής (1315), the leader of an imaginary chorus that may be envisioned as sacred to Dionysus.67 As such, her legendary beauty is beneficial, like that of Diallagë, and she complements the mention in the previous song of Hesychia and Aphrodite. The poetry of Aristophanes thus converts even the ambiguous charms of Helen to beneficence. The Trojan War, suggested by the reference to her as well as by the Homeric echo in the boar simile for Leonidas' troops, is poetically re-fashioned and limned in the glow of heroic, Athenian-Spartan unity. As Helen escapes being the cause of that war, so the cult of Athena of the Brazen House, ostensibly a "cause" or claim in the Peloponnesian War, is similarly transformed. Thucydides reports that the Athenians had claimed that, through the death of Pausanias, the Spartans had brought a curse upon themselves, since Pausanias had sought refuge in Athena's sanctuary.68 Athens demanded reparation, in response to the Spartan demand for restitution after the "curse" of Kylon. 69 These acrimonious preliminaries to the war are skilfully transformed into a graceful, unifying

One may also note that, probably within the same year, Aristophanes produced a lengthy parody of Helen at Thesm. 850ff: see Chapter 4, section C below. For the date of the Thesmophoriazusae, see the arguments of Sommerstein (note 2, above), who plausibly assigns it to the Dionysia of 411. 66 Tro. 941 — 1114; for the motif cf. also Andromache 629. For an interpretation of the scenes from the Trojan Women, see C. Moulton, "Antiphon the Sophist, On Truth", TAPA 103 (1972) 3 5 3 - 3 5 4 , and note 52. 67 A chorus which, of course, parallels the actual Athenian chorus in the theater at the real-life performance. Note in general the emphasis on dancing at the end of the play: cf. 1246, 1277, 1279, 1306, 1315. The only parallel is the éxodos of Wasps, on which see Whitman 160—161, and K. J . Reckford, "Catharsis and Dream-Interpretation in Aristophanes' Wasps", TAPA 107 (1977) 3 1 1 - 3 1 2 . 6 8 See Thuc. 1.128ff. 69 ibid. 1.126.3ff. 65

79

salutation in the final lyric of Lysistrata, however; Athena of the Brazen House telescopes the patron of the Acropolis (prominently identified with the whole action of the play) with Spartan worship, and the curses associated with the pre-war embassies are implicitly expiated with her invocation. Again, we have to do with an exorcism of strife. The éxodos of Lysistrata, then, manages to recall the Trojan War, the Persian War, and several prominent incidents of the Peloponnesian War—if only to "re-cast" them poetically. Helen is re-envisioned as pure; Thermopylae and Artemisium serve as examples of panhellenic harmony; such well-known names as Megara, Pylos, and Athena Chalkioikos are either neutralized through word-play, or are turned to positive account through prayer. Curses become blessings. The whole scene is an impressive re-enactment of the past for the benefit of the future. Through his use of metaphor, rhetoric, and selective historical reference, Aristophanes creates a poetic politics of peace for an audience still at war in real life. 70 D.

Conclusion

The analyses above, of the wool simile, the parabasis, and the concluding scenes of the play, have all been directed toward the same objective: a more detailed understanding of the fusion in Lysistrata of political concerns in Athens and the fantasy world of the play. That understanding requires an examination of essentially poetic mechanisms, which incorporate political reference within the structure of fantasy to transmute historical and present reality. The two major tendencies of previous criticism, to interpret the play reductively as either a psychological or as a social document, have largely ignored the complex tectonics of style that are responsible for the play's success as political fantasy. Our examination of the wool simile analyzed the linguistic and structural emphasis on the symmetry and inter-penetration of the politiceli and domestic worlds. That symmetry is further confirmed in the elaborate dispositions of the semi-choruses, and in the arrangement of motifs, in the parabasis. Finally, we have seen that the éxodos is consistently integrated with the structure and motifs of Lysistrata as a whole; the most overtly public of the sections we have analyzed, the éxodos yet carries its political theme with suggestive delicacy and grace as a result of Aristophanes' poetic

70 Dover (note 3, above) 161 stresses the practical side when he concludes: "Did Aristophanes or anyone else really believe that peace, however desirable, was to be had in 411 without concessions which would weaken and impoverish the Athenians more than they would tolerate? " But our emphasis here is on the poetic technique of Aristophanes, and on the fashion in which political matters are treated in the world (and with the language) of the play; what Aristophanes really believed must remain moot.

80

tools of metaphor and allusion. As we concluded in our discussion of the lyrics of insult and abuse, particularly with reference to the Birds, our analysis of Lysistrata shows that Aristophanes need not be termed either a poet of fantasy or a political playwright. His specific power is that he has achieved a splendidly complementary integration. In the next chapter, we t u m to another political play, the Peace, t o examine the techniques with which Aristophanes lyrically conjoins fantasy and satire with the elements of pastoral and romance.

6 Moulton (Hyp. 68)

81

CHAPTER 3

Festive I m a g e r y in the Peace T h e Peace is generally n o t regarded as one of A r i s t o p h a n e s ' better p l a y s . 1 T h e m o s t c o m m o n criticisms concern the play's lack of dramatic tension: there is n o t very much to the agon, for e x a m p l e , and aside f r o m Trygaeus' flight to O l y m p u s and b a c k , there is little action in the p l a y . 2 In addition, the identity of the chorus seems c o n f u s e d : panhellenic in the earlier scenes, they are narrowed down to Attic farmers in the end. 3 T h e play strongly suggests the Acharnions in its general theme and in s o m e individual details. 4 Even as we differentiate Dikaiopolis and Trygaeus as two quite different c o m i c heroes, 5 w e must admit that Aristophanes re-uses material in the Peace on a n u m b e r of occasions, more frequently, perhaps, than is cust o m a r y even for h i m . 6 Assessments of this c o m e d y are f o n d of the terms " s t a t i c " and " s y m b o l i c " ; recent critics, one notes, have turned to the linguistic texture o f the Peace, as if to stress that in the absence of much action the play retains s o m e virtues. 7 T h e c o m e d y is surely unique in the surviving Aristophanic corpus. Whatever the circumstances or the time span of its c o m p o s i t i o n , it is the only pièce de l'occasion k n o w n to us, as is virtually certified b y T h u c y d i d e s ' dating of the Peace of Nicias. 8 Since we k n o w very little about ancient dramatists' m o d e s of c o m p o s i t i o n , 9 it is unwise t o infer that the progress o f the negotia-

1 S e e , for e x a m p l e , Whitman 103—104, and references to the views of Wilamowitz, Rogers, and Murray (ibid. 3 1 0 , note 1); M. Platnauer, ed. Peace ( O x f o r d 1964) viii. 2 Cf. Whitman 104. 3 S e e T . Gelzer, Aristophanes der Komiker (Stuttgart 1 9 7 1 ) , col. 1 4 5 7 . 4 ibid. 1456, 1 4 5 8 . 5 S e e the discussion below in section B. 6 For analysis of re-use of m o t i f s in Aristophanic lyric, see Chapter 1. Another notable e x a m p l e is furnished b y the parodies of Telephus in Acharnions and Thesmophoriazusae. 7 S e e particularly the analysis of Whitman 1 0 3 f f , and the discussion of obscene language in the play by J . Henderson, in The Maculate Muse (New Haven 1 9 7 5 ) 62—66. A n exception is the c o m m e n t a r y of Platnauer (note 1, above), which furnishes little in this regard. 8 Thuc. 5 . 2 0 . 1 dates the signing of the Peace of Nicias to "directly after the D i o n y s i a " : αύται ai σπονδαί èyévovro τβλαττώντος τοϋ χειμώνος 'άμα ήρι, έκ Δωνυοίων ώθύς των αστικών. 9 A n e x c e p t i o n is the anecdote furnished b y Plutarch concerning Menander at Mor. 347e.

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tions had a limiting effect on Aristophanes' imagination, as some critics have suggested. Indeed, the very opposite may be true, since the dramatic tum-around after the battle of Amphipolis in 422, in which Kleon and Brasidas both perished, might well have liberated an artist's creative energies, and led to the preliminary outlines of a play before the negotiations were actually entered upon. 1 0 The play won second prize, as one of the ancient hypotheses informs us; more appealing to the judges in 421 was Eupolis' Kolakes (Flatterers), a satire on Kallias, the entertainer of the sophists. 11 Perhaps the Peace, then, appears more timely after the event than it actually was, either for its author or for the audience. The more curious, distinctive qualities of the Peace have little to do with contemporary political events. They emerge, rather, from the poetic technique and are related to the play's genre. Despite the toning down of the agonistic element, the hero confronts the opposition of Hermes and Polemos; later in the play, he disposes of alazones. He rises in the world (literally) through the means of a fantastic, outlandish plan, and ends the play in prosperous bliss. By rights, then, the Peace is a comedy. 1 2 Yet its comparatively static plot, the symbolic features of the language and of some of the characters, and various other aspects all suggest something of an experiment on Aristophanes' part: to the usual admixture of satire and fantasy, a substantial new element has been joined. This element is predominantly lyrical. 13 For in the Peace, as in n o other play, we are presented with extensive celebration of simple country joys, the fertility of the fields, and release from care of every kind. The motif of festivity is sustained throughout the play in its imagery. The lyrical element of the Peace has several anticipations, most notably the Country Dionysia celebrated by Dikaiopolis in the Acharnions.14 But in the Peace we are confronted, primarily through the play's metaphorical structure, with a large-scale instantiation of this impulse. Given subsequent definitions of pastoral and romance, we cannot adequately describe this element by either term, although, as we shall see, the Peace incorporates aspects of both. It is only through the recognition of such questions of genre that the play can be properly appreciated as comic drama, or its poetic technique be examined. 10

Thucydides refers to λόγοι, or discussions, held during the winter and early spring (5.17.2), and emphasizes that the deaths of Kleon and Brasidas, the most vigorous opponents of peace, cleared the way for negotiations (5.16.1). Aristophanes refers to their death in the scene with Polemos in Peace (269ff), but he would n o t necessarily have required detailed information about the peace talks, or a reliable prediction of their result, to have composed his play; after all, he was by now n o stranger to the world of fantasy. » Cf. Hyp. 3. 12 See the analysis of F. M. C o m f o r d , in The Origin of Attic Comedy. 13 Despite the indications of Gelzer (note 3, above) 1460, and T. McEvilley, "Development in the Lyrics of Aristophanes", AJP 91 (1970) 262. The latter b o t h concentrate too narrowly on the presence of lyric verse forms. i" Ach. 247ff.

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Let us first devote some attention to the ways in which Aristophanes reuses material that is found in earlier plays. Most scholars have cited the Acharnions and the Wasps in this regard. 15 We may compare the plays under several headings. First, there are parallels in the broad outlines of whole scenes. For example, both Dikaiopolis and Trygaeus extensively parody the situation of Euripidean tragic figures (Telephus and Bellerophon, respectively). 16 In both Acharnians and Peace there are elaborate, humorous accounts of the causes of the Peloponnesian War, delivered by Dikaiopolis in the first play, by Hermes in the second. 1 7 The prologue of Peace introduces the play with a dialogue between two slaves: one may compare the Knights and the Wasps. At the level of individual motifs and details, the parallels to the Wasps are the most prominent. J u s t as we hear that Philokleon, at the beginning, is suffering from a new νόσος, so we learn that the master in Peace is under the spell of a strange μανία, and the slaves in both plays jest with the interpretation of riddles. 18 Part of the parabasis in Peace is directly quoted from that of Wasps', we also have particularly emphatic abuse in both plays of the crab-like Karkinos and his sons. 19 Slightly less prominent repetitions or variations of detail recall other comedies: the airy vagaries of dithyrambic poets {Peace 827ff: cf. Clouds 337, and later Birds 1373ff); certain details in the portrait of Kleon (compare, for instance, Peace 313 with Knights 1030); the reform of the calendar {Peace 414ff: cf. Clouds 607ff); the prominence of Megarians and Boeotians {Peace 999ff: cf. Acharnions 729ff). More obvious than all the foregoing, b u t less useful in critical analysis, are the general similarities in plot, particularly with Acharnions. Trygaeus, an old Athenian, manages like Dikaiopolis to escape the hardships of war and, at the end of the play, to luxuriate in the benefits of peace. For the earlier hero, this is a private truce. The very name Dikaiopolis suggests more emphasis on the city (though country life is nostalgically evoked): it is not by accident that Achamians opens with an assembly on the Pnyx and includes,

15

See, for example, Gelzer 1456, 1458. Ach. 28Off, Peace 58ff. For analysis, see P. Rau, Paratragodia (Munich 1967) 19ff, 89ff. 17 Ach. 515ff, Peace 605ff. Although both these examples of humorous "pseudo-history" had their serious adherents in antiquity, they are plainly shot through with comic fantasy. The most penetrating analysis of the "inconcinnities" they present with Thucydides' account has been offered recently by G. E. M. de Ste. Croix; see The Origins of the Peloponnesian War (Ithaca 1972) 231—244, and cf. the appendix on "The political outlook of Aristophanes" (355ff). 18 For disease, cf. Wasps 71 ; for madness, cf. Peace 54, 65. Riddles (aiviyßara or -γρίφοι): Wasps 20, Peace 47. 19 Compare Peace 752ff with Wasps 1030ff. For Karkinos, see Wasps 150Iff, Peace 781, 864. 16

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in the course of the action, much sophistic rhesis.20 Trygaeus, by contrast, procures a general peace. He is a countryman, as is repeatedly emphasized by the puns on his name. 2 1 And the chorus of farmers in the Peace is far more committed to the lyrical celebration of the fields than is its counterpart in Acharnions.22 In both plays, there is an inter-relation of symbolic and metaphorical language, e.g. the puns on σττονδαί, on the accoutrements of war, and on the blessings of peace, especially food and sex. 23 On the whole, the differences between the two plays seem at least as significant as their similarities. We have sketched above some of the ways in which Aristophanes re-fashions material from earlier comedies in the Peace. As we have seen in our analysis of the lyric of insult and abuse, and as countless other examples indicate, this was not at all an unusual procedure for him; 2 4 indeed, while vaunting his originality and cleverness, he also parodies the very notion of "new jokes" upon occasion. 25 What justifies his boast of δεξιότης, however, is the intricate and imaginative adaptation of material to new contexts. This can be illustrated more fully by a study of the personification of Polemos in the Peace, an analysis which will also serve to introduce us to the seamless fabric of festival imagery in the play as a whole.

A. The Feast of Polemos

(236ff)

Trygaeus arrives at the house of Zeus, to be confronted by Hermes. 2 6 Reviled by the god (182ff), the hero is forced to state his name and provenance (190). At the sight of food (192), Hermes becomes more pliable, and explains to Trygaeus that he has no hope of seeing Zeus, since all the gods have departed from Olympus, leaving only Hermes as a guard; the immortals have turned the house over to Polemos, the personification of War, as a fitting result of the Greeks' hostilities (204—220). Polemos has in turn buried the goddess Peace in a deep cave, and has covered the entrance with stones ( 2 2 I f f ) . Trygaeus asks Hermes what Polemos intends

20

See, for example, the analysis of Dikaiopolis' speech at Ach. 496ff by C. T. Murphy, "Aristophanes and the Art of Rhetoric", HSCP 49 (1938) 9 9 - 1 0 4 . 21 See Peace 912, 1 3 3 9 - 1 3 4 0 . 22 Note the dismissive treatment of the farmer by Dikaiopolis at Ach. 1018ff. 23 For these elements in Achamians, see the analysis of Whitman 59ff. 24 See Chapter 1 and note 6, above. 25 Cf. the scene of comic by-play between Xanthias and Dionysus at Frogs Iff. 26 For the "doors" of Zeus, cf. Peace 179; Hermes is plainly the door-keeper. The discussions of the staging of the play have loomed large in the critical literature: cf. Platnauer (note 1, above) xi—xv, and H.-J. Newiger, "Retraktionen zu Aristophanes' 'Frieden'," Rhein. Mus. 108 (1965) 229ff.

85

to do next, and receives the ominous information that Polemos has acquired an enormous mortar (θυεία), since he plans to grind up the Greek cities ( 2 3 0 - 2 3 1 ) : Τ P.

τί δήτα

Ε ρ.

τρίβε

ταύτχι

T-Q Oveíq.

ιν èv αύτ-Q τάς

χρήσεται;

πόλεις

βουλεύεται.

—What is he going to do with that, I wonder! —He means to put the cities in and pound them. Hearing a loud noise within the house, Hermes departs; Polemos enters with a direful, para-tragic salutation (236—237): 2 7 Ιώ βροτοί ώς

βροτοί

αύτίκα

βροτοί

μάλα

τάς

πολυτλήμονες,

γνάθους

άλ·γηαετε.

Ο mortals! mortals! wondrous-woeful mortals! How ye will suffer in your jaws directly! Both Pindar and Heraclitus had written of Polemos, war personified, before. 2 8 For our purposes in analyzing Aristophanes' use of metaphor, however, the important precedent is the personification at Acharnions 9 7 9 f f , where Polemos, in a choral lyric, is pictured as a drunken guest who causes nothing but trouble at a symposium: ούδέποτ' ούδέ

éyù>

παρ'

Π ό λ ε μ ο ι ' οϊκαδ'

έμοί

ποτε

τον

ξ υ γ κ α τ α κ λ ι ν ε ί ς , o r t πάροινος όστις

επί

πάντ'

άγάθ'

ηρ^άσατο

πάντα

κάμάχετο

και

'πίνε, τάς έξέχει

κακά,

προσέτι

κατάκεισο, χάρακας θ' ημών

λαβε

ήπτε

πολύ

ßiq. τον

ύποδέξομαι,

Αρμόδιοι>

(¡.aerai

άνηρ

'έχοντας

έπικωμάσας

κάνέτρεπε πολλά τήνδε

κάξέχει προκαλουμένου-

φιλοτησίαν',

μάλλον olvov

980

εφυ,

ετι

έκ των

τφ

985 πυρί, άμπέλων.

War I'll never welcome in to share my hospitality, Never shall the fellow sing Harmodius in my company, Always in his cups he acts so rudely and offensively.

F o r the triple f o r m , cf. the lament of K u d o i m o s at Peace 2 8 0 ; c o m p a r e Frogs 184 and Menander, Dyskolos 5 7 4 . T h e epithet πο\υτ\ήμοι>&; is H o m e r i c ; cf. f o r e x a m p l e , Iliad 7 . 1 5 2 . T h e treatment o f P o l e m o s in this play has received excellent discussion b y H.-J. Newiger, w h o convincingly shows that P o l e m o s is not an allegorical figure, b u t rather a real stage persona—a person-symbol—with r o o t s in a m e t a p h o r that is n o w transformed into stage action: cf. Metapher und Allegorie (Munich 1 9 5 7 ) 11 I f f . Newiger's important discussion will serve as the basis f o r the analysis here, which focuses on the Peace as a whole. 27

S e e Pindar, fr. 78 (Snell); Heraclitus, FVS 2 2 Β 53. K u d o i m o s ( " T u m u l t " ) appears in H o m e r : cf. Iliad 5 . 5 9 3 , 1 8 . 5 3 5 . He is the slave o f P o l e m o s in Peace, rather than his s o n : cf. Newiger (note 2 7 , above) 113, n o t e 1. 28

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Tipsily he burst upon our happy quiet family, Breaking this, upsetting that, and brawling most pugnaciously. Yea when we entreated him with hospitable courtesy, Sit you down, and drink a cup, a Cup of Love and Harmony, All the more he burnt the poles we wanted for our husbandry, Aye and spilt perforce the liquor treasured up within our vines. The nature and actions of Polemos are pointedly contrasted with Dikaiopolis' anticipated feast in the antistrophe (Ach. 988ff), as well as with the appearance of Diallagë. The chorus, which has sung of Polemos' spilling of the wine and destruction of the vine-poles, now praise the erotic personification of war's opposite, and thinly disguise their sexual desire for her in an elaborate series of double-en tendres, dealing ostensibly with the planting of vines, figs, and olives (995ff). The lyric as a whole, admirably concise and balanced, presents two memorable symbolic characterizations, linked imaginatively by variations on the same motifs. 29 How has Aristophanes varied and expanded the presentation of Polemos in the Peace? Most obviously, Polemos is now a speaking character in a dramatic scene, rather than a personification in choral lyric. More significantly for the metaphorical structure of the Peace as a whole, it is now Polemos who is preparing a feast, rather than visiting a symposium as a rowdy guest. His ghastly cookery, as we gradually learn, involves the pounding of the cities of Greece into a pudding or "salad" in the gigantic mortar; 30 each city is metaphorically represented by a different food associated with it. Thus, a pun transforms Prasiai into leeks (πρασιαί); Megara is associated with garlic, Sicily with cheese, and Attica with honey (Peace 242ff). The chief difficulty with the plan is the absence of a pestle (άλετρίβανος); Polemos sends his flunkey Kudoimos ("Tumult") first to Athens and·then to Sparta to find one, but is told on each occasion that the "pestles" of both cities, figuratively now conceived as Kleon and Brasidas, have been lost (cf. 269—270, 283—284): in fact, both men had died the previous year. Polemos departs in disgust, exclaiming that he will make his own pestle, and Trygaeus seizes the opportunity to summon the chorus of farmers and craftsmen. The time has come for the rescue of Peace, and the men are all to bring their implements. He concludes (300): 31 νυν yàp ήμϊν άρπάσαι irapeaTW àyadoi

δαίμονος.

Now the cup of happy fortune, brothers, it is ours to taste. 2 9 Cf. the herald's announcement, immediately after this lyric, of the drinking contest of the Xoeç (Ach. lOOOff). For Polemos kômastës, see also J . Taillardat, Les Images d'Aristophane2 (Paris 1965) 364ff. The lyric in Acharnions is actually a syzygy, constituting the second parabasis of the play, but also fulfilling the function of a stasimon: cf. Comford 197 and G. M. Sifakis, Parabasis and Animal Choruses (London 1971) 35. 3 0 Cf. the comments of Platnauer, ad loc. 31 For the difficult word άρπάσαι, see the comments below.

87

During the entire scene, Trygaeus is forced into a secondary role; the apostrophes of Polemos to the doomed cities, and later his dialogue with Kudoimos, are punctuated by the hero's asides. One feature of such scene construction echoes those occasions in Aristophanes when the hero, who prepares a feast toward the end of the play, ignores the alazones who attempt to interrupt him. 3 2 An example is furnished by Trygaeus himself later in the Peace, when he explicitly instructs his servant to ignore the prophet Hierocles (μή νυν òpàv δοκώμεν αύτόν, 1 0 5 I f f ) . The structure of Polemos' preparations for a feast, then, before Trygaeus' triumph, clearly inverts and parodies to some extent the typical Aristophanic kömos. But the scene is even more firmly anchored in the structure of the Peace as a whole. The expansion of Polemos from the portrait in the Acharnions, as we have seen, involves a deliberate change from drunken guest t o macabre cook. This conception is well integrated into a series of episodes which all involve the preparation of food, and which are all thematically significant. If wine is one of the chief images of the Acharnions,33 food—its planting, harvesting, preparation, consumption, and excretion—is absolutely central in the Peace. The first words of the play are alp' alpe μάξαν, its last πλακούντας εδεσθε.34 The first scene pictures the two slaves preparing repellent cakes of excrement for the dung-beetle, who is alternately voracious and finicky (cf. 6ff and 25ff). Reversal of nature characterizes the imagery in this section of the play; a world at war is attended by the alimentary uniqueness of the beetle, madness, homosexual pathics, and malodorous effluvia. 35 The feast of Polemos is scarcely better: the host remarks, with sinister ambiguity, that mortals (who can hardly be the actual guests, but are more likely the entrée) will shortly rue their aching jaws (237): ώ ς αντίκα μάλα τάς γνάθους

άλγήσετε

Trygaeus' fear causes his bowels to relax dangerously (241); likewise, during his perilous flight through the air to Olympus, he had warned the μηχαναποιός in the theater to pay careful attention, lest he let Trygaeus fall (174— 176): ώ μηχαναποιέ, πρόσεχε τον νουν, ώ ς έμε ήδη στρέφει τι πνεύμα περί τον όμφάΚόν, κει μή φυλάξεις, χορτάσω τον κάνθαρον.

175

32 The best examples are furnished by Dikaiopolis in the Achamians, who ignores Lamachus at 1095ff, and by Pisthetairos in the Birds, w h o proceeds with his banquet preparations despite the interruptions of a long series of alazones. 33 Cf. Whitman 62ff. 34 Cf. Peace 1, 1359. 35 Compare the discussion of Henderson (note 7, above) 63—64.

88

I say, scene-shifter, have a care of me. You gave me quite a turn; and if you don't Take care, I'm certain I shall feed my beetle. Both scenes exploit the range of meaning in the verb τρίβω. Polemos is reported by Hermes to be about to " p o u n d u p " (τρίβειν) the cities of Greece (231); after Polemos' entrance, the verb is repeated at 246, and then four times in the word for pestle, άλετρίβανος (259, 265, 269, 282). 3 6 This is exactly the term used by the slave in the prologue to describe the preparation of food for the beetle's feast (8; cf. also 16, 27): άλλ' ώ ς τάχιστα

τρίβε πολλάς

και

πυκνάς.

Quick, quick, and beat up several, firm and tight. Shortly afterward, an obscene jest conjoins the notion of pathic homosexuality with the scatological beetle (11—12): 37 ετέραν ετέραν δός, παιδός ήταψηκότοςτετριμμένης yáp φησιν έπιθυμεϊν. Another cake, a boy companion's bring him: He wants one finelier moulded. Trygaeus " p o u n d e d " his head, we are told, when he fell off a ladder in his previous attempt to reach Olympus (ζυνετρίβη, 71). Polemos boasts that Megara will be pounded (έπιτρίψεσθ', 246) into mincemeat, and the unfortunate connotations of the verb are apparent in the lament of the chorus at 355 (κατατετρίμμεθα), as well as in the comment of Hermes to Trygaeus at 369 (και μην έπιτέτριψαί γβ),. which, in context, also carries an obscene overtone. 3 8 The wide range of meaning of the verb is exploited in various repetitions to link diverse images of sexuality, physical harm, and the preparation of food; the feast of Polemos is thus associated with the feast of the beetle in the first two scenes of the play. Indeed, the rich linguistic texture of these scenes abounds in associations. Consider the juxtaposition, for example, of Trygaeus' early complaint to Zeus (63) that he is, without knowing it, "crushing the seeds" out of the Greek cities, λήσεις αεαυτόν τάς πόλεις έκκοκκίσας with the report of Hermes (231) that Polemos plans to " p o u n d " them: τρίβειν έι> αύτχι τάς πόλεις βουλεύεται Both expressions are frequent metaphors for sexual intercourse in comedy; 3 9 the collocation effectively suggests the motif of perverse sexuality in connection with the war. 36

At 288 and 295, the pestle is called δοίδυξ. Compare the homosexual joke about the "ambrosia" of Ganymede at 724. 38 The verb also occurs at 589, in connection with the farmers' existence; for the usage at 1169, see section B, below. 39 On έκκοκκίσας at Peace 63, see Henderson (note 7, above) 63, note 6; for τρίβω, cf.

37

ibid. 176. 89

As is widely recognized, the second half of the play presents preparations for a feast of a different order, since the action consists principally in getting ready for the wedding banquet of Trygaeus. We shall see that the explicit action on stage is complemented by references to a variety of festivals and symposia. With regard to the imagery, the reversal of the symbolic equation of excrement with food (or, as in the case of the feast of Polemos, of the cities' inhabitants with food) to the new equation of sexual fertility (or harvest) with food is the chief metaphorical " d r a m a " of the play, and is summed up in Hermes' well-known blessing of the wedding of Trygaeus and Opora, herself the symbolic personification of Harvest (706—708): ϊθι νυν, έπί τούτοις την Όπώραν λάμβανε yvvalica σαυτώ τήνδε· κφτ' έν τοις άγροΐς ταύτχι Ι-υνοίκών έκποιοΰ σαυτώ βότρυς. Then on these terms I'll give you Harvesthome To be your bride and partner in your fields. Take her to wife, and propagate young vines. The evident reversal in βότρυς nicely underlines that Opora herself is the feast. 4 0 Before this moment, we have heard many unusual eating metaphors, all dealing with the war, e.g. the triremes which "devoured" (κατήσ• θιον) the innocent poor farmers' fig-branches (626—627). But after Trygaeus' betrothal, metaphors of eating are largely devoted to double-entendres which stress the bliss of normal sexual relations (e.g. 717, 851ff); alternatively, puns on food emphasize the new state of peace (e.g. ßot and βοηθεϊν at 925ff). On stage, the preparation of Trygaeus' sacrifice and wedding feast dominates the action, while the chorus gives itself over the evocation of country joys, feasting and drinking; note particularly the second parabasis, and its opening contrast between soldiers' rations and rustic drinking parties. 41 The Peace, then, is largely a succession of plats, both on the level of literal stage action and on the level of metaphor. If we are to assess the imaginative qualities of the short scene with Polemos, we must recognize that Aristophanes' metaphorical conception has tightly integrated the brief, symbolic vignette with the structure of the play as a whole. Thus, comparison of Polemos with Lamachus in the Acharnians leads us somewhat astray. 4 2 As H.-J. Newiger has indicated, the proper comparison for the "symbolic" character in Peace is the metaphorical personification of Polemos kômastês in Acharnians, just as we may compare the fuller treatment of Diallagé at

40

Cf. Whitman 112. Peace 1127ff; cf. section B, below. 42 Whitman 104 says, for example: "Polemos is a less interesting Lamachus." Similarly, he remarks that the image of mincemeat "strongly recalls the Knights" (110); cf. Knights 213ff. But the analysis above demonstrates that both the persona and the activities of Polemos possess a distinctive thematic relevance to the over-all structure of the Peace. 41

90

Lysistrata 1114ff with the personification at Acharnions 988ff. 4 3 Our analysis of the adaptation of the personification in Peace clearly shows the innovative skill with which the poet "re-fashions" metaphorical conceptions. Indeed, the final remark of Trygaeus after the exit of Polemos (300), νύν yàp

ήμίν

άρπάσαι

πάρβστιν

άβαθου

δαίμονος

confirms the analysis, since it refers to the libation offered after a feast, before the beginning of the after-dinner drinking, or symposium. If we accept the ms. reading of άρπάσαι, we have a difficult, but intelligible, metaphor: "Now is the time for us to seize Peace, (the unmixed wine, άκρατον olvov) of the άγαθός δαίμων." Herweden's emendation, αυ σπάσαι, is attractive: "Now is the time for us to drag (drink) Peace . . , " 4 4 In either case, Trygaeus plainly refers to the start of a symposium, and his words conflate the notions of rescuing Peace, and also drinking her, as one would a toast. The imagery is multi-vaient: the ghastly " f e a s t " of Polemos is over, and the rescue of Peace is about to begin. She will be the prelude to a real symposium, and her handmaidens will function at once as the ornaments and the substance of a new banquet. Later in the play, Trygaeus' imagery effects balance between Polemos as preparer of a feast and Eirênë as the hostess of a symposium, when he prays to Peace (996—999): μείζον •πάλιν φιλίας rivi

δ' ημάς έξ

τούς

"Ελληνας

άρχής

χνλώ

itpqoTépq.

και

συγγνώμη

κέραοον

τον

νουν.

And solder and glue the Hellenes anew With the old-fashioned true Elixir of love, and attemper our mind With thoughts of each other more genial and kind. Here the Greeks are once again envisioneu as the "ingredients" of a party, but it is Peace who presides, and "mixes" them, as one would wine, in a blend of friendship and forgiveness. One is reminded of the gold cup which Trygaeus presented to Hermes as a bribe, so that he might make libationsrecall the connotations of σπονδαί and σπένδειν (424—425): Τ p.

. . . δώρον

Ε p.

otju' ώ ς έλβήμων

δίδωμι

τήνδ', βιμ'

'ίνα σπένδειν áei τών

χρυσίδων.

έ'χβς· 425

—I give you this, a vessel for libations. —Fie! how I soften at the sight of gold! Trygaeus develops his prayer to Peace somewhat loosely, as he begs for bounty at the markets: may they be amply supplied with foods from Me43

Cf. Newiger (note 27, above) 119. For the formula, cf. Knights 85 and Wasps 525, and cf. Platnauer and van Leeuwen ad loc. There is a similar pun on έ λ κ ω (drag) at 4 6 4 f f , and διέλκω (drink) at 1131— 1132. 44

91

gara and Boeotia (lOOOff). The only person to be denied a portion will be the second-rate poet Melanthios (1009ff; cf. 802—803). As for Aristophanes himself, our poet has already indicated in the parabasis what bounty should befall him, at yet another banquet and symposium (769ff): πας yáp τις èpeî νικώντος έμοΰ κάπί τραπέζχι και ξυμποσίοις'φέρε TG¡> φαλακρή, δός τφ φαλακρώ των τρωΎαΚίων, και μάφαίρει Ύβνναωτάτου των ποιητών άνδρός το μέτωπον έχοντος'.

770

For be sure if this play be triumphant to-day, That whene'er you recline at the feast of the wine, Your neighbour will say, "Give this to the bald-head, give that to the bald-head, And take not away That sweetmeat, that cake, but present and bestow it On the man with the brow of our wonderful Poet!" The poet's victory and the victory of Peace herself, in festive celebration, are associated in triumph over the preverted banquets of the beetle and of War.

B. Hörai Philai: Elements

of

Pastoral

The Peace, as we have indicated, is replete with celebration of country life and of farmers' simple joys. The thesis of this section is that the tone of the celebration is well described by the term "pastoral." We do not mean to deny the originality of Theocritus, who may claim the distinction of inventing a genre which, with its well defined and yet flexible conventions, was to endure over the course of the development of Western literature. 45 Nor do the pastoral elements which we shall describe in the Peace, significant as they are, demand that we re-assess the play's fundamental status as comedy. Rather, just as a pastoral "tendency" has been discerned in the Homeric epics (particularly in the similes), and our appreciation of it may lead to a more comprehensive criticism of the Iliad and Odyssey, so too our recognition of Aristophanes' "green world" in the Peace, and the language used to characterize it, may refine and amplify our analysis of the play· 46 See William Empson, Some Versions of Pastoral (London 1935) and T. G. Rosenmeyer, The Green Cabinet (Berkeley 1969). 4 6 For pastoral in Homer, see J . Duchemin, "Aspects Pastoraux de la Poésie homérique: Les Comparaisons dans l'Iliade", REG 73 (1960) 3 6 2 - 4 1 5 .

45

92

The watch-word of the comedy, from the moment Peace is rescued, is the phrase εις àypóv ("to the fields"). Trygaeus first exclaims (551—555): άκ,ούετε λεώ · τους γεωργούς άπιέναι τα γεωργικά σκεύη λαβόντας εις àypòv ώς τάχιστ' άνευ δορατίου και ξίφους κάκοντίουώς ατταντ' ήδη 'στί μεστά τάνθάδ' ειρήνης σαπρας· άλλα πάς χώρει προς έργον εις äypov παιωνισας.

555

O yes! Ο yes! the farmers all may go Back to their homes, farm-implements and all. You can leave your darts behind you: yea, for sword and spear shall cease. All things all around are teeming with the mellow gifts of Peace; Shout your Paeans, march away to labour in your fields to-day. As Whitman has noted, the phrase εις àypóv frequently recurs. 47 The injunction to return to the fields is coupled with the desire for a release from care or affairs of business (πράγματα). When Trygaeus first identifies himself to Hermes, he declares he is neither an informer, nor a lover of business (ού συκοφάντης ούδ' έραστής πραγμάτων, 191), but rather a skilled vine-dresser (άμπελoυpyòς δεξιός). The erotic metaphor in έραστής later occurs in a positive context, in Trygaeus' prayer to Peace (987—989): άλλ' άπόφηνον ολην σαύτην / γενναιοπρεπώς τοϊοιν έρασταϊς / ήμϊν (...). To return to the usage of πράγματα, when Polemos departs, Trygaeus summons the chorus to rescue Peace: now is the moment, he says, since they are all released from troubles and battles (293): άπαλλαγεϊσι πραγμάτων τε και μαχών. The chorus reflects that before now they have suffered much, once again joining πράγματα with the notion of war (347—348): πολλά yáp άνεσχόμην / πράγματα τε και στιβάδας / ας ελαχε Φορμίων. They approach their moment of rejuvenation and freedom from care (350—352): άλλ' απαλό ν αν μ ϊδοις Ι και πολύ νεώτερον άπ- / αλλαγεντα πραγμάτων. Indeed, at play's end, Trygaeus assures them, in jingling verses, that their "business" will be confined to figs (1346-1348): οικήσετε yoúv καλώς ού itpay ματ' εχοντες, άλλα συκολογοϋντες. Go and dwell in peace: Not a care your lives impair, Watch your figs increase. The notion of release (άπαλλάττω) is as significant as the movement to the fields: the verb recurs at 303, 352, 920, and 1128-1129. 47

Whitman 110—111 and 311, note 23. The occurrences of the phrase or its variants are: 552, 555, 563, 569, 585, 707, 866, 1202, 1249, 1318, 1329.

93

The complementary motifs of "to the fields" and "release from care" combine to establish the groundwork for the celebration of the farmers and the life of simple country pleasures which is so prominent in the second half of the play. Even during the rescue of Peace, we note that the farmers, among all those whom Trygaeus has summoned, are crucial in the operation's success (508-511): Xo. Ε ρ. Χο. Τ ρ.

äy', ώνδρες, αύτοί δη μόνοι λαβώμζθ' oi γεωργοί. χωρεί ye τοι τό πράγμα πολλφ μάλλον, ώνδρες, ύμίν. χωρεϊν το πράγμα φησιν άλλα πάς άνηρ προΟυμού. 510 οϊ τοι γεωργοί Tovpyov έξέλκουσι, κάλλος ουδείς.

—Come, let us farmers pull alone, and set our shoulders to it. —Upon my word, you're gaining ground: I think you're going to do it. —He says we're really gaining ground: cheer up, cheer up, my hearty. —The farmers have it all themselves, and not another party. At first, the pleasures of country existence are recalled as objects of yearning (cf. πόθος at 579, 583, 586) by Trygaeus and the chorus, as both salute Peace (571—594). Shortly before this point, the language of Hermes and Trygaeus skilfully blends military with rustic connotations, suggesting the transformation from the war to peace that will be more extensively symbolized in Trygaeus' scene with the arms-makers at 12lOff. Hermes compares the "ranks" of the farmers to a cake or, indeed, a banquet, while Trygaeus eulogizes the farmers' implements (564—567): 48 Ε p. ώ ΙΙόσειδον, ώς καλόν τό στίφος αύτών φαίνεται και πυκνόν και yopyòv ώσπερ μάζα και πανδαισία. Τρ. νή Δι", ή γαρ σφύρα λαμπρόν ην äp' έξωπλωμένη, αϊ re θρίνάκες διαστίλβονσι προς τον ηλιον.

565

—Ο Poseidon! fair their order, sweet their serried ranks to see: Right and tight, like rounded biscuits, or a thronged festivity. —Yes, by Zeus! the well-armed mattock seems to sparkle as we gaze, And the burnished pitchforks glitter in the sun's delighted rays. With the transformation from war to peace barely underway, the stress in this celebration of country life is on nostalgic reminiscence: cf. άναμνησθέντες (571), παλαιάς (572), πριν (592). The full-fledged triumph of fertility and peace over war is proclaimed by Trygaeus in the éxodos, in conjunction with his own wedding, as he urges all to pray (1320—1328): κάπενξαμένονς τοϊσι θεοϊσιν διδόναι πλοΰτον τοίς Έλλησιν κριθάς re ποείν ημάς πολλάς 48

1320

For the temi στίφος in military contexts, see Aesch. Pers. 20, 366 and Herod. 9.57; the word recurs at Knights 852 in a parody of militarism. For έ ξ ω π λ ι σ μ έ ν η , see Platnauer ad. loc.

94

πάντας ομοίως οίνόν re πολύ ν, σϋκά τ ε τρώ^ειν, τάς re γυναίκας τίκτειν ημίν, και τάγαθά πάνθ' οο' άπωλέσαμεν συλλέξασθαι πάλιν έξ άρχής, λήξαί τ' αίθωνα οίδηρον.

1325

But first we'll pray to the Gods that they May with rich success the Hellenes bless, And that every field may its harvest yield, And our gamers shine with the corn and the wine, While our figs in plenty and peace we eat, And our wives are blest with an increase sweet; And we gather back in abundant store The many blessings we lost before; And the fiery steel—be it known no more. But the most extensive and remarkable description of rural existence centers on its provision of otium, and is delivered by the chorus in the second parabasis (1127ff). This poem also contains, as we shall see, the most pointed lyrical contrast of the country and the city, the world of πράγματα, and is thus an important touchstone. The poem opens with a general declaration of relief: release from helmets and soldiers' rations may allow a man to relax by the fire, drink with his friends, and (under cover of eating) enjoy a little sexual by-play ( 1 1 2 7 - 1 1 3 9 ) : 4 9 ηδομαί y' ηδομαι κράνους ά,τηλλαγμένος τυρού re και κρομμύων. ού γαρ φιληδώ μάχαις, άλλα προς πυρ διέλκων μετ άνδρών εταίρων φίλων, έκκε'ας, των ζύλων άττ' &ν χι δανότατα τού θέρους έκπεπρεμνιομένα κάνθρακίξων τούρεβίνθου τήν τε φη-γόν έμπυρεύων, χώμα την θράτταν κυνών της -γυναικός λυομένης.

1130

1135

What a pleasure, what a treasure, What a great delight to me, From the cheese and from the onions And the helmet to be free. 49

For the double-entendre

in 1136, see Henderson (note 7, above) 119, 177.

95

For I can't enjoy a battle, But I love to pass my days With my wine and boon companions Round the merry, merry blaze, When the logs are dry and seasoned, And the fire is burning bright, And I roast the pease and chestnuts In the embers all alight, Flirting too with Thratta When my wife is out of sight. The verb άπηΧλαγμένος echoes the motif of release from affairs (or city life, generally); as we have shown above, this notion complements the incantation eïç àypóv throughout the play. The compound διέλκων at 1131— 1132 recalls the "dragging" (ελκω) of Peace to safety, the main action of the play (cf. 464ff). The cozy scene of a farmer with his friends is probably autumnal, given the mention of the well-dried logs on the fire at 1133— 1135. 50 The epirrhema extends this picture. Planting is over, a little rain is expected; Komarchides (significantly named) chances upon a neighbor and suggests a party ( 1 1 4 0 - 1 1 5 8 ) : 5 1 où yàp εσθ' ή δω ν ή τυχεϊν μέν ήδη σπαρμένα, TÒV θεόν δ' έπιφακάξειν, και τιν' ειπείν γείτονα'είπε μοι, τί τηνικαύτα δρώμεν, ώ Κωμαρχίδη;'— 'έμπιεϊν έ'μοιγ' άρέακει τοϋ θεοϋ δρώντος καλώς. άλλα φαϋσον τών φασήλων, ώ yúvai, τρεις χοίνικας, των τε κυρών μεϊξον αύτοίς, τών τε σύκων εζελε, τόν τε Μανην ή Σύρα βωστρησάτω 'κ τοϋ χωρίου, ού yàp οίόν τ' έατί πάντως οίναρίξειν τήμερον ούδέ τυντλάξειν, επειδή παρδακόν το χωρών.'— 'κάξ έμοΰ δενεγκάτω τις την κίχλην και τώ σπίνωην δε και πυός τις ένδον και λα/γώα τέτταρα, ε'ί τι μή 'ξήνεγκεν αύτών ή γαλή της εσπέραςέφόφει yoüv ένδον ούκ οίδ' αττα κάκυδοιδόπαών ενεγκ ', ώ παΐ, τρί' ήμίν, εν δέ δούναι τορ πατρίμυρρίνας τ' αϊτησον έξ Αίσχινάδου τών καρπίμων χάμα της αύτής οδού Χαρινάδην τις βωσάτω, ώς âv έμπίχι μεθ' ημών, eu ποιούντος κώφελονντος τού θεού τάρώματα'.

50

1140

1145

1150

1155

Cf. van Leeuwen, ad loc. On the name Komarchides, which may mean either "village chief" or "master of the revels", cf. Platnauer ad loc. 51

96

Ah, there's nothing half so sweet as when the seed is in the ground, God a gracious rain is sending, and a neighbour saunters round. "O Comarchides!" he hails me: " h o w shall we enjoy the hours?" "Drinking seems to suit my fancy, what with these benignant showers. Therefore let three quarts, my mistress, of your kidney-beans be fried, Mix them nicely up with barley, and your choicest figs provide; Syra run and shout to Manes, call him in without delay, Tis no time to stand and dawdle pruning out the vines to-day, Nor to break the clods about them, now the ground is soaking through. Bring me out from home the fieldfare, bring me out the siskins two, Then there ought to be some beestings, four good plates of hare beside (Hah! unless the cat purloined them yesterday at eventide; Something scuffled in the pantry, something made a noise and fuss); If you find them, one's for father, bring the other three to us. Ask Aeschinades to send us myrtle branches green and strong; Bid Charinades attend us, shouting as you pass along. Then we'll sit and drink together. God the while refreshing, blessing All the labour of our hands." The variety and realism of the details in this passage suggest Theocritus or Herondas, and are only paralleled in certain other short passages in Aristophanic comedy dealing with domestic life: one thinks in particular of Lysistrata and Thesmophoriazusae.52 Although editors have sharply disagreed on the assignment of speeches within the epirrhema, the question of who speaks is not as important as the form of reporting itself, which through the imaginary dialogue conveys the arrangements for an impromptu celebration with vividness and immediacy. 53 The antistrophe shifts the scene to summer (1159—1171): ηνίκ' âv δ' άχέτας τον ήδύν νόμον, διασκοπών ήδομαι τάς Αημνίας άμπ έλους, ei irenaLvovoiV ήδη — τό γαρ φϊτυ πρφον φύοβι — τόν re φήληχ' ορών οίδάνοντ' · είθ' οπόταν χι πέπων, έσθίω κάπέχω χώμα φήμ'· ' Ώ ρ α ι φίλαι'· και τοϋ θύμου τριβών κυκώμαι· 52 53

1160

1165

See Victor Ehrenberg, The People of Aristophanes1 (Oxford 1951). In the citation above, I have followed Coulon's text in the Budé edition.

7 Moulton (Hyp. 6 8 )

97

κψτα yiyvoßai παχύς τηνικαϋτα τοϋ θέρους

1170

Ο to watch the grape of Lemnos Swelling out its purple skin, When the merry little warblings Of the Chirruper begin; For the Lemnian ripens early. And I watch the juicy fig Till at last I pick and eat it When it hangeth soft and big; And I bless the friendly seasons Which have made a fruit so prime, And I mix a pleasant mixture, Grating in a lot of thyme, Growing fat and hearty In the genial summer clime. The farmer examines his vines to the lulling accompaniment of the cicada's song; details are given of the distinctive qualities of the Lemnian vine (1163— 1164). When the fig is ripe, our countryman savors it, and blesses the seasons that have brought the harvest (ώραι φιλαι, 1168) as he mixes himself a drink; note the use of τριβών (1169) in the surroundings of pastoral ease, rather than in contexts of hardship. 5 4 As the plants and the vegetables mature in spring and summer, so the countryman grows fat from ease (1170— 1171). 5 5 The antepirrhema, syntactically continuous with the antistrophe, contains an antithesis to the preceding three sections in the description of the cowardly and corrupt military commander, who victimizes the countryman ( 1172— 1190): μάλλον ή θεοΐοιν έχθρον ταξίαρχου προσβλέπων τρεις λόφους έχοντα και φοινικίδ' όξεϊαν πάνυ, ήν έκεΐνός φηοα> είναι βάμμα Σαρδιανικόν ήν δέ που δέχι μάχεσθ' έχοντα την φοινικίδα, 1175 τηνικαύτ' αύτός βέβαπται βάμμα Κυζικηνικόν κς,τα φεύyei πρώτος ώσπερ ξουθός ίππαλεκτρυών τους λόφους σείων έyώ δ' εστηκα λινοπτώμενος. ήνίκ' αν δ' οίκοι γένωνται, δρώσιν ούκ άνασχετά, τους μεν έγγράφοντες ημών, τους δ' άνω re και κάτω 1180 έζαλείφοντες δις ή τρις. Αϋριον δ' εοθ' ηξοδος'. τ φ δέ OLTC ούκ έώνητ'· οι) γαρ ηδειν έξιών είτα προσοτάς προς τον άνδριάντα τον Πανδΐονος 54 55

98

See the discussion of τρή3ω in section A, above. For the sexual overtones of the passage, see Whitman 113.

είδεν αυτόν, κάπορών θει TL¿ κακφ βλέπων όπόν. ταύτα δ' ημάς τους ά^ροίκους δρώσι, τούς δ' έξ άστεως 1185 ήττον, οί θεοϊσιν ούτοι κάνδράσιν ριψάοπώεςών er' εύθύνας έμοί δώοουσιν, ήν θεός θέληπολλά yàp δή μ' ήδίκησαν, βντες ο'ίκοι μεν λέοντες, èv μάχχι δ' άλώπεκες. 1190 This is better than a Captain hated of the Gods to see, Triple-crested, scarlet-vested, scarlet bright as bright can be. 'Tis, he says, true Sardian tincture, which they warrant not to run; But if e'er it gets to fighting, though his scarlet coat be on, He himself becomes as pallid as the palest Cyzicene, Running like a tawny cockhorse, he's the first to quit the scene; Shake and quake his crests above him: I stood gaping while he flew. Ah, but when at home they're stationed, things that can't be borne they do. Making up the lists unfairly, striking out and putting down Names at random. 'Tis to-morrow that the soldiers leave the town; One poor wretch has bought no victuals, for he knew not he must go Till he on Pandion's statue spied the list and found 'twas so, Reading there his name inserted; off he scuds with aspect wry. This is how they treat the farmers, but the burghers certainly Somewhat better: godless wretches, rogues with neither shame nor—shield, Who one day, if God be willing, strict accounts to me shall yield. For they've wronged me much and sorely: Very lions in the city, Very foxes in the fight. The division of city from country here is very marked; the chorus claims that the poor citizens of the countryside (ημάς τούς άγροίκους, 1185) are at a disadvantage when compared to those from the city (τούς δ' έ ζ άστεως, 1185), at least when it comes to those who maliciously tamper with the conscription lists. In their anger, the chorus still employs a number of rustic images: cf. ώοπερ ξουθός ίππαλεκτρυών (1177), βλέπων όπόν (1184), and δντες οίκοι μεν λέοντες, / èv μάχχι δ' άλώπεκες ( 1 1 8 9 - 1 1 9 0 ) . Only in the complaint of the chorus in the parabasis of the Acharnians, that honorable old men are being beaten down in court by sophistic young rhetores, do we have a comparable scene, although we should note that even there the issue is not specifically framed as one of the city vs. the country. 56 5 6 Cf. Ach. 676ff. For some discussion of the contrast in the second parabasis of the Peace between the vita militaris and the vita rustica, see P. von der Miihll, "Die Nebenparabase im Frieden des Aristophanes und Tibulls erste Elegie und Horaz", in Festschrift J. Wackemagel (Göttingen 1923) 197—203; von der Miihll's principal emphasis is on Quellenforschung, and he proposes an old-Ionic elegiac model for the passage in Aristophanes.

99

The second parabasis as a whole is an eloquent accompaniment to the action of the latter half of the play, which so emphasizes the blessings of peace, the motif of festivity, and the intermingling of harvest, food, and sex. 57 The distinct status of the choral poem arises both from its form and its position. Set outside the main action, its imaginary dialogue contributes to the generalizing of Trygaeus' victory. Characterized as panhellenic from the beginning (cf. 93—94), the hero's accomplishment yet acquires a general, almost a universal, dimension when it is linked with the carefree existence, through the seasons, of simple countrymen. The choral song, with its criticism of military corruption and oppression in the last stanza, dissolves into the exclamations of Trygaeus at the beginning of his own feast (1191—1196): S 8 ¿οι) ίου. οσον το χρήμ' έπί Selitvov ηλθ' εις τους γάμους. €χ', άποκάθαφε τάς τραπέζας ταυτχιί· πάντως yàp ούδέν οφβλός ¿στ' αύτής έτι. è'ne LT ' έπιψορει τούς άμύλους και τάς κίχλας κ,αί τών λ α γ φ ω ν πολλά και τους κολλάβονς.

1195

Hillo! Hill ο! What lots are coming to the wedding supper! Here, take this crest and wipe the tables down, I've no more use for that, at all events. And now serve up the thrushes and the cates, And the hot rolls, and quantities of hare. The two festivals, that of the parabasis and that of the play proper, are thus continuous. The alazones who deal in armor and who attempt to interrupt Trygaeus ( 12 lOff) are as crude and offensive as the pompous and corrupt warriors in the last stanza of the parabasis; in parallel fashion, just as the chorus roundly condemned the latter, Trygaeus unceremoniously turns the former away. In the Peace we will not, as in later pastoral, witness the retirement of Trygaeus to his fields; even if we did, we might imagine him more busy with his vines than with the contemplative reflections of shepherds. But the motifs of the release from care and of the sharp opposition between country and town in the Peace adumbrate some concerns of the pastoral mode, as it later developed. 59 The significance of these elements, which I call the pastoral 57

For the significance of Theoria, handmaiden of Peace, see Newiger (note 7, above) 108-109. 58 Most editors assume, with the scholia, that 1193—1194 refer to a helmet (cf. Platnauer, ad loc). 59 Compare, for example, Virgil, Eel. 1. We should note particularly the definition of Alexander Pope, in "A Discourse on Pastoral Poetry", which speaks of pastoral as "an imitation of the action of a shepherd, or one considered under that character".

100

"tendency", for an interpretation of the Peace resides mainly in their contribution to the play's tone, and in the ways in which they complement the metaphorical progression from the banquets of the beetle and of Polemos to Trygaeus' wedding feast. The invocation Hörai Philai ("Happy Hours") at 1168 serves as much as any phrase in the play to characterize Trygaeus' comic victory, and to differentiate it from those of his fellow peace-maker, Dikaiopolis, and of that other assailant of the heavens, Pisthetairos. In the Acharnions, the chorus is decidedly bellicose for much of the play, and there is no generalization of the comic victory of Dikaiopolis, who acquires an emphatically private peace. In the Country Dionysia (Ach. 247ff), the phallic aspect predominates, and there is no whole or timeless portrait conveyed of rural existence, as in the Peace. The pastoral fantasy in the Birds, on the other hand, though it be adorned with shimmering lyrics (e.g. the Hoopoe's song at 227ff), is swiftly transformed into Pisthetairos' ambiguous "Utopia." 6 0 C. Tolmêma Neon: Elements

of

Romance

It may seem even more anachronistic to the pure theoretician of literary genre to speak of romance than to discuss pastoral with reference to Aristophanes. Yet, at least with regard to theoretical archetypes, the mixture of genres seems hardly improbable. Indeed, Northrop Frye has distinguished six phases of comedy, ranging from that which is dominated by an ironic or satiric mode, to a phase which chiefly exhibits self-absorbed romance. 61 It is Frye's description of romance itself which, with certain modifications, is suggestive for any consideration of the Peace, and which may serve further to define its distinctive qualities in the corpus of Aristophanes.62 Adventure is the central element in the genre of romance, which usually involves a hero's quest on a perilous journey. The hero is confronted with struggle; if he avoids being killed and succeeds in mastering his opponents, he returns to be exalted. In ritual terms, as Frye remarks, the "quest-romance is the victory of fertility over the waste-land." 63 The poetic symbolism of romance is replete with "points of epiphany": those extraordinary connections between heaven and earth, for example, familiar to us from the Biblical

6 0 On Ach. and Dikaiopolis, see particularly W. G. Forrest, "Aristophanes' Acharnions", Phoenix 17 (1963) 1—12; on the Birds, see the analysis of the concluding scenes in Chapter 1, section C, above, and cf. W. Arrowsmith, "Aristophanes' Birds: The Fantasy Politics of Eros", Arion N.S. 1/1 (1973) 1 1 9 - 1 6 7 . 61 See Northrop Frye, Anatomy of Criticism (Princeton 1957) 163ff. 62 Cf. ibid. 186ff for the following points, and also H. Felperin, Shakespearean Romance (Princeton 1972) and Northrop Frye, The Secular Scripture·. A Study of the Structure of Romance (Cambridge, Mass. 1976). 6 3 Frye, Anatomy of Criticism 193.

101

story of Jacob's ladder, or from such folk-tales as Jack and the beanstalk. 6 4 The enemy of the hero frequently threatens to kill him, and sometimes he succeeds; their relationship is parallel t o the eiron and alazon of comedy. Extraordinary feats of heroism in romance result in the maintenance of virtue, or in the salvation of a society: witness the.triumph of Prospero in the Tempest. The story frequently culminates in a wedding or in a reconciliation. The central theme of one phase of this genre, Frye says, is " t h a t of the maintaining of the integrity of the innocent world against the assault of experience." 6 5 Although Trygaeus' libidinal appetites might have shocked some later exponents of romance, it is evident that the Peace is the closest approach in Aristophanes to the mode, as sketched above. To a certain extent, Trygaeus' exploits parallel those of Dikaiopolis and Pisthetairos in the Acharnions and in the Birds. But, as we have noted above in the discussion of the play's pastoral elements, it is crucial to preserve the distinctions: Trygaeus is the only Aristophanic hero of his mould, for example, whose adventure results in the salvation of his whole society. 66 His magical flight to heaven, the agon that ensues there, and his return to a transformed world fit the pattern for the quest-romance admirably; the motivations and exploits of Dikaiopolis and Pisthetairos are better considered under the rubric of comic self-aggrandizement. Consider, for instance, the descriptions of Trygaeus' project, which he himself introduces as tolmëma neon, a "new act of daring" (92—94): Οι. Β' 7iol δήτ' άλλως Τ ρ. υπέρ Ελλήνων τόλμημα νέον

μβτεωροκοπβϊς-, πάντων πέτομαι παλαμησάμβνος.

—Why, where do you try so inanely to fly? —My flight for the sake of all Hellas I take, A novel and daring adventure preparing. The flight of Trygaeus is elaborately set against the tragic hybris of Bellerophon, dramatized by Euripides some years before, and the para-tragic language of the prologue comically emphasizes the parallel with that hero's defiance of the gods. 67 Similarly humorous are the obscene additions to Trygaeus' claim, when he returns, to have saved the Greeks. Envied by the chorus, he responds (865ff):

64

ibid. 203.

ibid. 2 0 0 - 2 0 1 . Lysistrata's plan also has this result, but her characterization presents us with significant differences: cf. the discussion of the final scenes of Lysistrata in Chapter 2, section C. 67 Cf. Rau (note 16, above) 8 9 f f . 65

66

102

οϋκουν δικαίως; όστις εις όχημα κανθάρου πιβάς έσωσα τους "Ελληνας, ώστ' έν τοις άιροϊς απαντας όντας άαφαλώς κινείν re και καθεύδειν.

865

And justly too, methinks, for I On beetleback essayed to fly, And rescued Hellas, worn with strife, And stored your life With pleasant joys of home and wife, With country mirth and leisure. Shortly afterward, he formally identifies himself (as he did at his arrival at the gates of heaven: cf. 190), and adds that he is a savior worthy of the chorus' admiration ( 9 1 7 - 9 2 3 ) : Xo. και πλήν ye των θεών άεί σ' ηΎησόμεσθα Τ ρ. πολλών yàp ύμίν άξιος Τρυγαϊος Άθμονεύς έγώ, δεινών άπαλλάξας πόνων τόν δημότην ομιλον, καί τον γεωρΎΐκόν λεών 'Τπέρβολόν re παύσας.

πρώτον.

920

—We'll always hold you first and best, except the Gods the ever blest. —In truth you owe a deal to me, For I've released the burgher crew And farmers too From toils and troubles not a few; Hyperbolus I've done for. The pomposity of his statement, and the bathetic addition of a jibe at the politician Hyperbolos (the subject of extended satire at 6 8 I f f ) , combine to cut the hero's claim down to size, just as the parody of Bellerophon in the prologue injected a humorous tone into his preparations. But the fact remains that his journey has been for altruistic motives (cf. his first words at 62—63); it has involved an extraordinary adventure, in the course of which he has been threatened with death (cf. Hermes at 364ff); his struggle for a point of "epiphany", begun in vain with a ladder from earth to heaven (69ff), has succeeded in the rescue and vision of Peace; and his journey has culminated in a triumphant return, wherein his marriage to Opora, together with the celebration of rural simplicity in the second parabasis, stress the integrity of the natural world. We cannot credibly compare Trygaeus with St. George or with Prospero. But, in what we may call the romantic "tendency" of the Peace, we may 103

discern a foreshadowing of some aspects of their story in Trygaeus' tolmëma neon. Frye, indeed, speaks of "the return of the golden age" in an incidental reference to Trygaeus' homecoming. 68 Although Aristophanes does not avail himself of the image, Hesiod's version of the myth, the description of the "golden race" of men, bears obvious affinities to the state of affairs at the end of the Peace: a god-like existence, free from care and old age, was the lot of the golden race, which delighted in festivals, and was blessed with abundance in the fields and with peace (Erga 109—119): 69 χρύσεον μεν -πρώτιστα ^ενος μερόπων άνθρώπων άθάνατοι ποίησαν 'Ολύμπια δώματ' εχοντες· σι μεν έπί Κρόνου ήσαν, οτ' ούρανορ έμβασιλευεν ώστε θεοί δ' εζωον άκηδέα θυμόν έχοντες νόσφιν ίχτερ τε πόνων και όιξύος, ούδέ τι δειλό ν 'γήρας έπη ν, αίεί δε πόδας και χείρας όμοιοι τερποντ' εν θαλίχισι, κακών εκτοσθεν απάντων θνήσκον δ' ώσθ' υπνω δεδμημένοι- έσθλά δε πάντα τοίσιν εην καρπόν δ' εφερε ζείδωρος αύτομάτη πολλόν τε και άφθονο ν οι δ' έθελημοί ήσυχοι έ'ργ' ένέμοντο σύν έσθλοίσιν πολέεσσιν.

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115 'άρουρα

The gods, who live in Mount Olympus, first Fashioned a golden race of mortal men; These lived in the reign of Kronos, king of heaven, And like the gods they lived with happy hearts Untouched by work or sorrow. Vile old age Never appeared, but always lively-limbed,

68

Frye, Anatomy of Criticism 177. That the motif received contemporary treatment is evident from the title of one of Eupolis' lost plays, Χρυσού l· γένος ("The Golden Race") A useful account of the m y t h of the Golden Age appears in Frank E. and Fritzie P. Manuel, "Sketch f o r a Natural History of Paradise", Daedalus (Winter, 1972) 8 4 - 9 0 . The Manuels refer t o t w o important comic fragments which, w i t h o u t mentioning the golden age or Hesiod's golden race of men, are nevertheless significant evidence for paradisiacal fantasy in fifth-century Athens. In Pherecrates' Miners (Kock, CA F I. 174—175), the abundance of f o o d in Hades is rapturously described; in Telecleides' Amphictyons (Kock, CAF I. 209—210), f o o d is again prominent, and its spontaneous presence may remind us of Hesiod's αύτομάτη (Erga 118), applied to the earth's harvest. My thanks to Professor F. Zeitlin for bringing these references to my attention. Specific discussion of the m y t h of the Golden Age in pastoral may be found in Rosenmeyer (note 45, above) 214—224. 69

The text is that of F. Solmsen, ed. Hesiodi Opera (Oxford 1970); the translation is by Dorothea Wender (tr. Hesiod and Theognis, Penguin, 1973). The spontaneous fertility of the fields (cf. αύτομάτη at 118) is n o t paralleled in the Peace, b u t cf. the chorus' exclamation with reference to Dikaiopolis at Ach. 9 7 7 : αυτόματα πάντ' ά γ α θ ά τφδέ ye πορίζεται. On Hesiod's account, see the provocative discussion of J.-P. V e m a n t , " L e m y t h e hésiodique des races. Essai d'analyse structurale", in Vernant, Mythe et pensée chez les Grecs I (Paris 1971) 1 3 - 4 1 , esp. 2 1 - 2 3 .

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Far from all ills, they feasted happily. Death came to them as sleep, and all good things Were theirs; ungrudgingly, the fertile land Gave up her fruits unasked. Happy to be At peace, they lived with every want supplied. We may recall how many romances, particularly of the Renaissance, were inspired by the myth of the Golden Age, or by its Biblical counterpart, the account of Paradise.70 Noting the emphasis in Hesiod's description on festivals (θαλφσι, 115), it is pertinent to observe once again that the stress in the Peace on freedom from care, fertility, and rejuvenation is largely sustained by the language of festivity. 71 To get his way with Hermes, Trygaeus promises that all the great festivals of Greece will be held in his honor (418ff). Later, in the first parabasis, the poet invokes the Muse in an adaption of a lyric of Stesichorus ( 7 7 3 - 7 8 0 , 8 1 6 - 8 1 7 ) : 7 2 μούσα, σι) μεν πολέμους άπωοαμένη μετ' è μου του φίλου χόρευσον, κλείουσα θεών re γάμους άνδρών re δαίτας

775

70

See Η. Levin, The Myth of the Golden Age in the Renaissance (Bloomington 1969), and J . Ferguson, Utopias of the Classical World (Ithaca 1975) 146ff; compare Gonzalo in The Tempest, II.i. 163. 71 Whitman 104 dubs the play a "festive masque". It is not inapposite to note the country "shearing" festival mid-way through Thè Winter's Tale, and the symbolic masque in a roughly similar position in The Tempest. With regard t o the motif of festival and festive imagery, exploited in the Peace in a variety of ways, one should compare the analysis in detail of the links between the background of a specific festival and one Aristophanic comedy as a whole in Chapter 4, section B, below. The recent study of F. R. Adrados, Festival, Comedy and Tragedy (tr. C. Holme, Leiden 1975) is preoccupied with discerning origins of theater, and is disappointing to the extent that the ritual forms which the author analyzes in drama are o f t e n t o o generalized to be very useful (e.g. on the agon, 283ff). On the other hand, Adrados correctly emphasizes the mimetic aspect of many of these forms (255ff, 315ff). The study of C. L. Barber, Shakespeare's Festive Comedy (Princeton 1959) remarks incidentally on the parallel between Shakespeare and Aristophanes vis-à-vis a "native festival tradition" (op. cit. 11). The author's citation of Cornford (op. cit. 7) leads one to suppose that the background for Barber's comparison of Dikaiopolis and Lamachus in the Acharnions t o Sir Toby Belch and Malvolio in Twelfth Night is summed up in The Origin of Attic Comedy. Barber's own methodology, which includes b o t h the analysis of evidence for specific native festivals in England and the examination of the language and imagery of Shakespearean comedy for c o m p o n e n t s of "festivity", is highly significant, I think, for the criticism of Aristophanes. I am glad to acknowledge here my debt in this and the following chapter t o Barber's work. 72 Cf. Platnauer, ad loc. and E. Fraenkel, Beobachtungen zu Aristophanes (Rome 1962) 207-209.

105

και θαλίας μακάρων σοι yàp τάδ' è ξ άρχής μέλει. *

780 *

*

μοϋσα Bea μβτ έμοϋ ξύμ· παίξε την έορτήν. Muse having driven afar this terrible business of war, Join with Me the chorus. Come singing of Nuptials divine and earthly banquets, Singing the joys of the blessed: this of old to Thee belongs.

Join in the festival dances, Heavenly Muse, beside me. In the best Shakespearean romance, a solid grounding of reality persists.73 Thus, although Prospero 's white magic stays the hand of would-be murderers on his enchanted isle, the responsibilities of government await his return to Milan, where "every third thought" shall be his "grave". 74 The romantic elements of the Peace are bounded quite differently, by the ironic and satirical conventions of Old Comedy. The invocation of the festive Muse in the first parabasis which we have cited above, for example, swiftly merges into the abusive exclusion from the feast of Karkinos, Morsimos, and Melanthios, who represent the worst in theater and dance (cf. 78 Iff, 802ff). Comic ponería facilitates the achievement of Trygaeus, and comic "self-assertion" is at least one element in its celebration. 75 Although the chorus rhapsodizes on their escape from the shield (έκφυλων την άσπίδα, 336), they later roundly criticize ριψάσπιδες (1186), and the treatment of the notorious coward Cleonymus is harshly satirical (cf. 446, 673ff, 1295ff). The reverie of rural fellowship in the second parabasis is sharply interrupted by a pointed, and poignant, example of urban oppression ( 1172ff). Other examples could be cited to the same effect. In addition, a rather different consideration from contemporary life bears on the question, namely the conduct of the peace negotiations themselves, which may be conceived, paradoxically, to have generated the elements of romance in the Peace even while circumscribing them. As in our previous analyses of Aristophanic poetry, we may observe a fusion in the Peace of fantasy and reality.

See Felperin (note 62, above) 242ff, on The Winter's Tale. The Tempest, V.i. 350. 7 5 For ponería, see Whitman 115; for "self-assertion", see K. J . Dover, Comedy (Berkeley 1972) 3Iff. 74

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Aristophanic

D.

Conclusion

Our examination of the Peace has led us to identify two "tendencies," pastoral and romantic, which mark the play as unique among Aristophanic comedies that survive. 76 We commenced with the premise that the play's symbolic and metaphorical structures are closely integrated, despite the evident paucity of dramatic action, and that an analysis of one scene in detail would reveal, by its ramifications, the principal threads in the texture of imagery in the comedy as a whole: festive imagery acts to unify the Peace from start to finish. Our conclusion is that the "feast of Polemos" indicates one phase of the play's movement from negative (or repellent) feasting to positive (or desirable) festivity. The opposite poles are represented, respectively, by the disgusting meal of the beetle in the prologue and by the wedding feast of Trygaeus in the second half of the play. The latter is, in turn, associated with symposiums and banquets honoring Aristophanes' putative victory at the festival of Dionysus, with the festivals of the gods themselves, and with the preparations for an idyllic country festival in the second parabasis. Through our analysis of the feast of Polemos, we have also been able to illustrate, as with the lyric of insult and abuse, the playwright's poetic technique in re-fashioning and adapting old or conventional material for a new purpose. 7 7 The innovative aspects of Polemos' personification, and the preparation of his feast, have led us to consider in more detail the variations of the motif of "festival" in the second half of the play. This motif may be traced securely to the very early stages of comedy. 7 8 But it also lends itself to treatment in both the pastoral and the romantic modes, and it has been our argument here that precisely those elements, whose elaboration is bounded by traditional irony and satire, distinctively characterize the Peace. Although Aristophanes' experiment in these predominantly lyrical modes may deprive the play of some of its dramatic energy and consistency, it is clearly responsible for its symbolic wholeness and irresistible charm. 7 9 In our next chapter, we continue to explore the questions of genre raised by Aristophanes' poetic drama, as well as the precise significance of "festivity" and "festival" for his comedy.

76

Among the lost plays, there numbered Γεωργοί (Farmers) and Ώ ρ α ι (Seasons); the fragments are too meager to permit reliable reconstruction. 77 See note 6, above. For this aspect of comic technique in Plautus, cf. E. Paratore, "Plauto imitatore di se stesso", Dioniso 46 (1975) 29—70. 78 See Comford, The Origin of Attic Comedy, J. Huizinga, Homo Ludens: A Study of the Play Element in Culture (Boston 1950) 21—22; C. L. Barber, Shakespeare's Festive Comedy (note 71, above) 7ff, 11. 79 The experiment was to continue in the Birds, to some degree, although there the motifs of pastoral and romance are incorporated for fundamentally different purposes: see section Β on the contrast between Trygaeus as comic hero and Pisthetairos, and note 60, above. 107-

CHAPTER 4

Poetry and Imitation in the Thesmophoriazusae The Thesmophoriazusae, like the Peace, has received less than its share of attention from Aristophanic critics.1 Analysts of the play's language have focused almost exclusively on the identification of para-tragic passages and situations, since this play, like no other in the Aristophanic corpus, exhibits the playwright's skill in comic paratragodia.2 Yet even the more comprehensive critics of "parody" and "original" have failed to explore the reasons for Aristophanes' selection of particular tragic plays and situations for burlesque, and few analyses have interpreted the play's structure as anything more than 1 For example, the recent b o o k of K. J . Dover, Aristophanic Comedy (Berkeley 1972): " . . . major parodies . . . are combined with slapstick, vulgar b u f f o o n e r y , jokes about adultery and the ways of women, and a foreign policeman's pidgin-Greek, to present something for all tastes, and the happy ending (happy for everyone except the policeman) leaves us with nothing difficult t o think a b o u t " (168—169). As description, this summary is accurate enough; b u t it fails to inquire deeply into the sources of the play's humor, or t o assess the playwright's poetic technique. Another critic dubs the play "flipp a n t " : cf. Whitman 217. Whitman admires the character of Euripides (227), b u t evidently regards the play as rather thin: cf. his remark on " t h e fading of Old C o m e d y " (218). K..-D. Koch speaks of the play as consisting almost totally of parody, and has little to say on it: cf. Kritische Idee und Komisches Thema (Bremen 1968) 54. The play is largely neglected in the older literature, one suspects for two reasons: it exhibits comparatively few political references, and its unusual form seems relatively intractable in any discussion of the structure of Old Comedy which stresses categories and origins. On the question of f o r m , see Gelzer, col. 1473: "Die Thesmophoriazusaen . . . entfernen sich am weitesten von der üblichen Form der Alten Komödie . . . " On the other hand, the play presents a relatively high proportion of lyric: see T. McEvilley, "Development in the Lyrics of Aristophanes", AJP 9 1 (1970) 258, 265. This is somewhat misleading, since many of the lyrics are prayers and form part of the parodie c o n t e n t of the play: cf. the discussion of W. Horn, Gebet und Gebetsparodie in den Komödien des Aristophanes (Nürnberg 1970) 94—121. On the bifurcation of the heroic role, see below. 2

For bibliography and analysis, see P. Rau, Paratragodia (Munich 1967), esp. 42—89, 98—114, 157—160. See also H. W. Miller, " S o m e Tragic Influences in the Thesmophoriazusae of Aristophanes", TAPA 77 (1946) 171—182, and "Euripides' Telephus and the Thesmophoriazusae of Aristophanes", CP 4 3 (1948) 1 7 4 - 1 8 3 ; W. Mitsdorffer, "Das Mnesilochoslied in Aristophanes' Thesmophoriazusen", Philologus 98 (1954) 59—93. Rau claims that parody, or comic re-casting of tragedy, occupy fully two-thirds of the Thesmophoriazusae·. cf. "Das Tragödienspiel in den 'Thesmophoriazusen'," in H.-J. Newiger, ed. Aristophanes und die Alte Komödie (Wege der Forschung CCLXV, Darmstadt 1975) 339.

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a series of farcical episodes. 3 The study that follows will attempt to repair these deficiencies, since any reading of the play as poetry demands that we try to relate paratragodia to the comedy's other significant motifs, especially those in its imagery, and to its structure. The conjunction in Thesmophorizusae of complex literary parody and stage farce is a variant, clearly, of the conjunctions in Aristophanic poetry of satire and fantasy, which we have analyzed in earlier chapters. We demonstrated that in the Birds and Lysistrata satire and fantasy are indissolubly fused. It is one of the objectives of this chapter to show in detail that the same fusion is accomplished in the Thesmophoriazusae, and that a small number of dominant motifs unify the play to a far greater extent than has previously been recognized. The thematic relationship of parody to farce is one important key to the interpretation of the comedy's coherence. Another vital element is the relationship of the Thesmophoriazusae to its festival background, which has been very largely ignored. As we observed in the last chapter, the notion of festivity is integral in the symbolic structure of the Peace. In the Thesmophoriazusae, familiarity with specific aspects of a particular festival of the Athenian calendar, the Thesmophoria, is crucial to our understanding of the play. 4 3 A partial exception is R. Cantarella, "Agathon und der Prolog der 'Thesmophoriazusen'", in Newiger (note 2, above) 324—338, repr. in translation of "Agatone e il prologo delle 'Tesmoforiazuse'", in Komoidotragemata (Amsterdam 1967) 7—15. 4 See the m e t h o d and conclusions of C. L. Barber in Shakespeare's Festive Comedy (Princeton 1959), and the comments in Chapter 3, note 71 above. The Athenian calendar was so replete with holidays in the late fifth century that it elicited a testy reference f r o m Aristophanes' contemporary, the Old Oligarch (cf. ps.-Xen. Ath. Pol. III.2):

... οΰσηνας πρώτον μεν δει έορτάσαχ. εορτάς όσας ουδεμία τών 'Ελληνίδων δε τούτοις ήττον τ iva δυνατόν έστι διαπράττεσθαι των της πόλεως) ...

πόλεων

(έν

" T h e y celebrate more festivals than any other Greek city, during which there is even less possibility of transacting public business." (For a more enthusiastic view, cf. Pericles at Thuc. 2.38.1). A rough count shows clear evidence of twenty-two separate festivals in the surviving plays of Aristophanes. The evidence ranges from incidental reference t o wholesale incorporation. Some m a j o r examples: the role of the Country Dionysia and of the Anthesteria in Acharnions, the Eleusinian mysteries in Frogs, the parodies of the Panathenaic procession in Ecclesiazusae and of the torch-race in Frogs, and the festival of the w o m e n in Thesmophoriazusae. Frequently, as in Acharnians, Peace, and Lysistrata, the spirit of festivity, defined and shaped in dramatic form from Athenian social custom, is opposed to the force of eris in the Peloponnesian War—or, in Barber's terms, holiday is set against everyday and doomsday. The point is neatly summarized in the concluding exchanges of Lamachus and Dikaiopolis (Ach. 1 2 1 0 - 1 2 1 3 ) : Λα. Δι. Λα. Δι.

τάλας éycò [της èv μάχη] ξυμβολής βαρείας. τοίς Χονσί yáp ης ξυμβολάς έπράττετο; ίώ (ίώ,) Παιάν Π αιάν. άλλ' ουχί νυνί τήμερον Π αιώνια.

—Oh, me, the heavy, heavy charge they tried! —Who makes a charge this happy Pitcher-tide?

109

Our analysis will also examine in detail Aristophanes' use of the theater itself (comedy/tragedy) as poetic image. As we have seen in the discussion of the lyric of insult and abuse, concern with the motif of the theater and its conventions appears in the extant plays as early as the Acharnions.5 In Thesmophoriazusae, perhaps the most self-conscious of all the plays, the motif is paramount. Nowhere else, not even in the Frogs, is the poet revealed as a creature of such complex reflectiveness and playfulness; and nowhere else are the potentialities and ambiguities of the poetic function set in such a universal and volatile matrix: the relationships of men and women. 6 To anticipate our detailed discussion: the poetics of the Thesmophoriazusae depend in large measure on the oppositions of male and female, of comedy and tragedy, and on the relationships, symbolic or otherwise, that may be imagined to exist between those sets of polarities. This is the skeletal framework for the play's action and language, and for its particular emphasis on paratragodia and mimesis. As we shall see, the framework is itself responsible for the bifurcation in this comedy, as in no other, of the heroic role, since Euripides and his Kinsman must share the limelight.7 Euripides enlists the Kinsman's aid to save him from the women, but the Kinsman must in the end turn to Euripides for a μηχανή σωτηρίας. 8

A. The Prologue and the Motifs of the Play The prologue introduces us to the dominant motifs of the Thesmophoriazusae with comprehensiveness and economy. 9 As R. Cantarella has indicated, the prologue may be divided into five parts: (1) the approach of Euripides and the Kinsman to the house of Agathon (Thesm. 1—38); (2) the appearance of Agathon's servant, and Euripides' request to see the young tragic playwright, so that the latter may defend him by proxy against the women who —Oh, Paean, Healer! heal me, Paean, pray. —'Tis not the Healer's festival to-day. Dikaiopolis has won the drinking contest of the Choes, second day of the Anthesteria. As for Lamachus, fresh from disaster, he has come to the wrong festival if he hopes for consolation; van Leeuwen aptly comments on the Paionia (1213): aliunde ignota est haec

έορτή. See Chapter 1, section A on Ach. 1150ff. It may be useful to remind ourselves at the outset that Thesm. is the only common element between the group of "Euripides plays" (Ach., Thesm., Frogs) and the group of "women's plays" (Lys., Thesm., Eccl.). 7 The Clouds is also problematic with respect to the heroic role: cf. Κ. J . Dover's introduction to his edition and commentary (Oxford 1968) xxiii—xxiv. But in Thesm. it is arguable that the heroic role is truly split; in Clouds it seems to have vanished altogether: cf. Whitman 120. β Cf. Thesm. 87, 270, 765, 1132. 9 For comment, see P. Händel, Formen und Darstellungsweisen in der aristophanischen Komödie (Heidelberg 1963) 1 9 3 - 1 9 4 . 5 6

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threaten to condemn him at the festival of the Thesmophoria (39—100); (3) the appearance of Agathon who, personifying both actor and chorus, tries out his latest poetic composition (101—129); (4) Agathon's exposition of his theory of mimesis, and Euripides' request for his help: following Agathon's rejection, Euripides' acceptance of the Kinsman's offer, and the latter's disguise as a woman (130—265); (5) Euripides' oath to save the Kinsman if necessary, and the latter's approach to the Thesmophorion, embellished by a conversation in persona with an imaginary servant. 10 Let us examine the principal motifs and stylistic features of these scenes, emphasizing their programmatic nature for the comedy as a whole. The scene opens with a dialogue. The Kinsman, already in physical difficulty from so much walking around (Thesm. 1—4), encounters only obscurity when he asks Euripides where they are going (5—11): Ευ. άλλ' ούκ άκούειν δει σε πάνθ' ος αύτίκα ϋφει παρεστώς. Κη. π ώ ς λεγεις; αύθις φράσον. ού del μ' άκούειν; Ευ. οι)χ ä y' âv μέΧΚχις òpàv. Κη. ούδ' àp òpàv bel μ'; Ευ. ούχ â y' àv άκούειν δέχι. Κη. π ώ ς μοι παραβείς; δεξιώς μέντοι λéyεις. ού 0ης συ χρηναι μ' οϋτ' άκούειν ονθ' òpàv, Ευ. χωρίς yàp αύτοΐν έκατέρου 'στίν ή φύσις.

5

10

—You're not to hear the things which face to face You're going to see. —What! Please say that again. I'm not to hear? —The things which you shall see. —And not to see? —The things which you shall hear. , —A pleasant jest! a mighty pleasant jest! I'm not to hear or see at all, I see. —To hear! to see! full different things, I ween; Yea, verily, genetically diverse. The conundrum is good fun, and is embellished with some suitably specialized language. 11 The Kinsman's admiration for Euripides' cleverness (9; cf. 21) is scarcely reduced by his confusion before Agathon's door, where Euripides' questions and injunctions evoke only befuddlement (26—28): Ευ. όρη,ς το θύρων τούτο; Κη. νη τον Ήρακλέα οΐμαί yε. Ευ. σίγα νυν. Κη. σιωπώ το θύριον. Ευ. άκου'. Κη. άκούω και σιωπώ το θύρων. 10

See Cantarella (note 3, above) 3 2 5 - 3 2 6 . On Thesm. 11, for example, see H. W. Miller, points to the philosophical meaning of χ ω ρ ί ς . 11

TAPA (1946) (note 2, above) 172, w h o

Ill

—See you that wicket? —Why, b y Heracles, Of course I do. - B e still. —Be still the wicket? —And most attentive. —Still attentive wicket? A f t e r the servant's appearance, when Euripides explains his plan to persuade Agathon to infiltrate the Thesmophoria, the Kinsman exclaims rhapsodically (93-94): rd πράγμα κομψό ν και σφόδρ' èκ τοϋ σου τοϋ yàp τεχνάζειν ημέτερος ò πυραμοϋς.

τρόπου·

A bright idea that, and worthy you: For in all craftiness we take the cake. The citations above illustrate some of the linguistic elements employed for satire of Euripides in the opening scene; note especially the usage of κομψόν and τεχνάξειν in the last selection. 12 Emphasis on cleverness, a pseudo-philosophical aura, and superficially precise distinctions: all these combine to stress the playwright's well-known connections with the sophists. 13 This motif is complemented by occasional snatches of tragic diction (e.g. ξυνετέκνου at 15, έπκοδών πτήξομεν at 36, Οριγκοϊς at 58), which are especially pronounced when Euripides at last reveals his own perilous predicament (71—77): 1 4 Ευ. ώ Zeü, τί δράσαι διανοεί με τήμερον, Κη. νη τούς θεούς έ γ ώ πυθέσθαι βούλομαι τί το πρά-γμα τουτί. τί στένεις; τί δυσφορείς; οι) χρήν σε κρύπτει» δντα κηδεστήν έμόν. ED. εστίν κακόν μοι μέγα η προπεφυραμένον. Κη. ποιόν π ; Ευ. τχ)δε θήμέρφ κριθήσεται εϊτ' ear' ετι ξών εϊτ' άπολωλ' Ευριπίδης.

75

—Ο Zeus! the Hour is come, and so's the Man! —O what's the matter? what disturbs you so? O, tell me what: I really want to know. Come, I'm your cousin; won't you tell your cousin? —There's a great danger brewing for my life. —O, tell your cousin what. —This hour decides Whether Euripides shall live or die. 12 On κομψόν, cf. ibid. 175. For τεχνάξαν, cf. Agathon's τεχνάσμασιν (198); cf. Ach. 385, Frogy 957. The word is not otherwise common in fifth-century literature. 13 See in general W. Nestle, Vom Mythos zum Logos2 (Stuttgart 1941) and W. K. C. Guthrie, A History of Greek Philosophy III (Cambridge 1969). 14 Cf. Rau, Paratragodia (note 2, above) 104.

112

Thus the first scene satirizes Euripidean philosophical speculation, 15 and contains para-tragic elements of diction which "elevate" the playwright's stage situation in Thestn. In addition, the approach to the house of Agathon lays the groundwork for a more extensive parody, or comic version, of a Euripidean play, the Telephus.16 The general similarities in situation, which become more precise in the Kinsman's defense speech to the women (446ff) and in his later threat to slay their "child" (689ff), are clear: Euripides, like his own dramatic creation Telephus, approaches a house in difficulty, intending to request a means to salvation from its occupant(s). 17 One may compare the situation in Acharnions, in which Dikaiopolis, in much the same position, importunes Euripides for help. Detailed analysis shows, as with other illustrations of the Aristophanic "re-use" of material, that the Telephus parody in Thestn. is developed independently and with imaginative adaptation to the theme and structure of the comedy as a whole. 18 For the moment, however, it is only the mention of lameness by the Kinsman (cf. 24) which, in addition to the playwright's dramatic situation, may indirectly suggest to us Euripides' notorious stage hero. 1 9 The dialogue between Euripides and the Kinsman concludes with an anticipation of Agathon's appearance. Euripides refers to his fellow tragedian as Ά^άΒων ò κλεινός (29), but the Kinsman's questions swiftly show that Agathon's fame is more limited than Euripides supposed (cf. 30—35). Here the confusion created by Euripides' earlier analytical description of the processes of seeing and hearing (5ff) is transferred to and exploited in another sphere, and it begins to emerge that the "theorem" of Euripides serves a broader purpose than merely satire of the sophists. For when the Kinsman supposes that Agathon is ò μέλας ò καρτεράς (31) or δασυπώγωρ (33), Euripides must contradict these implications of virility with exasperated impatience (cf. ούχ έόρακας πώποτβ; 31—32). Agathon's effeminate appearance and pathic homosexuality, major motifs in the scenes to follow, are explicit in the first segment's concluding exchange (34—35): Κη. μά τον Δι" οϋπω y' ώστε κάμέ y' ε'ώέναι. Ευ. και μην βεβίνηκας σύ y', άλλ' ούκ οίσθ' Ισως.

35

—No. No, I don't; at least I don't remember. —I fear there's much you don't remember, sir. ls

For detailed discussion, cf. ibid. 157—160. The distinction between parody and comic version is rightly maintained by Rau: the latter term more precisely describes the use of the Telephus in Thesm.: cf. "Das Tragödienspiel" (note 2, above) 344ff. 17 Cf. Miller, CP (1948) (note 2, above) 176. For the Telephus, see E. W. Handley and J. Rea, The Telephus of Euripides (BICS Suppl. No. 5, London, 1957). 18 See Miller, CP (1948); Rau, Paratragodia 42ff. Cf. our analysis of the personifications of Polemos in Acharnions and Peace in Chapter 3, section A. 19 For lameness as a typical characteristic of Euripidean heroes, see Ach. 411, Peace 147-148. 16

8 Moullon (Hyp. 68)

113

T h e c o m i c l a m p o o n in Euripides' philosophical theorem has another programmatic function. F o r Aristophanes allows the K i n s m a n t o underline the doctrine's absurdity b y incorrectly paraphrasing it. T h u s , the K i n s m a n infers that he is n o t to see or hear at all ( 1 0 ) : οι) φης σι) χρήραί

μ' οϋτ' άκούβίΡ οϋθ'

òpàv.

T h e interpretation is soon reinforced after Euripides' pseudo-technical explanation of the funnel (χοάνη) of the ear (14—18); hilariously inattentive, the K i n s m a n asks ( 1 9 ) : δια τήρ χοάνηρ ούρ μήτ' άκούω μήθ' ορώ; Did she! That's why I'm not to hear or see! T h e comic technique is reminiscent of the Clouds, even though the K i n s m a n will prove t o be far m o r e intelligent and resourceful than Strepsiades, and to be e n d o w e d with a far m o r e impressive m e m o r y . B u t the m o t i f of exclusion f r o m b o t h seeing and hearing m u s t surely suggest the mysteries in the c o n t e x t of the exchange in Thesm., and in particular the festival f r o m which all men were barred, which will be the mise-en-scène o f m o s t o f the c o m e d y . T h e designation of the play's dramatic date as the middle of the Thesmophoria is provided by the K i n s m a n himself later in the opening scene ( 8 0 ; cf. 3 7 6 — 3 7 7 ) ; ironically, it will be he w h o hears and sees the secret rites, although they are expressly forbidden to m a l e s . 2 0 Finally, Euripides' philosophy on seeing and hearing receives a c o m i c twist later in the play within the c o n t e x t of y e t another p a r o d y , when Euripides disguises his voice as E c h o , o f f s t a g e , and repeats the plaints of the K i n s m a n / A n d r o m e d a ( 1 0 5 6 f f ) . 2 1 This time, the K i n s m a n is in on the j o k e , since he has received a σημεΐον ( 1 0 1 1 ) that he is t o " p l a y " A n d r o m e d a . 2 2 B u t the Scythian archer assigned to guard him is not so fortunate, and the separate physis of seeing and hearing is farcically apparent in his c o n f u s i o n ( 1 0 8 6 f f ) . T h e appearance of A g a t h o n in the prologue is suspensefully delayed by the interruption o f his servant; structurally, one may c o m p a r e the brief appearance of K e p h i s o p h o n at Acharnians 3 9 6 f f and the m o r e e x t e n d e d scene with S o c r a t e s ' μαθητής at Clouds 1 3 3 f f . T h e servant parodies tragic diction (cf. 3 9 f f ) , and provides an inflated, metaphorical description of A g a t h o n ' s process o f c o m p o s i t i o n ( 5 2 f f ) ; in b o t h instances, the K i n s m a n d e x t e r o u s l y deflates p o e t i c pretension. N o t e the structure, for e x a m p l e , of the servant's call for silence ( 3 9 f f ) : Cf. Thesm. 6 2 8 ; for the emphasis on secrecy, cf. 9 2 . What he actually sees and hears is, for obvious reasons, fairly limited: cf. the stock j o k e s on w o m e n ' s drinking at 6 3 0 f f . 2 1 On Euripides' playing of the part, see C. W. Dearden, The Stage of Aristophanes ( L o n d o n 1976) 171. I see n o reason why the audience will have failed to " r e c o g n i z e " the voice, pace van L e e u w e n ad loc·. the association of E c h o with Euripides at 1 0 6 1 is virtually a give-away. 2 2 On the c o m p l e x staging at 1 0 0 8 f f , and the m o m e n t a r y appearance of Euripides as Perseus, see Dearden (note 2 1 , above) 171. î0

114

Θε. εύφημος πας 'έστω λαός, στόμα συγκλήσας- έπιδημεϊ yàp θίασος Μουσών ένδον μελάθρων τών δεσποσύνων μελοποιών. έχέτω δε πνοάς νήνεμος αίθήρ, κύμα δε πόντου μή κελαδείτω γλαυκό ν — Κη. βομβάζ.

40

45

—All people be still! Allow not a word from your lips to be heard, For the Muses are here, and are maljing their odes In my Master's abodes. Let Ether be lulled, and forgetful to blow, And the blue sea-waves, let them cease to flow, And be noiseless. —Fudge! The hieratic overtones of the servant's proclamation, and the concentration of elements borrowed from epic, tragic, and lyric diction, are complemented by the precise, rhetorical balance of the chiming imperatives έχέτω and κελαδείτω (43—44). 23 The passage is capped, ostensibly, with an elegant enjambement in γλαυκόν (45), a distinctively Euripidean epithet for the sea. 24 But the enjambement's artistry is its own undoing, as the spondaic clausula gives vyay to the Kinsman's βομβάζ. Similarly, the Kinsman steals from the servant's own book when he identifies himself as νήνεμος αίθήρ (51): compare the servant's use of the phrase (43), and also Euripides' preoccupation with αίθήρ in his disquisition at 14ff. The mocking demolition of Agathon's flunkey through a stylistic device is evident too in the bathos which caps the string of technical metaphors for the compositions of poetry (52ff) : Θβ. δρυόχους τιθέναι δράματος άρχάς. κάμπτει δέ νέας αψίδας επών, τα δε τορνεύει, τα δε κολλομελεϊ, και "γνωμοτυπεί κάντονομάζει και κηροχυτεί και γογγύλλει και χοανεύει — Κη. και λαικάξει.

55

—I was going to say he is going to lay The stocks and the scaffolds for building a play. And neatly he hews them, and sweetly he-glues them, And a proverb he takes, and an epithet makes, And he moulds a most waxen and delicate song, And he tunnels, and funnels, and— —Does what is wrong. 23 24

For discussion of the diction in detail, see Rau, Paratragodia 100—101. Cf. ibid. 101; Rau cites Eur. Cyclops 16 and Helen 400, 1457, 1501. 115

The culmination of the servant's chiming list of terms in χοανεύει (57) irrationally resonates with Euripides' earlier explanation of the χοάνη (18— 19), and the Kinsman elaborates his disrespect for the solemnity of Agathon's poetic composition by repeating χοανεliei at 62, now in the context of a homosexual joke (58—62): Θβ. τις άγροιώτας πελάόβι Οριγκοϊς; Κη. ος 'έτοιμος σού τοϋ re ποητοϋ τοϋ καλλιβποΰς κατά τοϋ θριγκοϋ 60 συγγογγύλας και σνστρέφας τουτί το πέος χοανεϋσαι. —What clown have we here, so close to our eaves? —Why, one who will take you and him, by your leaves, Both you and your terse professor of verse, And with blows and with knocks set you both on the stocks, And tunnel and funnel, and pummel, and worse. The repetitions of καλλιεπής (49) in καλλιεποϋς (60) and of θριγκοϊς (58) in dpiyKov (60) may lead in the wrong direction: it almost appears as if the Kinsman is dimwittedly adopting the servant's elevated language. But the conjunction of το πέος with χοανεϋσαι (62) clearly shows that the old man is no fool; he has appropriated the terminology both of Euripides and of Agathon's surrogate to effect a shift of metaphorical ground on them. 25 The servant retires into Agathon's house (70), explaining that his master will shortly emerge into the sunlight: in winter, it is otherwise difficult to shape his flexible choral songs (67—69). 26 Euripides explains his predicament to the Kinsman in more detail, and indicates his μηχανή for salvation; we are already led to suspect that Thesmophoriazusae will parodically exploit Euripides' complex dramas of rescue and intrigue. 27 The Kinsman exclaims in approval: Euripides' scheme is worthy of the playwright's own τρόπος (93). As Agathon is wheeled out on the ekkuklema (96), however, the Kinsman's sight again plays tricks on him, since what he sees is no man, but rather Cyrene, a notorious prostitute (95—98): 2 8 25

On the technical metaphors, see Rau, Paratragodia

102. Rau stresses the concreteness

o f the metaphors and the comic coinages; it is nevertheless possible that w e have some allusion here to the contemporary τέχναι monia

part of A History 26

λ ό γ ω ν ; cf. Plato, Phaedr.

collected in W. K . C. Guthrie, The Sophists of Greek Philosophy

27 l e and other testi-

(Cambridge 1971, repr. o f the first

I I I ) 44—45, note 4.

On the new music and the parody of it here, see Rau, Paratragodia

103. T h e "pathetic

f a l l a c y " here anticipates, to some degree, Agathon's aesthetic theory o f empathy. 27

See the analysis o f these dramas b y A . P. Burnett, in Catastrophe

Survived

(Oxford

1971). 28

For Cyrene, cf. Frogs

1328; the musical metaphor there is much elaborated in Phere-

crates, fr. 145. A s van Leeuwen remarks ad loc, at Thesm.

the structure and content o f the j o k e

9 5 f f are very similar to the situation at 235, where the Kinsman in disguise

fails to recognize himself in the p r o f f e r e d mirror, but affects to see Kleisthenes instead.

116

Ευ. oíya. Κτ?. τί δ' èariv; Ευ. ΊΚτγάθων εξέρχεται. Κη. και πού 'σθ'; Ευ. (οπού) 'στίν; ούτος ού κκυ κλού μένοςΚη. άλλ' η τυφλός μέν είμ'\ έ γ ώ yàp ούχ ορώ ανδρ' ούδέν' ένθάδ' όντα, Κυρήνην δ' ορώ.

95

- Ο , hush! —What now? —Here's Agathon himself. - W h e r e ? Which? —Why there: the man in the machine. —O dear, what ails me? Am I growing blind? I see Cyrene; but I see no man. Seeing and hearing, once more, are open to question. Euripides cautions the Kinsman to display more respect, since Agathon is preparing to compose a lyric (99). But the Kinsman replies by paraphrasing μελ^δείν with a considerably less elevated term, Βιαμινύρεται, and compares Agathon's strains with ant-tracks (100). The parody of the complex "new music" and of Agathon's diction in the ensuing lyric will not concern us here, since it has been treated in detail by Rau. 2 9 However, we should note in passing the significant dramatic motifs in Agathon's scene with Euripides and the Kinsman (101—265). First, we observe that in Agathon's "composition" he must play both the leader and the chorus in the imaginary drama, lines from which he recites. 30 The participial forms at 101 and 117, δεζάμεναι and κλχιξουσα, indicate that this is a δράμα -γυναικεΐον (cf. 151), a fact not without significance in the playwright's theoretical explanation later on. Here, though, the very structure of the lyric, parodie though its content be, is relevant to the overriding concern of the Thesmophoriazusae with the theater; for instance, in this scene Aristophanes, comic playwright, writes for an actor (unknown), who in disguise rehearses, within Aristophanes' comedy, a performance of a tragedy: in the rehearsal, the author must assume the (female) roles of both chorus-leader and chorus, assuming for the moment multiple parts. A second principal motif is adumbrated when, at least once in the course of the lyric, the rhetoric seems completely to merge masculine and feminine ( 1 2 3 - 1 2 5 ) : σέβομαι Αατώ τ' άνααοαν κίθαρίν τε ματέρ' ύμνων άρσενι ßoq. δοκίμων. 125 The ambiguity in theatrical terms, predictably, is adressed as a purely sexual ambiguity by the Kinsman, whether he is prompted by the verses cited above or, more probably, by the physical appearance of Agathon himself (134—145):

30

Cf. Paratragodia 103-108. On the assignment of speakers, see the note of van Leeuwen ad loc. 117

και σ, ώ νεανώκ', el τις et, κατ' Aίσχύλον έκ τής AvKOvpyeiaç 'έρεσθαι βούλομαι. ποδαπός ò yvuviç; τις πάτρα; τις ή στολή·, τις ή τάραξις τοϋ βίου; τί βάρβιτος λαλεί κροκωτώ; τί δε δορά κεκρυφάλ(ψ; τί λήκυθος και στροφών; ώς ού ξύμφορα. τις δαί κατόπτρου και ξίφους κοινωνία; σύ τ' αύτός, ώ παΐ, πότερον ώς άνήρ τρέφει; και πού πέος; πού χλαίνα; ποϋ Αακωνικαί; άλλ' ώς yvvr¡ δήτ'; είτα ποϋ τά τιτθία; τί φής; τί σιγφς; άλλα δήτ' έκ τοϋ μέλους ζητώ α', έπειδή y' αύτός ού βούλει φράσαι;

135

140

145

And now, dear youth, for I would question thee And sift thee with the words of Aeschylus, Whence art thou, what thy country, what thy garb? Why all this wondrous medley? Lyre and silks, A minstrel's lute, a maiden's netted hair, Girdle and wrestler's oil! a strange conjunction. How comes a sword beside a looking-glass? What art thou, man or woman? I f a man, Where are his clothes? his red Laconian shoes? I f woman, 'tis not like a woman's shape. What art thou, speak; or if thou tell me not, Myself must guess thy gender from thy song. With all these questions we return, once again, to the m o t i f of the theater since, significantly, the Kinsman's passage is itself a parody o f drama, this time of Aeschylus' Edonians, where Lykourgos questioned Dionysus in the Kinsman's words at line 1 3 6 . 3 1 The reference to previous tragedy thus contains an allusion to sexual ambiguity in the god of the theater himself; the theme will, of course, be more fully exploited in the presentations by Aristophanes and Euripides, a few years later, of Dionysus as a stage character in the Frogs and in the Bacchae.32 F o r now, over and above his literary cleverness, the Kinsman seems to intuit that Agathon's essential nature is t o be found in his dramatic composition, since he asks at the end of his speech if he should seek to identify the playwright έκ τοϋ μέλους ( 144). As it turns out, the Kinsman is on the right track. Agathon explains that there must be a concordance in the poet of outer accoutrements and inner intelligence, of έοθής and yvώμη; the dramatist's τρόποι must change to suit his material ( 1 4 8 - 1 5 2 ) : Cf. Aesch. fr. 72 (Mette). One should compare Eur. Bacchae 453ff, and the remarks of E. R. Dodds, Eurípides Bacchae2 (Oxford 1960) xxxi—xxxii, who concludes that Euripides followed closely some aspects of the Aeschylean treatment. 3 2 For Dionysus' effeminate appearance, cf. Frogs 45ff, Eur. Bacchae 353, 453ff. 31

118

έγώ δέ την έσθήθ' άμα · et δέ δειλòu και nouripòu αυδρα τις τέκοι yvin), ή τριήραρχον ύστέραν

ττονηρόν ή κυβερνήτη

αύτήν καθήσθαι σκάφων

830

835

KaKÓu, άποκεκαρμένηυ

της TÒU άι>δρεϊοι> τεκονσης. τ φ yàp εικός, ώ πόλις, την "Τπερβόλου καθήσθαι μητέρ'

ήμφιεσμέυηυ

λευκά και κόμας καθεϊσαυ πλησίον της Λαμάχου, και δανείξειν χρήμαθ', $ χρήν, ει δανείσειέν nui και TÓKOU πράττοιτο, öiööuai μηδέν' άνθρώττωυ TÓKOU, άλλ' άφαιρείσθαι βία τα χρήματ' είπόντας τοδί 'άξια γονν et τόκου τεκούσα τοιούτον TÓKOU'.

840

845

Many things we have against you, many rules we justly blame; But the one we now will mention is the most enormous shame. What, my masters! ought a lady, who has borne a noble son, One who in your fleets and armies great heroic deeds has done, Ought she to remain unhonoured? ought she not, I ask you, I, See, for example, H. Bergson, Le Rire (Paris 1900); J . Huizinga, Homo Ludens: A Study of the Play Element in Culture (Boston 1950); M. Gurewitch, Comedy, the Irrational Vision (Ithaca 1975). 8 3 The nature of language is a well attested interest of the contemporary sophists, who inquired into the όρθότης ονομάτων, criticized the ambiguities of language, and debated the roles of nomos and physis in its development. See, in general, Guthrie (note 25, above) 204ff, who summarizes testimonia and bibliography; Plato, Cratylus", J . S. Morrison, "The Truth of Antiphon", Phronesis 8 (1963) 35—49. The jokes on linguistic gender and morphology at Clouds 658—692 no doubt poke pun at this sophistic interest; but they are also a suggestive anticipation of Aristophanes' full-scale exploitation of ambiguity in Thesm. 8 4 Cf. μεμφόμεσθα at Ach. 676, Clouds 576. 82

133

In our Stenia and our Scira still to take precedence high? Whoso breeds a cowardly soldier, or a seaman cold and tame, Crop her hair, and seat her lowly; brand her with the marks of shame; Set the nobler dame above her. Can it, all ye Powers, be right That Hyperbolus's mother, flowing-haired, and robed in white, Should in public places sit by Lamachus's mother's side, Hoarding wealth, and lending monies, gathering profits far and wide? Sure 'twere better every debtor, calm, resolving not to pay, When she comes exacting money, with a mild surprise should say, Keeping principal and income, You to claim percentage duel Sure a son so capital is capital enough for you. The entire passage, capped with its alliterative, ironic pun on TeK0vaa¡TÓK0U (bearing children and charging interest) at 845, may appear to be constructed for the satire of Hyperbolos through his mother rather than for a serious plea for social reform (cf. irpoeòpiav, 834). The festivals named by the women, the Skira and the Stenia, were both associated with the Thesmophoria, and must have been confined to, or dominated by, females; 8 5 one presumes that the women would also have been able t o regulate the conferral of τιμή (833) on those who attended. Thus, on the satirical level, the passage seems more directed at Hyperbolos than at men in general. We should note, however, that one premise of the lampoon implicitly dignifies the status of women, and particularly of mothers; for it is assumed that the heroism and opprobrium of Lamachus and Hyperbolos are attributable to the respective moral qualities of their female parents, and should be reflected by their mothers' place in society. The premise itself is paradoxical in a culture where a person's very identification involved his patronymic. Furthermore, the emphasis on mothers and children is linked with a pervasive motif in the play (and an important aspect of the festival of the Thesmophoria): the importance for Greek women of child-birth, and specifically the birth of legitimate sons (cf. 3 3 8 - 3 3 9 , 5 0 2 - 5 1 6 , 5Θ4-565). 8 6 The Telephus parody, in which the Kinsman threatens to slay Mika's only " b a b y " (cf. 697—698), is t o be viewed within this context as well; in addition to the paratragodia of Euripides, adapted to the situation of the Kinsman, and to the satire of the women's drunkenness, the parody functions as a metaphorical vehicle within the play's comic framework which signals the Greek wife's pre-emient social function: the bearing of children. 8 7

85

Cf. Parke (note 44, above) 88, 156ff. Harpocr., s.v. σκίρον, connects the Skira with the use of a large OKiaßeuw in the festival procession; but cf. Deubner (note 44, above) 46ff. 86 See Slater (note 56, above) 3—74. Note again the designation of the festival's third day as Kalligeneia. 87 Cf. Dem. 59.122. In the parody, the sex of the baby is female, to accommodate the

pun on κόρη (cf. 717, 733, 760). 134

The parabasis as a whole is carefully integrated with the structure, motifs, and tone of the first half of the play. 8 8 As we have seen, the ironic rhetoric of the first section continues, to some extent, the juridical tone of the earlier trial scene. The content of the parabasis proper, however, exhibits a defense of women which, for all its wit and refuge in abstractions, is considerably more effective than the justification in the previous agon. The pnigos, introduced by a passage of aischrologia, passes swiftly to a complex metaphor in which accoutrements of the spheres of men and women, the weaving rod and the parasol, the spear-shaft and the shield, are deftly merged in the context of a charge against men that they have abdicated their responsibility. The image of the κανώι> and the οκιάδβιον is the textual counterpart for two prominent features of the play's background: the characteristics of mimetic drama, and the circumstances of the women's festival. The epirrhema, in the form of a conventional "grievance" and an equally conventional attack ad hominem, presents a third reversal of conventions, as Aristophanes exploits the motif of mothers and sons, prominent in the play as a whole, for polemical effect. 8 9 With the conclusion of the parabasis, the remainder of the Thesmophoriazusae is dominated by parody of two Euripidean tragedies produced the year before, the Helen and the Andromeda. We turn now to an analysis of the significance of these parodies. In the course of our discussion, we shall be able to assess anew the importance of imitation (mimesis) as a controlling theme in the comedy as a whole.

C. Poetry and

Imitation

The analysis thus far has led us to emphasize the programmatic nature of the prologue to the Thesmophoriazusae, and we have observed how Agathon's theory of mimesis (149ff), the motif of transvestism, and the background of the festival itself complement the metaphorical and rhetorical structure of the first two-thirds of the play. After the parabasis, the Kinsman deliberates on his failure to attract Euripides' attention through the stratagem of carving a message on the votive tablets: Euripides, he concludes, must be ashamed of his frigid tragedy, the Palamedss. In words that virtually echo Agathon, the Kinsman turns to a new device (846—851): ίλλός Ύε-γένημαι προσδοκών ό δ'ούδέπω. τι δήτ' &ν βίη τούμποδών; ούκ. εαθ' οπως οι) τον Παλαμήδη ψυχρόν οντ' αίσχύνεται. 88 89

Pace Whitman 224. Contrast the poignant compression of the women's metaphor at Lys. 651, άνδρας

ίίσφέρω. 135

τώ δήτ' αν αύτόν npoaayayoißην δράματι; έ γ φ δ α - την καινην Έλένην μιμήσομαι. πάντως υπάρχει μοι yvvaineía στολή.

850

I've strained my eyes with watching; but my poet, "He cometh n o t . " Why not? Belike he feels Ashamed of his old frigid Palamede. Which is the play to fetch him? O, I know; Which but his brand-new Helen? I'll be Helen. I've got the woman's clothes, at all events. He will "imitate" (μιμήσομαι, 850) the Euripidean Helen: his female disguise (yvvaiKeia στολή, 851) is ready to hand (ύπαρχει, 851). 9 0 By the "new Helen" (καινήν Έλένην, 850), the Kinsman refers to the play's recent production in 412 and also to its nature. For although the version of the myth which Euripides exploited was not original en bloc (we may trace it at least as far back as Stesichorus), the play's dazzling complexity and its penchant for ironies and dramatic reversals must have made the portrait of Helen seem "new". 9 1 Likewise, a hint of Agathon's emphasis on originality (attested by Aristotle) emerges from his servant's metaphorical description of the poet's creative process (52—53): 9 2 δρυόχους τιθέναι δράματος άρχάς. κάμπτει δέ νέας άφίδας έπων. In any case, the phrase καινην Έλένην, with its evocation of the currency and originality of Euripides' drama, is ironically proleptic: as played by the Kinsman and Euripides, this imitation of Helen will indeed prove to be a " n e w " production. The ensuing parody (855—919) has been analyzed in detail by Rau, who demonstrates its broad range: citation of ipsissima verba, small b u t fateful changes in otherwise exact citations, parody of situation (e.g. the recognition scene), and compression and conflation of whole scenes and charac90

Cf. Agathon's υπάρχον (155) and μίμησις (156).

91

The Helen has recently enjoyed a spate of productive comment. Part of its attraction for Aristophanes, indeed, may have been its inclusion of comic elements. See A. Pippin (Burnett), "Euripides' Helen: a Comedy of Ideas", CP 55 (1960) 1 5 1 - 1 6 3 and G. Zuntz, "On Euripides' Helena: Theology and Irony", in Euripide (Entretiens Hardt VI, Geneva 1960) 201—241. Also relevant are Β. M. W. Knox, "Euripidean Comedy", in Word and Action (Baltimore 1979) 2 5 0 - 2 7 4 ; R. Kannicht, Euripides Helena (Heidelberg 1969) 5 7 - 6 8 ; C. P. Segal, "The Two Worlds of Euripides' Helen", TAPA 102 (1971) 5 5 3 614; A. P. Burnett, Catastrophe Survived (Oxford 1971) 7 6 - 1 0 0 . 92 On Agathon, see Arist. Poetics 1451b (on the Antheus, a play that was apparently completely original, in that it employed no incidents or characters from myth or history); 1456a (Agathon's skill at dramatic reversals, and his being the first to compose choral songs merely as interludes, έμβόλψα).

136

ters. 93 The Kinsman must begin by impersonating Helen; but, as the parody proceeds, he temporarily drops out of character to assume yet another female role, that of the old woman who, somewhat disrespectfully, receives Menelaus upon his landing in Egypt in Euripides' play (cf. Thesm. 8 7 I f f with Helen 4 4 I f f ) . That Menelaus was dressed in rags in the original, and was thus in "disguise", adds to the humor; so, too, the consistent indications in Euripides that various women (the ypaϋς, Helen, Theonoe) are more intelligent and resourceful than Menelaus add piquancy to the parody's satire of the playwright, who " p l a y s " Menelaus during the scene. 94 The woman guarding the Kinsman, Kritylla, is at first outraged by his impertinence in venturing to "imitate" another woman so soon (862—863): Κη. Ελένη δ' έκλήΟην. Γυ. Β', αύθις αύ yiyvei yυνή, •πριν της ετέρας δούναι γυναικίσεως δίκην; —And I was Helen. —What, again a woman? You've not been punished for your first freak yet. But even she, willy-nilly, is drawn into the parody when the Kinsman imaginatively identifies her as Theonoe (896—899): Ευ. ξένη, τις ή yραύς ή κακορροϋοϋσά σε; Κη. αϋτη Θεονόη Π ρ ω τ έ ω ς . Γυ. Β', μα τώ θεώ, εί μη Κρίτυλλά y' Άντιθέου Γapyηττόθεv. αν δ' el πavoϋpyoς. —Who is the old woman who reviles you, lady? —Theonoe, Proteus' daughter. —What a story! Why, I'm Critylla, of Gargettus, sir, A very honest woman. In such an atmosphere of role-playing, the tomb of King Proteus is as apt a symbol for the scene of the parody as it was for the original; and it is not surprising that Aristophanes manages to include an extended reference to the personification of change and metamorphosis (874ff). Appropriately, the confused Kritylla concludes that Euripides and the Kinsman are referring to a real person, the general Proteas, who had died some years before. 9 S In the face of the Kinsman's identification of the locale as Egypt, Kritylla struggles to re-assert reality; they are all, she says, in the Thesmophorion (879-880): πείθει τι τφ (κακώ) κακώς άπολουμένφ ληρονντι λήρον, θεσμοφορεϊον τουτογί. Cf. Paratragodia (note 2, above) 53—65. F o r an appraisal of Menelaus' unheroic qualities, see B u r n e t t , Catastrophe 8 Iff. 9 5 Cf. Thesm. 8 7 6 and T h u c . 1.45.2 and 2 . 2 3 . 2 .

880

93

94

Survived

137

Pray don't believe one single word he says. This is the holy temple of the Twain. But, ignoring her for the moment, Euripides inquires if Proteus is at home; picking up Kritylla's τέθνηκβ (883), a verb that draws the woman ineluctably into the worlds of the tragedy and the parody, Euripides asks where Proteus is buried, and is told by the Kinsman that they are sitting on his tomb (886). Indignantly, Kritylla exclaims ( 8 8 7 - 8 8 8 ) : κακώς

dp'

έξόλοιο,

ό σ τ ι ς ye τολμάς

— κάξολεϊ

σήμα

·γέ r o t , —

τύν βωμόν

καλβίν.

Ο, hang the rascal; and he shall be hanged! How dare he say this altar is a tomb? Her frustrated insistence on the altar of the Thesmophorion is hilarious. But the parody is more skilful than we might at first suspect, since part of Aristophanes' purpose is surely the burlesque of Euripides' reversal of tragic conventions in the Helen, where the heroine in fact took refuge at a tomb, rather than at an altar, the usual locus of suppliants. 96 This upset of conventions, comparatively minor in itself, yet points the way toward a broader understanding of the parodies' place in the comedy. The skill of the parody aside, we must ask why Aristophanes selected it for inclusion in the Thesmophoriazusae.9"1 J u s t as we have insisted that a reading of the play demands an understanding of the festival background, so it is essential to criticism to analyze Aristophanes' choice of tragedies for paratragodia. The explanation that both Helen and Andromeda, the major subjects for parody, were very recently produced and thus likely to be fresh in the memory of spectators affords only a partial rationale, since our play itself, and other Greek dramas, furnish examples o í far less immediate allusion. 98 A more comprehensive answer involves the radical technique of the Helen, set beside the more conventional treatment of subject and situation in the Andromeda. Both tragedies are obviously applicable to the dramatic situation of the Kinsman, since both involve the rescue of a woman who must otherwise surrender to a grim fate (i.e. the marriage of Helen to Theoklymenos, and the sacrifice of Andromeda to the sea monster). 9 9 From 96

Cf. Burnett, Catastrophe Survived 78. Previous analyses have tended to center on the parody's technique rather than on its relation to the play as a whole: cf. note 2, above. 98 The Telephus, for example, was produced (438 B.C.) long before either Ach. or Thesm.·, other examples may be drawn from the Frogs or from Euripides' Electro. 99 We should remark the presence of the puzzling ode at Hel. 1301ff on Demeter and Persephone: for the most thorough investigation, see Kannicht (note 91, above) ad loc. The subject matter is obviously connected with the festival of the Thesmophoria, but the parody in Thesm. ignores the ode, perhaps for religious reasons, but more probably because the poem is a curious example of religious syncretism (the cults of Demeter and Cybele seem merged). 97

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the Helen, and from all we can reconstruct of the lost Andromeda, we may conclude that Euripides worked out the μηχαναί σωτηρίας in very different, contrasting fashions. 1 0 0 Helen, dominated by irony and reversal, was a drama of intrigue, where the heroine provided the μηχανή (cf. Hei 813, 1034), and was the instrument of σωτηρία through τέχνη (Hel. 1 0 9 1 - 1 0 9 2 ) : ή yàp θανείν ôeï μ', ήν ά λ ω τβχνωμένη, ή πατρίδα τ' έλθ€ϊν και σον έκσώσαι δέμας. I may be caught in treachery, then I must die. Or I shall save your life, and we shall both go home. (tr. R. Lattimore) On the other hand, Andromeda appears, for all its exotic setting and spectacular stage effects (e.g. the Echo scene, parodied at Thesm. 1079ff), to have been a more conventional rescue drama, at least with regard to the behavior of its leading male and female characters: Perseus conformed to the traditional heroic type far more than Menelaus, who was hesitant to act and dressed in rags; and Andromeda, maiden in distress, will probably have been a more passive, conventional heroine than Helen. The two plays together, then, afford Aristophanes a wide range of material. Formally, the Helen is the basis for parody of episodes in iambic trimeter, of characters and situation; the Andromeda serves as the model for burlesque of lyric monody and stage effects. More significantly, at the thematic level the two tragedies juxtapose traditional and non-traditional conceptions of male and female. As if to complement this juxtaposition, the parodies are arranged so that in the first it is Euripides who plays one role consistently, the unconventional " h e r o " Menelaus, whereas the Kinsman must assume the parts of Helen and the old woman; in the second, the Kinsman consistently represents Andromeda, whereas Euripides must first play the female Echo, and then the conventional hero Perseus. The parodies, when considered together, constitute yet another emblem within the Thesmophoñazusae of the shifting relationships between men and women, relationships conditioned by the harmonies or discontinuities between gender and sex role, or behavior. Now, however, the material is drawn from myth, rather than from real life. Dramatic mimesis, the poetic "imitation" of both Euripides and Aristophanes, clearly assumes the leading role in setting forth these relationships in the comedy's final portion. The two great parodies are separated by a choral dance and hymn (947— 1000), a performance which re-asserts the ambience of the festival. 101 This hymn is more general in nature, invoking a variety of Olympian gods, and 100 See the summary of Andromeda in Τ. B. L. Webster, The Tragedies of Euripides (London 1967) 1 9 2 - 1 9 9 . 101 Cf. όργια σεμνά at Thesm. 948 and 1151, and compare the Hymn to Demeter 476. The ritual fast is also referred to: Thesm. 949, 984.

139

includes a disclaimer of any abuse of men (cf. 9 6 3 f f ) ; special invocation of A t h e n a and the goddesses of the festival is reserved for a complementary h y m n after the Andromeda parody (1136—1159). The Kinsman, w h o has despaired of σωτηρία (946), is encouraged by Euripides' m o m e n t a r y appearance as Perseus. He prays to Ζευς σωτήρ (1009) as he prepares t o "bec o m e " A n d r o m e d a (yiyveaO': 1012); the necessary props (the bonds, δεσμά) lie once more to hand (υπάρχει, 1012: cf. 8 5 1 and Agathon at 155). Again, it is unnecessary t o discuss the parody in detail (1009—1132), since it has been exhaustively analyzed by Rau and others. 1 0 2 We have n o t e d that in formal and thematic ways it complements the earlier parody of the Helen·, we may observe the f u n c t i o n of auxesis as well, since the second parody is nearly twice the length of the first, and includes broader, more farcical strokes of h u m o r . 1 0 3 The culmination of the farcical tendency is reached in Euripides' final impersonation, after the second choral h y m n . Having come t o terms with the w o m e n ( 1 1 6 0 f f ) , he distracts the Scythian's attention by "playing" an old bawd with a shapely y o u n g girl in tow. Even here a verbal jest evokes the play's principal comic theme, the juxtaposition of sex roles. F o r when the Scythian asks the " p a n d e r " the young girl's name, Euripides replies that she is called Artemisia, a name that since the Persian wars conn o t e d a "masculine" female ( 1 2 0 0 - 1 2 0 1 ) : 1 0 4 To. όνομα δε σοι τι έατιν, Ευ. Αρτεμισία. Το. μβμνησι τοίνυν τοϋνομ • Άρταμουξία.

1200

—Zu, vat I call zu? —Artemisisa. —Yesh. Hartomixer. As the Scythian pursues Artemisia, Euripides manages at last to free the Kinsman, and they make their escape with the complicity of the chorus. The w o m e n ' s closing lines, in part formulaic, distinctively evoke the conj u n c t i o n in the comedy of the Thesmophoria and of theatrical " p l a y " (1227-1231):105 ά λ λ α πεπαισται μ ε τ ρ ί ω ς ήμϊνωσθ' ώρα δή 'στι βαδίζειν 102

See Paratragodia 65—89, and W. Mitsdörffer (note 2, above). Cf. the abuse at 1079ff, and the obscenities of the Scythian at 1114ff. 104 Cf. Lys. 675, where the men apprehensively imagine that Artemisia may sail against them. 10s For the formulaic element, cf. van Leeuwen ad loc, who compares άποδούναι ... τT)V χάριν at Peace 761 and μετρίως at Clouds 1511. With πέπαισται (1227), we may compare the emphasis on παίζω at 947, 975, 983. The mimetic character of the Nesteia and of the όργια σεμι>ά, which imitated the behavior of Demeter herself, seems clear. At Clouds 1510—1511, the chorus declares κεχόρευται . . . μετρίως; through the substitution in πέπαισται μετρίως, we are reminded of the women's "play" in both the festival and the theater. In Rau's analysis of Aristophanic parody, the element of play (Spiel) emerges as paramount: cf. Paratragodia 183—184. 103

140

ο'ίκαδ' έκάστη. τώ Θεσμοφόρω δ' ήμϊν άγαθήν τούτων χάριν άνταποδοίτον.

1230

But we've ended our say, and we're going away, Like good honest women, straight home from the Play. And we trust that the Twain-Home-givers will deign To bless with success our performance to-day. The concluding segment of the play, then, is dominated by an exhilarating profusion of mimetic acts: the progression is generally from sophisticated verbal parody toward farce, until literary antecedents are altogether jettisoned in the comic climax. Doubtless, as critics have suggested, there is considerable irony in Euripides' abandonment of his own plays as μηχαναί σωτηρίας: the slanderer of women is forced to rely on a female disguise, a possibility he rejected at the opening of the play, and to appeal to the crude Scythian's cruder instincts. 106 Yet we would be mistaken to exaggerate the irony by extracting a serious theme, or any sustained literary criticism, from the play's outcome. Beyond the satirical deflation of Euripidean μηχαναί the play does not venture; Aristophanes' main purpose is scarcely to show the tragic art of Agathon and Euripides as decadent and bankrupt. 1 0 7 This assessment of late fifth-century drama is reserved for the Frogs, where Dionysus sets out to find a ·γόνιμον ποιητήν (Frogs 96), and where the extended, parodie agon between Aeschylus and Euripides involves explicit moral and political aspects (cf. Frogs 1419ff). In the Thesmophorìazusae, by contrast, the "imitation" of tragedy functions as a celebration of the poetic art itself, and the parodies are vehicles for transforming characters and places. 106

Cf. Whitman 219. See G. Murray, Aristophanes (Oxford 1933) 117 and Whitman 217: "Euripides is laughed at, but not condemned, as he is in the Frogs." But Whitman's appreciation of the play, which ignores the importance of the festival, seems more than a trifle solemn: cf. 224 on the parabasis, and the criticism (216) that "there is no trace of rejuvenation . . . in short, very little of the theme of fertility or life". Yet the festival itself, so prominent in the play's text and its thematic structure, introduces and celebrates many of those motifs which are, in other plays, clustered around the male hero; in the emphasis on fertility and aischrologia, furthermore, the play's festival setting is linked with elements that were probably of great significance in the development of comedy. See Cornford 83. The role of festival settings and references in Aristophanes generally deserves more study; see Chapter 3 on the Peace, and Chapter 4, note 4, above. The importance of the Eleusinia in the Frogs has, however, long been recognized; for an analysis which stresses the connections between the festival and the theater, see Whitman 2 2 8 - 2 5 8 , esp. 235ff, 256ff. The Thesmophorìazusae and the Frogs share a number of motifs: the importance of the festival background, the motif of androgyny, the conventions of the theater, the significance of mimesis (cf. Frogs 109), and paratragodia. In some ways, then, the Frogs again constitutes evidence for Aristophanes' re-use of material, and it may be significant that the play opens with a jest on stock comic jokes. 107

141

Euripides and Agathon are selected as prominent representatives of selfconsciousness and experimentation in contemporary tragedy. Whatever views of women the two may have held, and whatever Aristophanes seriously thought of their poetry, certain superficial features of their art or appearance suffice to link them credibly with the comic outrage of the women in general. The women at the Thesmophoria, and various features of their position in Athenian life, join with the notion of mimesis to control the comedy's parodie impulse. D. Conclusion The Thesmophoriazusae, as we have seen, is skilfully composed and unified. The principal motifs are set out in the prologue and then developed in two distinct segments: the ekklesia of the women, with the prosecution and defense of Euripides, and after the parabasis the para-tragic rescue of the Kinsman. The "heroic role" is assumed by the Kinsman in the first segment, by Euripides in the second. The programmatic function of the prologue is clear: rhetorical pyrotechnics, the motif of disguise (and, specifically, transvestism), the notion of mimesis, and the setting at the festival of the Thesmophoria constitute the play's donnée. Ambiguities of language and of the theatrical process, both representations of reality, emerge from the preliminary jests on seeing and hearing, and from Agathon's "imitation" of both actor and chorus in his rehearsal. Agathon's appearance introduces visually a second major theme, ambiguities of gender and sex role. His theory of imitation, insisting on a proper harmony between a playwright and his poetry, becomes the centerpiece for a comedy that plays on the theory's consequences: the potential disjunction between gender and sexual identity, and between aesthetic imitation and its objects. The Thesmophoria thus functions as a rich, symbolic setting for the play, since even in real life something of the disjunction between the sexes marked the festival's observance. Yet a number of features of that observance suggest a ritual mimesis, as we have remarked. The mimesis of Aristophanes' poetic fantasy converts the festival to an ekklesia, where the women may function in even more atypical ways within the framework of an informal play within a play. This transformation culminates in a more formal framework, the paratragodia of Telephus, where a play within a play is explicitly enacted. The parabasis most nearly approaches in tone a serious defense of the women, b u t the central images of the κανών (weaving rod/spear-shaft) and the οκυϊόεων (parasol/shields) once again remind us of the multiple emphasis on malefemale polarities within the play's symbolic structure. After the parabasis, paratragodia becomes the principal device through which Aristophanes simultaneously exploits theatrical and sexual ambiguities. Helen and Andromeda, in the originals and in their comic versions, may offer both traditional and non-traditional personae for heroic roles, male and female. It is for this reason, more than any other, that these Euripidean plays serve Aristophanes' purpose. 142

The Thesmophoriazusae is primarily neither satire nor polemic, but rather a brilliant fusion of parody and farce. The comedy employs Euripides as a character, rather than as a target. Even as we recognize that the ultimately successful μηχανή σωτηρίας proceeds from farce, rather than from one of his tragedies, it is for all that a "staged" invention, with Euripides playing a role in disguise, and assisted by Aristophanes' comic chorus. The play may indeed reflect shifting currents of opinion on the position of women in society; the implications of reversal of sex roles anticipate the full-blown assembly of the Ecclesiazusae and also some of the motifs which we may infer were popular in Middle Comedy. 1 0 8 As in Lysistrata, the details of domestic life are prominent in Thesmophoriazusae·, in addition, the setting of the festival establishes a firm link between women's position in real life and their role in the world of the play. 1 0 9 But the play is not a polemic on the position of women any more than it is a satirical attack on Euripides: the antagonists, after all, are reconciled at the conclusion. Neither is it true that tragedy and comedy emerge in Aristophanes as correlated with masculine or feminine principles, despite the tendency of comic writers to personify their Muse and their creations. 1 1 0 Comedy and tragedy, as a result of the play's premises and its structure, are rather conjoined by Aristophanes' fantastic exploitation of mimesis, and the theater becomes a symbol for illusion and change, even as comedy and tragedy are allowed to maintain their separate status as genres. 111 In a parallel fashion, mimesis functions to conjoin male and female in the Thesmophoriazusae with hilarious consequences, even as Aristophanes' poetic technique manages to highlight the sexes' fundamental separation in Athenian society. 112

108 See such titles as Alexis, Odysseus at the Loom, and the increasing number of plays named for female protagonists. For a survey of what we know of Middle Comedy (really very little), see K. J. Dover in Fifty Years (and Twelve) of Classical Scholarship (New York 1968) 1 4 4 - 1 4 9 ; also cf. T. Β. L. Webster, Studies in Later Greek Comedy2 (Manchester 1970). 109 Contrast the more fantastic premises involved in Lysistrata and Ecclesiazusae. 110 Cf. Clouds 534ff, and for the Aristophanic Euripides in this respect, see Frogs 862, 939ff. Compare, too, Cratinus' play The Wine-Flash (ΐΐυτίνη), where Comedy is personified as the wife of the playwright; see J. Taillardat, Les Images d'Aristophane2 (Paris 1965) 4 5 1 - 4 5 4 . 111 In this respect, it is relevant to compare the mysterious assertion by Socrates to both Aristophanes and Agathon, at the end of Plato's Symposium, to the effect that the same man may write both tragedy and comedy: . . . τού αύτού άνδράς eluax κωμψδίαν και τρα •γωδίαν έπίσταηθαι noieiv, και τον τέχιηι τραγ^δοποιόν örra και κωμψδοποών eivai (Symp. 223d). In all probability, Socrates means that the τέχνη of both genres, since it involves mimesis, is identical: as we learn in the Republic, such mimesis undesirably separates poetry from reality. 112 Again, Plato's Symposium presents a provocative comparison in the speech of Aristophanes at 189ff, and especially in the myth of the τρία yévr¡: male, female, and androgyne.

143

Conclusion The aim of this study has been to examine Aristophanes' poetic art through analysis of a number of leading techniques in the comedies. We began with the premise that the critical interpretation of the plays requires a detailed understanding of the poetic mechanisms of Old Comedy. In the first chapter, devoted to three representative examples of the lyric of insult and abuse, the analysis focused on relatively brief texts, and attempted to demonstrate the fusion in the abuse lyrics of satirical and fantastic elements. We discovered that the lyrics are internally unified; to a considerable degree, they are integrated with their respective plays, verbally and thematically. Reductive emphasis on satire or fantasy ignores the playwright's poetic technique, which has their union as its main objective. The second chapter amplified the scope of our investigation, with the treatment of three passages from Lysistrata which exhibit an inter-penetration of the political and domestic worlds. This consistent nexus supports the fantastic premise of the play, and permits poetry to transmute history at its conclusion. The third and fourth chapters were devoted to readings of two neglected plays in their entirety, the Peace and the Thesmophoriazusae. The integration of satire and fantasy which is the matrix of Aristophanic poetry is co-ordinated in the Peace by images of festival and festivity; although the play is relatively devoid of plot action, it is tightly unified on a metaphorical plane. The Thesmophoriazusae illustrates again the significance of festivals in comedy; for the background of the Thesmophoria, and especially its mimetic motifs, complement the play's own fusion of parody and farce, and its use of the theater itself as poetic image. Contrary to the generally accepted notions of Aristophanic comedy as episodic and loosely structured, this study illustrates that the coherent unities in comic poetry are to be sought in the unique realm of the fantasy itself. Aristophanes' verbal art, in metaphor and pun, co-ordinates and unifies his plays far more than the actions in his plots, in an Aristotelian sense. For example, the apparently irrelevant lyric of abuse in the Birds, despite the stanzas' separation, is skilfully composed to refract and anticipate various motifs in the scene which surround it; the elaborate symmetry and unusual form of the parabasis in Lysistrata mirrors the structured inter-relationships of political and domestic life, of male and female, which are central in that play; the ambiguous image of the κανών and the σκιάδειον in the Thesmophoriazusae functions as an emblem for the comedy's principal themes. 144

The analysis, finally, has led us to consider important questions of genre. We have suggested that the Peace, in its incorporation of pastoral and romantic elements, signals that our interpretations of Old Comedy may be too rigidly fixed in anachronistic notions of genre. Paradoxically, the comparatively strict conventions of Old Comedy seem to have exerted no constraining influence on Aristophanes, but rather a liberating stimulus to his imagination; the extant plays freely exploit a number of modes. One remembers, with Max Beerbohm, that "laughter rejoices in bonds".

10 Moulton (Hyp. 68)

145

Selected Bibliography Adrados, F. R.: Festival, Comedy and Tragedy, tr. C. Holme (Leiden 1975). Arrowsmith, W.: "Aristophanes' Birds·. The Fantasy Politics of Eros", Arion N.S. 1/1 (1973) 1 1 9 - 1 6 7 . Barber, C. L.: Shakespeare's Festive Comedy (Princeton 1959). Bergson, H.: Le Rire (Paris 1900). Broneer, O.: " T h e Thesmophorion in A t h e n s " , Hesperia l i (1942) 2 5 0 - 2 7 4 . Burkert, W.: Griechische Religion der archaischen und klassischen Epoche (Stuttgart/ Berlin/Cologne/Mainz 1977). (Burnett), Α. Pippin: "Euripides' Helen·, a Comedy of Ideas", CP 55 (1960) 1 5 1 - 1 6 3 . Burnett, A. P.: Catastrophe Survived (Oxford 1971). Cantarella, R.: " A g a t h o n und der Prolog der 'Thesmophoriazusen"', in H.-J. Newiger, ed. Aristophanes und die Alte Komödie (Darmstadt 1975) 324—338. Connor, W. R.: The New Politicians of Fifth-Century Athens (Princeton 1971). Cornford, F. M.: The Origin of Attic Comedy2 (Cambridge 1934). Coulon, V., ed.: Aristophane (5 vols.) (Paris 1 9 2 3 - 1 9 3 0 ) . Dale, A. M.: "Old C o m e d y : The 'Acharnians' of Aristophanes", in Collected Papers (Cambridge 1969). Dearden, C. W.: The Stage of Aristophanes (London 1976). De Carli, E.: Aristofane e la sofistica (Florence 1971). Detienne, M.: The Gardens of Adonis, tr. J . Lloyd (Atlantic Highlands 1977, originally pubi. 1972). —: Dionysos mis à mort (Paris 1977). Deubner, L.: Attische Feste (Berlin 1932). Dodds, E. R., ed.: Euripides Bacchae2 (Oxford 1960). Dover, Κ. J . : " N o t e s on Aristophanes' Acharnians", Maia 15 (1963) 6—25. —: "Greek C o m e d y " , in Fifty Years (and Twelve) of Classical Scholarship (New York 1968). —: ed. Aristophanes Clouds (Oxford 1968). —: " L o stile di Aristofane", Quaderni Urbinati 9 (1970) 7—23. —: Aristophanic Comedy (Berkeley 1972). Ehrenberg, V.: The People of Aristophanes2 (Oxford 1951). Empson, W.: Some Versions of Pastoral (London 1935). Felperin, H.: Shakespearean Romance (Princeton 1972). Ferguson, J . : Utopias of the Classical World (Ithaca 1975). Forrest, W. G.: "Aristophanes' Acharnians", Phoenix 17 (1963) 1—12. Fraenkel, E.: Beobachtungen zu Aristophanes (Rome 1962). Frye, Ν.: Anatomy of Criticism (Princeton 1957). —: The Secular Scripture : A Study of the Structure of Romance (Cambridge, Mass. 1976). Gelzer, T.: Der epirrhematische Agon bei Aristophanes (Munich 1960). —•.Aristophanes der Komiker (Stuttgart 1971). —: "Tradition und Neuschöpfung in der Dramaturgie des Aristophanes", in Newiger, ed. Aristophanes und die Alte Komödie (Darmstadt 1975) 283—316.

146

Gomme, A. W.: "The Position of Women in Athens in the Fifth and Fourth Centuries B.C.", CP 20 (1925) 1 - 2 5 (repr. in Essays in Greek History and Literature, O x f o r d 1937). - : "Aristophanes and Politics", CR 52 (1938) 9 7 - 1 0 9 (repr. in More Essays in Creek History and Literature, L o n d o n 1962). Grube, G. Μ. Α.: The Greek and Roman Critics (London 1965). Gurewitch, M.: Comedy, the Irrational Vision (Ithaca 1975). Guthrie, W. K. C.: A History of Greek Philosophy (Cambridge 1969). Haldane, J . Α.: "A Scene in the Thesmophoriazusae ( 2 9 5 - 3 7 1 ) " , Philologus 109 (1965) 39-46. Handley, E. W. and Rea, J . : The Telephus of Euripides (BICS, Supplement No. 5, L o n d o n 1957). Händel, P.: Formen und Darstellungsweisen in der aristophanischen Komödie (Heidelberg 1963). Henderson, J . : The Maculate Muse (New Haven 1975). H o f m a n n , H.: Mythos und Komödie (Hildesheim 1976). Horn, W.: Gebet und Gebetsparodie in den Komödien des Aristophanes (Nürnberg 1970). Huizinga, J . : Homo Ludens: A Study of the Play Element in Culture (Boston 1950). Kannicht, R., ed.: Euripides Helena (Heidelberg 1969). Knox, B. M. W.: "Euripidean C o m e d y " , in Word and Action (Baltimore 1979) 2 5 0 274. Koch, K.-D.: Kritische Idee und Komisches Thema (Bremen 1968). Lévêque, P.: Agathon (Paris 1955). Levin, H.: The Myth of the Golden Age in the Renaissance (Bloomington 1969). Lewis, D. M.: "Notes on Attic Inscriptions (II)", Annual of the British School at Athens 5 0 (1955) 1 - 1 2 . Manuel, Frank E. and Fritzie P.: "Sketch for a Natural History of Paradise", Daedalus (Winter, 1972) 8 4 - 9 0 . McEvilley, T.: "Development in the Lyrics of Aristophanes", AJP 91 (1970) 2 5 7 - 2 7 6 . Merry, W. W., ed.: Birds'1 (Oxford 1904). Miller, H. W.: "Some Tragic Influences in the Thesmophoriazusae of Aristophanes", TAPA 77 (1946) 1 7 1 - 1 8 2 . —¡"Euripides' Telephus and the Thesmophoriazusae of Aristophanes", CP 43 (1948) 174-183. Mitsdörffer, W.: "Das Mnesilochoslied in Aristophanes' Thesmophoriazusen", Philologus 98 (1954) 5 9 - 9 3 . Moulton, C.: " A n t i p h o n the Sophist, On Truth", TAPA 103 (1972) 3 2 9 - 3 6 6 . -: Menander, The Dyskolos (New York 197 7). — : " T h e Lyric of Insult and Abuse in Aristophanes", Mus. Helv. 36 (1979) 23—47. von der Miihll, P.: "Die Nebenparabase im Frieden des Aristophanes und TibuUs erste Elegie und Horaz", in Festschrift J. Wackemagel (Göttingen 1923) 1 9 7 - 2 0 3 . Murphy, C. T.: "Aristophanes and the Art of Rhetoric", HSCP 49 (1938) 6 9 - 1 1 3 . Murray, G.: Aristophanes (Oxford 1933). Mylonas, G.: Eleusis and the Eleusinian Mysteries (Princeton 1961). Nestle, W.: Vom Mythos zum Logos2 (Stuttgart 1941). Newiger, H.-J.: Metapher und Allegorie (Munich 195 7). - : " R e t r a k t i o n e n zu Aristophanes' ' F r i e d e n ' " , Rhein. Mus. 108 (1965) 2 2 9 - 2 5 4 . — : ed. Aristophanes und die Alte Komödie (Wege der Forschung CCLXV, Darmstadt 1975). —: "Die 'Vögel' und ihre Stellung im Gesamtwerk des Aristophanes", in ibid. ed., Aristophanes und die Alte Komödie. 147

Parke, H. W.: Festivals of the Athenians (Ithaca 1977). Pickard-Cambridge, A. W.: The Dramatic Festivals of Athens2 (Oxford 1968). Platnauer, M., ed.: Aristophanes Peace (Oxford 1964). Pomeroy, S.: Goddesses, Whores, Wives, and Slaves (New York 1975). Prato, C.: I Canti di Aristofane (Rome 1962). Rabkin, E.: The Fantastic in Literature (Princeton 1976). Rau, P.: Paratragodia (Munich 1967). —: "Das Tragödienspiel in den 'Thesmophoriazusen"', in Newiger, ed. Aristophanes und die Alte Komödie (Darmstadt 1975) 3 3 9 - 3 5 6 . Reckford, K . J . : "Catharsis and Dream-Interpretation in Aristophanes' Wasps", TAPA 107 (1977) 2 8 3 - 3 1 2 . Reinhardt, Κ.: "Aristophanes und A t h e n " , in Tradition und Geist (Göttingen 1960), repr. in Newiger, ed. Aristophanes und die Alte Komödie (Darmstadt 1975). Rogers, Β. B., ed.: The Comedies of Aristophanes (11 vols.) (London 1902—1916). Rosenmeyer, T. G.: The Green Cabinet (Berkeley 1969). Sandbach, F. H.: The Comic Theatre of Greece and Rome (New York 1977). Seel, O.: Aristophanes oder Versuch über Komödie (Stuttgart 1960). Segal, C. P.: " T h e Character and Cults of Dionysus and the Unity of the Frogs", HSCP 65 (1961) 2 0 7 - 2 4 2 . Segal, E.: " T h e φύσις of C o m e d y " , HSCP 77 (1972) 4 9 - 5 6 . Sifakis, G. M.: Parabasis and Animal Choruses (London (1971). Silk, M. S.: Interaction in Poetic Imagery (Cambridge 1974). Slater, P.: The Glory of Hera (Boston 1968). Sommerstein, A. H.: "Aristophanes and the Events of 4 1 1 " , JHS 97 (1977) 1 1 2 - 1 2 6 . Sparkes, Β. Α.: "Illustrating Aristophanes", JHS 95 (1975) 1 2 2 - 1 3 5 . Spatz, L.: Aristophanes (Boston 1978). S r e b m y , S.: " D e r Schluss der 'Lysistrate'", Eos 51 (1961) 39—43, repr. in Newiger, ed. Aristophanes und die Alte Komödie (Darmstadt 1975). de Ste. Croix, G. Ε. M.: The Origins of the Peloponnesian War (Ithaca 1972). Taillardat, J . : Les Images d'Aristophane2 (Paris 1965). Thompson, Η. Α.: " P n y x and T h e s m o p h o r i o n " , Hesperia 5 (1936) 151—200. Todorov, T.: The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to a Literary Genre, tr. R. Howard (Ithaca 1975). Ussher, R. G., ed.: Aristophanes Ecclesiazusae (Oxford 1973). van Leeuwen, J . , ed.: Aristophanes (11 vols.) (Leiden 1893—1906). V e m a n t , J.-P.: " L e m y t h e hésiodique des races. Essai d'analyse structurale", in Vernant, Mythe et pensée chez les Grecs I (Paris 1971) 13—41. Webster, T. B. L.: The Tragedies of Euripides (London 1967). —: Studies in Later Greek Comedy2 (Manchester 1970). West, M. L.: "Aristophanes, Acharnions 1 1 7 8 - 8 6 " , CR 2 1 (1971) 1 5 7 - 1 5 8 . Whitman, C. H.: Aristophanes and the Comic Hero (Cambridge, Mass. 1964). de Wita-Tak, T. M.: " T h e Function of Obscenity in Aristophanes' Thesmophoriazusae and Ecclesiazusae", Mnemosyne 2 1 (1968) 357—365. von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, U., ed.: Aristophanes, Lysistrate (Berlin 1927). Zuntz, G.: " O n Euripides' Helena·. Theology and I r o n y " , in Euripide, Entretiens Hardt VI (Geneva 1960) 2 0 1 - 2 4 1 .

148

Index of Passages AELIAN V. H. 1 2 . 2 8 : 129 η. 70 AESCHYLUS Cho. 5 8 5 - 5 8 6 : 3 5 Edonians (fr. 72, M e t t e ) : 1 1 8 Persae 20, 3 6 6 : 9 4 n. 4 8 P.D. 1 - 2 : 37 ANTIPHON FVS 87 Β 4 5 : 39 η. 5 2 APOLLODORUS 1.30: 124 η. 55 ARISTOPHANES Acharnians 5 f f : 23 9 - 1 2 : 23 n. 15 1 7 - 2 7 : 23 n. 15 8 8 - 8 9 : 32 2 4 7 f f : 101 2 6 9 - 2 7 0 : 2 2 n. 13 2 8 0 f f : 8 4 n. 16 3 1 8 f f : 2 4 n. 18 3 5 0 - 3 5 1 : 23 n. 14 3 8 5 : 1 1 2 n. 12 3 9 6 f f : 114 4 1 1 : 113 n. 19 4 9 6 f f : 85 n. 2 0 5 0 2 f f : 23 5 1 5 f f : 8 4 n. 17 6 2 8 f f : 23 n. 17 6 6 5 f f : 23 6 7 6 f f : 9 9 n. 56 7 0 4 : 37 7 2 5 - 7 2 6 : 33 n. 38 7 2 9 f f : 84 7 6 4 f f : 122 848: 22 8 8 5 f f : 66 n. 3 0 9 7 7 : 104 n. 6 9 979ff: 8 6 - 8 7 988ff: 9 0 - 9 1 lOOOff: 87 n. 29 1 0 1 8 f f : 85 n. 2 2 1 0 9 5 f f : 88 n. 3 2 1 1 5 0 f f : 1 8 - 2 4 , 39 n. 53

1 1 6 6 f f : 36 1 1 7 4 f f : 24 1 2 1 0 - 1 2 1 3 : 109 n. 4 Birds 1: 3 2 n. 36 6 8 : 33 n. 38 13Off: 27 n. 27 2 2 7 f f : 101 2 5 5 - 2 5 7 : 35 2 8 7 - 2 9 0 : 3 2 n. 3 3 , 3 4 4 5 1 - 4 5 2 : 3 4 - 3 5 , 36 7 5 5 - 7 5 6 : 29 n. 3 1 , 4 2 8 7 9 - 8 8 0 : 43 l l O l f f : 2 4 n. 18 1 2 2 5 : 76 n. 5 5 1 2 8 2 : 4 0 n. 5 9 1373ff: 84 1 3 8 3 - 1 3 8 5 : 35 1 4 4 6 - 1 4 5 0 : 42 1 4 7 0 f f : 2 8 - 4 6 , 132 n. 80 1 5 0 8 : 132 n. 79 1 5 9 6 f f : 4 5 n. 70, 76 n. 55 Clouds 1 0 9 : 33 n. 38 1 3 3 f f : 114 337: 84 3 5 3 - 3 5 4 : 32 5 0 1 - 5 0 4 : 40 5 3 4 f f : 143 n. 110 5 5 9 : 53 n. 10 5 7 6 : 133 n. 8 4 607ff: 84 6 5 8 - 6 9 2 : 133 n. 83 9 5 2 f f : 70 1 0 2 2 : 19 n. 4 1 0 2 4 f f : 70 1 0 9 6 f f : 26, 1 3 0 n. 76 1 5 1 0 - 1 5 1 1 : 1 4 0 n. 1 0 5 Ecclesiazusae 4 3 6 - 4 4 0 : 2 6 , 1 3 0 n. 76 4 4 2 - 4 4 3 : 124 n. 5 4 1 1 4 4 f f : 27 Frogs I f f : 8 5 n. 25

149

45ff: 118 η. 32 96: 141 109: 141 η. 107 184: 86 η. 27 4 1 6 - 4 3 0 : 18 η. 3 424: 41 η. 60 494ff: 121 η. 38 679: 130 η. 71 718ff: 4 9 - 5 0 862: 143 η. 110 939ff: 143 η. 110 957: 112 η. 12 1328: 116 η. 28 1419ff: 141 1491: 40 η. 49 1504: 130 η. 71 1532: 130 η. 71 Knights

85: 91 η. 44 211-216: 52-53 213ff: 90 η. 42 2 8 4 - 3 0 2 : 18 η. 3 765: 130 η. 73 852: 94 η. 48 8 6 4 - 8 6 7 : 53 927ff: 20 9 7 3 - 9 9 6 : 18 η. 3 1030: 84 Lysistrata

16: 124 η. 56 36: 66 η. 30 99ff: 48 1 5 5 - 1 5 6 : 78 194ff: 75 389ff: 123 η. 46 39Iff: 68 η. 33 5 3 1 - 5 3 8 : 57 55 Iff: 48 5 6 7 - 5 8 6 : 4 9 - 5 8 , 7 4 - 7 5 , 131 590: 68 η. 33 6 1 4 - 7 0 5 : 18 η. 3, 5 8 - 6 8 651: 62, 135 η. 89 675: 140 η. 104 706ff: 66 728ff: 57 8 9 6 - 8 9 7 : 57 1019-1023: 57-58 1043ff: 2 4 - 2 8 , 48 1072-1320: 6 8 - 8 0 1105: 70 η. .38 1 1 0 8 - 1 1 1 1 : 70 1112-1161: 70-73 150

111 4ff: 9 0 - 9 1 1156: 55 η. 14 1181: 28 1216ff: 74 η. 48 1 2 2 3 - 1 2 2 4 : 27 1228ff: 7 4 - 7 6 1254-1258: 76-77 1273ff: 68 n. 32, 7 7 - 7 8 1 3 1 2 - 1 3 1 5 : 78 Peace

1: 88 n. 34 8: 89 1 1 - 1 2 : 89 47: 84 n. 18 54: 84 n. 18 58ff: 84 n. 16 6 2 - 6 3 : 89, 103 65: 84 n. 18 69ff: 103 71: 89 9 2 - 9 4 : 102 1 4 7 - 1 4 8 : 113 n. 19 174-176: 8 8 - 8 9 179: 85 n. 26 186ff: 101 n. 62 190: 103 191: 93 2 3 0 - 2 3 1 : 86, 89 236ff: 8 5 - 9 2 280: 86 n. 27 293: 93 300: 87, 91 313: 84 3 4 7 - 3 4 8 : 93 3 5 0 - 3 5 2 : 93 355: 89 369: 89 414ff: 84 418ff: 105 4 2 4 - 4 2 5 : 91 464ff: 91 n. 44, 96 5 0 8 - 5 1 1 : 94 5 5 1 - 5 5 5 : 93 5 6 4 - 5 6 7 : 94 605ff: 84 n. 17 68 Iff: 103 7 0 6 - 7 0 8 : 90 724: 89 n. 37 752ff: 84 n. 19 761: 140 n. 105 769ff: 92 773-780: 105-106

7 8 1 : 8 4 η. 19 816-817: 105-106 8 2 7 f f : 84 8 6 4 : 8 4 η. 19 865ff: 1 0 2 - 1 0 3 9 1 2 : 85 η. 21 9 1 7 - 9 2 3 : 103 9 8 7 - 9 8 9 : 93 9 9 6 - 9 9 9 : 91 9 9 9 f f : 84, 92 1 0 5 I f f : 88 1 0 6 0 : 4 4 η. 67 1 1 1 5 : 27 η. 2 6 1 1 2 7 f f : 9 0 η. 4 1 , 9 5 - 1 0 1 1 1 3 1 - 1 1 3 2 : 9 1 η. 4 4 1 1 3 6 : 9 5 η. 4 9 1 1 6 8 : 101 121 Off: 1 0 0 1 3 0 0 : 122 1320-1328: 94-95 1 3 3 9 - 1 3 4 0 : 85 η . 21 1 3 4 6 - 1 3 4 8 : 93 1 3 5 9 : 8 8 η. 3 4 Thesmophoriazusae Iff: 1 1 0 - 1 2 3 5 - 1 1 : 111 10: 1 1 4 11: 111 η. 11 19: 1 1 4 26-28: 111-112 34-35: 113-114 39ff: 1 1 4 - 1 1 5 5 2 f f : 1 1 5 - 1 1 6 , 136 5 8 - 6 2 : 116 7 1 - 7 7 : 112 9 3 - 9 4 : 112 95-98: 116-117 1 2 3 - 1 2 5 : 117 134-145: 117-118 137: 52 148-152: 118-119 1 5 4 - 1 5 6 : 119 175: 112 η. 12 2 6 6 - 2 6 7 : 121 2 8 9 - 2 9 1 : 122 2 9 3 - 2 9 4 : 1 2 4 , η. 5 2 2 9 5 f f : 123, 125 η. 6 0 3 8 1 : 121 η. 3 9 3 8 3 f f : 126 4 1 4 f f : 1 2 4 η. 5 6 4 4 6 f f : 126 574: 120

605: 132 6 2 8 : 1 2 4 η. 5 4 63Off: 1 1 4 η. 20 633: 126 7 6 9 f f : 1 2 0 η. 35 7 8 5 : 127 η. 67 785-847: 127-135 7 9 0 f f : 1 2 4 η. 5 6 8 0 9 : 1 3 0 η. 72 810: 130 8 3 4 : 1 2 4 η. 4 8 846-851: 135-136 855-919: 136-138 947-1000: 139-140 1 0 0 8 f f : 1 1 4 η. 2 2 , 1 4 0 1 0 5 6 f f : 120 1 0 7 9 f f : 139, 1 4 0 η. 1 0 3 1 1 1 4 f f : 140 η. 1 0 3 1 1 3 6 - 1 1 5 9 : 140 1 1 7 2 f f : 120 1 2 0 0 - 1 2 0 1 : 140 1227-1231: 140-141 Wasps 20: 3 2 , 8 4 η. 18 71: 8 4 η. 18 93: 4 3 5 2 5 : 9 1 η. 4 4 8 3 6 f f : 20 1 0 3 0 f f : 84 η. 19 1 5 0 1 f f : 84 η. 19 ARISTOTLE Ath. Pol. 20: 72 η. 4 3 Poetics 1 4 5 1 b : 136 η. 9 2 1 4 5 6 a : 136 η. 9 2 DEMOSTHENES 5 9 . 1 2 2 : 1 3 4 η. 8 7 EURIPIDES Andromeda: 114, 1 3 8 - 1 3 9 Bacchae 3 5 3 : 1 1 8 n. 3 2 4 5 3 f f : 118 n. 31, n. 32 Cyclops 16: 1 1 5 n. 2 4 Electro: 1 3 8 n. 9 8 Erechtheus: 6 9 n. 35 Helen: 135ff 4 0 0 : 115 n. 24 4 4 1 ff : 137 1 0 9 1 : 139 1301ff: 138 n. 99 1 4 5 7 : 115 n . 2 4

151

1501: 115 η. 24 Melanippê Sophë: 69 η. 35 Palamedes: 120 η. 35, 127 Telephus: 24 η. 24, 82 η. 6, 113, 120 η. 35, 126, 134, 138 η. 98, 142 Troades 9 4 1 - 1 1 1 4 : 79 η. 66 HERACLITUS FVS 22 Β 53: 86 η. 28 HERODOTUS 2.171: 124 η. 54 6.134: 125 η. 57 9.57: 94 η. 58 HESIOD Erga 1 0 9 - 1 1 9 : 104 HOMER Iliad 4.405: 130 5.584: 21 η. 10 5.593: 86 η. 28 6.492: 57 7.152: 86 η. 27 12.380: 21 η. 10 18.535: 86 η. 28 20.168: 76 η. 60 23.760: 132 η. 78 Odyssey 11.12ff: 40 η. 55 22.243: 4 0 η. 56 22.268: 40 η. 56 24.6ff: 40 η. 57 HOMERIC HYMNS Demeter 476: 139 η. 101 ISAEUS 3.80: 124 η. 53 6 . 4 9 - 5 0 : 124 η. 52 8.3: 37 η. 46 MENANDER Dysk. 574: 86 η. 27 Epitr. 749: 124 η. 53 fr. 546 Κ.: 124 η. 56 ΡΗΕ RE C RATE S fr. 130: 33 η. 39 fr. 145: 116 η. 28 PINDAR fr. 78 (Snell): 86 η. 28

152

PLATO Cratylus: 133 η. 83 Laws 909b: 40 n. 58 Phaedrus 271c: 116 n. 25 Symposium 189: 143 n. 112 194e—197e: 121 n. 37 223d: 143 n. I l l PLINY N.H. 7.2.23: 39 n. 51 PLUTARCH Moralia 347e: 82 n. 9 Solon 8: 124 n. 48, n. SOPHOCLES Antigone 3 3 2 - 3 3 3 : 34, 37 n. 3 4 2 - 3 4 3 : 35 Electro 1484: 72 n. 39 THEOCRITUS 15: 121 n. 39 THUCYDIDES 1.22.3: 76 n. 55 1.45.2: 137 n. 95 1.68.2: 76 n. 55 1.102.3: 72 n. 42 1.102.4: 72 n. 42 1.126.3: 79 n. 69 1.128: 69 n. 34, 79 n. 2.23.2: 137 n. 95 2.38.1: 109 n. 4 2.42: 72 n. 39 2.65.11: 53 n. 9 4.17: 72 n. 39 5.16.1: 83 n. 10 5.17.2: 83 n. 10 5.20.1: 82 n. 8 6.27: 68 n. 33 6.85.2: 43 n. 65 8.2.2: 56 n. 16 8.41: 130 n. 71 8.54: 56 n. 17 8.69.3: 28 n. 29, 48 η. XENOPHON Cyr. 1.4.8: 66 n. 31 ps.—XENOPHON Ath. Pol. 3.2: 109 n. 4

55

49

68

1