Lysistrata
By Aristophanes
()
About this ebook
When the strike begins, and the men respond, the comedic battle of the sexes that ensues makes this spirited play one of the most enjoyable of the classics. In it, Aristophanes employs a mixture of shrewd logic and raffish humor that fully exploits the rich comic potential of the story and its underlying antiwar sentiment. Always a favorite of audiences, Lysistrata, because of its pointed feminist sympathies, is studied and performed today more than ever.
Aristophanes
Aristophanes (446–386 BCE) was a Greek comedy writer, who produced about 40 plays throughout his career. His work was the embodiment of “Old Comedy”—an early form of the genre that used exaggerated characters and scenarios. Aristophanes’ first play, The Banqueters, was produced in 427 BCE, quickly followed by The Babylonians. His most famous production, Lysistrata, was initially performed in 411 BCE and centers on one woman’s attempt to end a war by holding a sex strike. Due to his sensationalized plots and vibrant characters, Aristophanes is considered one of the architects of Greek comedy.
Read more from Aristophanes
Aristophanes: Four Comedies Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Birds Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Complete Plays Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Birds and Other Plays Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Yale Required Reading - Collected Works (Vol. 1) Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Harvard Classics: All 71 Volumes Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Frogs Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Lysistrata and Other Plays Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Yale Classics (Vol. 1) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Birds: A Play Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Lysistrata Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Lysistrata and Other Plays (Translated with Annotations by The Athenian Society) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Clouds Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Thesmophoriazusae (Or The Women's Festival) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Lysistrata Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsYale Classics (Vol. 1): Yale Required Reading Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Clouds Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Wasps Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Frogs Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Birds Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Ecclesiazusae Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Frogs and Other Plays Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related authors
Related to Lysistrata
Related ebooks
Lysistrata Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLysistrata: A Play Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Lysistrata (Translated with Annotations by The Athenian Society) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsQuite Funny, A Bit Sexy & Slightly Profound Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLa Celestina: A Play with Music Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Road and Other Liars Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Tempest (The Unabridged Play) + The Classic Biography: The Life of William Shakespeare Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Tempest: Including "The Life of William Shakespeare" Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAntony and Cleopatra Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/551 Poems Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRitual and Bit Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPirate Talk or Mermalade Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Tempest Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIt's Murder! Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Roaring Girl, or Moll Cutpurse: "Who'll hear an ass speak?" Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5My Crazmad Book of Poems Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsToo Many Words Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDragonish Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Anvil of Navarre Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPatience Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Tempest (Golden Deer Classics) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Tempest (Book Center) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Barracuda, Lemon, Whale Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Clouds Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Merchant of Venice Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMy Ariel Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSwetnam, the Woman-hater, arraigned by women: A new comedie, acted at the Red Bull, by the late Queenes seruants Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Tempest (Dream Classics) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Great North Road Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWhatever It Is, I Don't Like It: The Best of Howard Jacobson Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
General Fiction For You
The Priory of the Orange Tree Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Mythos Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Cloud Cuckoo Land: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Princess Bride: S. Morgenstern's Classic Tale of True Love and High Adventure Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Man Called Ove: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Silmarillion Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Covenant of Water (Oprah's Book Club) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The City of Dreaming Books Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Ocean at the End of the Lane: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Fellowship Of The Ring: Being the First Part of The Lord of the Rings Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Life of Pi: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Alchemist: A Graphic Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dante's Divine Comedy: Inferno Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The King James Version of the Bible Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5It Ends with Us: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Shantaram: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Unhoneymooners Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Nineteen Claws and a Black Bird: Stories Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Meditations: Complete and Unabridged Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Babel: Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators' Revolution Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Labyrinth of Dreaming Books: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Ulysses: With linked Table of Contents Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Rebecca Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Everything's Fine Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Canterbury Tales Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Pet Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Nettle & Bone Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Other Black Girl: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5You: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Related categories
Reviews for Lysistrata
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
Lysistrata - Aristophanes
Aristophanes
Lysistrata
First digital edition 2017 by Anna Ruggieri
LYSISTRATA
LYSISTRATA stands alone with the Propylaea at her back.
LYSISTRATA
If they were trysting for a Bacchanal, A feast of Pan or Colias or Genetyllis, The tambourines would block the rowdy streets, But now there's not a woman to be seen Except--ah, yes--this neighbour of mine yonder.
Enter CALONICE.
Good day Calonice.
CALONICE
Good day Lysistrata. But what has vexed you so? Tell me, child. What are these black looks for? It doesn't suit you To knit your eyebrows up glumly like that.
LYSISTRATA
Calonice, it's more than I can bear, I am hot all over with blushes for our sex. Men say we're slippery rogues--
CALONICE
And aren't they right?
LYSISTRATA
Yet summoned on the most tremendous business For deliberation, still they snuggle in bed.
CALONICE
My dear, they'll come. It's hard for women, you know, To get away. There's so much to do; Husbands to be patted and put in good tempers: Servants to be poked out: children washed Or soothed with lullays or fed with mouthfuls of pap.
LYSISTRATA
But I tell you, here's a far more weighty object.
CALONICE
What is it all about, dear Lysistrata, That you've called the women hither in a troop? What kind of an object is it?
LYSISTRATA
A tremendous thing!
CALONICE
And long?
LYSISTRATA
Indeed, it may be very lengthy.
CALONICE
Then why aren't they here?
LYSISTRATA
No man's connected with it; If that was the case, they'd soon come fluttering along. No, no. It concerns an object I've felt over And turned this way and that for sleepless nights.
CALONICE
It must be fine to stand such long attention.
LYSISTRATA
So fine it comes to this--Greece saved by Woman!
CALONICE
By Woman? Wretched thing, I'm sorry for it.
LYSISTRATA
Our country's fate is henceforth in our hands: To destroy the Peloponnesians root and branch--
CALONICE
What could be nobler!
LYSISTRATA
Wipe out the Boeotians--
CALONICE
Not utterly. Have mercy on the eels! [Footnote: The Boeotian eels were highly esteemed delicacies in Athens.]
LYSISTRATA
But with regard to Athens, note I'm careful Not to say any of these nasty things; Still, thought is free.... But if the women join us From Peloponnesus and Boeotia, then Hand in hand we'll rescue Greece.
CALONICE
How could we do Such a big wise deed? We women who dwell Quietly adorning ourselves in a back-room With gowns of lucid gold and gawdy toilets Of stately silk and dainty little slippers....
LYSISTRATA
These are the very armaments of the rescue. These crocus-gowns, this outlay of the best myrrh, Slippers, cosmetics dusting beauty, and robes With rippling creases of light.
CALONICE
Yes, but how?
LYSISTRATA
No man will lift a lance against another--
CALONICE
I'll run to have my tunic dyed crocus.
LYSISTRATA
Or take a shield--
CALONICE
I'll get a stately gown.
LYSISTRATA
Or unscabbard a sword--
CALONICE
Let me buy a pair of slipper.
LYSISTRATA
Now, tell me, are the women right to lag?
CALONICE
They should have turned birds, they should have grown wings and flown.
LYSISTRATA
My friend, you'll see that they are true Athenians: Always too late. Why, there's not a woman From the shoreward demes arrived, not one from Salamis.
CALONICE
I know for certain they awoke at dawn, And got their husbands up if not their boat sails.
LYSISTRATA
And I'd have staked my life the Acharnian dames Would be here first, yet they haven't come either!
CALONICE
Well anyhow there is Theagenes' wife We can expect--she consulted