The Acharnians/The Clouds/Lysistrata'We women have the salvation of Greece in our hands'Writing at a time of political and social crisis in Athens, the ancient Greek comic playwright Aristophanes was an eloquent, yet bawdy, challenger to the demagogue and the sophist. In Lysistrata and The Acharnians, two pleas for an end to the long war between Athens and Sparta, a band of women on a sex strike and a lone peasant respectively defeat the political establis...

Lysistrata by Aristophanes is a comedic masterpiece set against the backdrop of the Peloponnesian War. In a bold attempt to end the war, the women of Greece withhold their affections from their men until peace is achieved. With Aristophanes' sharp wit and satirical approach, Lysistrata offers a humorous critique of war and gender roles. It's a classic that still rings true, challenging societal norms and expectations with its timeless humor. Dive into the world of Lysistrata and discover w...

Wishing to escape the nonsense of the city – laws, wars, politicians, who needs ‘em? – a pair of Athenians decide to leave civilization behind and live among the birds. However, not even utopia is free from their very human desire for advancement, no matter how far from society the two men find themselves. Soon the Athenians establish an empire of birds, and plot to steal the scepter of heaven from the king of the Gods.Escapist fantasy with a bleak undercurrent, The Birds offers a ...

The plays in this volume all contain Aristophanes' trademark bawdy comedy and dazzling verbal agility. In THE BIRDS, two frustrated Athenians join the birds to build the utopian city of 'Much Cuckoo in the Clouds'. THE KNIGHTS is a venomous satire on Cleon, a prominent Athenian demagogue, while THE ASSEMBLY WOMEN deals with the battle of the sexes as the women of Athens infiltrate the all-male Assembly in disguise. The lengthy conflict with Sparta is the subject of PEACE, inspired by the h...

When the Peloponnesian War goes on too long, the women of Athens, led by the beautiful Lysistrata, take matters into their own hands, withholding their passion as a way to force their men to negotiate a peace treaty. But the women’s vow to deny their husbands and lovers does little to force peace, and instead ignites a battle between the sexes.Aristophanes’ Lysistrata was first performed in 411 B.C., and was one of the first comedies to explore sexual dynamics between men ...

All 11 comedies, literally translated. Two volumes in one file. Includes: Knights, Acharnians, Peace, Lysistrata, The Clouds, The Wasps, The Birds, The Frogs, The Thesmophoriazusae, The Ecclesiazusae, and Plutus. According to Wikipedia: "Aristophanes (ca. 446 BCE ca. 386 BCE), son of Philippus, of the deme Cydathenaus, was a prolific and much acclaimed, comic playwright of ancient Athens. Eleven of his forty plays have come down to us virtually complete. These, as well as fragments of some...

The plot of the play revolves around Pisthetaerus, an Athenian who convinces the birds to create a great city in the sky, and thus regain their status as the original gods. Pisthetaerus eventually transforms into a bird-like god himself, and replaces Zeus as the king of the gods.

“It’s this that grieves us most of all, to see men who have never served or held either lance or oar in defense of their country, enriching themselves at our expense without ever raising a blister on their hands.”Aristophanes' The Wasps is a timeless comedy, combining witty satire and raucous slapstick to delightful effect. Modern critics have acclaimed it as a perfectly realized fantasy, remarkable for its wit.The Wasps ridicules one of the Athenian institutions: ...

New English versions of Lysistrata, The Frogs, The Birds, and Ladies' Day. "Thanks to Dudley Fitts...we can appreciate Aristophanes' vigor, his robust style, his scorching wit, his earthy humor, his devotion to honesty and his poetic imagination" (Brooks Atkinson, New York Times). Index.

Capturing the antic outrageousness and lyrical brilliance of antiquity’s greatest comedies, Aaron Poochigian’s Aristophanes: Four Plays brings these classic dramas to vivid life for a twenty-first century audience.The citizens of ancient Athens enjoyed a freedom of speech as broad as our own. This freedom, parrhesia, the right to say what one pleased, how and when one pleased, and to whom, had no more fervent champion than the brilliant fifth-century comic...

Reissue of Aristophanes' most famous plays in the Methuen Classical Greek Dramatists seriesAristophanes is the oldest comedic writer in Western literature. Although only eleven of the some forty plays he wrote survive, his unique blend of slapstick, fantasy, bawy and political satire provide us with a vivid picture of the ancient Athenians - their social mores, their beliefs and their exuberant sense of occasion. Wasps is a lawcourt satire, Clouds a lighthearted look at education, ...

Burdened by his son’s expensive habit of betting on horse races, Strepsiades enrolls in a school for charlatans run by the philosopher Socrates. Deemed too old, Pheidippides takes his father’s place to learn how to become the best orator in Ancient Greece and talk his way out of trouble. Accompanied by patron goddesses dressed as clouds, the pair scheme to convince their creditors to forgive the son’s mounting debts.One of eleven plays to survive to the present day, the caricature ...