ARISTOPHANES – PEACE (Comedy, Greek, 421 BC)
Introduction Peace (Gr: Ειρήνη ) is a comedy by the ancient Greek playwright Aristophanes. It tells the story of Trygaeus, a middle-aged Athenian who takes it upon himself to rescue the allegorical figure of Peace and thereby bring about an end to the Peloponnesian War. In doing so, he earns the gratitude of farmers while bankrupting various tradesmen who had profited from the hostilities, and he celebrates his triumph by marrying Harvest, a companion of Peace and Festival. Historical background All the early plays of Aristophanes were written and acted against a background of the Peloponnesian war.The war between Athens and Sparta began with the Megarian decree in 431 BC and it developed into a war, in which Athens was unchallenged at sea and Sparta was undisputed master of the Greek mainland. The play was first staged at the the City Dionysia dramatic contest in Athens, just a few days before the ratification of the Peace of Nicias in 421 BCE, which promised to end the ten year old Peloponnesian War (although in the end, the peace only lasted some six years, even that marked by constant skirmishing in and around the Peloponnese, and the war eventually rumbled on until 404BCE). Synopsis Two slaves of Trygaeus are introduced, outside an ordinary house in Athens, kneading what appears to be unusually large lumps of dough, that is actually excrement which is to be fed to the giant dung beetle that their master intends
flying to a private audience with the gods. Trygaeus himself then appears above the house on the back of the dung beetle, hovering in an alarmingly unsteady manner, while his slaves, neighbours and children plead with him to come back down to earth. He explains that his mission is to reason with the gods about the Peloponnesian War and, if necessary, to prosecute them for treason against Greece, and he soars away towards the heavens. Arriving at the house of the gods, Trygaeus discovers that only Hermes is home, the other gods having packed up and departed for some remote refuge where they hope never to be troubled again by the war or the prayers of humankind. Hermes himself is only there making some final arrangements for the new occupant of the house, War, who has already moved in. Peace, he is informed, is imprisoned in a cave nearby. War then comes on stage, carrying a gigantic mortar in which he intends to continue grinding the Greeks to paste, but he complains that he no longer has a pestle to use with his mortar, as his old pestles, Cleon and Brasidas (the leaders of the pro-war factions in Athens and Sparta respectively) are both dead, recently perished in battle. While War goes to find a new pestle, Trygaeus calls on Greeks everywhere to come and help him set Peace free while there is still time. A Chorus of excited Greeks from various city-states arrives, dancing frantically in their excitement. They get to work pulling boulders from the cave's mouth, along with a Chorus of farmers, and eventually the beautiful Peace and her comely companions, Festival and Harvest, emerge. Hermes explains that she would have been freed much earlier, except that the Athenian assembly kept voting against it. Trygaeus apologizes to Peace on behalf of his countrymen, and updates her on the latest theatre gossip from Athens. He leaves her to enjoy her freedom while he sets off again for
Athens, taking Harvest and Festival back with him (Harvest to be his wife), while the Chorus praises the author for his originality as a dramatist, for his courageous opposition to monsters like Cleon and for his genial disposition. Trygaeus returns to the stage, declaring that the audience looked like a bunch of rascals when seen from the heavens, and that they look even worse when seen up close. He sends Harvest indoors to prepare for their wedding, and delivers Festival to the Athenian leaders sitting in the front row. He then prepares for a religious service in honour of Peace. The smell of the roasting sacrificial lamb soon attracts an oraclemonger, who hovers about the scene in quest of a free meal, but he is soon driven off. As Trygaeus joins Harvest indoors to prepare for his wedding, the Chorus praises the idyllic country life during peacetime, although it also bitterly recalls how different things were only just recently, in time of war. Trygaeus returns to the stage, dressed for the wedding festivities, and local tradesmen and merchants begin to arrive. The sickle-maker and jar-maker, whose businesses are flourishing again now that peace has returned, present Trygaeus with wedding presents. Others, however, are not faring so well with the new peace and Trygaeus offers suggestions to some of them about what they can do with their merchandise (e.g. helmet crests can be used as dusters, spears as vine props, breastplates as chamber pots, trumpets as scales for weighing figs and helmets as mixing bowls for Egyptian emetics and enemas). One of the guests children begins reciting Homer's epic song of war, but Trygaeus promptly sends him away. He announces the commencement of the wedding feast and opens up the house for celebrations. Analysis The play is notable for its optimism and its joyous anticipation of peace and for its celebration of a return to an idyllic rural life.
However, it also sounds a note of caution and bitterness in the memory of lost opportunities, and the ending of the play is not happy for everyone. The Chorus' joyful celebration of peace is tinged with bitter reflections on the mistakes of past leaders, and Trygaeus expresses anxious fears for the future of the peace since events are still subject to bad leadership. The recital of the militaristic verses from Homer by the son of Lamachus towards the end of the play are a dramatic indication that war is deeply rooted in Greek culture and that it may still command the imagination of a new generation. As in all of Aristophanes' plays, the jokes are numerous, the action is wildly absurd and the satire is savage. Cleon, the pro-war populist leader of Athens, is once again singled out as a target for the author's wit even though he had died in battle just a few months earlier (as had his Spartan counterpart Brasidas). However, unusually, Cleon is granted at least a modicum of respect by Aristophanes in this play. Aristophanes' love of rural life and his nostalgia for simpler times comes through strongly in the play. His vision of peace involves a return to the country and its routines, an association he expresses in terms of religious and allegorical imagery. However, in spite of these mythical and religious contexts, political action emerges as the decisive factor in human affairs, and the gods are shown to be distant figures. Mortals must therefore rely on their own initiative, as represented by the Chorus of Greeks working together to release Peace from captivity. Unusually for an Old Comedy play, there is no traditional agon or debate in Peace, nor is there even an antagonist to represent a pro-war viewpoint, apart from apart from the allegorical character of War, a monstrosity incapable of eloquence. Some have seen Peace as an early development away from Old Comedy and towards later New Comedy.
Ειρήνη (Peace) , Trygaeus and the Chorus. (3-4-2016) A picture from the play of 1st Secondary School of Messini in the Ekklesiasterion of Ancient Messini.
ARISTOPHANES - PLUTUS
Introduction “Plutus” (Gr: “Ploutis”) or “Wealth” is a late comedy by the ancient Greek playwright Aristophanes, first produced around 388 BCE or later. It is a kind of allegory about a poor man, Chremylos, who befriends the blinded Plutus, god of wealth, and encourages him to distribute riches to the deserving and the virtuous. Synopsis Chremylos, an elderly and poor Athenian citizen, and his slave Cario, return to Athens from Delphi, where Chremylos had gone to seek advice from the oracle concerning his son, and whether he should be instructed in injustice and knavery and the other arts whereby worldly men acquire their riches. Apollo instructs him to follow the first man he meets on leaving the temple and to persuade him to come home with him. The first man he meets happens to be a blind beggar but, when Chremylos persists in following him anyway, he discovers that he is in reality Plutus, the god of wealth, whom Zeus has robbed of his eyesight so that he would be unable to distinguish between the just and the unjust. After much argument, Plutus is persuaded to enter Chremylus' house. Chremylus is convinced that, if Plutus' eyesight can be restored, then there is hope that wealth will be distributed to the virtuous, rather than randomly, thus making the world a better place. On arriving at the house, they encounter the ragged goddess Poverty, who has been Chremylus’ guest for many years. She argues that without poverty there would be no slaves (as every slave would buy his freedom) and no fine goods or luxury foods (as nobody would work if everyone were rich), but Chremylus is unimpressed by her arguments.
Plutus' eyesight is restored at the temple of Asclepius, famous for cures and miracles of this nature, and he formally becomes a member of Chremylus' household. He begins to hand out riches to the more deserving people (including his benefactor, Chremylus) and to removes riches from the unvirtuous, effectively turning the world upside-down economically and socially. Predictably, this gives rise to rancorous comments and claims of unfairness from those who have been deprived of their riches. In the end, the messenger god Hermes arrives to inform Chremylus that the gods are angry because they have been starved of the sacrifices and homage due to the traditional Olympian gods, since all good men have been directing all their attention to Plutus. Hermes, worried about his own predicament, actually offers to work for the mortals, and enters Chremylus' house as a servant on those conditions. The play concludes with Chremylus’ proposal that Plutus should replace Zeus as king of the gods, and they carry him in a solemn procession to the temple and install him in the place of Zeus. Analysis “Plutus” is the last, and least humorous, of Aristophanes’ extant plays, written shortly before his death, around 388 BCE (or possibly as late as 380 BCE). Indeed, it may have been first staged by Aristophanes’ son after his death. It was probably a significant revision of a much earlier play dating from around 408 BCE, and so is often referred to as “Plutus II” or “Wealth II”. Like many of his plays, it is a political satire on contemporary Athens featuring the stupid master, the insubordinate slave and many attacks on the morals of the time. Like “Ecclesiazusae”, it also involves the establishment of a kind of utopian community, this time as a solution to the eternal attraction of wealth and prosperity and the problem of the unequal distribution of goods.
The gods are rather severely handled in the play, as are the tricks of the priestcraft and superstition, so that we can perceive that the old reverence for them had passed away, even among men with pretensions to goodness. Although Plutus is recommended to replace Zeus at the end of the play, the priest of Zeus has already lowered his deity by representing him as only anxious for his perquisites and libations. However, the play is often regarded, even by specialists, as something of an afterthought in the poet's career. In its absence of personal interests and personal satire, and its lack of strong comic incidents, it comes over more as a whimsical allegory than as a comedy proper. Much of Aristophanes' old bitterness is gone, but so is much of the old vigour.
Along with “Ecclesiazusae”, it is sometimes considered a product of the “third age” of Aristophanic drama. In an Athens conquered and humbled after the Peloponnesian War, the role of the comic poet had changed significantly and he was no longer expected to be the frank and fearless adviser of the state, reprover of mistaken policy, exposer of trickery and vice in high places and round abuser of his countrymen for their own good. “Plutus” deals, not with political, but with private life, and is usually ranked as belonging to the tradition of Middle Comedy, or at least to the time of transition from Old to New Comedy.
An abstract from the play “Plutus” presented by the 1st Secondary School of Gerakas in Ekklisiastirion of Ancient Messini.
ARISTOPHANES - CLOUDS
Introduction “The Clouds” (Gr: “Nephelai”) is a comedy by the ancient Greek playwright Aristophanes, originally produced at the Athens City Dionysia of 423 BCE. It is perhaps the world's first extant “comedy of ideas” and lampoons intellectual fashions in classical Athens. In the play, Strepsiades, an elderly Athenian mired in debt, enrolls his son Pheidippides in Socrates’ philosophy school so that he might learn the rhetorical skills necessary to defeat their creditors in court, although all he really learns is cynical disrespect for social mores and contempt for authority, which leads to Strepsiades burning the school down in disgust. Synopsis The play begins with Strepsiades sitting up in bed, too worried to sleep because he is faced with legal action for nonpayment of debts. He complains that his son, Pheidippides, blissfully asleep in the bed next to him, has been encouraged by his aristocratic wife to indulge an expensive taste in horses and the household is living beyond its means. Strepsiades wakes his son to tell him of his plan to get out of debt. At first Pheidippides goes along with his father’s plan but soon changes his mind when he learns that he must enrol in the Phrontisterion (which may be translated as “The Thinkery” or “Thinking Shop”), a philosophy school for nerds and intellectual bums that no self-respecting, athletic young man like Pheidippides cares to be involved with. Strepsiades’ idea is for his son to learn how to make a bad argument look good and thereby beat their aggrieved creditors in court. Pheidippides will not be persuaded, though, and Strepsiades eventually decides to enrol himself, in spite of his advanced age.
At The Thinkery, Strepsiades hears about some of the recent important discoveries made by Socrates, the head of the school, including a new unit of measurement for ascertaining the distance jumped by a flea, the exact cause of the buzzing noise made by a gnat and a new use for a large pair of compasses (for stealing cloaks from pegs over the gymnasium wall). Impressed, Stepsiades begs to be introduced to the man behind these discoveries, and Socrates appears overhead in a basket he uses to observe the Sun and other meteorological phenomena. The philosopher descends and inducts the new elderly student in the school in a ceremony which includes a parade of the majestic singing Clouds, the patron goddesses of thinkers and other layabouts (which become the Chorus of the play). The Clouds declare that this is the author's cleverest play and the one that cost him the greatest effort, praising him for his originality and for his courage in the past in lampooning influential politicians such as Cleon. They promise divine favours if the audience will punish Cleon for his corruption, and rebuke the Athenians for messing about with the calendar and putting it out of step with the moon. Socrates returns to the stage, protesting about how inept his new elderly student is. He attempts one further lessons, directing Strepsiades to lie under a blanket in order to encourage thoughts to arise naturally in his mind. When Strepsiades is caught masturbating under the blanket, Socrates finally gives up and refuses to have anything more to do with him. Strepsiades resorts to browbeating and threatening his son, Pheidippides, into enrolling into The Thinkery. Two associates of Socrates, Right and Wrong, debate with each other over which of them can offer Pheidippides the best education, with Right offering a preparation for an earnest life of discipline and rigour and Wrong offering a foundation for a life of ease and pleasure, more typical of men who know how to talk their way out of trouble and of those in eminent positions in Athens. Right is defeated, Wrong leads
Pheidippides off into The Thinkery for his life-changing education, and Strepsiades goes home a happy man. The Clouds step forward to address the audience a second time, demanding to be awarded first place in the festival competition, in return for which they promise good rains, and threaten that they will destroy crops, smash roofs and spoil weddings if not granted the prize. When Strepsiades returns to fetch his son from the school, he is presented with a new Pheidippides, startlingly transformed into the pale nerd and intellectual bum that he had once feared to become, but supposedly well prepared to talk their way out of financial trouble. The first two of their aggrieved creditors arrive with court summonses, and the confident Strepsiades dismisses them contemptuously, and returns indoors to continue the celebrations. However, he soon reappears, complaining of a beating that his “new� son has just given him. Pheidippides emerges and coolly and insolently debates a son's right to beat his father, ending by threatening to beat his mother also. At this, Strepsiades flies into a rage against The Thinkery, blaming Socrates for his latest troubles, and leads his slaves in a frenzied attack on the disreputable school. The alarmed students are pursued offstage and the Chorus, with nothing to celebrate, quietly departs. Although originally produced at the Athens City Dionysia dramatic contest in 423 BCE, the play was revised some time between 420 and 417 BCE after its poor initial reception (it came last of the three plays competing at the festival that year). The play is unusually serious for an Old Comedy and possibly this was the reason why the original play failed at the City Dionysia. No copy of the original production survives, and it seems likely that the extant version is actually slightly incomplete. Despite its poor reception, however, it nevertheless remains one of the most celebrated and perfectly finished of all
Hellenic comedies, containing some of the finest specimens of lyric poetry that have come down to us. The original production of “The Clouds” in 423 BCE came at a time when Athens was looking forward to a truce and potentially a period of peace in the ongoing Peloponnesian War with Sparta.Aristophanes therefore apparently saw little need for renewing the attacks he had begun in his previous plays (particularly “The Knights”) against Cleon, the populist leader of the pro-war faction in Athens, and turned his attention instead to broader issues, such as the corrupt state of education in Athens, the recurring issue of Old versus New and the so-called “battle of ideas” stemming from the rationalist and scientific ideas of thinkers such as Thales, Anaxagoras, Democritus and Hippocrates, and the growing belief that civilized society was not a gift from the gods but rather had developed gradually from primitive man's animallike existence. Socrates (portrayed in the play as a petty thief, a fraud and a sophist) was one of the most distinguished philosophers of Aristophanes’ time, and also apparently had an illfavoured face that lent itself easily to caricature by maskmakers, and “The Clouds” was not the only play of the period to lampoon him. The play gained some notoriety in ancient times, however, for its acerbic caricature of the philosopher, and it was specifically mentioned in Plato's “Apology” as a factor contributing to the old philospher’s trial and eventual execution (although in fact Socrates’ trial occurred many years after the performance of the play). As is usual with plays in the Old Comedy tradition, “The Clouds” is studded with topical jokes that only a local audience could understand, and a huge number of local personalities and places are mentioned. At one point, the Chorus declares that the author chose Athens for the first performance of the play (implying that he could have produced it somewhere else), but this is itself a joke as the play is specifically tailored to an Athenian audience.
It is one of the principal forms of Aristophanic wit in general to take a metaphor in its literal sense, and examples in this play include the introduction of Socrates floating in a basket in the sky (thus walking on air like an idle dreamer) and the Clouds themselves (representing metaphysical thoughts which do not rest on the ground of experience but hover about without definite form and substance in the region of possibilities).