Aristophanes

Aristophanes (born around 450-445 BC – died around 385 BC) was a Greek writer who wrote 40 plays. However, only 11 of his plays survive in their entirety. He is famous for writing comedies (funny plays), and even today his plays make people laugh.

Many of the jokes in his plays relate to sex. For example, Lysistrata is about a group of women who protest against a war by not having sexual intercourse with their husbands until the war is ended.

Another well known play by Aristophanes is The Frogs.

A licence for slander

George Grote said of Aristophanes:

"Never probably will the full power of unshackled comedy be so exhibited again...the unsparing licence of attack upon the gods, the institutions, the politicians, philosophers, poets, private citizens... and even upon the women of Athens".

"[Athenians] bore with good-humoured indulgence the full outpouring of ridicule... upon those democratic institutions to which they were sincerely attached... The democracy was strong enough to tolerate unfriendly tongues either in earnest or in jest.^p450/452

Surviving plays

• The Acharnians (425 BC)
• The Knights (424 BC)
• The Clouds (original 423 BC, uncompleted revised version from 419 BC – 416 BC survives)
• The Wasps (422 BC)
• Peace (first version, 421 BC)
• The Birds (414 BC)
• Lysistrata (411 BC)
• Thesmophoriazusae (The Festival Women, first version, c. 410 BC)
• The Frogs (405 BC)
• Ecclesiazousae (The Assemblywomen, c. 392 BC)
• Plutus (Wealth, second version, 388 BC)

Other pages

• Theatre of Ancient Greece

Other websites

• The Frogs at the Internet Classics archive (English version)