comedy to end the WAR
Did a play really convince Athens to concede defeat?
Aristophanes’ comedy Lysistrata was produced (probably at the Lenaea Festival) in February 411 BCE and reveals several remarkable things. Firstly it shows that Athenian cultural life continued during the war. Comedy, tragedy and (as the dialogues of Plato and Xenophon show) philosophy continued and even thrived in Athens during the war. At the same time, the nature of Athens’ democracy was such that Aristophanes (and others) could offer criticisms of the conduct of the war, and Athens’ political leadership (Peisander in this case), in an astonishing way.
Lysistrata tells of the eponymous heroine (her name means ‘disbander of armies’) calling a meeting of women from all around Greece (mirroring the various meetings of the male politicians running the war). They decide to end the war by withholding sex and other domestic duties from the men. Older women will also occupy the Acropolis so that access to the funds to carry out the war will be denied. In the play their decisions are supported by the gods and are successful (after a very short period of time!). The play occurred at a low-point in Athens’ fortunes during the war and calls for an end to the war in such a forum are surprising. At the same time all the actors in Greek comedy were men, and Athens’ strict controls on women’s behaviours and movement meant that the play was deliberately unreal. Nonetheless the idea of a heroine would still have been radical in Greek comedy and the play shows innovations in Aristophanes’ development.