The Genre Explorers discussion

The Ancient Comedic Play groupread for February is Lysistrata by Aristophanes from appprox. 411 BC.

Short Summary: Written during a time of continous war, with honorable peace for both sides seeming utopian, Aristophanes proposes the idea: "What would happen if all the women on both sides withheld sexual favours from their husbands until they agree to stop the war?"

This might not be as literarily influential as Plautus' Roman comedies, but if you ask someone to name an ancient comedy, this will probably be the one to come up the most.

Old School Greek Comedies:
- Comedies and tragedies from Athens were always produced in connection with one of the festival for Dionysus (among other things their god for wine and theatre). It was a competition for five playwrights chosen beforehand and Aristophanes had some works who won and some who at least placed high.
- Comedy was a handed down trade, meaning that Aristophanes' son also became a writer of comedy.
- The Chorus was so important that it was a rule that they should remain on stage throughout the entire play (although little exceptions were allowed). They not only sang, but also danced, although what we know of their dances today is next to nothing and only taken from discovered vases.
- 3 actors were usually used, but a maximum of 4 was allowed. Which is why these plays usually don't have too many main characters.

There are many, many more restrictions and traditions concerned with Old School Greek Comedy, but these are the ones that stood out to me reading the Introduction of my copy.

I finished this a few days ago. The version I read was the 1973 Penguin which also contains Aristophanes' "The Archanians" and "The Clouds". The translation's by Alan H. Somerstein and it definitely seems like the translation plays a huge part (no pun intended) in his plays. He's very much about puns and wordplay. The translation was okay though not great. The notes weren't really as helpful as I would have liked.

I found these works haven't aged nearly as well as, say, Shakespeare's plays or other works from Ancient times. Which seems mostly due to his constant referring to prominent people of his day and the very particular rules and norms of Ancient Greek comedy. His humor wasn't really for me, but all in all it did have an interesting premise and was probably worth the read. "The Clouds" was more my speed, but I'm glad I finally got around to reading Lysistrata as it's so incredibly famous :)

Does anyone know of any works this play inspired?

I did a search on modern versions of Lysistrata. In the top result I found a British play that's on Goodreads.

The Common Chorus: A Version of Aristophanes' Lysistrata by Tony Harrison

I have never read it and I haven't heard of Tony Harrison. So I have no idea of whether it's any good.

Interesting, thank you. I'm curious as to how big of an influence Aristophanes has been on literature. While, for instance, you constantly see Plautus being mentioned as sources of this or that, or generally as being influential in literature, I've yet to come across that with Aristophanes. Mostly he's just being mentioned as having been important in his day.

That said, I more often hear A. mentioned than P. whom I had even forgotten existed (so thank you for nominating him, it brought his works to my mind again!)
It's quite ironical really.

Yes, Plautus was influential. He was the source for Shakespeare's The Comedy of Errors and of course A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, a Stephen Sondheim musical, was originally a Plautus play. These are only the best known instances of Plautus influence.

On the other hand, the Wikipedia article on Plautus states that he was influenced by Greek New Comedy. It's at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plautus. Greek New Comedy is not well known today. Aristophanes is the best known example of Greek Old Comedy.

The Wikipedia article on Aristophanes has a section on his influence. It's at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aristoph.... There were apparently plays by Racine and Goethe that are rather obscure which were based on Aristophanes plays. His influence was mainly on the politics of his day. Wikipedia suggests that Gilbert and Sullivan were influenced by Aristophanes. I don't agree. I think that if Aristophanes hadn't existed, someone else would have become the founder of satire. There were also British satirists who could be considered more of an influence on Gilbert and Sullivan than Aristophanes.

Maneachmi is the Plautus play I'm most looking forward to, precisely for it being the source for Comedy of Errors. I've also read that a Molière play is based on a Plautus play - I think it's The Miser? Or The Misanthrope perhaps, can't quite remember.

Yes exactly and the question then remains, how much was New Comedy influenced by Aristophanes? And maybe there were writers before A. who wrote satiric comedies. It can be hard to tell with such ancient texts.

It's quite interesting that the plays of two such famous writers that are based on his works remain obscure. About the Gilbert and Sullivan, in my edition the translator actually mentioned using their tunes as models for many of his Chorus song translations, but I agree with you, I doubt he's the reason for satire. I think the various forms of humor have always been here and will always be here to varying degrees.

Very helpful information you've provided for the discussion Shomeret! :)

Aleta wrote: "Maneachmi is the Plautus play I'm most looking forward to, precisely for it being the source for Comedy of Errors. I've also read that a Molière play is based on a Plautus play - I think it's The M..."

According to the Plautus article on Wikipedia, Greek New Comedy was farcical rather than satirical. Farce is now known as situation comedy. The situation is what is humorous. Plautus wrote situation comedy. The difference between satire and farce is that satire pokes fun at situations that are taken seriously and regarded as normal. The situations in farce are ridiculous, and are not considered normal.

Shomeret wrote: "Aleta wrote: "Maneachmi is the Plautus play I'm most looking forward to, precisely for it being the source for Comedy of Errors. I've also read that a Molière play is based on a Plautus play - I th..."

Not sure exactly where you're going with this, sorry :) I am aware of the differences between the two, but not entirely sure what it was in response to?

Aleta wrote: "Shomeret wrote: "Aleta wrote: "Maneachmi is the Plautus play I'm most looking forward to, precisely for it being the source for Comedy of Errors. I've also read that a Molière play is based on a Pl..."

It was in response to your question of whether New Comedy was influenced by Aristophanes. Since they are two different types of comedy, I would say no.

Ah I see. I just started reading a collection of Plautus plays and the introduction says something similar to what you said. It's not always though, that different types of humor, genres etc don't influence each other. Especially as we're the sum of our experiences and thus we sometimes unconsciously bring things we've read/seen/heard, something we might not even have liked, into something completely different. Also, if The New School Comedy of Greece was a sort of movement against Aristophanes and the Old School (as the introduction to my Plautus version suggests), then that's influence as well. A different kind, but still influence :)