Aristophanes is a funny guy and he writes funny plays. Like all the best comedians, he manages to slip some serious stuff into the mirth and merriment (and abundant priapism), as he sharply critiques aspects of his society, his government and his fellow playwrights. I very much enjoyed the 'peace' theme in Lysistrata and The Acharnians - a somewhat daring point of view to take while your country is in the middle of a war. The mix of high and low comedy felt very Shakespearean, although from now on I should say Shakespeare's comedy seems very Aristophanian.

I do have a critique of my own for Douglass Parker's translations of three of the four plays in the book (Lysistrata, The Acharnians and The Congresswomen). Parker saw his job, apparently, as bringing Aristophanes into the present so a modern audience would get the jokes. He did this by substituting anachronistic 20th Century American idioms, references and puns for those of 5th Century BCE Greece. (Example: "We want to get laid," say the women in Lysistrata at one point.) It must be particularly frustrating for a translator because so much of Aristophanes' humor and wordplay is essentially untranslatable (the universality of poop jokes excepted, of course). I found this 'modernizing' technique often interrupted the narrative flow, and distracted me from my perspective. Admittedly, my perspective was this: imagining what it must have been like being in the Theater of Dionysus watching Aristophanes' new play for the first time. So when Mr. Parker has a character refer to something or someone that didn't exist then, or use an idiom or slang expression you might hear on SNL, it threw me out of my pleasant time-travel fantasy. (Are we in Ancient Greece or am I at Second City?) I think I understand the concept in theory (I guess the idea is that if Aristophanes were doing a revival of his plays on Broadway in 2013, he wouldn't treat them as museum pieces - he'd put in jokes the audience would understand), but in practice it could be annoying.

On the other hand, I did laugh quite a bit at the first three plays, more than at The Frogs, which was translated in a much more conventional style by Richard Lattimore. Adhering more closely to the original text had its drawbacks - it wasn't nearly as funny as the others, and I don't think that was Aristophanes' fault. Instead of substituting modern American slang, Lattimore explained all the Greek language puns in footnotes, which took all the humor out of them. As the old comic once said, "If you gotta explain 'em...."

Douglass Parker, trans

The Congresswomen
"political opinion: three obol (paid) assembly transforms polis into something unthinkable
why then! now anything can happen
why not have a state takeover masterminded by wild-eyed radical transvestite women who turn the state into fullblown utopian communistic welfare state"

Lysistrata
"debased mountain dialect Sparta v Athens (city)" excellent translation
by what mechanism does the absurd work?
what is the difference between the ridiculous which we find dumb and the ridiculous which we find disarming?

Acharnians
dialectologist, yes; but friggin' comedian first

aristophanes precedent for both moliere and beckett

Only having to read Lysistrata, I found this play a tad dull, yet a theme shown in this play will come back time and time again throughout all histories, and that is the role of women within a society. The play is straightforward and all women practice abstinence until the men make peace and stop the Peloponnese War. Even though Lysistrata is the voice behind the movement, it is the secondary character, Myrrhine's actions that lead the movement.

Aristophanes remains one of the funniest writers to this date. One of my favs this summer

Lysistrata was genuinely so fascinating that it merited an immediate re-read. Obviously fiction, but its about the women of Athens banding together and occupying the Parthenon in order to keep their men from going to war with Sparta. The two choruses (men v. women) in this were honestly so silly. Girls get it done!

The Congresswomen: Actually hilarious. kind of a sit-com element. The characters in this are genuinely funny in their own right (with and without some of the body humor that the classical world so loved!) and the situation itself is entertaining (who doesn't love an all-girl takeover of the democratic assembly lol) I truly love the attention that Aristophanes gives women in his works.

The Frogs: The chorus of the play are little frogs--what's not to love! Dionysus goes in search of the best comedian in the underworld and what results is sidesplitting literary criticism.

Never has scatological and prurient humor been so funny, so artistic in composition, or so politically relevant. Hey, scenes blocked out on a chamber pot never get old--even literary critics in the underwold would have to admit that.

I was unprepared for this comedic play which seems impossibly modern and slapstick. I was looking for a copy of The Frogs, attributed to Aristophanes and performed 405 B.C. This particular edition was translated by Richard Lattimore, who translated a popular version of the Iliad, though it seems dated now. This play, on the other hand, virtually jumps off the page with vitality & energy.

Lattimore has translated this humor broadly; he says in his introduction to this play that he hates to explain the humor to us because that always makes it unfunny, but I would guess it is beyond the vast majority of folks to understand he is satirizing Aeschylus and Euripides...I suppose it works as general comedy, but it would certainly be better for those who have studied Classics.

I give it four stars only because I'm not sure I got it completely...and I wouldn't want to give Aristophanes less than that.

Very interesting plays! Acharnians was the long and difficult one, I lost interest very soon. Others were a lot of fun.

... only read "Lysistrata" not all four of these plays
... translated by Douglass Parker
... no proper review, because I read it aloud with two family members, which was a very enjoyable experience, but would have been regardless of the play.
... ribald and entertaining, though a bit one-note.
... I learned that sex strikes date back over 2000 years.

Light reading, of sorts. This makes me glad I didn't take the classics as my field.

This collection of comedies is fun to read and easy to understand (thanks not only to the translation but also to the detailed notes which are provided at the end of each play and explain references to the classical world. That there is a note corresponding to a line is indicated by a small asterik which does not break up the action of the play for those who do not want to read them). It fascinates me how different yet similar ancient comedy is to our own. Many tropes have remained the same today, though they are often given different weight.

I was introduced to Aristophanes my first year in college (29 years ago – oy!), reading what’s translated here as The Congresswomen. It was hilarious. I read a couple more of his plays a few years ago and found them also very funny, so I figured it was time to revisit the gals and read a couple others I hadn’t read yet. Aristophanes is perfect when your brain’s too tired for really dense stuff and you could use a laugh, but you still want an original, critical thinker giving you something of substance (of course Seinfeld and the Simpsons fit the bill fairly well, too, and I’d argue they each give you some meat to chew on, or hearty vegetables if you prefer).

Just read Parker's Lysistrata, not the others--what great wit and dialect! Captures Aristophanes's registers and humor better than any other translation I've read, even if it's more liberal and unorthodox.