The Peace is about a man called Trygaeus who ends a war by talking to the gods, who bring out Peace; upon ending the war, the gods reward him by letting him marry Harvest, who will bring prosperity to farmers such as himself. The plot is really just that simple.

Now, a lot of other elements make this play really good instead of just a typical play. Firstly, a lot of Aristophanes' bitterness towards politics always seem to shine through, no matter what the play is about. This play is no exception. I can see why people would start to tire of the playwright crap-talking Cleon, but I think it's pretty funny to read about, as well as reflective of the time period. But as I said, disliking this is completely understandable.

Secondly, Aristophanes was really an ancient absurdist in my eyes. Seriously, what's up with riding the giant dung beetle to the palace of Zeus? And what's up with all those damn beetle jokes at the beginning? I also really was amused by the image of War and Riot making a salad, then disappearing from the play, never to be seen or heard from again. I'm not sure that I ever see that much of an explanation for the whole beetle thing or the salad-making, but I assume that Aristophanes just puts it there and expects the reader to accept it (yeah, Trygaeus riding a giant dung beetle totally fits in...). I like his attitude if that's the case. But once again, I can see why this can throw readers off.

This actually is the strangest paly I have read by Aristophanes, but I can't say that I didn't expect it.

Nananana que guasón nano cómo vas a ser escritor durante 421 antes de cristo y escribir sobre mondongos y sexo ? Jsjsjs

I love seeing ancient Greek authors absolutely dragging their contemporary nemesis through the mud with witty remarks and obscure references.

So weird. So crude. Full of scatological humor, and Aristophanes ripping on Euripides, making fun of the gods, raising up wine and sex and other such fun as antidotes or alternatives to war. I can respect the pacifist angle, and there were some funny lines, but this one mostly just seemed silly.

So concludes December of Drama, week 1: the Greeks! Watch this space.

Servants bicker and complain of their jobs, until finding out that the door to the master's kitchen was open. The figures all live in this reality where they are incapable of accepting others and reality, focusing on details and parts of their lives that impact the lives of others negatively. The women of Athens are the most rational within this paradigm, refusing physical contact with those to whom they were wed until the war was finished, until the war was brought to a close. It satirized the ideas of Athens, and the value of democracy, within a warring state.

No me he enterado de nada.

Las múltiples referencias de Aristófanes a la situación política de ese momento, las burlas hacia otros dramaturgos y los juegos de palabras (que pierden un poco el significado tras los siglos y las diversas traducciones), creo que quedan bastante obsoletas en el presente siglo. En mi opinión, la tragedia griega ha evolucionado bastante mejor que la comedia.

Divertidísima (y a la vez muy didáctica, sobre todo si das con una buena edición) comedia de Aristófanes. Tiene puntazos de humor muy buenos (y muy 'verdes' en ocasiones) y es más fácil de seguir (o a mí me resultó más fácil) que, por ejemplo, 'Las avispas', otra de las comedias de este autor. Me puedo imaginar a los espectadores griegos en su momento partiéndose de risa con la interpretación de esta obra.

Aristophane’s Peace is a play about a man who flies to heaven on a giant dung beetle to find Peace in Heaven. He learns that Peace was buried alive by War. This play was written during a lull in the Peloponnesian war where two major leaders on both the Athenian and Spartan sides. There was even a short lived peace treaty. The main character frees Peace and her two friends Harvest and Festival come back to Earth. The rest of the play is kind of a mess where they plan a party I think? There’s lots of mentions of farmers and agriculture. The play is hopeful, satirical, and scatological. The most interesting part to me was the fact that the main character rode a giant dung beetle. It’s a reference to Aesop’s fable The Eagle and the Beetle. The fable is about a beetle who retaliates against an eagle for eating his friend, a hare. The beetle then destroys all of the eagles eggs, over and over again. The Eagle eventually goes to the god Jupiter and asks him to protect the eggs but the beetle flies to heaven and annoys Jupiter to the point where he gets up, dropping and breaking the eggs. The fable ends with this resolution “Now the Beetle told the reason for her action, and Jupiter had to acknowledge the justice of her cause. And they say that ever after, while the Eagle's eggs lie in the nest in spring, the Beetle still sleeps in the ground. For so Jupiter commanded.” “Even the weakest may find means to avenge a wrong.” Of course war returned to Athens and the Peloponnesian war continued.

انتقد أريستوفان تدهور الأحوال السياسية في أثينة وتلاعب السياسيين بعواطف الشعب من خلال الخطابات الديماغوجية والوعود الكاذبة وتقلب الأهواء. ويدخل في هذا الباب هجاؤه المقذع للعسكريين الذين يعلقون مصالحهم الخاصة على فرصة الحرب, ويزينون خوضها للناس ويوهمونهم بأنها السبيل الوحيد لتحقيق المصالح الوطنية والأمجاد القومية, في حين أنها, في حقيقتها, لا تجلب سوى الدمار والويلات والخراب.

Ok.

It's incredible that as recently as 1960 the comedian Peter Cook could cause a stir by publicly ridiculing the British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan as he sat in the audience of the Beyond the Fringe show when you consider what Aristophanes, fully two thousand years beforehand, used to do to the great and good of Athenian society in his astonishingly caustic and pointed plays.

In Peace, as elsewhere, his main target is the autocratic Cleon, who he insults mercilessly throughout here, first obliquely, then flagrantly, in a coarse and pun-filled riot of a play condemning the war between Athens and Sparta and celebrating a break in the hostilities.

Variously, Cleon gets called a

(notes, review to follow when get a chance to reread)

I want to fly on a giant bug