Sunday, September 22, 2013

Go Girl Power!


I had a mixture of reactions after reading Aristophanes' Lysistrata.  The first one was...

The second reaction was..

It was the first time I've ever read a Greek comedy, so I had no idea what to expect.  I have to say I was pleasantly and hilariously surprised.
   Normally, I never associated the ancient Greeks with humor.  Humor, especially the kind seen in Lysistrata, is meant for modern-day teenagers with immature minds, right?  The Greeks were too uptight and pristine to have time to sit around and laugh at crude, sexual jokes.  Aristophanes' play, Lysistrata, begs to differ.  Lysistrata is one giant sexual innuendo.  However, as a reader I had to make myself look past all of phallic jokes and dirty puns to uncover the serious story regarding the women of Greece.
    Many scenes throughout the comedy have somewhat sober undertones that can be easily overlooked due to the distraction of the multitude of jokes, but my main focus is the scene in which Lysistrata and the Councilor discuss the women’s motives behind their actions in lines 506 through 613.  The conversation might seem ridiculous and a jab at cross-dressing, but it represents the struggles of the women of the time.  Women are supposed to be passive creatures that don’t speak out or participate in important matters.  They are supposed to sit back and let the men handle the affairs of the city.  Lysistrata says, “Throughout this futile war, we women held our peace./ Propriety (and husbands) permitted no peep/ To escape our mouths” (lines 506-509).  The women are finally fed up with being put down, and the men are at a complete loss for a way to deal with their newfound predicament.  Go girl power!

   The women go as far as to instruct the men to be the submissive ones for a change.  Then maybe stuff would get done.  In the midst of calling the Councilor a “loser,” Lysistrata also accuses him of using ineptitude as a “shield against advice” (line 522).  Maybe bluntly rebuking the Councilor wasn't the smartest idea, but it was pretty funny to read.  Of course he finds Lysistrata’s proposition of gender role reversals to be an “insufferably presumptuous notion!”  For this comment, the Councilor is mobbed and dressed as a housewife.  The dressing of the Councilor is as important as it is ridiculous.  Even in modern times, the way people dress affects how they are judged.  Slowly, society is pulling away from this way of thinking, but, in Athens, dress code marked where one stood in society.  The veil, a common article of clothing worn by the women, symbolizes the derogatory way women were judged by the people of Greece.  The veil does not make the Councilor a woman.  That would be improbable! But by draping the veil on the Councilor, Lysistrata and the other women were bringing him down to their level, so perhaps he would feel the same oppression that the women felt.
   Jump ahead to Lysistrata’s comparison of the women’s grand plan with wool, and the conversation takes an even more serious turn despite the witty banter.  The Councilor finds Lysistrata’s solution regarding wool and getting rid of "all the layabouts and briars" preposterous (line 35).  But what does he know?  He’s a man.  He probably didn’t understand half of what she said regarding wool because he never actually had to deal with spinning wool firsthand.  After the Councilor ix-nays Lysistrata’s plan, she gets even more testy and points out that the women have suffered just as much, if not more than the men, when it comes to war because the women have to give up their husbands and sons to the fighting.  It’s also becoming more and more difficult for women to find a husband because most of the men are dying in battle.  Once again, the Councilor doesn’t understand the women’s struggles because he is a man.  When men grow old they can still find a young bride, no matter how creepy the marriage might be.  Women who are past their prime are forced to sit around and waste away.
   At this point, the women play dress up with the Councilor again, but this time they dress him as a corpse- not quite as fun as a housewife.  The fact that they are able to stand still long enough for the women to dress him up is a feat within itself.  Too bad it’s not Halloween.  The Councilor as a corpse could represent a wide variety of things, from the death wish spat by Lysistrata to the fact that every man will one day die.  The women must basically prepare every man for a funeral when they are preparing them for war.  The Councilor is not going to war; he just serves as a good substitute because he’s there and being a jerk.  Honestly, he was asking for it.
   This scene may have not been the funniest compared to the the rest of the comedy, but it was still full of hilarity.  All jokes aside, Lysistrata definitely warrants a second glance into the somber nature of the otherwise outlandish play.  The effect of war on women is a topic that is often overlooked in works from ancient Greece, and if it's touched upon like in Trojan Women, the suffering is overwhelming.  The women in Lysistrata are able to describe their hardships and woes without beating their breasts and falling to the ground.  The play is able to portray a comedy that would have had the Greeks bent over double from laughter while sneaking a hidden message between the lines without beating it over the reader's head.  Props to Aristophanes. 
   I thoroughly enjoyed reading Aristophanes' work, especially once I was able to appreciate both the humor and undertones.  I had no idea that the Greeks could be so funny!
   

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