Lysistrata E-Book

- Aristophanes

• Herausgeber: Phoemixx Classics Ebooks
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 65

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

Lysistrata Aristophanes - Greek playwright, Aristophanes, lived during the 5th and 4th century BC and is considered one of the principal authors of the Greek classical period. Of the nearly thirty plays he wrote during his career, eleven are extant. Amongst the most famous of these is Lysistrata, a comedy which focuses on the women of Greece whose husbands have left for the Peloponnesian War. The women do not care about the conflict as much as they care about missing their husbands. Its titular character, Lysistrata, insists that men rarely listen to womens reasoning and exclude their opinions on matters of state. In retaliation she convinces the women of Greece to organize a strike, refusing to have sex with their husbands until both sides agree to cease fighting. The irony of this is that the men become more upset with their wives than they do with their enemies of war. Notable for its positive portrayal of womens rationality in a male-dominated society, Lysistrata stands as one the most popular and frequently performed plays from classical antiquity

Leseprobe

Aristophanes

Lysistrata

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Dramatis Personae

LysistrataCalonicéMyrrhinéLampitoStratyllisA MagistrateCinesiasA ChildHerald of the LacedaemoniansEnvoys of the LacedaemoniansPolycharidesMarket LoungersA ServantAn Athenian CitizenChorus of Old MenChorus of Women

Lysistrata

Scene: In a public square at Athens; afterwards before the gates of the Acropolis, and finally within the precincts of the citadel.

Lysistrata: Ah! if only they had been invited to a Bacchic revelling, or a feast of Pan or Aphrodité or Genetyllis, why! the streets would have been impassable for the thronging tambourines! Now there's never a woman here — ah! except my neighbour Calonicé, whom I see approaching yonder....Good day, Calonicé.

Calonicé: Good day, Lysistrata; but pray, why this dark, forbidding face, my dear? Believe me, you don't look a bit pretty with those black lowering brows.

Lysistrata: Oh, Calonicé, my heart is on fire; I blush for our sex. Men will have it we are tricky and sly....

Calonicé: And they are quite right, upon my word!

Lysistrata: Yet, look you, when the women are summoned to meet for a matter of the last importance, they lie abed instead of coming.

Calonicé: Oh! they will come, my dear; but 'tis not easy, you know, for women to leave the house. One is busy pottering about her husband; another is getting the servant up; a third is putting her child asleep or washing the brat or feeding it.

Lysistrata: But I tell you, the business that calls them here is far and away more urgent.

Calonicé: And why do you summon us, dear Lysistrata? What is it all about?

Lysistrata: About a big affair.

Calonicé: And is it thick too?

Lysistrata: Yes indeed, both big and great.

Calonicé: And we are not all on the spot!

Lysistrata: Oh! if it were what you suppose, there would be never an absentee. No, no, it concerns a thing I have turned about and about this way and that of many sleepless nights.

Calonicé: It must be something mighty fine and subtle for you to have turned it about so!

Lysistrata: So fine, it means just this, Greece saved by the women!

Calonicé: By women! Why, its salvation hangs on a poor thread then!

Lysistrata: Our country's fortunes depend on us — it is with us to undo utterly the Peloponnesians.

Calonicé: That would be a noble deed truly!

Lysistrata: To exterminate the Boeotians to a man!

Calonicé: But surely you would spare the eels.

Lysistrata: For Athens' sake I will never threaten so fell a doom; trust me for that. However, if the Boeotian and Peloponnesian women join us, Greece is saved.

Calonicé: But how should women perform so wise and glorious an achievement, we women who dwell in the retirement of the household, clad in diaphanous garments of yellow silk and long flowing gowns, decked out with flowers and shod with dainty little slippers?

Lysistrata: Nay, but those are the very sheet-anchors of our salvation — those yellow tunics, those scents and slippers, those cosmetics and transparent robes.

Calonicé: How so, pray?

Lysistrata: There is not a man will wield a lance against another...

Calonicé: Quick, I will get me a yellow tunic from the dyer's.

Lysistrata: ...or want a shield.

Calonicé: I'll run and put on a flowing gown.

Lysistrata: ...or draw a sword.

Calonicé: I'll haste and buy a pair of slippers this instant.

Lysistrata: Now tell me, would not the women have done best to come?

Calonicé: Why, they should have flown here!

Lysistrata: Ah! my dear, you'll see that like true Athenians, they will do everything too late....Why, there's not a woman come from the shoreward parts, not one from Salamis.

Calonicé: But I know for certain they embarked at daybreak.

Lysistrata: And the dames from Acharnae! why, I thought they would have been the very first to arrive.

Calonicé: Theagenes' wife at any rate is sure to come; she has actually been to consult Hecaté....But look! here are some arrivals — and there are more behind. Ah! ha! now what countrywomen may they be?

Lysistrata: They are from Anagyra.

Calonicé: Yes! upon my word, 'tis a levy en masse of all the female population of Anagyra!

Myrrhiné: Are we late, Lysistrata? Tell us, pray; what, not a word?

Lysistrata: I cannot say much for you, Myrrhiné! you have not bestirred yourself overmuch for an affair of such urgency.

Myrrhiné: I could not find my girdle in the dark. However, if the matter is so pressing, here we are; so speak.

Calonicé: No, let us wait a moment more, till the women of Boeotia arrive and those from the Peloponnese.

Myrrhiné: Yes, that is best....Ah! here comes Lampito.

Lysistrata: Good day, Lampito, dear friend from Lacedaemon. How well and handsome you look! what a rosy complexion! and how strong you seem; why, you could strangle a bull surely!

Lampito: Yes, indeed, I really think I could. 'Tis because I do gymnastics and practise the kick dance.

Calonicé: And what superb bosoms!

Lampito: La! you are feeling me as if I were a beast for sacrifice.

Lysistrata: And this young woman, what countrywoman is she?

Lampito: She is a noble lady from Boeotia.

Lysistrata: Ah! my pretty Boeotian friend, you are as blooming as a garden.

Calonicé: Yes, on my word! and the garden is so prettily weeded too!

Lysistrata: And who is this?

Lampito: 'Tis an honest woman, by my faith! she comes from Corinth.

Lysistrata: Oh! honest, no doubt then — as honesty goes at Corinth.

Lampito: But who has called together this council of women, pray?

Lysistrata: I have.

Lampito: Well then, tell us what you want of us.

Lysistrata: With pleasure, my dear.

Myrrhiné: What is the most important business you wish to inform us about?

Lysistrata: I will tell you. But first answer me one question.

Myrrhiné: What is that?

Lysistrata: Don't you feel sad and sorry because the fathers of your children are far away from you with the army? For I'll undertake, there is not one of you whose husband is not abroad at this moment.

Calonicé: Mine has been the last five months in Thrace — looking after Eucrates.

Myrrhiné: 'Tis seven long months since mine left me for Pylos.

Lampito: As for mine, if he ever does return from service, he's no sooner back than he takes down his shield again and flies back to the wars.

Lysistrata: And not so much as the shadow of a lover! Since the day the Milesians betrayed us, I have never once seen an eight-inch-long godemiche even, to be a leathern consolation to us poor widows....Now tell me, if I have discovered a means of ending the War, will you all second me?

Myrrhiné: Yes verily, by all the goddesses, I swear I will, though I have to put my gown in pawn, and drink the money the same day.

Calonicé: And so will I, though I must be split in two like a flat-fish, and have half myself removed.

Lampito: And I too; why, to secure Peace, I would climb to the top of Mount Taygetus.

Lysistrata: Then I will out with it at last, my mighty secret! Oh! sister women, if we would compel our husbands to make peace, we must refrain...

Myrrhiné: Refrain from what? tell us, tell us!

Lysistrata: But will you do it?

Myrrhiné: We will, we will, though we should die of it.

Lysistrata: We must refrain from the male altogether....Nay, why do you turn your backs on me? Where are you going? So, you bite your lips,and shake your heads, eh? Why these pale, sad looks? why these tears? Come, will you do it — yes or no? Do you hesitate?

Myrrhiné: No, I will not do it; let the War go on.

Lysistrata: And you, my pretty flat-fish, who declared just now they might split you in two?

Calonicé: