The Life of Aristophanes
Like all ancient Greek history, the birth of Aristophanes is nearly impossible to pinpoint. Assuming he was around forty years old at the height of his career, he most likely entered the world around 444 BCE (Murray 14). This man’s date of birth is not necessarily relevant. The magnitude of his success, however, is. Aristophanes wrote forty comedies, but only eleven are available today (Wilson 96).
The root of Aristophanes’ prominence came from his manipulative abilities. He was a playwright who knew what to tell his audience, and thus, received applause and approval. In the crowded Athens, attacks and invasion were common. He lived among other Athenians. He understood what his neighbors wanted because he experienced the conflict and unrest alongside them. According to Professor Murray of Oxford University, “…he had found comedy indecent, coarse, common, and what is called ‘low-brow,’ and built it up into something artistic, intellectual, public-spirited, and genuinely brilliant” (Murray 10). Aristophanes used political affairs and popular Athenian culture to turn theatre as he understood it into something accessible, yet clever. This worked to his benefit during his lifetime, but shortly after his death, comedic tastes changed (Wilson 96).
Later in Aristophanes’ career, he begun to use parabasis (Murray 11). This is a Greek theatrical technique of directly addressing the audience on behalf of the playwright. Aristophanes used the chorus in The Clouds to tell spectators, “I am what I am; a poet who does not give himself airs. I do not try to cheat you by bringing on the same points twice and three times; I show my art by bringing forward ideas always new, none like the last and all clever” (Murray 9). In Lysistrata, he has the Koryphaios of men tell us, “I can’t dispute the truth or logic of the pithy old proverb: Life with women is hell. Life without women is hell, too” (Aristophanes 96). He used this character to simplify his frustration with women and with war. He treated his audience as though they were quick and knowledgeable. The audience at Greek theatre were wealthier citizens (it cost two obols to enter) and their sons (MacDowell 13). These men deserved to hear the Aristophanes’ honest opinion through its somewhat clouded symbolism.
While these Greek plays were comedies, they were also a part of a religious whole. Within the plays, Gods were honored through ceremonies, processions, and choral performances (MacDowell 7). Because they were comedies, Aristophanes often put a spin on hymns and personified certain gods to look foolish (MacDowell 18). Most of Aristophanes’ plays were performed at the Lenaia, which was a small festival held in Athens around March. The audience consisted of anywhere between ten thousand and thirty thousand Athenian citizens (MacDowell 14). Some were shown at the enormous City Dionysia in January. However, the Athenian government preferred his political works stay in smaller venues (Wiles 53). If Aristophanes was going to write openly about the affairs of Athens, he had better exclude foreign auditors (Wiles 53). These theatre festivals were highly competitive, and normally pitted five comedies against one another. During the Peloponnesian War, money was tight, and there were only three comedies. This meant Aristophanes only had to beat out two other playwrights. He used the chorus to his advantage. He had them begging the ten randomly chosen judges to vote for his play (MacDowell 11). Apparently, it worked.
Whether this was to protect himself from the government, no one can know, but Aristophanes often kept a low profile. He had his lead actor, Kallistratos, direct most of his work (including Lysistrata). Later in life, he used his son and dramatist Philonides as directors (Wiles 56). He preferred to stay quasi-anonymous. Once other poets started claiming Aristophanic works as their own, he stepped out of the shadows and embraced the his rightful success (Wiles 54).
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