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Lysistrata, one of the most famous and most popular plays of the great comic writer Aristophanes (456-386 BC), tells the story of how the women from the Greek city states decide to take over the public treasury in Athens and to stop having sex with their husbands until the men agree to stop fighting a destructive civil war. Written in 411 BC, when the Athenians and the Spartans had been at war for about twenty years, the play is celebrated not only as an extremely funny and frank comedy but also as a major landmark of feminist and pacifist literature.
The sexually explicit nature of the story and especially the use of huge male phalluses make Lysistrata a very robust comedy, so much so that in modern times it offended middle-class tastes for many years. However, the play also explores a number of serious themes: the connection between male sexuality and violence, the destructive effects of war on women’s lives, and the corruption and absurdity of war, among others. The importance of these themes in recent decades has encouraged all sorts of productions and adaptations of this most eloquent and relevant of plays.
Ian Johnston’s new translation conveys the humour and the seriousness of Aristophanes’ original text in a fluent and accurate modern English. The text also provides footnotes to assist the reader with references to people and events mentioned in the play.
- Category
- Classics
- ISBN (softcover)
- 978-0-9818162-3-4-3
- e-ISBN
- 978-1-935238-22-5
- Author
- Aristophanes
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\"These new dramatic releases provide us once again with that powerful and direct style of translation for which Professor Johnston has become known. Students reading these translations will have no doubt of the passion and issues raised by the plays.\"
Princeton Professor Emerita.Elaine Fantham,
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Thank you so much for the translation of \"The Frogs\" you have made available on the web. I am going to see the play performed tonight at the ancient theatre in Argos and I\'m sure I\'ll get a lot more out of it thanks to your efforts. I compared a few translations but yours seemed the most satisfying. The notes are very useful, too - I might have got the mythological references, and even some of the literary ones, but gay Athenians, ghost writers and crooked laundry keepers would have passed me by.
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I want to thank you, first, for your excellent translation of Aristophanes\' Frogs. I have used it with great success in an undergraduate course this term.
Furman University -
I want my high school juniors to read Medea. It\'s the first semester for teaching Greek Drama at a new school. I\'ve look through translations and I like yours best.
Nashville, Tennessee -
Hello. I\'m a student at the University of Illinois - Chicago and am a big fan of your work. I strangely find myself coming back again and again to your work... leaving each time with a satisfying reading experience. As I\'m sure you are acutely aware, your work has a certain pristine quality to it that other translations fall short of. The clarity of your expression (and the accuracy too) is quite remarkable.
-
\\\"These new dramatic releases provide us once again with that powerful and direct style of translation for which Professor Johnston has become known. Students reading these translations will have no doubt of the passion and issues raised by the plays.\\\"
Princeton Professor Emerita.Elaine Fantham,
-
Thank you so much for the translation of \\\"The Frogs\\\" you have made available on the web. I am going to see the play performed tonight at the ancient theatre in Argos and I\\\'m sure I\\\'ll get a lot more out of it thanks to your efforts. I compared a few translations but yours seemed the most satisfying. The notes are very useful, too - I might have got the mythological references, and even some of the literary ones, but gay Athenians, ghost writers and crooked laundry keepers would have passed me by.
-
I want to thank you, first, for your excellent translation of Aristophanes\\\' Frogs. I have used it with great success in an undergraduate course this term.
Furman University -
I want my high school juniors to read Medea. It\\\'s the first semester for teaching Greek Drama at a new school. I\\\'ve look through translations and I like yours best.
Nashville, Tennessee -
Hello. I\\\'m a student at the University of Illinois - Chicago and am a big fan of your work. I strangely find myself coming back again and again to your work... leaving each time with a satisfying reading experience. As I\\\'m sure you are acutely aware, your work has a certain pristine quality to it that other translations fall short of. The clarity of your expression (and the accuracy too) is quite remarkable.
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