The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1927-12-26
ARISTOPHANES AND THE
COMIC DRAMA

COMIC DRAMA
1T is an unusual phenomenon that
Il comic poet should last so well.
Comedies die sooner in the blighting
winds of time than tragedies; partly
because they are less elemental and
profound, largely because their
humor is bound up in obscure allu-
sions to local and contemporary
things.
But even to this day, despite the
difficulty of translating wit and his
torical context from one idiom into
another, Aristophanes is alive, and
we can read him with profane de-
light. He has given an adjective to
every language, and Heine could not
die without mentioning his name.
If we read him we must be pre-
pared for riotouS coarseneSS and OBJ
sceniiy. He does not hesitate to
show Blepyrus in the throeS of in
testinal congestion, and he scatters
among this lines such Rabelaisian
quipS as must be regretfully exclud-
ed from these chaste pages. But
such was the custom Of the day.
The comic drama, as we have said,
grew cut of Phallic festivals, cele-
brating Bacchus in vintage and har-
vest season; the spirit of fertility
was worshipped without restraint
and when the comic drama spoke,
a moratorium was placed on NOR
atty.
What makes this burlesque for
givable is its rich and endless humor,
the cracking play of Aristophanes'
irony and wit; beside him Moliere is
a gloomy tragedian.
We see in him the vitality of
people that could for thirty years
wage a war of life and death, and
yet, at its height, give funds to
maintain the drama and permit
ruthless critic to ridicule its own
stupidities.
Never was IT, ught so quick, never
was life so full and strong, as in
those terrible and chaotic days when
Aristophanes laughed.
We know hardly anything of his
life. He was born about 448 B. c.,
apparently of foreign origin; for
Cleon, in revenge for the flashing
which the comedies gave him, had
Aristophanes indicted for forging
papers of Athenian citizenship.
The dramatist lived in no ivory
tower, he was intensely alive to the
events and ideals of his day, and in
his writings every interest of his
time found honorable or dishonor-
able mention.
AS religion and the stories of gods
and heroes offered the subjects of
tragedy, SO politics and the doings
of public men provide the material
of the comic drama. Lacking news
papers, Athens had oratory and
comedy; the oratory served as the
editorials, the comedy as cartoons.
For Aristophanes was a politician
as we'll as a dramatist; each of his
comedies was political pamphlet,
a round in his long duel with the
leaders of the popular party at
Athens. In form his plays are as
low as burlesque; in purpose they
are high as the noblest of Euripides.
He as a fighter and a dramatist
afterward.
y
ARISTOPHANES AND THE WAR
A ND yet his great passion was for
IN peace. Conceive a modern
playwright, at the top of his pro-
fession using the stage in play after
play to denounce a great war in the
midst of that war, .ridiculing without
stint the popular leader of the mill
tary party. and attacking without
fear all the forces impeding peace.
Imagine a Rebelaisian Bernard
Shaw. in plays as we'll AS prefaces,
damning war in time of war.
After the death of Pericles and
the fall of Alcibiades, supreme pow
er in Athens passed into the hands
of Cleon, a rich tanner, representa-
tive of the commercial interests that
wanted a Knockout blow. e., the
utter destruction of Sparta as COM
petitor for the control Of empire and
sea. In lost play 1.-THE Baby
lonians" CAPS B. O. Aristophanesi
took fling at Cleon. and with such
hypodermic effect that the burly
'stratege' prosecuted him and had
him fined. A later play recalls the
incident:
"And how Cleon made me pay
I've not forgtten-for my last
years play;
Dragged me before the Council,
Il brought his spies