Lysistrata - A Different Kind of War

    There are a number of parallels between war as we commonly know it and the women's plan. A dictionary definition of war: "an organized effort by a government or other large organization to stop or defeat something that is viewed as dangerous or bad.” This, of course, is exactly what the women are doing. Another poster mentions Lysistrata asks much of her sisters-in-arms but offers not much herself, a shrewd politician. A key part of any war is denial of resources, which the women excel at in the obvious way as well as with the other duties they abandon (“[The child] has not been fed or washed now for six days!” might be my favorite line from the play). As with any war, both sides' soldiers suffer; the women's resolve falters near the end of their campaign. Ultimately the men fail to overcome them and both wars end in peace.

    After a little digging I found something that may explain these parallels. Aristophanes produced Lysistrata in 411 BC. This is two years after Athens, Aristophanes' home, suffered a major loss in the war featured in the play. With this in mind, the play accomplishes two things: A “happily ever after” peaceful resolution to a war people were certainly not happy about at the time, and at the same time a way to make fun of it with the outrageous battle of the sexes. While the women's war parallels the Peloponnesian War, Aristophanes can also take this opportunity to mock those directly participating in the war; for example, the soldiers are shown to be almost entirely incompetent (I'm going to reference the line about the child again).

    Ultimately comedy seems to be the safest way of publicly disagreeing with something, and Aristophanes uses it here to express his disagreement with the Peloponessian War.