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.
