G. Thompson
Lysistrata has been performed in recent years as a play in opposition to war, and as a play in opposition to patriarchy. That was the reason I selected it for this term, and that's one of the essential questions for us. However, the play also confronts us with familiar stereotypes about women from the ancient past (uncontrollable sexual desires which have to be controlled by men), and with broad physical humor (men with oversized erections). Beyond being possibly uncomfortable, these may undercut any attempt to treat the play as having a Message. So there's that.
I think what would be best would be to work through the text of the play today, having these in mind, and then return to the larger questions on Monday and more familiar ground (for me) with Shaw and Major Barbara.
First, however, we can use Aristophanes to talk about the physical location of Greek plays and how that affects its writing and performance.
(other pictures from Canvas) This is one of two possible sites for Aristophanes' play in 411 B.C.E. [more on this context on Monday, as we should try to place this play in its period to at least some extent] The plays took place as part of a religious festival for Dionysus, but that doesn't mean it was like medieval passion plays, pious and restrained (mostly). Dionysus was the god of wine and revelry was expected . . . the Greek pantheon had gods who pretty much reflected human behavior and appetites. Plays were written as a competition, and the plays we have were the most successful. Major tragic playwrights whose works survive are the big three, Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripedes; the only comic playwright I recall hearing about is Aristophanes.
Greek civic life was divided into city-states: while there was a common language, the dialects differed, and that is reflected in this translation. The translator chose to give the Spartans a Scottish dialect--presumably since this was played in Athens, that was part of their comic characterization. The late 5th century B.C.E. saw continuing warfare: Athens was an important military power, with several other cities allied with it; Sparta was their main rival, and philosophical differences underlay their rivalry. Athens was famously democratic (with the understanding that it was free men and citizens who had a say--not slaves and not women). Sparta was more like a modern fascist state. Of the two, Athens was dominant at sea, and Sparta at land warfare. Both were threatened periodically by Persia.
Lysistrata reflects what must have been impatience at continual warfare and its costs. One plot point in the play reflects this: when the men come to the Acropolis to get money, they need it to buy lumber for oars for the warships: Greece is a pretty dry place anyway, and they had cut down a lot of the suitable trees already.
Overview, Greek theater:
Think about staging: The classic modern stage, still most familiar, is probably the proscenium stage. That would definitely be the stage in use with Ibsen and Miller.
Greek theater took place in outdoor amphitheaters, with huge seating—apparently as many as 14,000. As you can see from the images, there's not much of a set--a door and a concealed area which in Lysistrata stands for Lysistrata's house and then the Acropolis. Main characters in the tragic plays wore oversized masks, which I understand had some sort of megaphones to help amplify the voice. I don't think the comic plays had masks, however. The number of named characters was limited (I think to four), and so other parts were filled by the chorus, who represent various subsets of the population generally. Changes in scene and time are marked by choral interludes with poetry, songs, and dances, and those are aspects of the plays which we don't have as we read the text.
As you can see from the photo, the staging area is surrounded by audience at nearly 180o, so the players had to address more widely than would be the case in a modern proscenium stage. All the actors were men--I'm curious how this worked out with the casting of Reconciliation.
Contrast the other two periods with which we are concerned, the Elizabethan/Jacobean period and the modern stage in the 19th-20th centuries.
Elizabethan theater had to be very portable, the plays achieve much of their effect through language and costume, not set. Several plays were done in repertory, so there couldn't be an elaborate set to be struck for the next performance. Also, when the town was suffering plague, they closed the theaters in hopes of limiting the damage. (They didn't know about bubonic plague coming from fleas and rats, but they did know about more general transmission of disease from sick people.) With the theaters closed, acting companies had no revenue, so they needed to be able to hit the road. (Such a traveling company shows up in Hamlet, and there's a bit of dialogue about competition from a company of children.) So a lot is done with costumes in that period--not the case for Greek plays.
19th-c. theater such as Ibsen’s made more use of the fourth-wall convention and realistic sets. Since London had I think three licensed theaters, they could settle in for a while. There was an assumption at this time that it was desirable to represent as fully and in as much detail as possible, so for Ibsen and Shaw you would have fairly detailed props and sets as well as costumes. We tend to read the Serious Drama here--there were equivalents to Aristophanes in the popular theater, with comedies and melodramas offering broader, lower-class appeal. In presenting drama of ideas, Ibsen and Shaw stand out against a background of less serious texts, just as indie films stand out against films with car chases--so-called action films, Adam Sandler or Tyler Perry movies, romantic comedies, and so on.
20th-c. theater varies a good deal, and probably depends less on physical qualities of the set. For us there's likely to be a mixture of stages. I don't know if we play in amphitheaters any more, but we have other options.
Theater in the round--SVSU has a small version of this in the black box.
Thrust stage—audience on three sides—as with theater in the round, this emphasizes the possibility of closeness to the action. This can matter. Actors can interact with the audience, through asides and soliloquies, and even when the text doesn't permit such interaction, we are physically closer, which aids in identification. I don't know that the audience was encouraged to identify with characters in Lysistrata.
Proscenium stage--the audience is all out front, and we are looking in through a fourth wall. In plays oriented to this structure, actors are pretty much forbidden to break that wall. Imagine having Dr. Stockmann or Peter Stockmann step out front to explain their actions. It's part of the conventions, an unspoken contract with the audience about the rules of the game which everyone is playing together.
I don't know whether this is true, but I read a comment online which asserts that the extant text of the play doesn't assign dialogue to characters--that has to be figured out.
I'm not sure how a Victorian translation would work--purging references to sex would be a little like the Korean theater owner who decided to shorten The Sound of Music by cutting out all the songs.
The plot line is well-known: tired of the long wars between Athens and Sparta (and some other assorted cities, and the Persians), Lysistrata proposes to other women, both from Athens and from other areas, including Sparta, that they withhold sex from their husbands until they agree to stop the wars. The play has been revived in recent centuries as both an antiwar play and a feminist play, and one question we should raise is whether either or both of these are accurate.
By Aristophanes' time, the number of named parts was limited, so for more than four you brought in the chorus. [I'm not entirely comfortable with this assertion]
The chorus provided a flexible group of extras / dancers / people of the city to fill in as needed.
Actors were all male.
Greek society was highly patriarchal, and a lot of the assumptions about women are misogynistic (e.g., women are more strongly driven by sexual desire than men).
The play's argument isn't entirely coherent: [name] complains that her frustration comes from the fact that her husband is away at the wars for five months. But if that's the case, withholding sex from him doesn't make any sense, because he wouldn't be there to request it in any case.
Set out phases of the play. I'd like to do this through group discussion.
Group 1--pp. 141-150. The women come together, hear Lysistrata's plan, and agree to take an oath.
Group 2--pp. 150-56. Men arrive with pots of fire to break into the Acropolis; conflict with the women.
Group 3--pp. 156-65. Arrival of the Magistrate, conflict between him and Lysistrata.
Group 4--pp. 156-72 Conflict with men; dispute reported between Lysistrata and women who want to go home.
I think this is as far into the play as we should go today.
Notes, below.
Opening--conversation between Lysistrata and Calonice. Lysistrata comes off like a straight man (woman), with Calonice making cheap sexual jokes.
Other women arrive (line 65, p. 143). Lampito, from Sparta--they give her a Scottish accent (?).
145--"don't you miss them when they're away at the war?"
ref. to leather dildos. I suppose we shouldn't be surprised that ancient Greeks had sex, but these jokes are a bit surprising, at least to me.
145--Lysistrata announces her plan; the women walk off. Innuendos suggesting that women are less likely to do without sex than men.
146 What if their husbands rape them? Then be passive--they won't take pleasure if the women don't respond.
147 Second, more practical plan--occupy the Acropolis, which is where the treasury is. The Greeks needed money to buy lumber--to make oars for warships, since they had cut down their trees already.
They take an oath--instead of a sacrifice, they use wine.
Arrival of men, conflict
150 Chorus of old men enter--
Translator writes their verse as limericks
The men plan to use fire to burn their way into the Acropolis; women arrive with water to douse the torches.
Stratyllis, leader of the women.
156 magistrate's entrance--"the unbridled licentiousness of the female sex displaying itself." Where did he get that? "Look at the way we pander to women's vices--we positively teach them to be wicked."
Lysistrata emerges from the Acropolis to dispute with him. Policemen, archers on one side, Lysistrata, more women on the other. Magistrate gives up.
159 Lysistrata says that they want to keep the money and prevent further wars. The women manage household finances, and this isn't different.
160 Matters of war and peace aren't supposed to be women's concerns. But women have sons who go off to fight (164). If you want to make this out as an antiwar play, this is part of the support.
163 Analogy between making fleece and running the city.
"A woman's not in bloom for long."
167 "Let's be men who smell like men." Old Spice commercial. They take off their tunics.
"If once we let these women get the semblance of a start,
Before we know, they'll be adept at every manly art." etc. (167)
Riding of a certain kind suits women to a T.
169 Women inside are fickle--they are coming up with excuses to go home and get laid.
171 Lysistrata gives the women a pep talk--the men are just as desperate as they are.
172 Choruses of naked men and women
174 Apparently women either plucked or singed their pubic hair (!)
174 Cinesias is coming, Myrrhine's husband, with an erection. She leads him on, then delays him to get everything just so.
179 Myrrhine runs back inside.
180 Herald from Sparta wants to talk peace. The allies have all risen . . . lots of men on stage with erections. "They're standing absolutely firm." At some point the erection jokes get repetitive.
184 Spartans arrive
185 Lysistrata comes out of the Acropolis. Appearance of a naked woman Reconciliation--they parcel out parts of her body as compromise (186-88).
191 They close with a dance.
I'm interested in finding out how this plays.
I should try to find out more about the political dimensions of the play for Athens in 411 B.C.E.
Performances in last few decades?