Aristophanes' Lysistrata: A Commentary on the Ancient Greek Humor

In the play Lysistrata by Aristophanes humor is used brilliantly in a variety of ways. The audience will be able to recognize the humor of the sexual undertones that are infused throughout the story as a means of lightening the very grave concept of a civil war. With the use of humor Aristophanes created a story that could easily have been a drama or tragedy but instead managed to create a unique war-related comedy.

The humor in Lysistrata is conveyed both directly and indirectly. The play deals with sex and sexuality in a comedic fashion and also is able to show the humor that can be found in the foolishness of men. Some of the direct humor that is in the play comes from the Koryphaios of Men. This character continually makes a fool of himself by believing men are superior to women in any aspect of life. It is his continuous usage of this belief that make him so comical because the audience constantly sees the Koryphaios of Men manipulated and played as a fool by Lysistrata and the other women. It is comical to see the Koryphaios of Men pig headed nature that is still common in many men today. The fact that Aristophanes shows men behaving this foolishly also can provide some insight on his own view of women. It seems that Aristophanes believes that women are much more capable and clever than they were being given credit for. It also shows that he believed that it was truly women who ran the country and that the women simply let the men believe that they were in charge.

The indirect usage of humor comes from the constant sexual references that are in almost every page of the play. The consistent use of sex shows how prominent sex was in the Greek society and that it was taken much lighter than how it is presented in present society. Aristophanes uses his wit to make sexual undertones and to charge his dialogue with sexual metaphors and imagery. Though we are reading a translation of the story and it is still obvious what Aristophanes is stating, I am positive that in the original language of the play that Aristophanes threw the sexual vocabulary right into the public audience.