RETURN TO SHOW PAGE

During the war, the men, by staying away from home for long stretches of time, were progressively ruining the community. Determined to preserve their traditional family life, the women of Athens act bravely and aggressively. Lysistrata proves to the women of Greece that they have the intelligence and judgment to make wise political decisions. Her conservative values and good sense allow her to see what needs to be done to protect Greece.

411 BCE, the year Lysistrata was written, was very close to the end of the Peloponnesian War. The war lasted from 431 to 404 BCE. This time length is longer than that of any previous war. The Peloponnesian war got its name because of the two groups that were involved: Sparta and its Peloponnese-based alliance and Athens and its allies. “According to Thucydides, [the war began] because the growth of Athenian [political and economic] power alarmed the Spartans, who feared that their interests and allies would fall to the Athenians restless drive. Pericles, the most powerful politician in Athens at the time, persuaded the assembly to take a hard line when the Spartans demanded that Athens ease restrictions on city-states allied with Sparta. Corinth and Megara, crucial Spartan allies, complained bitterly to Sparta about Athens; finally Corinth told Sparta to attack Athens, or else Corinth and its navy would change sides to the Athenian alliance. Sparta’s leaders therefore gave Athens an ultimatum—stop mistreating our allies—that Pericles convinced the Athenian assembly to reject” for reasons including treaty violation and desire to generate popularity (Hunt et al. 115). “The Peloponnesian War took place above all because Spartan leaders believed they had to fight now to keep the Athenians from using their superior long-distance offensive weaponry—the Delian League’s naval forces—to destroy Sparta’s control of the Peloponnesian League” (Hunt et al. 115-116). In the end, it was a loan to Sparta from the Persians, who thought Athens’ defeat was in their best interest that caused the Athenians to surrender in 404 BCE and ultimately end the twenty-seven year war.

"The Peloponnesian War, 431 - 404 B.C.E.: For the first ten years, the Peloponnesian War's battles took place largely m mainland Greece. Sparta, whose armies usually avoided distant campaigns, shocked Athens when its general Brasidas led successful attacks against Athenian forces in northeast Greece Athens stunned the entire Greek world in the war's next phase by launching a huge naval expedition against Spartan allies in far off Sicily. The last ten years of the war saw the action move to the east, on and along the western coast of Anatolia and its islands, on the boundary of the Persian Empire, which helped the Spartans build a navy there to defeat the famous Athenian fleet" (Hunt et al. 116).

Due to strong economic activity, the mid fifth century BCE was Athens’ greatest period of prosperity. This period was called the Golden Age. The wealth was spent on public buildings and art. Participating in sacrifices and city festivals is how the Greeks maintained religious tradition. During the Golden Age, Athens used its wealth for even more extravagant celebrations. The Golden Age is the period when the Parthenon, Goddess Athena’s temple, was built on the acropolis in the heart of Athens. The summit of the acropolis was reserved for sanctuaries honoring several of the city’s protective deities and could be used as a fortress in a case of last resort. Besides material culture, the Athenians developed new philosophical ideas: “Innovative concepts in education, philosophy, historical writing, and medicine thrilled some fifth-century Greeks, but they deeply upset others, who feared that these startling changes from the old ways would undermine the traditions that held society together, especially religion” (Hunt et al. 104).The Golden Age came to an end around the same time as the end of the Peloponnesian War.

The Parthenon was built in honor of Athena, goddess of wisdom, warfare, strategy, and reason. It honored her as the divine champion of the military power and proclaimed that she had an eminent presence in the city. Inside the temple soared a gold-and-ivory statue nearly forty feet high depicting the goddess in armor, holding in her outstretched hand a six-foot statue of Nike, the goddess of victory. The Parthenon's design followed standard temple architecture: a rectangular box on a raised platform studded with columns. Constructed from twenty thousand tons of Attic marble, the temple stretched some 230 feet in length and 100 feet wide, with eight columns across the ends instead of the six normally found in Doric style and seventeen instead of thirteen along the sides. The Parthenon is also famous for its sophisticated architecture. Because a perfectly rectangular building appears curved to the eye, subtle curves and inclines were built into the design to produce an illusion of completely straight lines.

The Greeks believed that marriage between men and women was a blending of different yet complementary strengths that produced excellence. Athenian wives were seen as partners with their husbands in owning and managing the household’s property in order to help the family thrive. As written in The Making of the West: Peoples and Cultures:

“Women who were citizens enjoyed legal privileges and social status denied slaves and foreigners, and they earned respect through their roles in the family and in religion…. Tradition restricted women’s freedom of movement in public…. An elite woman careful of her reputation only left the home for appropriate reasons, such as religious festivals, funerals, childbirth at the houses of relatives and friends, and trips to workshops to buy shoes or other domestic articles….Often her husband escorted her, but sometimes she took only a slave, setting her own itinerary….Men claimed this restriction protected women by limiting opportunities for seducers and rapists. Men wanted to ensure that their children were truly theirs, that family property went only to genuine heirs….Women who bore legitimate children merited increased respect and freedom ….because it was literally the source of family—the heart of Greek society. To defend this fundamental social institution, men were expected to respect and support their wives …. In the safety of the home a well-off woman would spin wool for clothing, converse with visiting friends, direct her children, and supervise slaves…Poor women had little time for such activities because they—like their husbands, sons, and brothers—had to leave their homes, usually crowded rental apartments, to set up small stalls to sell bread, vegetables, simple clothing, or trinkets they had made.... A few women in Athens escaped traditional restrictions by working as what Greeks called a hetaera (literally, “companion”). Companions, usually foreigners, were physically attractive, witty in speech, and skilled in music and poetry. Men hired them to entertain at symposia (drinking parties to which wives were not invited) with their playful conversation. Their much-admired skill at clever taunts and verbal snubs allowed companions a freedom of speech denied to “proper” women; they nevertheless lacked the social respectability and status that wives and mothers possessed. Sometimes companions also sold sex for a high price…Athenian men (but not women) could buy sex as they pleased without legal hindrance…Men (but, again, not women) could also have sex freely with female or male slaves, who could not refuse their masters…Great riches could free a woman from tradition, allowing them to speak to men openly and bluntly” (Hunt et al. 98-102).

“The only formal education available came from private teachers, to whom well-to-do families sent their sons to learn to read, write, play a musical instrument or sing, and practice athletic skills suitable for war…The daughters of wealthy families usually received instruction at home from educated slaves, who were expensive because they were rare. The young girls learned reading, writing, and arithmetic so that they would be ready to help their future husbands by managing the household. Poor girls and boys received no formal education; they learned a trade and perhaps a little reading, writing, and calculating by assisting their parents in their daily work or by serving as apprentices to skilled crafts workers” (Hunt et al. 105).

Aristophanes is thought to have written forty plays, eleven of which are still in existence. These plays are the only surviving comedies of the fifth century. The first nine are considered to be in the style of Old Comedy and were all written while Athens was engaged in the Peloponnesian War. “Although the events of most Old Comedies could not occur in everyday life, parallels with real events are abundantly clear, the fantastic exaggerations serving to point up the absurdity of their real-life counterparts. In addition to fantasy, farcical situations are typical, and considerable emphasis is placed on the pleasures of eating, drinking, sex, wealth, and leisure” (Brockett, Franklin 15). In keeping with the style, Aristophanic comedy is noteworthy for its commentary on contemporary society, politics, theatre, and the war. Like tragedies, comedies were written in verse. In them, well-known men of the day were targets for insults. Women characters, portrayed as figures of fun and ridicule, seem to have been fictional to protect the dignity of actual female citizens. Several of Aristophanes’ comedies have powerful women characters that compel the men of Athens to change their policy to preserve family life and the city-state. The remarkable freedom of speech of Athenian comedy allowed frank, even brutal, commentary on current issues and personalities. It cannot be an accident that this energetic, critical drama emerged in Athens at the same time as radical democracy.

The Greeks held annual festivals in honor of their gods and goddesses. Four annual festivals were held in honor of Dionysus: Rural Dionysia, Lenaia, Anthesteria, and City Dionysia. A comedy competition was added to the Lenaia in 442 BCE. Plays up until then were only presented at City Dionysia. It can be assumed that the Lenaia festival is where Lysistrata was presented because that is also the location where another Aristophanes’’ play, Frogs, was presented in 405 BCE. By the late fifth century plays were being performed in the Theatre of Dionysus located at the acropolis.

Archon Basileus, the principle religious official of Athens, was appointed by the city to supervise the festivals. A large share of each production expense was the responsibility of the choregos who was chosen by the archon to produce the performance. This position was considered a civic responsibility of wealthy citizen and was performed in rotation. Some of the duties of the choregoi included: training and costuming the chorus, paying the musicians and supernumerary actors, and supplying properties.

By 411 BCE playwrights were no longer acting in their plays and a total of three actors, as introduced by tragedian Sophocles, were playing all the parts in the play. Actors were assigned instead of cast to prevent an unfair advantage. The style of acting used in fifth-century comedy cannot be precisely known but comic acting is thought to of been burlesque in nature. Several actor conventions can be assumed: all actors were male, wore masks, and played more than one role—if not in a single play, over the course of the trilogy and the satyr play. Much of the dialogue was sung or delivered as recitative, and dance was part of many scenes, especially the songs of the chorus. The ability of the actor to project emotion through the voice was considered very important, more so than projecting age and sex. The actors’ movement was probably dictated by a set of conventionalized, stylized, or symbolic gestures.

The chorus serves several functions: “it adds dynamic energy to a play with its dances, songs, and visual spectacle, it sets the overall mood of the play and of individual scenes, it serves an important rhythmical function, creating intervals or slowing the action to allow the audience time to reflect or anticipate, it can serve as a character, giving advice, expressing opinions, asking questions, and sometimes takes an active part in the action” (Brockett, Franklin 18-19). Old Comedy choruses were most likely composed of twenty-four members. As in Lysistrata, the chorus could sometimes be divided into two semi-choruses. The chorus normally entered after the prologue and remained until the end of the play. In comedy it is thought that they entered with an energetic dance. The chorus sometimes could exchange spoken dialogue with a character. It is unknown how the chorus was grouped or placed during episodes of the play or how their formation changed during choral odes.

Music was a vital part of Greek drama. Rarely was it used independently, and even then it was only for special effects. The instruments used were the flute, lyre, trumpet, and various forms of percussion. A comprehensive reconstruction of Greek music isn’t possible due to the small amount in existence. The composer is unknown but it could have been the flute player, who seemed to be the most important member of the band. According to History of the Theatre, “Most Greek dance was mimetic (expressive of a particular kind of character or situation). In theatrical performances, dance seems to have been closely related to the words through a set of moment-by-moment symbolic gestures” (Brockett, Franklin 20). Comic dance was far less formal and sometimes intentionally ridiculous mimicking animal movements and victory celebrations.

Most agree that the comical “costumes were adapted from those worn in everyday Greek life, especially for those characters who are being only mildly ridiculed in the play. For comic slaves and ridiculous old men the costuming was more grotesque with a tunic that was made too short and too tight so as to emphasized comic nudity. It was worn over flesh-colored tights, which were often padded and included an oversized phallus. Similarly, there is a wide range of female characters whose sexual attributes were also exaggerated through costume” (Brockett, Franklin 21-22). Symbolic properties were also used as a tool of identification. For example, a spear used to symbolize a warrior. Masks were made of linen, cork, or lightweight wood. Masks, as depicted in artwork, show that they covered the entire head of the actors and therefore included beards and a hair style. There was more variety in comedic masks and they were often exaggerated. The chorus wore identical masks except when portraying well-known figures.

Theatres in Greece were built on public land. The surviving Greek plays were all performed in the Theatre of Dionysus which, in the last stage of development, seated between 14,000 and 17,000 male citizens. It is located on the southeast slope of the acropolis in Athens. By 411 BCE the orchestra would have been circular. The orchestra contained a skene, which was probably developed out of a need for a dressing room and then later incorporated into the action. It had three doors and, later, was extended with a second level.

In 411 BCE, plays would have been using the skene as a background. Pinakes and then periaktois were used to create a façade for the background. Machinery for special effects was limited. The most noteworthy were the ekkyklema (a rolling platform for revealing tableaux) and the mekane or crane used to suspend characters. The passages on both sides of the skene, or parodoi, were used as the primary entrances of the chorus and sometimes actors. In 411 BCE the auditorium seating would have been made of wood on sloped ground. The audience was made up of local male citizens. Females and slaves were excluded. Foreigners were forced to use high seats.

Comedy is thought to have begun in ancient Doria an area on the Peloponnese with major cities Sparta and Corinth. The first forms of popular entertainment represented a “variety entertainment that could include short playlets, mimetic dance, imitations of animals and birds, singing, acrobats, juggling, and more” (Brockett, Franklin 37). Collectively called mimes, they introduced grotesque stock characters presenting everyday domestic situations as well as mythological burlesque. Most of the dialogue was probably in prose, improvised, and sung. The shows could have included dance. These mimes are thought to have first appeared in Megara (approx. twenty-five miles from Athens) in the sixth century BCE.

From the beginning up until approx. 404 BCE, the form of Old Comedy solidified. As mentioned previously, all the surviving work from this genre is written by Aristophanes. It is clear that his works we heavy influenced by the early mimes. Middle Comedy began around the end of the Peloponnesian War. With this new movement, censorship of the theatre was introduced the phallic element of comedy was banished. It would last until approximately 323 BCE. The only surviving examples are Aristophanes’ Ecclesiazusae and Plutus. In Middle Comedy, actors no longer wore phalluses, the parabasis (a direct address to the audience) was removed, the Chorus became less important, and there was no dangerous political content to the plays.

New Comedy flourished in the Hellenistic Period until approximately 265 BCE. New Comedy, unlike Old Comedy, was less concerned with “political issues in favor of a concern for love, financial worries, and familial or social relationships….Many plays were essentially character studies, and others were based on myths….[They were treated] as reflections of prevailing ideology rather than merely frivolous, diversionary entertainment….In many New Comedies the chorus appeared onstage only during the interludes between episodes….Characters may have gradually become conventionalized into a restricted number of types….Menander (342-291 BCE), who wrote more than one hundred plays after 321 BCE, is by far the most important author of New Comedy….By 300 BCE plays were no longer performed exclusively at Dionysian festivals. Well known actors were touring everywhere” (Brockett, Franklin 32-33).

The Dorian colonies in southern Italy carried with them their own entertainment including mimes, called phlyakes. Phlyax comedy reaches back as far as 350 BCE with “subjects ranging from mythological burlesque…to daily life. Lovemaking, gluttony, beating, thievery, and trickery are popular motifs” (Brockett, 38). Phlyakes represented the Greek influence on Roman theatre. Atellan farce was an original Roman form of comedy which, some would argue, was another form of the Greek mime.

Atellan farce went on to mould the shaping of the Roman mime, which was first recorded in 211 BCE. The dramatic pieces in the “mimes reflected the taste of the period, as can be seen from the numerous beatings, fights, and other forms of violence included in them. The mimes were especially disliked by the Christians, whose sacraments and beliefs they often ridiculed” (Brockett, Franklin 44). Contrary to the performances of New Comedy, the actors in the mimes did not wear masks but might have been selected for their physical specificity and comical expression. Additionally, they appear to have attended special schools and were trained for an exaggerated and physical type of presentation.

In the early middle ages, the mime troupes were persecuted by the Christian Church but continued the tradition in the performances of the minstrels, jesters, jugglers, and animal trainers. The themes and characters in the festival Feast of Fools “allowed the lesser clergy to ridicule their superiors and the routine of church life. Much of this is reminiscent of earlier pagan festivals, and many scholars have linked the Feast of Fools with pagan rites….Although extensive development of comic episodes had to await the separation of drama from the liturgy, the Feast of Fools undoubtedly influenced the development of comedy both in religious and secular plays” (Brockett, Franklin 80). Popular festivals, like Feast of Fools, as well as puppet performances and farces, continued to recycle the characters and plots of the ancient mimes, gaining the appreciation of the medieval audiences.

Commedia Dell’Arte flourished from the sixteenth to the early eighteenth centuries. “One school seeks to trace it from Atellan farce of Rome as preserved by wandering mimes during the Middle Ages or by Byzantine mimes who came west when Constantinople fell in 1453. The principle evidence for this view is the similarity in stock characters in the two forms…The two fundamental characteristics of Commedia Dell’Arte were improvisation and stock characters: the actors worked from a plot outline, on the basis of which they improvised dialogue and action, and each performer always played the same character with its fixed attributes and costume….Many comic bits (lazzi, singular lazzo) were sufficiently standardized to be indicated in plot outlines as lazzo of fear, hat lazzo, and so on…The scenarios were refined over a period of time and passed down from one troupe to another. More than 1000 have been preserved…Most scripts were comic, although a few were serious and many were melodramatic….The character types in commedia can be divided into two general categories: the unmasked and the masked. The unmasked roles were those of the young lovers, who usually served as a norm against which the peculiarities of other characters were seen. Typically they were depicted as witty, handsome, [and well-educated], but they might also be characterized as naïve….The masked roles can be divided into masters and servants….The most varied of all the commedia types were the servants, or zanni. Most scripts required at least two of these characters, one clever and the other stupid….Most of the servants were male…. [They were] typically young, coarsely witty, and always ready for an intrigue….In size, the troupes averaged ten to twelve members….The troupes traveled frequently, and at each new town they had to petition for the right to perform, a favor not always granted….The commedia was most vigorous between 1570 and 1650”(Brockett, Franklin 69-73).

The plots and characters in the very popular improvisational Commedia entered written comedy as seen in the plays of classical playwrights like Moliere and Beaumarchais, “….Many of [Moliere’s (Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, 1622-1673)] works are farces in the manner of the commedia Dell’Arte, by which he was much influenced….A large number of these were “comedy ballets”….Moliere’s great achievements are his comedies of character and manners….Moliere made comedy a vital reflection of contemporary life and manners….Moliere usually conforms to the neoclassical ideal of five acts and the unities. Some of the plays are written in verse, others in prose. Although his language is witty for its own sake; aptness to character and situation is the secret of his dialogue….With Moliere, the settings are a reflection of the manners and characters depicted, and his example did much to popularize the interior setting for comedy” (Brockett, Franklin 190).

“The Restoration is noted for its sprightly comedy of manners….The elements that were typical of the type: characters drawn from the upper classes and preoccupation with seduction, arranged marriages, the latest fashions, and witty repartee….The Country Wife, in which the hero circulates the rumor that he is sexually impotent in order to facilitate his seductions, is often cited as evidence of the moral laxity of Restoration comedy….A trend emerged [in the eighteenth century] toward “sentimentality and toward protagonists drawn from the middle class….Rather than seeking to arouse laughter or ridicule, [comedy now] sought to arouse noble sentiments through the depiction of trials bravely borne by sympathetic characters who are rescued from their sufferings and handsomely rewarded,” (Brockett, Franklin 223-224). “Robust comedy did not altogether die out. Between 1720 and 1760, however, “laughing” comedy was restricted primarily to farce” (Brockett, Franklin 228).

“Although during the eighteenth century neoclassicism remained the dominant mode, a number of minor dramatic types (pantomime, ballad opera, comic opera, and burlesque) undermined its authority. Pantomime combined elements from commedia Dell’Arte and farce with topic satire and stories drawn from classical mythology….Music accompanied much of the action. But the dominant feature was spectacle….By 1723 pantomime was the most popular form of theatrical entertainment. Although pantomimes served only as afterpieces, many were more popular than the plays they accompanied” (Brockett, Franklin 225). Pantomime characters evolved from Commedia Dell’Arte types known since 16th century.

“[A] significant minor form [of comedy] to emerge was comic opera. Forbidden to use dialogue, the fair troupes condensed the necessary exposition and speech into couplets…The couplets, set to popular tunes, were then sung by confederates planted in the audience…It featured commedia characters …These short pieces parodied tragedies and operas and satirized current events and fashions. By the 1740s, opera comique began to drop its farcical and satirical subjects matter in favor of more sentimental stories…Two significant innovations were made in opera comique after its revival in 1751. First, ordinary characters began to replace the commedia figures…Second,…original music began to replace the popular tunes which had characterized the form…The boulevard theatres lost the right to do opera comique when the Comedie Italienne was awarded a monopoly on the form in 1762,” (Brockett, Franklin 251-252).

“In England between 1850 and 1870, burlesque-extravaganza was one of the most popular dramatic types. Parodying well-known plays, performers, or topical events, and featuring songs and dances, it appealed to the taste for broad comedy and spectacle” (Brockett, Franklin 317). “Popular entertainment between the wars took the form of musical comedy and revues…Musical comedy, long merely the excuse for presenting beautiful chorus girls, began to move in a new direction after 1928…Music, story, dance, and setting were fully integrated to tell a semi-serious story” (Brockett, Franklin 407).

Silent comedy, a style of acting related to but distinct from mime, was invented to bring comedy into the medium of film in the silent film era (1900s–1920s). Silent comedy is still practiced, though much less frequently, but it has influenced comedy in modern media as well. Silent comedy, like Chaplin, Hal Beetle's Beetle Boy comedies, Buster Keaton, etc. placed a heavy emphasis on visual and physical humor, and what are known as "sight gags", to tell a story and entertain the viewer. Many of these physical gags were exaggerated forms of violence or abuse and came to be called "slapstick". The slipping on a banana peel, getting soaked with water, and getting a pie thrown in one's face are all classic examples of slapstick comedy devices.

As theatre advanced into the twentieth century, comedic elements preserved the traditions of the past while shaping to fit modern audiences. Through this progression, comedy and theatre in general became increasingly eclectic, borrowing different elements from different styles and movements.

An important legacy of silent film comedy is the humor in animated cartoons. Even as live-action comedy moved towards a focus on the verbal humor of Abbott and Costello and Groucho Marx, animated cartoons took up the entire range of slapstick gags, frenetic chase scenes, visual puns, and exaggerated facial expressions previously seen in silent comedies. These devices can be seen in The Looney Tunes and Merry Melodies cartoons from Warner Brothers. During the 1960s and 1970s, several films made homage to the silent era of film comedy. It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World performers and gags form the era and Blake Edwards' The Great Race and Mel Brooks' Silent Movie were full-length tributes. Peter Bogdanovich's What's Up, Doc? also featured slapstick gags and physical scenes that prefigured much of the humor in The Blues Brothers and Airplane!.

Italian film-maker Federico Fellini (1920 –1993) is a good example of utilizing many elements of traditional comedy. Fellini had a fondness for bizarre characters such as albinos, dwarfs, hunchbacks, the morbidly obese or the emaciated. He also had an obsession with facial expression. He loved to explore the humanistic elements of the beautiful and grotesque. This obsession also played into his love for the seedy and bizarre circus atmosphere. The female sex objects in Fellini’s films had a tendency to be grossly over-endowed. These characterizations are very similar to the grotesque and exaggerated characters found in early Greek comedy. Fellini loved to characterize his actors an explore expression and movement much like the stock characters found in Roman mimes and Commedia Dell’Arte.

Fellini’s films have been described as ironic and satirical, but unlike the farces and political comedies evolved from the Old Comedy tradition, Fellini’s films also have been described as containing elements of nostalgia, lyricism, mysticism, surrealism, hallucination, and dream. The adjectives "Fellinian" and "Felliniesque" are synonymous with any kind of extravagant, fanciful, even baroque image in the cinema and in art in general. Fellini set his films apart by exploring satire and humanism on a deep, almost psychological level in an extravagant, fantastical, and surreal manner, giving even the bizarre and grotesque an absurdist beauty.

Sarah Ruden was born and raised in Ohio. She received a bachelor of arts degree from the University of Michigan, a master’s in creative writing from John Hopkins University, and a Ph.D. in Classical Philosophy from Harvard University. She is an award-winning journalist and a poet. She is a research fellow at the Yale Divinity School in New Haven, Connecticut, where she lives. She concentrates her efforts on literary translation of the Greek and Roman classics.

Her translation of Virgil’s The Aeneid was published by Yale University Press in 2007. Two other classical translations of hers, Petronius’ The Satyricon and The Homeric Hymns, were highly praised. She has also published a volume of poems titled Other Places, which won South Africa’s Central News Agency Literary Award. Rod Dreher, in an article titled "Sarah Ruden, A Joyful Iconoclast," wrote that “what makes reading Ruden such a pleasure, aside from the quality of her thinking and her prose, is her willingness to question settled truths, and to do it with such a lightness of spirit”.

• Map of Greek Dialects
• Reference Page (PDF)
• Map of Athens
• Merriam-Webster dictionary definitions with audio pronunciations
• Referenced and Cited Works

• Merriam-Webster Online. 30 Nov. 2010.
• Wiktionary, the Free Dictionary. 30 Nov. 2010.
• "Fellows: Sarah Ruden." 30 Nov. 2010. John Simmon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.
• Dreher, Rod. "Sarah Ruden, A Joyful Iconoclast." Beliefnet. 30 Nov. 2010. 26 Feb. 2010.
• Howjsay.com: A free online Talking Dictionary of English Pronunciation. 30 Nov. 2010.
• Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. 30 Nov. 2010.

• Aristophanes. Lysistrata. Tras. Douglass Parker. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1964.
• Aristophanes. Lysistrata. Tras. Sarah Ruden. Cambridge, Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, Inc., 2003.
• Brockett, Oscar G., and Franklin J. Hildy. History of the Theatre. Ed. Karon Bowers. Boston: Pearson: Allyn and Bacon, 2007.
• Hunt, Lynn, Thomas R. Martin, Barbara H. Rosenwein, R. Po-chia Hsia, and Bonnie G. Smith. The Making of the West: Peoples and Cultures. vol. 1. Ed. Mary Dougherty. 2nd ed. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2005.
• Gascoigne, Bamber. World Theatre: An illustrated History. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1968.

RETURN TO SHOW PAGE