Power In Lysistrata

Theater, on the surfaces it is merely entertainment, but pull back the layers and a dialogue between people's beliefs and the culture around them emerge. No other culture may have understood this more than the creators of theater: the Greeks. One such Greek, Aristophanes, developed the play Lysistrata. In this Grecian comedy Lysistrata, a woman, leads a group of women in boycotting war. However, the action of the main characters and the themes that Aristophanes explores makes this play a significant historical source. The themes of sex, war, and power in Lysistrata display both Aristophanes portrayal of woman and the real and imagined gender roles of ancient Greece. Sex, it may be a tale as old as time, but in Lysistrata it was a very constant
Aristophanes showed that Grecian women had very little power in society. He displayed their lack of power when Lysistrata fought for power by taking the acropolis in order to control the money that founded the men’s wars. If women like Lysistrata held political power or even controlled the finances, they may have been able to have say in their men going off to fight and Lysistrata action would not have been necessary. If real Grecian women tried to attempt what Lysistrata did, it would not have succeeded because ancient Greece was a man’s world. Men ruled politically and economically and had a more sense than the males portrayed in the play, and the punishment that actual women would receive would not likely be worth the risk if they failed. Also, when Lysistrata talks about a man beating his wife when she spoke against her husband’s political views about the war from lines 600 to 605 only solidifies the observation that women were subjected to males political and economical. (35) Furthermore, it is prudent to mention that the Aristophanes portrayed man as being argumentative, unintelligent, and needy to be comical and not how the men watching this play would actually viewed