14 Aristophanes: Lysistrata
(Greece, 411 BCE)

Scene

At the base of the Orchestra are two buildings, the house of Lysistrata and the entrance to the Acropolis; a winding and narrow path leads up to the latter. Between the two buildings is the opening of the Cave of Pan. Lysistrata is pacing up and down in front of her house.

Lysistrata: Ah! if only they had been invited to a Bacchic revelling, or a feast of Pan or Aphrodite or Genetyllis, why! the streets would have been impassable for the thronging tambourines! Now there’s never a woman here-ah! except my neighbour Cleonice, whom I see approaching yonder…. Good day, Cleonice.

Cleonice: Good day, Lysistrata; but pray, why this dark, forbidding face, my dear? Believe me, you don’t look a bit pretty with those black lowering brows.

Lysistrata: Oh, Cleonice, my heart is on fire; I blush for our sex. Men will have it we are tricky and sly….

Cleonice: And they are quite right, upon my word!

Lysistrata: Yet, look you, when the women are summoned to meet for a matter of the greatest importance, they lie in bed instead of coming.

Cleonice: Oh! they will come, my dear; but it’s not easy, you know, for women to leave the house. One is busy pottering about her husband; another is getting the servant up; a third is putting her child asleep or washing the brat or feeding it.

Lysistrata: But I tell you, the business that calls them here is far and away more urgent.

Cleonice: And why do you summon us, dear Lysistrata? What is it all about?

Lysistrata: About a big thing.

Cleonice (taking this in a different sense; with great interest): And is it thick too?

Lysistrata: Yes, very thick.

Cleonice: And we are not all on the spot! Imagine!

Lysistrata (wearily): Oh! if it were what you suppose, there would be never an absentee. No, no, it concerns a thing I have turned about and about this way and that so many sleepless nights.

Cleonice (still unable to be serious): It must be something mighty fine and subtle for you to have turned it about so!

Lysistrata: So fine, it means just this, Greece saved by the women!

Cleonice: By the women! Why, its salvation hangs on a poor thread then!

Lysistrata: Our country’s fortunes depend on us-it is with us to undo utterly the Peloponnesians.

***

Myrrhine: Are we late, Lysistrata? Tell us, pray; what, not a word?

Lysistrata: I cannot say much for you, Myrrhine! you have not bestirred yourself overmuch for an affair of such urgency.

Myrrhine: I could not find my girdle in the dark. However, if the matter is so pressing, here we are; so speak.

Cleonice: No, let’s wait a moment more, till the women of Boeotia arrive and those from the Peloponnese.

Lysistrata: Yes, that is best…. Ah! here comes Lampito. (Lampito, a husky Spartan damsel, enters with three others, two from Boeotia and one from Corinth.) Good day, Lampito, dear friend from Lacedaemon. How well and handsome you look! what a rosy complexion! and how strong you seem; why, you could strangle a bull surely!

Lampito: Yes, indeed, I really think I could. It’s because I do gymnastics and practise the bottom-kicking dance.

Cleonice (opening Lampito’s robe and baring her bosom): And what superb breasts!

Lampito: La! you are feeling me as if I were a beast for sacrifice.

Lysistrata: And this young woman, where is she from?

Lampito: She is a noble lady from Boeotia.

Lysistrata: Ah! my pretty Boeotian friend, you are as blooming as a garden.

Cleonice (making another inspection): Yes, on my word! and her “garden” is so thoroughly weeded too!

Lysistrata (pointing to the Corinthian): And who is this?

Lampito: ‘Tis an honest woman, by my faith! she comes from Corinth.

Cleonice: Oh! honest, no doubt then-as honesty goes at Corinth.

Lampito: But who has called together this council of women, pray?

Lysistrata: I have.

Lampito: Well then, tell us what you want of us.

Cleonice: Yes, please tell us! What is this very important business you wish to inform us about?

Lysistrata: I will tell you. But first answer me one question.

Cleonice: Anything you wish.

Lysistrata: Don’t you feel sad and sorry because the fathers of your children are far away from you with the army? For I’ll wager there is not one of you whose husband is not abroad at this moment.

Cleonice: Mine has been the last five months in Thrace-looking after Eucrates.

Myrrhine: It’s seven long months since mine left for Pylos.

Lampito: As for mine, if he ever does return from service, he’s no sooner home than he takes down his shield again and flies back to the wars.

Lysistrata: And not so much as the shadow of a lover! Since the day the Milesians betrayed us, I have never once seen an eight-inch gadget even, to be a leathern consolation to us poor widows…. Now tell me, if I have discovered a means of ending the war, will you all second me?

Cleonice: Yes verily, by all the goddesses, I swear I will, though I have to put my gown in pawn, and drink the money the same day.

Myrrhine: And so will I, though I must be split in two like a flat-fish, and have half myself removed.

Lampito: And I too; why to secure peace, I would climb to the top of Mount Taygetus.

Lysistrata: Then I will out with it at last, my mighty secret! Oh! sister women, if we would compel our husbands to make peace, we must refrain…

Cleonice: Refrain from what? tell us, tell us!

Lysistrata: But will you do it?

Myrrhine: We will, we will, though we should die of it.

Lysistrata: We must refrain from the male altogether…. Nay, why do you turn your backs on me? Where are you going? So, you bite your lips, and shake your heads, eh? Why these pale, sad looks? why these tears? Come, will you do it-yes or no? Do you hesitate?

Cleonice: I will not do it, let the war go on.

Myrrhine: Nor will I; let the war go on.

Lysistrata (to Myrrhine): And you say this, my pretty flat-fish, who declared just now they might split you in two?

Cleonice: Anything, anything but that! Bid me go through the fire, if you will,-but to rob us of the sweetest thing in all the world, Lysistrata darling!

Lysistrata (to Myrrhine): And you?

Myrrhine: Yes, I agree with the others; I too would sooner go through the fire.

Lysistrata: Oh, wanton, vicious sex! the poets have done well to make tragedies upon us; we are good for nothing then but love and lewdness! But you, my dear, you from hardy Sparta, if you join me, all may yet be well; help me, second me, I beg you.

Lampito: ‘Tis a hard thing, by the two goddesses it is! for a woman to sleep alone without ever a strong male in her bed. But there, peace must come first.

Lysistrata: Oh, my darling, my dearest, best friend, you are the only one deserving the name of woman!

Cleonice: But if-which the gods forbid-we do refrain altogether from what you say, should we get peace any sooner?

Lysistrata: Of course we should, by the goddesses twain! We need only sit indoors with painted cheeks, and meet our mates lightly clad in transparent gowns of Amorgos silk, and perfectly depilated; they will get their tools up and be wild to lie with us. That will be the time to refuse, and they will hasten to make peace, I am convinced of that!

Lampito: Yes, just as Menelaus, when he saw Helen’s naked bosom, threw away his sword, they say.

Cleonice: But, oh dear, suppose our husbands go away and leave us.

Lysistrata: Then, as Pherecrates says, we must “flay a skinned dog,” that’s all.

Cleonice: Fiddlesticks! these proverbs are all idle talk…. But if our husbands drag us by main force into the bedchamber?

Lysistrata: Hold on to the door posts.

Cleonice: But if they beat us?

Lysistrata: Then yield to their wishes, but with a bad grace; there is no pleasure in it for them, when they do it by force. Besides, there are a thousand ways of tormenting them. Never fear, they’ll soon tire of the game; there’s no satisfaction for a man, unless the woman shares it.

Cleonice: Very well, if you must have it so, we agree.

Lampito: For ourselves, no doubt we shall persuade our husbands to conclude a fair and honest peace; but there is the Athenian populace, how are we to cure these folk of their warlike frenzy?

Lysistrata: Have no fear; we undertake to make our own people listen to reason.

Lampito: That’s impossible, so long as they have their trusty ships and the vast treasures stored in the temple of Athene.

Lysistrata: Ah! but we have seen to that; this very day the Acropolis will be in our hands. That is the task assigned to the older women; while we are here in council, they are going, under pretence of offering sacrifice, to seize the citadel.

Lampito: Well said indeed! everything is going for the best.

Lysistrata: Come, quick, Lampito, and let us bind ourselves by an inviolable oath.

Lampito: Recite the terms; we will swear to them.

***

Cleonice: Now, my dears, let me swear first, if you please.

Lysistrata: No, by Aphrodite, unless it’s decided by lot. But come, then, Lampito, and all of you, put your hands to the bowl; and do you, Cleonice, repeat for all the rest the solemn terms I am going to recite. Then you must all swear, and pledge yourselves by the same promises,-I will have naught to do whether with lover or husband…

Cleonice (faintly): I will have naught to do whether with lover or husband…

Lysistrata: Albeit he come to me with an erection…

Cleonice (her voice quavering): Albeit he come to me with an erection… (in despair) Oh! Lysistrata, I cannot bear it!

Lysistrata (ignoring this outburst): I will live at home unbulled…

Cleonice: I will live at home unbulled…

Lysistrata: Beautifully dressed and wearing a saffron-coloured gown

Cleonice: Beautifully dressed and wearing a saffron-coloured gown…

Lysistrata: To the end I may inspire my husband with the most ardent longings.

Cleonice: To the end I may inspire my husband with the most ardent longings.

Lysistrata: Never will I give myself voluntarily…

Cleonice: Never will I give myself voluntarily…

Lysistrata: And if he has me by force…

Cleonice: And if he has me by force…

Lysistrata: I will be cold as ice, and never stir a limb…

Cleonice: I will be cold as ice, and never stir a limb…

Lysistrata: I will neither extend my Persian slippers toward the ceiling…

Cleonice: I will neither extend my Persian slippers toward the ceiling…

Lysistrata: Nor will I crouch like the carven lions on a knife-handle.

Cleonice: Nor will I crouch like the carven lions on a knife-handle.

Lysistrata: And if I keep my oath, may I be suffered to drink of this wine.

Cleonice (more courageously): And if I keep my oath, may I be suffered to drink of this wine.

Lysistrata: But if I break it, let my bowl be filled with water.

Cleonice: But if I break it, let my bowl be filled with water.

Lysistrata: Will you all take this oath?

All: We do.