Venom in Verse: Aristophanes in Modern Greece

by Gonda A.H. Van Steen

Overview

Aristophanes has enjoyed a conspicuous revival in nineteenth- and twentieth-century Greece. Here, Gonda Van Steen provides the first critical analysis of the role of the classical Athenian playwright in modern Greek culture, explaining how the sociopolitical "venom" of Aristophanes' verses remains relevant and appealing to modern Greek audiences. Deriding or challenging well-known figures and conservative values, Aristophanes' comedies transgress authority and continue to speak to many social groups in Greece who have found in him a witty, pointed, and accessible champion from their "native" tradition.


The book addresses the broader issues reflected in the poet's revival: political and linguistic nationalism, literary and cultural authenticity versus creativity, censorship, and social strife. Van Steen's discussion ranges from attitudes toward Aristophanes before and during Greece's War of Independence in the 1820s to those during the Cold War, from feminist debates to the significance of the popular music integrated into comic revival productions, from the havoc transvestite adaptations wreaked on gender roles to the political protest symbolized by Karolos Koun's directorial choices.


Crossing boundaries of classical philology, critical theory, and performance studies, the book encourages us to reassess Aristophanes' comedies as both play-acts and modern methods of communication. Van Steen uses material never before accessible in English as she proves that Aristophanes remains Greece's immortal comic genius and political voice.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781400823758
Publisher:	Princeton University Press
Publication date:	02/28/2000
Series:	Princeton Modern Greek Studies , #16
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	288
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

Gonda A. H. Van Steen is Assistant Professor of Classics and Modern Greek at the University of Arizona in Tucson.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations
Preface
Acknowledgments
Prologue
Ch. 1. Poisoned Gift from Antiquity: Aristophanes as Paravase of Koraes' Nationalist Ideology
Ch. 2. Aristophanes in Modern Greek: A Demotic, Satirical, and Theatrical Paravase
Ch. 3. The Lysistrata Euphoria of 1900 to 1940: Sexual and Antifeminist Paravase
Ch. 4. Koun's Birds of 1959: Paravase of Right-Wing Politics
Ch. 5. Framing, Clowning, and Cloning Aristophanes
Epilogue
Notes
Bibliography
Index

What People are Saying About This

Stratos Constantinidis

Van Steen's intellectual horizon extends beyond classical philology, to include critical theory and performance theory . . . Her arguments and foci are refreshing.
— "Stratos Constantinidis, Ohio State University

Oliver Taplin

This is a good subject, which has never been properly explored before, and it deserves a well-researched book devoted to it.... Because Aristophanes is so obviously vulgar, popular and accessible, his work cuts across the dichotomy between the elevation of Ancient Greece as noble and pure versus its repudiation as elitist and exclusive. Van Steen explores these intertwining political and cultural dialectics with knowledge and finesse.
— Oliver Taplin, Oxford University

From the Publisher

"This is a good subject, which has never been properly explored before, and it deserves a well-researched book devoted to it.... Because Aristophanes is so obviously vulgar, popular and accessible, his work cuts across the dichotomy between the elevation of Ancient Greece as noble and pure versus its repudiation as elitist and exclusive. Van Steen explores these intertwining political and cultural dialectics with knowledge and finesse."—Oliver Taplin, Oxford University

"Van Steen's intellectual horizon extends beyond classical philology, to include critical theory and performance theory . . . Her arguments and foci are refreshing."—"Stratos Constantinidis, Ohio State University

"Stratos Constantinidis

Van Steen's intellectual horizon extends beyond classical philology, to include critical theory and performance theory . . . Her arguments and foci are refreshing.
— "Stratos Constantinidis, Ohio State University

Stratos E. Constantinidis

Van Steen's intellectual horizon extends beyond classical philology, to include critical theory and performance theory.... Her arguments and foci are refreshing.

Recipe

"This is a good subject, which has never been properly explored before, and it deserves a well-researched book devoted to it.... Because Aristophanes is so obviously vulgar, popular and accessible, his work cuts across the dichotomy between the elevation of Ancient Greece as noble and pure versus its repudiation as elitist and exclusive. Van Steen explores these intertwining political and cultural dialectics with knowledge and finesse."—Oliver Taplin, Oxford University

"Van Steen's intellectual horizon extends beyond classical philology, to include critical theory and performance theory . . . Her arguments and foci are refreshing."—"Stratos Constantinidis, Ohio State University

Editorial Reviews

. . . Still, it was the sex, and, more than anything, the mere unprintable words that continued to prove the biggest stumbling-block, down the ages, in coming to terms with Athens' wittiest comic gadfly. Today there is a curious unreality about this kind of Bowdler and Grundy attitudinizing; who can honestly believe that Dr Thomas Arnold, of Rugby fame, didn't have his tongue in his cheek when he pronounced that no man could safely read Aristophanes till he was forty? Gavin Ewart got it right in his poem "The Word-Bird": "The Word-Bird knows that everybody in Britain is frightened to death of words, / So it flies up to a great height and drops them on people like turds. / It always chooses large assemblies where all sexes are present / And some of the words it lets fall are very far from pleasant:/ To the Puritan ears they strike with a loud thud - / And among the genteel (for this reason) its name has always been mud."

There was certainly no hurry to revive the work of this far from mealy-mouthed playwright in any European language, a reluctance to which Aristophanes' bewildering wealth of instant topical allusions contributed not a little (it still provides his translators with a constant headache). It was claimed - plausibly, if not quite correctly - that the 1883 production of the Birds at Cambridge was the first complete performance of an Aristophanes play since the author's death.

Peter Green

Winner of the John D. Criticos Prize

From the Publisher

"Van Steen demonstrates how dramas originally crafted to play a role in shaping the world's oldest democracy have similarly served the development of a new one on the same territory. Those who associate Aristophanes' only with ancient will certainly profit from reading this volume."

Choice

"In this impressive monograph, Van Steen chronicles the reception history of modern Greek Aristophanic performance from the important revival of Plutus in 1868 to the most recent interpretations of this playwright. She also explores Aristophanes' role as a cultural icon in Greek society, bridging the gap between the elitism of the classics and the mass appeal of Attic comedy."

Classical World

A delightful and instructive book . . . wonderful and highly useful.

Journal of Modern Greek Studies - Marina Kotzamani

A riveting, complex and often surprising exegesis that should be made compulsory reading for all students of the Greek world, ancient and modern alike . . . Aristophanes has formed a constant and central element in Greek politics and Greek theatre. Van Steen deserves all credit both for isolating this richly rewarding virgin lode, and mining it with such skill and perseverance . . . Venom in Verse is that rarity among scholarly studies: a beautifully written book, to read and reread rather than merely consult, with added pleasure at each fresh perusal.

Times Literary Supplement - Peter Green

A delightful and instructive book . . . wonderful and highly useful.
— Marina Kotzamani

Journal of Modern Greek Studies

A riveting, complex and often surprising exegesis that should be made compulsory reading for all students of the Greek world, ancient and modern alike . . . Aristophanes has formed a constant and central element in Greek politics and Greek theatre. Van Steen deserves all credit both for isolating this richly rewarding virgin lode, and mining it with such skill and perseverance . . . Venom in Verse is that rarity among scholarly studies: a beautifully written book, to read and reread rather than merely consult, with added pleasure at each fresh perusal.
— Peter Green

Times Literary Supplement