Four Plays by Aristophanes: The Birds; The Clouds; The Frogs; Lysistrata (Meridian classics)

	List Price: $16.00 Special Price: $10.88 Your Savings: $ 5.12 ( 32% ) Subject To Change Without Notice Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Manufacturer: Plume
Average Customer Rating:
Binding: Paperback Dewey Decimal Number: 882.01 EAN: 9780452007178 ISBN: 0452007178 Label: Plume Manufacturer: Plume Number Of Items: 1 Number Of Pages: 624 Publication Date: 1994-05-01 Publisher: Plume Studio: Plume
Related Items Sophocles I: Oedipus The King, Oedipus at Colonus, Antigone (The Complete Greek Tragedies) The Three Theban Plays (Penguin Classics) The Oresteia: Agamemnon; The Libation Bearers; The Eumenides (Penguin Classics) Euripides V: Electra, The Phoenician Women, The Bacchae (The Complete Greek Tragedies) (Vol 7) Euripides I: Alcestis, The Medea, The Heracleidae, Hippolytus (The Complete Greek Tragedies) (Vol 3)
Editorial Reviews: The acknowledged master of Greek comedy, Aristophanes brilliantly combines serious political satire with bawdiness, pyrotechnical bombast with delicate lyrics. This volumes features his four most celebrated masterpieces: THE CLOUDS, THE BIRDS, LYSISTRATA, and THE FROGS. Three of the leading translators of the 20th century--William Arrowsmith, Richmond Lattimore, and Douglas Parker--have created versions of the comedies that are at once contemporary, historically accurate, and funny. Also included are introductions to each play that describe the historical and literary background of the work.
Spotlight customer reviews: Customer Rating: Summary: Arrowsmith Edition Comment: Four Plays by Aristophanes / 0-452-00717-8 This edition features wonderful translations of "The Clouds", "The Birds", "Lysistrata", and "The Frogs". The humor and satire is well-managed within the translation, particularly within (my favorite) "Lysistrata". The bantering dialogue within the play is hilarious from the exhortations of the women to their fellow sisters to abstain from sex with their men (regardless of their own strong, womanly desires) to the tongue-in-cheek dialogue between a teasing wife and her impatient husband, to the final division of land to be 'presented' in the form of a nude lady acting as a visual aid. The four plays are described in this edition as follows: THE CLOUDS: The most controversial of Aristophanes' plays, it is a brilliant caricature of the philosopher Socrates, seen as a wily sophist who teaches men to cheat through cunning argument. THE BIRDS: This portrayal of a flawed utopia called Cloudcuckooland is an enchanting escape into the world of free-flying fantasy that explores the eternal dilemmas of man on earth. LYSISTRATA: In the twenty-first year of the Peloponnesian War, the women of Athens and Sparta, tired of the incessant fighting between their men, resolve to withhold sex from their husbands until peace is settled. THE FROGS: Visiting the underworld, the god Dionysus seeks the counsel of the dead tragedians Aeschylus and Euripides on how to bring good writing back to Athens. A fierce debate - full of scathing insults and literary satire - ensues between the two dramatists. Customer Rating: Summary: Inexpensive and very okay Comment: Roche's Signet Classic "Four Plays by Aristophanes" provides good contemporary translations of Lysistrata, The Frogs, A Parliament of Women, and Plutus. On the negative side, the renderings are not terrifically inspired. The paper is too pulpy for a "classic," but that's a drawback of most (though not all) inexpensive classics nowadays. My printing of Roche, however, is not thick or blotchy, though I've noticed the Signet Classics sometimes tend in that direction. Gone are the days, evidently, when the pages of a Signet Classic always looked crisp and stayed bright for decades. I've got some from the '60s that still look good. Roche's introduction and notes to these four plays are brief but solid. Customer Rating: Summary: Great Ancient Greek Political Parodies Comment: I should first point out that I read a different edition of this book, and the one that I had had only two plays - The Birds and The Frogs. I will review only these two. Aristophanes has a "no holds barred" type of approach to controversial political decisions and actions. The Birds is a comedy that ridicules the disastrous Greek expedition to Sicily in 413 B.C. Arisotophanes is a wonderful writer and he uses similes and parables throughout his writing. Besides being comedic, The Birds pays tribute to man's eternal desire to achieve the freedom and beauty associated with birds. The Frogs is a parody on the stupidy and culpability of persons afflicted with their own preoccupation with themselves. We see these types of "puffed up" personalities all around even in this day and age. So like the frogs we hear in our ponds and marshes chirping the same old songs. This is acually as timely as it was when it was written sometime around 400 B.C. Hard to believe. Customer Rating: Summary: Get on the right page Comment: The reviews attached here seem to refer to another collection by another translator--the Arrowsmith edition, apparently. Instead of "Clouds" we have two lesser plays--"Parliament of Women" and "Wealth." The translation's lively, the notes very helpful, the glossary mentioned in other reviews is absent here. All in all, a very useful introduction to Aristophanes, and endless fun. Customer Rating: Summary: ancient Greek comedy at its best Comment: Aristophanes was to theatre what Socrates was to religion and politics--the funny, irreverent "bad boy." My favorite of these 4 plays has to be "The Clouds", which is in fact a parody mocking and making fun of Socrates (spelled or mis-spelled Sokrates). Very funny dialogue. David Rehak author of "A Young Girl's Crimes" More Reviews