Aristophanes c.448-c.385BC
Greek comic dramatist

He wrote some 50 plays, but only 11 are extant. The best-known of his earlier works, in which the satire is largely political, are Hippeis (424, 'Knights'), Nephelai (423, 'Clouds') and Sphekes (422, 'Wasps') (named from their respective choruses), and Eirene (421, 'Peace'). These were followed by Ornithes (414, 'Birds'), Lysistrata (411, 'Destroyer of Armies'), Thesmophoriazusae (411, 'The Women attending the Thesmophoria') and Batrachoi (405, 'Frogs', which contains a burlesque poetic contest between Aeschylus and Euripides). Later come Ecclesiazusae (392, 'Women in Parliament') and Plutus (388). In the last, the themes are personal, and the chorus plays only a marginal role. Aristophanes is the only writer of Old Comedy of whom complete plays survive. The objects of his often savage satire are social and intellectual pretension. The plots of his plays show a genius for comic and often outrageous invention, and the verse in his choruses marks him as a notable poet.

Bibliography: L E Lord, Aristophanes: his plays and influence (1925)