Sex and the Senses: the Poetic Process in Aristophanes

SEX AND THE SENSES:

THE POETIC PROCESS IN ARISTOPHANES’ THESMOPHORIAZUSAE

A Thesis

Submitted to the Graduate School

of the University of Notre Dame

in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements

for the Degree of

Master of Arts

Eryn L. Pritchett

Aldo Tagliabue, Director

Graduate Program in Classics

Notre Dame, Indiana

May 2019

Eryn L. Pritchett

CONTENTS

Introduction ...... 1

Chapter 1: Examining the Prologue ...... 8 1.1 The Senses: Expressed and Suppressed ...... 8 1.2 Senses and the Sexes ...... 18 1.3 The Metatheatrical Uses of the Senses and Sexes ...... 26 1.4 Relative Tests the Theory …………………………………………....32 1.5 Conclusion ………………………………………………………………38

Chapter 2: Questioning the Stability of the Sensual Senses ...... 40 2.1 Recapping the Theory ...... 40 2.2 The Gendered Verbs of Speaking ...... 42 2.3 Agathon, a Confusion of Sexes ...... 48 2.4 The Women’s Response ...... 51

Conclusion ...... 61

Bibliography ...... 64

INTRODUCTION

The Thesmophoriazusae, crafted in 411 BCE by Aristophanes, is centered around Euripides’ attempts to rescue himself from the women’s wrath at the Thesmophoria festival. These women are upset with

Euripides for his portrayal of women in tragedies since he calls them

“adulterous whores, easy sluts, wine-os, traitresses, gossips, good for nothings, and a great curse to man.”1 They have decided to kill him, but

Euripides plans to get Agathon to infiltrate the festival to save his life.

Unfortunately for Euripides, Agathon is not interested and his Relative must fill that role. Relative is quickly found out, and the rest of the action consists of Euripides and Relative acting out tragic rescue plots.

This comedy, although it “contains considerable literary and dramatic criticism, in the form of both explicit commentary and parody,”2

1 τὰς μοιχοτρόπους, τὰς ἀνδρεραστίας καλῶν, τὰς οἰνοπότιδας, τὰς προδότιδας, τὰς λάλους, τὰς οὐδὲν ὑγιές, τὰς μέγ᾽ ἀνδράσιν κακόν:

(Aristophanes, Thesmophoriazusae, 391-393). All translations are my own, with assistance from the commentaries of Austin and Olson (2009) and Sommerstein (2015).

2 Gamel, "Introduction,” 319.

had been ignored by many scholars until recently. In 1972, just to give an example, Dover lamented that it “has nothing to say about making peace.”3 In terms of Aristophanic contests, scholars preferred for decades the Frogs to Thesmophoriazusae. When concerning dramatic women the Lysistrata was their first choice. Other scholars, then, starting from Lever, believed that the play was weak, “finding the conflict not so clear cut since the idea at stake… is only the stepping off point for the fun that follows.”4 For Norwood, although in comparison with his contemporaries he thought highly of the play, the extreme nature of the obscenity was an obstacle.5

By 2001 however, increasing interest in the Thesmophoriazusae reversed the scholarly trend. Building from Bain and Adams on

Menander and Latin comedy, Sommerstein argued that features of speech, such as obscenity, are used to mark masculine and feminine speech.6 Moreover, feminist scholars focused their attention on this play’s portrayal of gender relations, while others stressed the connection

3 Dover, 1972, 169.

4 Lever, 1956, 120.

5 For his exceptional appreciation of this play, see Norwood, 1932, 253-254.: the Thesmophoriazusae is “perhaps the world’s finest masterpiece … that never misses a point, never overstresses it.”

6 Sommerstein, 1995, 63.

between this comedy and the ritual context of the Athenian

Thesmophoria festival.7

This rise of interest has resulted in an outpouring of literature on both feminist and performance studies about the Thesmophoriazusae.

Feminist criticism is dominated by the views of both Taaffe and Zeitlin.

The former attempts to show that while most scholars deem tragedy as the realm of the female, and comedy that of the male, the

Thesmophoriazusae proves that “comedy must have femininity to exist.”8 Zeitlin looks at the co-dependence of gender and genre and at the difference between the representation of females and males in comedy and tragedy, intersecting around the concepts of femininity, comedy and mimesis.9 According to Zeitlin’s interpretation, “a woman both imitates and is imitated;” furthermore, this play offers an investigation of the self through theater.10

On the other hand, the Thesmophoriazusae has been analyzed also from a performative perspective. In a special issue of the American

7 Gamel, “Introduction”, 320.

8 Taaffe, 1993, 102.

9 See Zeitlin, 1981, 301-327.

10 Zeitlin, 1996, 14.

Journal of Philology published in 2002,11 scholars explored the performance of the Thesmophoriazusae. Both Tzanetou and Stehle focus on the 411 BCE performance, with concern to Athenian culture and theater. Van Steen shows the varied readings and responses provided by the twentieth-century Greek audience to the script and how it relates to their cultural history. Scharffenberger, looking at Arrowsmith’s translation, Euripides Agonistes, examines the connection between the translator’s corpus and the context of his time. Finally, Gamel looks at the Thesmophoriazusae from the perspective of an actor, director, and playwright.

While gender theory, mimesis, metatheater, and intertextuality have proved to be extremely valuable avenues of discovery, the prologue itself has received little attention. Clements has studied this section from a philosophical perspective, arguing that the frequent mention of both hearing and seeing echoes Parmenides’ reflection on the topic.12 While

Clements’ analysis is helpful, it does not address the dramatic function implicit in both the initial joke and the first 200 lines.

11 Vol. 123, No. 3, Autumn, 2002.

12 See Clements, 2014, 1: “when theatre turns inward to theorize itself explicitly [metatheater] … it does so using the lenses of one particular philosophical framework."

We should now examine how the different approaches outlined above can shed light on the prologue. What more can be said about the repetition of hearing and seeing? Does Aristophanes use other senses, and if so, why? Moreover, by the time the real action of the comedy begins, in which Relative infiltrates the Thesmophoria, over 200 lines have passed. What is the significance of such a long prologue? Is it an introduction to the main themes of the text or something more?

This thesis offers a new interpretation of the Thesmophoriazusae which further explores the transvestment of characters within this comedy. I will argue that the repeated use of sex and senses language creates a reciprocal relationship of stabilization and deconstruction that allows for a more sophisticated reading of the transvestment. In chapter one, I analyze the sex and senses language inside the prologue and how they connect to a metatheatrical reading of the play.13 In chapter two, I focus on how this interpretation sheds new light on the assembly scene.

The connection between the sex and senses which is established by chapter one creates subtle expectations for the audience, which

13 Metatheatrical as defined by metadrama (metatheatre) in the Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms (3 ed.): “Drama about drama, or any moment of self‐ consciousness by which a play draws attention to its own fictional status as a theatrical pretense”.

Aristophanes is able to challenge in the assembly scene, so that gender identity is always unstable, always unsure.

Throughout this thesis, I combine feminist criticism mostly inspired by Foley with Revermann’s performance theory and with the recently developed interest in multisensorial aspects of ancient Greek and Roman literature.14 Building off the work of structural and cultural anthropologists, some have seen Aristophanic plays through the equation “female is to male as nature is to culture,”15 which implies that they are distinct categories with no overlap. Foley claims, conversely, that this equation does not show an appropriate relationship with Greek culture and cannot fully represent reality. She claims that the dynamic is between oikos and polis, female and male, nature and culture, and that this is a reciprocal relationship, that functions both individually and collectively.16 By showing how these dichotomies work together, Foley provides the framework for understanding the connection between the senses and the sexes, which will be a key point of my analysis of the

Thesmophoriazusae.

14 For an influential study which contributed to the development of this approach, see Butler and Purves 2013, and all the other volumes of The Senses in Antiquity series.

15 Taaffe, 1993, 24.

16 Foley, 1982, 5.

Performance studies is also required to understand the relationship between the senses and the sexes. Revermann asserts that the way to understand the absurdism of the comedy is to look at how it is “created, engineered, and managed” to understand its meaning within its own context.17 By applying Revermann’s performance theory to the use of senses, I will analyze how Aristophanes repeatedly links the prologue both to the development of the plot and the characters’ interaction with the audience.

17 Revermann, 2006, 5.

CHAPTER 1:

EXAMINING THE PROLOGUE

1.1 The Senses: Expressed and Suppressed

In this chapter, I propose a new reading of the prologue of the

Thesmophoriazusae focused on the use of senses and the sexuality which they express. These senses are linked to the sexes: male and female.

Additionally, the connection between the senses and sexuality serves a metatheatrical function at the level of the characters. This is also related to the structure of the play, the transvestment of characters, and the reception of the play by the audience. This chapter is divided into four sections. The first investigates the suppression of hearing and seeing, alongside the introduction of other senses (section 1.1). Then, I will interpret the suppression of hearing and seeing as subtle references to the sexes, showing that seeing is associated with the female sex, and hearing with the male (section 1.2). Finally, I will investigate the metatheatrical effect of this association (section 1.3), and how to apply it

(section 1.4).

The Thesmophoriazusae opens with a “Who’s on first” joke about seeing and hearing:18 from the very start of this play, therefore, senses appear to be a major theme. ‘Hearing’ and ‘seeing’ are respectively referenced 62 and 48 times, and in crucial sections of the prologue characters are requested to suppress them. Along with this suppression, throughout the first 213 lines Aristophanes mentions the use of touching almost 30 times and tasting and smelling about 5 times each. In order to understand the reasons why these senses are either suppressed or expressed, it is necessary to first identify them. In order to do so, as

Clements demonstrates, the best approach is to start from the beginning.

“Our interpretation of these opening moments, then, will begin … with the task its original audience faced, the task of piecing together an understanding of its emergent characters through their rapid flow of speech. In practical terms, this will entail close, sequential, line-by- line analysis; and if we are to appreciate the experience of listeners making sense of what they have heard, a style of reading sensitive to an audience’s movement back and forth within it, induced by the key expository cues they encounter.”19

18 The “Who’s on first” joke was made famous by the comedians Abbott and Costello and the basic premise is that Abbott is telling Costello the names of the players on a baseball team, but those names correspond to ambiguous pronouns and the like. For example, the first baseman is named “Who,” which creates ambiguity to the phrase “Who’s on first.” It is either a question of “which person is on first?” OR an answer “the name of the person on that base is Who.”

19 Clements, 2014, 11.

The beginning of the Thesmophoriazusae plunges the audience into the world of the senses. Immediately, the audience is given its first glimpse of the dichotomy that will follow.

RELATIVE ὦ Ζεῦ χελιδὼν ἆρά ποτε φανήσεται; ἀπολεῖ μ᾽ ἀλοῶν ἅνθρωπος ἐξ ἑωθινοῦ.

O Zeus! Really, you mean the swallow will appear!? THIS man will be the death of me! Making me plod around since morning like an ox.20

Aristophanes, Thesmophoriazusae, 1-2

The relative first questions the appearance of the swallow, meaning that he is excited to see the end of his woes. The swallow, which is a songbird of early spring, is the first clue to the importance of both hearing and seeing. Although the swallow is a songbird, it is not the sounds of the swallow’s song that are important here, but its appearance, indicated by Relative’s exclamation "you mean the swallow will appear?!" This statement is strange due to the fact that the play would be set in October-November, since that is when the Thesmophoria

Festival is celebrated.21

20 For explanation of “like an ox” see discussion on the next page.

21 Austin and Olson, 2009, 50.

However, while some argue that “the idea of the swallow’s arrival was [possibly] already proverbial by this period and could be used at any time of year,” the inconsistency in time may also be due to the creative genius of Aristophanes.22 This clever witticism is not the only hidden clue to the discussion of senses that follow. As Sommerstein points out, the early dialogue between Relative and Euripides is part of

“a pattern found in several of Aristophanes’ other comedies: a dialogue between two characters, which may or may not drop some tantalizing hints about an enterprise in which they are engaged, and which is calculated both to arouse laughter and to leave the audience mystified until the nature of the enterprise is subsequently revealed to them.”23

Following his cry, Relative describes his toils. In my translation of this verse, I have added "like an ox" to fully express the meaning of ἀλοάω which means “to thrash, tread.” According to Austin and Olson, ἀλοῶν means:

“‘Thrashing around’ … [it] is properly ‘thresh [cut grain], i.e. by causing horses, oxen, or the like to trample it on a threshing-floor… hence the meaning ‘trampling endlessly about, pounding along’ here and the more common extended sense ‘thresh, crush.’”24

22 Austin and Olson, 2009, 51.

23 Sommerstein, 2012, 144-5.

24 Austin and Olson, 2009, 52.

For an ancient audience, which is used to the descriptive world of oral poetry, this word would be associated with a sound, since the act of threshing (separating grain from a plant) would have been common occurrence in their everyday life.

In order to further highlight the importance of the senses,

Aristophanes now makes explicit references to seeing and hearing.

RELATIVE οἷόν τε, πρὶν τὸν σπλῆνα κομιδῇ μ᾽ ἐκβαλεῖν, παρὰ σοῦ πυφέσθαι ποῖ μ᾽ ἄγεις ωὖριπίδη;

Before I throw up my spleen completely, O Euripides, is it possible to hear from you where you lead me!

EURIPIDES ἀλλ᾽ οὐκ ἀκούειν δεῖ σε πάνθ᾽ ὅσ᾽ αὐτίκα ὄψει παρεστώς.

But it’s not necessary for you to hear everything which immediately you will see by being here.

Ar., Th., 3-6

Relative asks Euripides where they are going, but not before yet another phrase which draws attention to the senses. Exclaiming that he is about to "throw up [his] spleen completely," Relative is placing the image of this act into the audience's mind. Knowing that ancient comedy is not afraid of a little slapstick, the audience might even expect to witness vomiting on stage. This visual and possibly audial expectation helps Aristophanes continue his witty introduction of the senses. Furthermore, smell and

taste cannot be ruled out, causing one verse to serve a multifunctional role of sense expression.

Then, immediately after these hidden clues about senses, Relative introduces the first suppression of the senses, by means of a joke. In the first line for Euripides, he asserts that hearing is not necessary because soon Relative will see. This first suppression of hearing is multifaceted, as will be seen in later discussion. However, it is important to note now, that Euripides is the first character in the play to express suppression.

This suppression still continues in the narrative.

RELATIVE πῶς λέγεις; αὖθις φράσον. οὐ δεῖ μ᾽ ἀκούειν;

What are you saying? Repeat it. It is not necessary for me to hear....

EURIPIDES οὐχ ἅ γ᾽ ἂν μέλλῃς ὁρᾶν.

No, truly- what you are going to see.

RELATIVE οὐδ᾽ ἆρ᾽ ὁρᾶν δεῖ μ᾽;

And it’s not necessary for me to see....

EURIPIDES οὐχ ἅ γ᾽ ἂν ἀκούειν δέῃ.

No, truly! What you need to hear.

RELATIVE πῶς μοι παραινεῖς; δεξιῶς μέντοι λέγεις. οὐ φῂς σὺ χρῆναί μ᾽ οὔτ᾽ ἀκούειν οὔθ᾽ ὁρᾶν;

What are you telling me? You certainly speak cleverly. You’re not saying that it is necessary for me neither to hear nor to see?

Ar., Th., 6-10

Relative immediately complicates the narrative by focusing on the necessity to not hear and see as a function, not as a direction. This means that Relative is focusing on the act of hearing and seeing; or, more plainly, he is concerned with hearing and seeing as an ability. Euripides, on the other hand, is focusing on the action of hearing and seeing, meaning he is concerned with what Relative is doing presently. They are both misinterpreting the situation, but the idea of suppression is throughout. This obvious confusion is used with comic effect to draw the audience’s attention to the senses. References to vision and hearing repeatedly assault the ears of the audience, being expressed explicitly over and over again. In fact, in the first 20 lines alone, words related to seeing appear 10 times and words related to hearing appear 15 times.

The dichotomy between the eyes and ears persists, extending past the action of expression into the realm of suppression. As Taaffe points out, “Relative functions throughout as an intermediary through whom

the audience’s gaze is filtered.”25 Thus, the continual repetition of varying forms of οὐ and μή are reflections on the need of the audience to reject/suppress their senses in order to enjoy fully the dramatic experience. In fact, οὐ is used almost 25 times and μή is used over 10 times, an unusual concentration of negatives. Overall, this connection between suppression of both hearing and seeing continues in the rest of the prologue and is counterbalanced by instances of suppression and expression of other senses.

When Slave appears on stage, he starts his speech with sound and sight, but he then turns his attention to touch. This is the first explicit expression of a sense other than hearing and seeing.

SLAVE δρυόχους τιθέναι δράματος ἀρχάς. κάμπτει δὲ νέας ἁψῖδας ἐπῶν, τὰ δὲ τορνεύει, τὰ δὲ κολλομελεῖ, καὶ γνωμοτυπεῖ κἀντονομάζει καὶ κηροχυτεῖ καὶ γογγύλλει καὶ χοανεύει.

[Agathon is about to] to lay the keel, the beginning of a drama. He is bending a new arch of words, He’s rounding them off with a chisel, he is patching them together, forging maxims, crafting metaphors, And molding it in wax, shaving off the excess, And pouring it in a funnel...

25 Taaffe, 1993, 78.

RELATIVE καὶ λαικάζει.

And fucking little boys.

Ar., Th., 51-7

In Slave’s words, each verb works as a metaphor for drama, through the sense of touch. By using τιθέναι (‘to lay’) and κάμπτει

(‘bending’), the physical act of crafting a ship is juxtaposed against drama, δράματος, to build the metaphor which will be further explored in section 3. Furthermore, through the use of sculpting and forging verbs, touch is used to express the physical act of creation, as we see in

τορνεύει (‘work with a lathe’) and κηροχυτεῖ, (‘casting a mold’). Especially relevant to the discussion in the following section is the verb χοανεύει

(‘pour into a funnel’) which has its root in χοάνη (‘funnel’). Finally,

Relative delivers the punchline with another verb of physicality: λαικάζει

(‘to fuck little boys’). This vulgar reference to pederastic fornication would have been an acceptable joke to the ancient audience, but also brings sexuality to the sense of touch, a theme which is further explored in the next sections.

Further on in the prologue, touch is combined with taste and smell:

RELATIVE ὡς ἡδὺ τὸ μέλος ὦ πότνιαι Γενετυλλίδες καὶ θηλυδριῶδες καὶ κατεγλωττισμένον ...

O Holy Ladies of the Genetyllides, how sweet is the song, Smelling like a woman and French-kissy...

Ar., Th., 130-2

Taste is the first sense that Relative points out when he begins to question Agathon (“how sweet is the song”), and it is quickly followed by the final sense, smell, when he questions Agathon “smelling like a woman.” Following this, κατεγλωττισμένον (“French-kissy26”) begins a progression of kissing that eventually leads to a “thrill in his rear,” bringing together the taste and touch senses in a sexual way. To conclude, the prologue of the Thesmophoriazusae is comprised of a wide range of sensory references, which focuses both on the suppression of hearing and seeing as well as the addition of other senses. In the next two sections, I will interpret this striking use of senses and relate it both to sexuality, gender and performance.

26 Sommerstein, 2015, 33.

1.2 Senses and the Sexes

In this section, I will show that throughout the prologue, senses, and especially suppression of both hearing and seeing, relate to male and female sexes.27 The first subtle suggestion for this association is in the mention of the swallow and the sound of threshing in the very first lines of the Thesmophoriazusae. A swallow is often used as a metaphor for the female sex organ, while both the horse and ox are used to represent the male genitals.28 Thus the very start of the play links appearance or visual recognition with the swallow/vagina/female while simultaneously linking noise or audial recognition with the horse/ox/phallus/male. But these connections are just the beginning and may have been too subtle for the audience to grasp initially.

EURIPIDES χωρὶς γὰρ αὐτοῖν ἑκατέρου 'στὶν ἡ φύσις.

Indeed! Different is the nature of each of them, one from the other.

RELATIVE τοῦ μήτ᾽ ἀκούειν μήθ᾽ ὁρᾶν;

[the nature] of not hearing and not seeing?

27 Throughout the paper I use “sex” and “gender” in the most common scholarly view, according to which the former is a biological category while the latter a social construct.

28 For swallow = ‘cunt’ see Henderson,1991, 147. For animals such as horses and bulls representing the phallus, see Henderson, 1991, 48.

EURIPIDES εὖ ἴσθ᾽ ὅτι.

Yes, indeed.

RELATIVE πῶς χωρίς;

How are they different?

EURIPIDES οὕτω ταῦτα διεκρίθη τότε. αἰθὴρ γὰρ ὅτε τὰ πρῶτα διεχωρίζετο καὶ ζᾦ᾽ ἐν αὑτῷ ξυνετέκνου κινούμενα, ᾧ μὲν βλέπειν χρὴ, πρῶτ᾽ ἐμηχανήσατο ὀφθαλμὸν ἀντίμιμον ἡλίου τροχῷ, ἀκοῆς δὲ χοάνην ὦτα διετετρήνατο.

They were once separated, as follows: Since Aether, when first he separated himself- and he then gave birth in his bosom to living creatures endowed with motion- for those who needed to see, first he built the eye, imitating the disc of the sun; and finally, he bore through the ear, making a funnel for hearing.

RELATIVE διὰ τὴν χοάνην οὖν μήτ᾽ ἀκούω μήθ᾽ ὁρῶ; νὴ τὸν Δί᾽ ἥδομαί γε τουτὶ προσμαθών. οἷόν γέ πού' στιν αἱ σοφαὶ ξυνουσίαι.

And because of this funnel I don’t need to hear or see; By Zeus! It is my pleasure to learn it. How great it is to have, so to speak, wise company!

Ar., Th., 11-21

When Euripides begins his explanation of Aether at line 11, the sexes and senses start to become more explicit. Here, Euripides uses

φύσις to describe the difference between hearing and seeing. By using

φύσις in this way, Euripides attempts to show that the “nature” of both the funnel and disc are found within the hearing and seeing dichotomy.

This helps to clarify the connection between hearing and seeing with male and female, as seen above.

The connection between the senses and sexes becomes even more clear when Aether (masculine) is described as creating living creatures in himself (like a woman bearing a child). This is followed by a metaphor that solidifies the relationship for the rest of the play. The eye is related to the sun, which is in the shape of a disc. If we continue the previous examples where seeing = female, then this implies that the eye = sun = vagina.29 This case is made stronger by the continuing expression of female as seeing. Another thing that strengthens this connection is the more solid connection of the funnel with a phallus. Henderson points out that “bored holes” are often a metaphor for the female sex organ.30

29 For the argument of rings and circles as female genitalia, see Henderson, 1991, 138-9.

30 Henderson, 1991, 45. While there is a possible reading that the funnel is linked to the vagina, because it is created by a tool that bores a hole, I believe that the “funnel” here is actually describing the tool itself, and is therefore meant to be read as a phallic symbol.

Therefore, something that διετετρήνατο, or “bores through” would be the opposite, making the funnel equivalent to the phallus. This extends the metaphor of hearing onto the description of the funnel, thus making the funnel masculine. When Relative says that it will be his “pleasure to learn it,” (ἥδομαί) at line 20, the play is making a sexual innuendo out of the root for the word: ἦδος, “delight or pleasure.” This strengthens the argument that hearing and seeing are related to the sexual organs.

In lines 30-35, then, Relative and Euripides further exploit this link between senses and sexes in connection with Agathon’s identity:

RELATIVE ποῖος οὗτος Ἁγάθων;

Who is this Agathon?

EURIPIDES ἔστιν τις Ἀγάθων-

There is this one Agathon...

RELATIVE μῶν ὁ μέλας, ὁ καρτερός;

You mean the tan,31 strong one?

EURIPIDES οὔκ, ἀλλ᾽ ἕτερός τις. No, but another one.

31 “A dark complexion (from spending time in the sun) was regarded as a mark of manliness.” Austin and Olson, 2009, 62.

RELATIVE οὐχ ἑόρακα πώποτε. μῶν ὁ δασυπώγων;

I have never seen him. You mean the one with the shaggy beard?

EURIPIDES οὐχ ἑόρακας πώποτε;

You have never seen him?

RELATIVE μὰ τὸν Δί᾽ οὔτοι γ᾽ ὥστε κἀμέ γ᾽ εἰδέναι.

By Zeus, not at all in such a way that I would know.

EURIPIDES καὶ μὴν βεβίνηκας σύ γ᾽, ἀλλ᾽ οὐκ οἶσθ᾽ ἴσως.

And still you’ve fucked him. But perhaps you do not know him.

Ar., Th., 30 - 5

In this passage, the link between senses and sexes is applied to a specific case, Agathon’s effeminate identity. As the passage above suggests,

Agathon lacks manliness, since he is not tan (μέλας “dark”) and strong, and he also does not have a beard, which was a distinct feature of

“manliness” in fifth-century BCE Athens. Considering this, Euripides is forced to emphasize ‘seeing’ in the context of Relative’s ability to know

Agathon. In fact, Euripides emphasizes Agathon’s appearance, and only his appearance, in the description of him, thus connecting Agathon directly with the feminine characteristics inherent in this play. 22

When Relative finally admits that he does not know Agathon in any way, the ‘seeing’ becomes an explicit reference to sex, with Euripides stating that Relative “still fucked him” although Relative might not know him. οἶδα is a verb that indicates knowing through seeing, thus connecting with the ‘eye’ at its root. Because the eye, and thus seeing, has been connected with the female sex, here ‘not seeing’ implies a reference to the male sex. Thus, Relative, not seeing or rather being the male, “still fucked him.” Now, ‘seeing’ is directly connected with the sex act for the first time, and it is interesting to note that this is the final step in the “emasculating scale” from before. Agathon is so far from a manly man that he is the passive participant in sex acts, like a woman.32

Quickly after this revelation, at line 36 Euripides and Relative are forced to hide themselves from view so that the Slave may appear on stage and continue the sex and senses narrative.

32 This assumption is based on the Greeks perception of sexuality, in which all women are passive sex partners, regardless of their real role in sex. Henderson, 1991, 34.

EURIPIDES ἀλλ᾽ ἐκποδὼν πτήξωμεν, ὡς ἐξέρχεται θεράπων τις αὐτοῦ πῦρ ἔχων καὶ μυρρίνας προθυσόμενος, ἔοικε, τῆς ποιήσεως.

But let us hide, stepping out of the way, so that one of his slaves can go out on stage carrying a brazier and garland of myrtle in order to offer sacrifices, it looks to me, for his master’s compositions.

Ar., Th., 36-8

The concealment of Relative and his relationship with Slave creates a fascinating dynamic which highlights the sexual senses that are required for composition. In the proceeding section, I highlight the effect of connecting the sexes and senses with composition, however it is important to note its first appearance here.

EURIPIDES σίγα, τι λέγει;

Silence! What is he saying?

SLAVE πτηνῶν τε γένη κατακοιμάσθω θηρῶν τ᾽ ἀγρίων πόδες ὑλοδρόμων μὴ λυέσθων.

And the race of the winged, let them sleep, The feet of the wild, forest roaming beasts, Let them not be released.

RELATIVE βομβαλοβομβάξ.

Bombalobombax.

SLAVE μέλλει γὰρ ὁ καλλιεπὴς Ἀγάθων, πρόμος ἡμέτερος—

For he is about to, He who is elegant in diction, Agathon, Foremost among us…

RELATIVE μῶν βινεῖσθαι;

You don’t mean: “to be fucked?”

Ar., Th., 46-51

At line 46, Euripides demands silence, so that he might hear the slave’s description of Agathon. Slave then goes on to describe the birds and beasts, alluding to sight for the birds and sound for the beasts. If we recall the first connection to the male and female through the Aether discussion, this association becomes even more appropriate. Females are represented by birds, at least in this metaphor, because of their connection to sight (‘winged’ birds seen in the sky), while the beasts represent males because of their association with hearing (the sound of their feet as they roam through the forest).33 Slave’s reference to birds and beasts, and through them to sight/female and hearing/male, is once more linked to sexuality. Aristophanes wastes no time in marking this

33 Henderson (1991) argues that birds represent the female genitalia on p. 47 and beasts the male on p. 48.

connection using Relative. The vulgar slur that Relative abruptly inserts into the conversation (μῶν βινεῖσθαι; You don’t mean: “to be fucked?”) brings an end to the Slave’s thought and connects the previous bird/beast dichotomy, and with it the sight/sound dichotomy, to sexuality. This striking and repeated association between the senses and sexes requires further interpretation, which I will offer in the following section of this chapter.

1.3 The Metatheatrical Uses of the Senses and Sexes

In this section I will provide my reading of the “sexes and senses narrative,” arguing that it offers different layers of metatheatrical implications. This new metatheatrical reflection suggests that both dramatic composition and reception can be read as a sexual act. This same narrative also ironically draws the audience’s attention to the theatrical convention by which ancient male actors had to disguise themselves to play the women’s role. I will start my analysis by returning to the passage filled with expressions of touch that I have commented on previously. In light of my identification of the “sexes and senses narrative,” this passage can be seen in reference to sexual acts. Let us read its most important lines again:

SLAVE τίς ὁ φωνήσας;

Who makes that sound?

RELATIVE νήνεμος αἰθήρ.

It's the windless Aether.

… to lay the keel, the beginning of a drama. He is bending a new arch of words, He’s rounding them off with a chisel, he patching them together, forging maxims, crafting metaphors, And molding it in wax, shaving off the excess, And pouring it in a funnel...

RELATIVE καὶ λαικάζει.

And fuck little boys.

Ar., Th., 51-7

After another mention of (the windless) Aether, which reminds us of the initial identification between senses and sexes, some of the expressions of touch reveal a connection to sexual actions. According to

Henderson, κάμπτει, “bend, twist” can be a sexual metaphor for forceful

rape.34 At the root of τορνεύει (“rounding them off with a chisel”) is the noun τόρνος, which is a carpenter’s tool for drawing a circle. With the circle metaphor found in the analogy of the disk and funnel, it is clear that this is a sexual double entendre for the “tool” of a male in connection with the “circle” of a female. Before Relative speaks his sexually charged lines, by virtue of the verb λαικάζει (“fuck little boys”),

Slave makes the most critical connection to the sex and senses narrative explored in section 2 with χοανεύει. The action of “pouring into a funnel” is now wrought with sexual innuendo as revealed by the connection of the funnel to the male sex. Agathon, by virtue of the way he crafts his dramas, is seen as the male aggressor; conversely, the drama is seen as the passive sexual partner.

SLAVE τίς ἀγροιώτας πελάθει θριγκοῖς;

Who is the rustic that approaches these strong walls?

RELATIVE ὃς ἕτοιμος σοῦ τοῦ τε ποιητοῦ τοῦ καλλιεποῦς κατὰ τοῦ θριγκοῦ συγγογγύλας καὶ συστρέψας τουτὶ τὸ πέος χοανεῦσαι.

One who is ready, in your presences and the poets,

34 Henderson, 1991, 175.

Your poet who is most elegant in diction and close to the strong walls, He, the one rounding out and twisting around, To cast a mold of this one’s dick.

SLAVE ἦ που νέος γ᾽ ὢν ἦσθ᾽ ὑβριστὴς ὦ γέρον.

When you were young, how insolent you must have been, old man!

Ar., Th., 58-63

Even before Agathon appears on stage, he has been marked both by the senses and by the sexual aspects of his craft and person. As we see here, after his arrival on the stage, the senses become expressed even more. In fact, every description of crafting before τὸ πέος χοανεῦσαι (“to cast a mold of this one’s dick”) becomes sexually charged after Relative drops in the mention of the penis, τὸ πέος. However, the preceding language already holds sexual meanings, such as θριγκοῦ “wall or gate”, which is a double entendre for the hindquarters.35

A few lines later, not only the dramatic composition, but also the reception of drama is characterized as a sexual act:

35 Henderson, 1991, 199.

RELATIVE ὡς ἡδὺ τὸ μέλος ὦ πότνιαι Γενετυλλίδες καὶ θηλυδριῶδες καὶ κατεγλωττισμένον ...

O Holy Ladies of the Genetyllides, how sweet is the song, Smelling like a woman and French-kissy...

Ar., Th., 130-2

As seen before, the sexual language of smell and touch are here used in response to the reception of the dramatic technique of Agathon.

Relative now juxtaposes this sexual language with the reception of drama. Agathon is now representative of the female gender, but also of drama, and the way which these both exude emotion. In light of the sex and senses narrative, listening and responding to a dramatic performance is presented as a sexual act. The drama, in the feminine role, imagines the audience in the role of the male, along with both

Relative and Euripides who are the on-stage spectators. This collective group is required to suppress part of their vision and hearing to accept the transvestment on stage. The level of this interpretation requires a more sophisticated reader response, beyond the realm of reactionary emotions. The analysis I have provided is clearly part of a literary game that Aristophanes is playing, further explored in Chapter 2.36

36 Other scholars have noticed how this subtly works within Greek literature. In Chapter One of Jesper Svenbro’s book, Phrasikleia: An Anthropology of Reading in Ancient Greece, he highlights the important function of subtle changes from the neuter 30

While on the one hand, Relative here establishes the “sex and senses” theory, he also starts to confuse it (Chapter 2). Taaffe asserts that Relative is established as “a naïve but witty spectator” during his first encounter with Euripides, and his comments before Agathon arrives on stage “emphasizes [his] role as spectator, specifically as one who will gaze upon both women and men dressed as women.”37 In the next chapter, I explore how this metatheatrical message continues to function in the play. Furthermore, the sex and senses narrative sheds new light on the transformation scene. Gender dynamics, made more visible by the sex and senses narrative, place an emphasis on the theatrical convention of male actors playing the role of women.

RELATIVE πότερα φανερὸν ἢ λάθρᾳ;

Would he be seen or unseen?

EURIPIDES λάθρᾳ, στολὴν γυναικὸς ἠμφιεσμένον.

Unseen, putting on the clothes of a woman.

to the feminine gender in the description of the name of Phrasikleia and how they anticipate a deeper interpretation of the reading.

37 Taaffe, 1993, 79-80.

RELATIVE τὸ πρᾶγμα κομψὸν καὶ σφόδρ᾽ ἐκ τοῦ σοῦ τρόπου: τοῦ γὰρ τεχνάζειν ἡμέτερος ὁ πυραμοῦς.

That is a clever deed, very much in your way, And as such we will take the cake.

Ar., Th., 91 – 4

After Euripides explains to Relative that he needs Agathon to dress like a woman to infiltrate the women at the Thesmophoria, Relative questions whether he will be “seen or unseen?” Euripides claims that he must be “unseen,” dressing up like a woman. As we have seen throughout the prologue, this is another connection between vision and female, but here vision requires suppression. The audience is expected to suppress their ability to both see and hear, or distinguish, the male from the female for the transvestment to work. Both the audience and the women at the Thesmophoria must be convinced of Relative’s transformation for their plan to work. However, this creates a dramatic irony in which the audience is further exposed to the transvestment of characters, leaving the male actors who are dressed as the women of the

Thesmophoria to be exposed as just that, men dressed up as women.

1.4 Relative Tests the Theory

In this section, I will show how Relative’s transformation works within the “sex and senses” theory established in this chapter. After

Agathon refuses to help Euripides, Relative agrees to dress as a woman to infiltrate the Thesmophoria. Once the transformation takes place, the sex and senses theory the audience was primed to accept after the prologue is highlighted. Relative states at line 235 that he doesn’t see himself, he sees Cleisthenes.

EURIPIDES ὁρᾷς σεαυτόν;

Do you see yourself?

RELATIVE οὐ μὰ Δί᾽ ἀλλὰ Κλεισθένη.

No, by God, but I see Cleisthenes!

Ar., Th., 235-6

On the level of transvestment of characters, the vision of himself now as

Cleisthenes is an indication of the completed transformation of Relative, with Cleisthenes’ apparent feminine behavior as the crux of the joke. As

Austin and Olson point out,

“If Euripides is in fact playing the parodic barber, the expected response to ὁρᾷς σεαυτόν; (‘Do you see yourself’) is ‘Not myself, but someone much more handsome’ vel sim. But Inlaw instead claims to see Kleisthenes, a politically and socially prominent individual who Aristophanes ridicules repeatedly elsewhere for his beardlessness, his general femininity, and his willingness to be fucked by other men.”38

38 Austin and Olson, 2009, 131.

While the question “Do you see yourself?” is a colloquial expression,

Aristophanes marks this phrase, having Relative reply with an unexpected answer. Relative, the male (“not seen”) is now the female, or at least the feminine Cleisthenes (“seen”). Interestingly, Cleisthenes will appear as an effeminate character right before the capture of Relative, with marked “sex and senses” language (to be explored in section 2.3).

On the one hand, the fact that Relative does not see himself but

Cleisthenes indicates the completed transformation. On the other hand, a subtle hint that this disguise will fail lies in the fact that he doesn’t see

‘himself.’ Since the “sex and senses” theory suggests that “seeing” =

“woman”, and Relative does not “see” himself, he fails to completely transform. This transformation, which suggests that he will be caught by the women of the Thesmophoria festival, is incomplete because Relative lacks the true seeing ability connected with women at the beginning of the play. The claim is made stronger when Relative has donned his female attire and is ready to infiltrate the Thesmophoria Festival.

EURIPIDES ἁνὴρ μὲν ἡμῖν οὑτοσὶ καὶ δὴ γυνὴ τό γ᾽ εἶδος: ἢν λαλῇς δ᾽, ὅπως τῷ φθέγματι γυναικιεῖς εὖ καὶ πιθανῶς.

A man, on the one hand, this one is to us, now a woman, as to his looks at least. But if you prattle on, take care that you act as a woman with your voice, very persuasively!

RELATIVE πειράσομαι.

I will try my best!

Ar., Th., 266-8

We hear an indication of the transformation at the beginning and end of line 266, with the contrasting ἁνὴρ and γυνὴ. Euripides has indicated to the audience the shift from male to female. However, he warns that although he looks like a woman, he must take care to talk like one too. While sound, speaking, and the like, are established by the prologue as masculine traits, the fact that he uses λαλῇς instead of a form of λέγω makes it clear that this is a femininized form of communication. In this passage the failure to transform becomes the conclusion. Austin and Olson point out that

“The contrast Euripides draws is between Inlaw’s physical transformation (already accomplished) and the care the old man must still take to sound like a woman… καὶ δὴ marks ‘the completion of something required by the circumstances’, i.e. the successful transformation of Inlaw into someone who can pass for a woman… [With] ἢν λαλῇς δ᾽: Inlaw is taking on the mission Agathon refused (cf. 211- 12) and Euripides presumably expects him to speak in the women’s assembly on his behalf… he none the less uses not the neutral vb. λέγω but the more judgmental λαλέω… prefiguring the disaster to come.39

39 Austin and Olson, 2009, 140.

In an example of dramatic irony, Relative urges Euripides to promise to save him ‘if’ he fails. Relative replies:

RELATIVE μὰ τὸν Ἀπόλλω οὔκ, ἤν γε μὴ ὀμόσῃς ἐμοί—

By Apollo, no, not unless you swear to me -

EURIPIDES τί χρῆμα;

What?

RELATIVE συσσώσειν ἐμὲ πάσαις τέχναις, ἤν μοί τι περιπίπτῃ κακόν.

- that you will help me with all your skills, if something bad were to fall upon me

EURIPIDES ὄμνυμι τοίνυν αἰθέρ᾽ οἴκησιν Διός.

Alright, I swear to aether, the dwelling place of Zeus

RELATIVE τί μᾶλλον ἢ τὴν Ἱπποκράτους ξυνοικίαν;

Why this, rather than to the house of Hippocrates?

EURIPIDES ὄμνυμι τοίνυν πάντας ἄρδην τοὺς θεούς.

Fine, I swear to all the gods!

RELATIVE μέμνησο τοίνυν ταῦθ᾽, ὅτι ἡ φρὴν ὤμοσεν, ἡ γλῶττα δ᾽ οὐκ ὀμώμοκ᾽: οὐδ᾽ ὥρκωσ᾽ ἐγώ.

Ok, remember this, your mind swore this oath and your tongue has not sworn. And I did not make you swear it!

Ar., Th., 269-76

Relative’s request brings to light two failures to transform. On the one hand, Relative is predicting to the audience that Euripides will need to rescue him, thus the need for the oath, implying Relative’s failed transformation. On the other hand, there is a subtle indication that

Euripides will also fail to transform.

Euripides swears to “aether” that he will rescue Relative. By mentioning “aether,” Aristophanes is recalling the Aether discussion at lines 11-21. Chapter one shows that this scene is where the “sex and senses” theory becomes explicit (p. 16 – 18). The use of aether therefore suggests again sex and senses, since he is swearing by the creator of the male/female dichotomy of the sun disk and funnel.

However, the audience would not recognize that Euripides must transform into a woman to save Relative until line 275. The repetition of

οὐ and ὄμνυμι hint at the need for a feminized rescue: not swearing

(speaking) = female. Furthermore, it is not the tongue (or male identity) that swore to rescue him. Relative has, apparently, “successfully”

transformed, and his close connection with the sex and senses narrative highlight this aspect of his character.

1.5 Conclusion

Although in recent decades the Thesmophoriazusae has benefited from new scholarly interest, the prologue still needs significant attention.

Scholars such as Clements have already accepted the importance of the prologue; however, none have explored how Aristophanes uses the senses in the prologue nor how performance theory can further illuminate this scene. I have attempted to offer a new interpretation focused on the function of the senses as suggestive of both gender dynamics and theatrical conventions. In my view, the mention of seeing is associated with the feminine, and hearing with masculinity. The suppression and expression of these senses show both how drama is received by the audience, and how the sex and senses narrative applies to the theatrical conventions of Aristophanes’ day.

As Pellegrini asserts, “What I particularly like is the way in which

Performance Studies is interested in how… the body is so crucial to the making of meaning - not just the conferral of meaning but producing new

meanings.”40 Aristophanes has artfully used the senses to bring out the gender dynamics at play in drama and made his metatheatrical comments explode from the prologue into the rest of the play. While many have seen the importance of the paratragedy, they miss the clues offered by the prologue. In the next chapter, a focus on the “sex and senses” theory, as outlined in this chapter and condensed in Table 2.1

(p. 32), will continue to shed light on the transvestment of characters.

More importantly, the next chapter will examine how the confusion of this theory asserts that “the convention of male actors playing female roles is not only explicit but also showcases the inauthenticity of the

‘real’ women who hold Euripides responsible for their bad reputations.”41

40 Tisch School of the Arts website, https://tisch.nyu.edu/performance- studies/how-to-apply/how-to-apply-graduate, accessed August 21, 2018.

41 Taaffe, 1993, 74.

CHAPTER 2:

QUESTIONING THE STABILITY OF THE SENSUAL SENSES

2.1 Recapping the Theory

As we have seen in the first chapter, the prologue lays out a clear connection between the sexes and senses. The female/eye/vagina sees and stays silent but does not hear, while the male/ear/phallus hears and emits noise but does not see. The table below shows the complicated and intricate way this metaphor functions:

TABLE 2.1

LINKING THE SEXES AND SENSES

Eye Seen Not Not Blind FEMALE unseen VAGINA Not Ear Not heard Unheard Silent Not Eye Not Seen Unseen Blind MALE Ear Heard Not Not Silent PENIS Unheard

This intricate examination yields a fruitful metatheatrical analysis in the prologue, as I have shown in the first chapter. The connection between the sex and the senses is directly connected to 1) the transvestment of the characters, 2) structure of the play, and 3) the reception of the play by the audience.

In this chapter, I show how the interpretation of the use of the sex and senses in the prologue functions in the assembly scene. The theory initially establishes certain expectations that can later be exposed and deceived. Aristophanes uses these expectations to challenge the audience’s assumptions. Scholars have already noted that the assembly scene highlights the transvestment of characters, with the “big joke” at line 531:

CHORUS ἀλλ᾽ οὐ γάρ ἐστι τῶν ἀναισχύτων φύσει γυναικῶν οὐδὲν κάκιον εἰς ἄπαντα πλὴν ἄρ᾽ εἰ γυναῖκες.

Well, ya know, there is nothing worse in the world than women whom nature has made shameless, except other women.

Ar., Th., 531-2

In a moment when the chorus “expresses problematic self-blame… [they] signal to the audience that they are men underneath.”42 My analysis will

42 See Taaffee, 1993, 91.

show another, subtle, way in which Aristophanes exploits this theatrical convention.

First, I will look at how the Agathon scene that occurs at the very end of the prologue and, therefore, a few lines before the assembly scene starts: the exploitation within the account of Agathon’s tranvestment of the ‘sex and senses narrative’ of the prologue makes it likelier that the same narrative may relate to the assembly scene (Section 2.2). Then, I show how the verbs of speaking in the assembly scene (and later in the entire comedy) are representative of different sexes (Section 2.3). Finally,

I will look at the interplay between the sex and senses within the assembly scene, and analyze how this functions metatheatrically (Section

2.4). I do not expect that everyone in the ancient audience would pick up on each subtle clue of the sex and senses theory I will discuss, but, as I will argue in the conclusion of this chapter, these references could provide the audience with a second-level reading of the assembly scene, one that would highlight the crossing between gender that is there evoked.

2.2 Agathon, a Confusion of Sexes

The connection between the sexes and the senses, outlined previously, is crucial towards the end of the prologue of the

Thesmophoriazusae, namely in the Agathon scene. As I will shortly show, 42

here Aristophanes manipulates the senses, creating a confusion which accentuates a crucial joke of the play: the exposure of the male-only performance. Scholars have already identified the explicit ways through which Aristophanes metatheatrically comments on transvestment within the Agathon scene. My reading will prove the existence of even subtler reflections.

The key passage noticed by scholars is the one in which Relative inserts himself into Agathon’s choral ode.43 Here Relative begins to question Agathon, first calling him a man and then asking him what kind of woman he is. This sets the stage for the progression of reciprocal male and female items which ultimately end in a blending of the senses.

RELATIVE καί σ᾽ ὦ νεανίσχ᾽ ὅστις εἶ, κατ᾽ Αἰσχύλον ἐκ τῆς Λυκουργείας ἐρέσθαι βούλομαι. ποδαπὸς ὁ γύννις; τίς πάτρα; τίς ἡ στολή; τίς ἡ τάραξις τοῦ βίου; τί βάρβιτος λαλεῖ κροκωτῷ; τί δὲ λύρα κεκρυφάλῳ; τί λήκυθος καὶ στρόφιον; ὡς οὐ ξύμφορον. τίς δαὶ κατόπτρου καὶ ξίφους κοινωνία; τίς δ᾽ αὐτὸς ὦ παῖ; πότερον ὡς ἀνὴρ τρέφει; καὶ ποῦ πέος; ποῦ χλαῖνα; ποῦ Λακωνικαί; ἀλλ᾽ ὡς γυνὴ δῆτ᾽: εἶτα ποῦ τὰ τιτθία; τί φῄς; τί σιγᾷς; ἀλλὰ δῆτ᾽ ἐκ τοῦ μέλους ζητῶ σ᾽, ἐπειδή γ᾽ αὐτὸς οὐ βούλει φράσαι;

43 See Taaffe, 1993, 80: “Agathon himself seems confused about the gender logic of his chorus. They sing of ‘queen Leto, and the famous lyre, mother of hymns with a masculine shout (124-5). The [Agathon] scene provides an opportunity for an analysis of the spectator’s gaze and the semiotics of theater, for the Relative sees the man underneath Agathon’s female costume and jokes about thinking, at first, that he was seeing the prostitute Cyrene (97-8).”

I want to ask you, o young man, which kind of woman you are, Like from Aeschylus’ Lykourgeian tetralogy? From what country is this womanish man? Where is his fatherland? What is his garment? Why this confusion of spirit? How does [his masculine] lyre Speak to [his feminine,] saffron dress? To his woman’s hair net? What about the oil flask and girdle? Surely these don’t work together! What about a marriage between a mirror and a sword? And are you, child, indeed a man? Where is your penis? Where is your cloak? Where are your manly shoes? But then, are you a woman? Then where are your little boobies? What are you saying? Why are you silent? But then I must look for you, in your song, Since you don’t wish to reveal it to me!

Ar., Th., 134-45

In this passage, the metatheatrical mention of Aeschylus’ tetralogy signals the confusion Relative is suffering. He reveals in the text something that would be apparent in performance, Agathon is dressed up like a woman. Agathon confirms this when he states his “clothes are in accordance with [his] thoughts.”44 Relative makes it clear that there is

a confusion about the state which Agathon appears (ἡ τάραξις τοῦ βίου).

According to Given, following Relative’s assertion of the effeminate character and feminine appearance of Agathon, he

“expresses confusion about the contradictory accoutrements that Agathon possesses: a low- toned musical instrument (βάρβιτος) and a woman’s gown (κροκωτῷ) (137-138), a mirror and sword (140) and so forth. He possesses a surplus of clearly gendered accoutrements, yet he lacks both phallus and breasts (142-143). He is a man-woman, (γύννις, 136), yet neither man nor woman. His appearance represents for Inlaw ἡ τάραξις τοῦ βίου (137), a mixture, a confusion, a disturbance of life.”45

Following the confusion of spirit, Relative uses a masculine object to speak to his feminine lyre, using λαλεῖ at 138, an important verb as I will show in Section 2.3. Relative’s assault on Agathon’s “contradiction-laden appearance, with its surpluses and lacks,” reaches a climax in the final

44 ἐγὼ δὲ τὴν ἐσθῆθ᾽ ἅμα γνώμῃ φορῶ. χρὴ γὰρ ποιητὴν ἄνδρα πρὸς τὰ δράματα ἃ δεῖ ποιεῖν πρὸς ταῦτα τοὺς τρόπους ἔχειν. αὐτίκα γυναικεῖ᾽ ἢν ποιῇ τις δράματα, μετουσίαν δεῖ τῶν τρόπων τὸ σῶμ᾽ ἔχειν.

I make my clothing in accordance with my thoughts. For it is necessary, that a man, a poet, on account of his drama, (aside Which it is necessary for him to make) hold himself in this way. And immediately, if he makes a drama with a female character, Then it is necessary to hold the body in concert with their behavior.

Ar., Th., 148-52 45 Given, 2007, 36.

part of his speech with an emphasis on the senses. The first sense

Relative connects to Agathon is the masculine one (“What are you saying?”), indicating the true identity of Agathon. This is followed by the suppression of this sense (“Why are you silent?”), indicating Agathon’s attempt to suppress his maleness. This is followed by the female sense, of seeing, to further indicate the effeminate character of Agathon (“But then I must look for you, in your song, /Since you don’t wish to reveal it to me!”). Through this subtle shift between senses, the text further emphasizes Taaffe’s convincing argument that the confusion of Relative in response to Agathon’s appearance is intended to confirm that “the audience knows that Agathon really is male, no matter what his gender identity in public might appear to be… His femininity is a mask he dons to carry out his profession, much as an actor does.”46

Furthermore, in light of the prologue’s ‘sex and senses narrative’, we can see this manipulation already present when Agathon initially arrives on stage:

46 Taaffe, 1993, 81-3.

AGATHON -- ἱερὰν χθονίαις δεξάμεναι λαμπάδα κοῦραι ξὺν ἐλευθέρᾳ πατρίδι χορεύσασθε βοάν. -- τίνι δαιμόνων ὁ κῶμος; λέγε νυν.

-- honoring the Nether Goddesses, Maidens, take up the torches, in the company Of our free fatherland, Dance with shouts! --To which of the divine does your merriment belong? Speak now!

Ar., Th., 101-5

In these words by Agathon, the first subtle indication of the confusion between the sexes becomes visible in the moment in which torches (λαμπάδα) are physically manipulated by ‘maidens’ (κοῦραι). Here

I read the torch as an euphemism for the male penis. Even more, it is possible that these “torches” are represented in the form of a costume penis, and it is further possible that they grab these for a visual cue to the joke of their transvestment. There is, however, a double ambiguity to this passage. If δεξάμεναι means something more like “welcome or accept,” then the torches (penises) would be accepted by the women, indicating penetration. A further confusion of sexes is seen in this example, where the ambiguous nature of Agathon’s sexual identity is brought to light in the language of the text.

This phallic euphemism of the torches for the women, followed quickly by a metatheatrical reference to choral dance, brings us again to a confusion of the senses. The women are required to shout (βοάν), a sense reserved for men in the sex and senses theory. His response to his own chorus (of women) is another metatheatrical comment: κῶμος

(‘merriment’), which is at the root of κωμῳδία (comedy).47 Here again, the women are ordered to speak, showing again Agathon’s failure to completely assume the female identity, and indicates a full expression of masculine identity.

2.3 The Gendered Verbs of Speaking

In this section I will discuss how verbs or saying are used to express the dynamics of gender. Although these are simple words, it is proper of ancient theater to use simple words to create instability and new meanings.48 As was shown in the first chapter, “the very start of the play links … noise or audial recognition with the

47 κωμῳδία (comedy) = κῶμος (merriment) + either ᾠδή (song) or ἀοιδός (singer), both from ἀείδω (I sing).

48 Goldhill argues that Oedipus Tyrannus creates potential, but not certain double meanings “by making the most mundane of words [like λύσις and ὅπου] a site of instability.” This, according to Goldhill, is used by Sophocles to heighten the irony of the play by creating a confusion in the understanding of the audience. At critical moments in the OT, theses mundane terms are markers of something deeper within the text. Goldhill, 2009, 39.

horse/ox/phallus/male.” In this section, I will then argue that from the assembly scene to the end of the Thesmophoriazusae the verbs ἀγορεύω and λαλέω are used according to a gendered division, in light of which the confusion between sexes within the characters’ transvestment is further highlighted.

ἀγορεύω, ‘to speak in an assembly,’ is marked masculine by the nature of the verb. Speaking in an assembly is not something a woman does, it is the responsibility of men. However, constantly throughout the

Thesmophoriazusae, it is the women who use derivatives of this verb to describe their own acts: the female herald (ἀγορεύουσαν, 306/7 and

ἀγορεύειν, 379); the chorus (ἀγορεύει, 786 and κἀπαγορεύετε, 790).

The speaking verb λᾰλέω ‘to prattle, gossip’ is inherently feminine in the same way ἀγορεύω is inherently masculine, it is something customarily done by women. Interestingly, it is only the male characters in the play that use this verb to describe the actions of women. Relative starts this at line 138, λαλεῖ, however Euripides makes it clear that λᾰλέω is considered feminine, especially in this play at 267.

A man, on the one hand, this one is to us, now a woman, as to his looks at least. But if you prattle on, take care that you act as a woman with your voice, very persuasively! 49

RELATIVE πειράσομαι.

I will try my best!

Ar., Th., 266-8

Here both the noun γυνὴ and the verb γυναικιεῖς reinforce the feminine connotation of the verb λαλῇς. Even further, all 12 uses in the comedy of

λαλέω come out of the mouths of men49 except for once instance, when

Mica is recalling the things said by a man, Euripides: “adulterous whores, easy sluts, wine-os, traitresses, gossips, good for nothings, and a great curse to man.”50 In light of this analysis, it can be argued that the use of both ἀγορεύω and λαλέω in the assembly scene carry on gendered connotations.

This same interpretation can be extended to the verb λέγω. While until line 85 this verb appears in the mouth of both Relative and

Euripides, as we see at the lines 6-9, 45 and 85, after this last occurrence this verb is only used by characters that are either

49 Including Cleisthenes, λαλούμενον 578; Relative, λαλεῖτε 717; Scythian archer/ Euripides, λαλῖς 1083; Scythian archer/ Euripides, λαλῖς 1087; Scythian archer, λάλο 1097; Relative, λαλῆσι 1108; Scythian archer, λαλῆς 1109.

50 τὰς μοιχοτρόπους, τὰς ἀνδρεραστίας καλῶν, τὰς οἰνοπότιδας, τὰς προδότιδας, τὰς λάλους, τὰς οὐδὲν ὑγιές, τὰς μέγ᾽ ἀνδράσιν κακόν:

Ar., Th., 391-393.

effeminate, “female,” or pretending to be female as a disguise:51 both

Agathon and Cleisthenes, the effeminate male characters of this play, use the verb at 105, 176, 182 (Agathon) and 625 (Cleisthenes). Moreover, the characters that are playing actual females on stage use the verb throughout the assembly scene.52 Finally, when Relative is attempting to disguise himself as a woman on stage, he uses this verb (476, 492, 513,

541, 566). In light of this examination, in the assembly scene not only

ἀγορεύω and λαλέω, but also λέγω has a strong gendered connotation: while the verb appears at first in the prologue to be masculine, it quickly transforms into a feminine verb, indicating another subtle hint to the transformation apparent on stage.

2.4 The Women’s Response

Before the women arrive on stage, there has been a confusion of sexuality with the complexities of expression and suppression - of hearing and seeing - which would force the audience to be hyper-aware of the gender distinctions within the play. These distinctions are already

51 The only exception is the Sythian archer at lines 1102 and 1104, who is questioning what Euripides is saying.

52 Woman Herald, 300, 343; Chorus of Women, 356, 364, 435, 436, 440, 442; Mica, 405, 431, 539, 634, 635, 636; Critylla, 453.

present in the Agathon scene. At the end of the analysis of this scene,

Taaffe argues that

“as the play moves into its next section, we are given a model in the Relative by which to measure the performance of the real male actors as comic women and vice versa. There is no longer any reason for us to believe that they are women. We must now actively suppress our knowledge of theatrical conventions.”53

In what follows, however, I will argue that subtle references to sexes and senses highlights further the repeated masculinization of the “women” in the play, and, therefore, forces the audience to recognize that the actors in front of them are men disguised as women. Let us read the first relevant passage:

WOMAN HERALD περίθου νυν τόνδε πρῶτον πρὶν λέγειν.

Now, put this on (the garland) first before you speak!

CHORUS LEADER σίγα σιώπα, πρόσεχε τὸν νοῦν: χρέμπτεται γὰρ ἤδη ὅπερ ποιοῦσ᾽ οἱ ῥήτορες. μακρὰν ἔοικε λέξειν.

Silence! Keep completely quiet! Pay attention: for indeed she is clearing her throat just as the orators generally do. She seems to have a lot to say!

Ar., Th., 380-2

53 Taaffe, 1993, 86.

Here the confusion of silence and speaking marks the confusion of genders produced by the “women” on stage. First, the Woman Herald indicates that Mica must put “this” on before she speaks. “This” is the garland, “as the context makes clear.”54 As I have shown in chapter one, circular objects are linked to the female sex (p. 18, 25). However, Mica is commanded to put on the garland before she speaks, a masculine task, marking another confusion of sexes. The Chorus Leader begins with two commands for silence, yet ends with μακρὰν ἔοικε λέξειν (“seems to have a lot to say” line 383). The audience, on the one hand, is confronted with feminine language, but ultimately the Chorus Leader ends on a masculine-coded word, λέξειν as opposed to the earlier use of λάλω when describing women. This, therefore, confirms the masculine identity of the

“women” at the Thesmophoria.

54 Austin and Olson, 2009, 174.

What follows is the first speech that favors Euripides being put to death.

MICA φιλοτιμίᾳ μὲν οὐδεμιᾷ μὰ τὼ θεὼ λέξουσ᾽ ἀνέστην ὦ γυναῖκες: ἀλλὰ γὰρ βαρέως φέρω τάλαινα πολὺν ἤδη χρόνον προπηλακιζομένας ὁρῶς ἡμᾶς ὑπὸ Εὐριπίδου τοῦ τῆς λαχανοπωλητρίας καὶ πολλὰ καὶ παντοῖ᾽ ἀκουούσας κακά.

By the two goddess, it is not for love of honor that I have risen to speak, o women; but rather I have carried this grievous suffering for a long time indeed, seeing us being grossly abused by Euripides, son of a greengrocer,55 and having heard many evil things of all kinds.

Ar., Th., 383-8

A definite confusion of both sex and senses happens immediately. The verb of speaking, λέξουσ᾽, is situated between two marked feminine phrases, the first being μὰ τὼ θεὼ “by the two goddesses.” According to

Austin and Olson “in Attic, oaths by ‘the twin deities’ refer to Demeter and Kore; they are used exclusively by women.”56 The address to women

(ὦ γυναῖκες) is marked feminine speech; yet, the dual character of Mica, as both female character and male actor, is thus highlighted by the corresponding ὁρῶς and ἀκουούσας. By juxtaposing the two senses, the confusion is amplified, and further exposes the male performers.

55 Sommerstein, 1995, 132.

56 Austin and Olson, 2009, 176.

MICA τί γὰρ οὗτος ἡμᾶς οὐκ ἐπισμῇ τῶν κακῶν; ποῦ δ᾽ οὐχὶ διαβέβληχ᾽, ὅπουπερ ἔμβραχυ εἰσὶν θεαταὶ καὶ τραγῳδοὶ καὶ χοροί, τὰς μοιχοτρόπους, τὰς ἀνδρεραστίας καλῶν, τὰς οἰνοπότιδας, τὰς προδότιδας, τὰς λάλους, τὰς οὐδὲν ὑγιές, τὰς μέγ᾽ ἀνδράσιν κακόν: ὥστ᾽ εὐθὺς εἰσιόντες ἀπὸ τῶν ἰκρίων ὑποβλέπουσ᾽ ἡμᾶς σκοποῦνταί τ᾽ εὐθέως μὴ μοιχὸς ἔνδον ᾖ τις ἀποκεκρυμμένος. δρᾶσαι δ᾽ ἔθ᾽ ἡμῖν οὐδὲν ὥσπερ καὶ πρὸ τοῦ ἔξεστι: τοιαῦθ᾽ οὗτος ἐδίδαξεν κακὰ τοὺς ἄνδρας ἡμῶν:

For what kind of evil has he not smeared us with? Where is there, in those places where there are spectators, tragic actors and chorus members that he has not slandered us; calling us adulterous whores, easy sluts, wine-os, traitresses, gossips, good for nothings, and a great curse to man? So that, immediately coming back from the theater seats, they eye us with suspicion, checking straight away that there isn’t some hidden lover inside. We’re not able to do anything now as we used to before, since that guy taught our husbands such evil things!

Ar., Th., 389-400

This passage has an overt metatheatrical agenda: by having Mica mention the spectators, actors, chorus, as well as the seats where theater goers sit, Aristophanes intends to remind the audience of their role in the comedy, to remind them they are in a theater. However, this standard message is complicated by further subtle references to “sex and senses”: while Euripides is the one who uses slanderous terms for the women, the men are defined as the ones to look for the hidden lovers, a 55

feminine trait according to the theory emerged in the prologue. These theoretical male lovers are unseen, which according to the theory is a feminine trait. This shows yet another confusion. From a performative perspective, this hidden lover line could be an indication to the costumed penis of the actors, which prompts a telling glance of the ‘chorus of women’ at their missing phallic costume. This would further expose their dual nature as both male actor and female character.

As the women come to demand the death of Euripides, they set a masculine tone with the marked language at the beginning and end of their speeches. Mica uses λέξουσ᾽ at line 384 and λέγω at line 431, while

Critylla uses ταῦτα λέξαι βούλομαι at line 445 and λέγω at line 453. After the women plead their case as to why they should punish Euripides,

Relative has his chance to defend him. Surprisingly, his disguise does not fail him yet, as he also marks the beginning and end of his speech in a similar way to the first two speakers (λέγω at line 474 and λέγει at line

513). What is interesting to note is the shift in person, and that while

Mica and Critylla both end with λέγω, Relative starts with it. Though they are similar, the audience is still directed to notice that they are different.

RELATIVE τὸ μὲν ὦ γυναῖκες ὀξυθυμεῖσθαι σφόδρα Εὐριπίδῃ, τοιαῦτ᾽ ἀκουούσας κακά, οὐ θαυμάσιόν ἐστ᾽, οὐδ᾽ ἐπιζεῖν τὴν χολήν. καὐτὴ γὰρ ἔγωγ᾽, οὕτως ὀναίμην τῶν τέκνων, μισῶ τὸν ἄνδρ᾽ ἐκεῖνον, εἰ μὴ μαίνομαι. ὅμως δ᾽ ἐν ἀλλήλαισι χρὴ δοῦναι λόγον: αὐταὶ γάρ ἐσμεν, κοὐδεμί᾽ ἔκφορος λόγου.

Women, it is no wonder that you are exceedingly angry with Euripides, who has spoken such bad things, indeed your anger is boiling over. For myself, I swear by my children, I hate that man, if I didn’t, I would be mad! Nevertheless, it is necessary that we exchange words with one another; since, we are alone, there is no one who will carry a report of our discussion off.57

Ar., Th., 466-72

Again, the “sex and senses” theory is muddled, as the marked feminine language (ὦ γυναῖκες, αὐταὶ) is juxtaposed with speaking words

(λόγον, λόγου). Relative asserts that male speech is to blame for their anger, (τοιαῦτ᾽ ἀκουούσας κακά), linking the ‘women’ on stage with the masculine sense. However, unlike Mica’s speech, the masculine λόγος surrounds the feminine αὐταὶ, showing how Relative is supposed to be completely recognized as a male, where Mica is understood as female.

57 Austin and Olson, 2009, 197.

CHORUS LEADER παύσασθε λοιδορούμεναι: καὶ γὰρ γυνή τις ἡμῖν ἐσπουδακυῖα προστρέχει. πρὶν οὖν ὁμοῦ γενέσθαι, σιγᾶθ᾽, ἵν᾽ αὐτῆς κοσμίως πυθώμεθ᾽ ἅττα λέξει.

Stop quarrelling! For some woman eagerly runs towards us. Before you all come at one another, Silence, so that we can learn from her the well ordered things she has to say.

Ar., Th., 571-3

Although the Chorus Leader refers to Cleisthenes as a γυνή, he is also welcomed to speak (573), another blending of the genders. This time, however, the effeminate Cleisthenes is able to reveal what the audience has known all along, that there is an imposter among them. The indication that the “women” at the Thesmophoria are not able to fully see that Cleisthenes is not, in fact, a woman, strengthens the assertion above.

CLEISTHENES Εὐριπίδην φάσ᾽ ἄνδρα κηδεστήν τινα αὑτοῦ γέροντα δεῦρ᾽ ἀναπέμψαι τήμερον.

They say that Euripides has sent an old man here today, one of his relatives.

CHORUS πρὸς ποῖον ἔργον ἢ τίνος γνώμης χάριν;

For which goal? Or to advance what plan?58

58 Sommerstein, 1995, 75.

CLEISTHENES ἵν᾽ ἅττα βουλεύοισθε καὶ μέλλοιτε δρᾶν, ἐκεῖνος εἴη τῶν λόγων κατάσκοπος.

So that he might spy on your speeches and what you wish and intend to do, and the things you were discussing.

CHORUS καὶ πῶς λέληθεν ἐν γυναιξὶν ὢν ἀνήρ;

But how could a man go unnoticed among women?

Ar., Th., 584-9

Finally, with the arrival of Cleisthenes, the “women” are able to finally reveal themselves to the audience. Line 589, if the assumption holds as stated previously, is a superb example of dramatic irony, as the chorus comments, ‘unknowingly,’ on their own failure to transform. The emphasis placed on ἀνήρ due to its position in the line is telling.

Aristophanes does not miss the chance to remind the audience here of

Relative’s transformation.

CLEISTHENES ἀφηῦσεν αὐτὸν κἀπέτιλ᾽ Εὐριπίδης καὶ τἄλλ᾽ ἅπανθ᾽ ὥσπερ γυναῖκ᾽ ἐσκεύασεν.

Euripides singed and plucked him and made him look completely like a woman.

RELATIVE πείθεσθε τούτῳ ταῦτα; τίς δ᾽ οὕτως ἀνὴρ ἠλίθιος ὅστις τιλλόμενος ἠνείχετο; οὐκ οἴομαι 'γωγ᾽ ὦ πολυτιμήτω θεώ.

Do you believe these things? What man is fool enough to let himself be plucked? As for myself, I don't believe a word of it.

Ar., Th., 590-4

Still, surprisingly, it is not this outburst of Relative that gets him exposed as the traitor. He is only found out through an interrogation.

The permeable boundary between male and female, sight and sound, helps Aristophanes challenge Athenian assumptions about the comic stage, accustomed to male actors portraying female characters. It is not a matter of simple costuming, the words also must convince the audience to abandon their pre-conceived notions and enjoy the humor of confusion.

CONCLUSION

The connection between women, seeing, and being unheard with men, hearing and being unseen is confused by the presence of the

“female” chorus. However, the “sex and senses” narrative starts to balance again once Relative is captured. After Euripides arrives to save him, the parody of tragedy takes over. There are a number of parodies of tragedy throughout the Thesmophoriazusae,59 and scholarship is abundant on the topic.60

The first characters on stage are all male; yet, due to the setup of the prologue, followed by the rescue attempts of the paratragedy, the entire stage transforms from all-male to all-‘female’. However, the “sex and senses” theory established in the prologue complicates this transformation. The metatheatrical effect of connecting the female and

59 Cf. Spatz, 1978, 103-115.

60 Cf. Bobrick, 1997; Bowie, 1993, ch. 9; Jendza, 2013; MacDowell, 1995; McClure 1999, 205-36; Miller, 1948, 174-83; Rau, 1967, 42-114; Stehle, 2002, 389- 401; Taaffe, 1993, ch. 3; Tzanetou, 2002, 329-67; and aZeitlin 1996.

male sexes with hearing and seeing creates both stability and confusion.

Furthermore, the dichotomies guide the audience to reveal to themselves the truth behind the masks of the “female” characters. The foreshadowing and dramatic irony created by this theory help drive the narrative forward, but also set up expectations that can be exposed and deceived. Taaffe shows that

“masculinity in this play cannot be completely disguised; its power will always reveal itself through any costume, even on stage.... [The Thesmophoriazusae] works to misrepresent women and to make a joke of male actors’ attempts to portray female figures in tragedy and comedy.”61

At the end of the day, Aristophanes uses a sophisticated tool to perform a function which is not unusual in ancient Greek drama. The internal characters and chorus both play a role in the problem with transvestment, and therefore he must use this intricate play with sex and senses to highlight the metatheatrical comments in the play. The mark of a good comedy is the ability to blend humor between simple, straight forward jokes and intricate, cultured ones. Aristophanes’ “fun” is making the jokes harder to understand, with the layers becoming even more layered; therefore, if you understand the more intricate jokes, you

61 Taaffe, 1993, 78.

can appreciate the play on a deeper level but if you don’t, you can still enjoy the play. Rather than an attempt to show it is absurd to ban women from the stage, in the end it is a clever attempt to unmask the process of transvestment and find comedy in unexpected places.

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