Is Polite Society Polite? Part 8

I will venture a word here concerning the subjective side of comedy. Is it the very depth and quick of our self-love which is reached by the subtle sting which calls up a blush where no sermonizing would have that effect? Deep satire touches the heroic within us. "Miserable sinners are ye all," says the preacher, "vanity of vanities!" and we sit contentedly, and say Amen. But here comes some one who sets up our meannesses and incongruities before us so that they topple over and tumble down. And then, strange to say, we feel in ourselves this same power; and considering our follies in the same light, we are compelled to deride, and also to forsake them.

The miseries of war and the desirableness of peace were impressed strongly on the mind of Aristophanes. The Peloponnesian War dragged on from year to year with varying fortune; and though victory often crowned the arms of the Athenians, its glory was dearly paid for by the devastation which the Lacedaemonians inflicted upon the territory of Attica. "The Acharnians," "The Knights," and "Peace" deal with this topic in various forms. In the first of these is introduced, as the chief character, Dikaeopolis, a country gentleman who, in consequence of the Spartan invasion, has been forced to forsake his estates, and to take shelter in the city. He naturally desires the speedy conclusion of hostilities, and to this end attends the a.s.sembly, determined, as he says:

To bawl, to abuse, to interrupt the speakers Whenever I hear a word of any kind, Except for an immediate peace.

This method reminds us of the obstructionists in the British Parliament.

One man speaks of himself as loathing the city and longing to return

To my poor village and my farm That never used to cry: "Come buy my charcoal,"

Nor "buy my oil," nor "buy my anything,"

But gave me what I wanted, freely and fairly, Clear of all cost, with never a word of buying.

After various laughable adventures, Dikaeopolis finds it possible to conclude a truce with the invaders on his own account, in which his neighbors, the Acharnians, are not included. He returns to his farm, and goes forth with wife and daughter to perform the sacrifice fitting for the occasion.

DIKaeOPOLIS

Silence! Move forward, the Canephora.

You, Xanthias, follow close behind her there In a proper manner, with your pole and emblem.

WIFE

Set down the basket, daughter, and begin The ceremony.

DAUGHTER

Give me the cruet, mother, And let me pour it on the holy cake.

DIKaeOPOLIS

O blessed Bacchus, what a joy it is To go thus unmolested, undisturbed, My wife, my children, and my family, With our accustomed joyful ceremony, To celebrate thy festival in my farm.

Well, here's success to the truce of thirty years.

WIFE

Mind your behavior, child. Carry the basket In a modest, proper manner; look demure; Mind your gold trinkets, they'll be stolen else.

Dikaeopolis now intones a hymn to Bacchus, but is interrupted by the violent threats of his war-loving neighbors, the Acharnians, who break out in injurious language, and threaten the life of the miscreant who has made peace with the enemies of his country solely for his own interests. With a good deal of difficulty, he persuades the enraged crowd to allow him to argue his case before them, and this fact makes us acquainted with another leading trait in Aristophanes; viz., his polemic opposition to the poet Euripides. Dikaeopolis, wis.h.i.+ng to make a favorable impression upon the rustics, hies to the house of Euripides, whose servant parleys with him in true transcendental language.

DIKaeOPOLIS

Euripides within?

SERVANT

Within, and not within. You comprehend me?

DIKaeOPOLIS

Within and not within! What do you mean?

SERVANT

His outward man Is in the garret writing tragedy; While his essential being is abroad Pursuing whimsies in the world of fancy.

The visitor now calls aloud upon the poet:

Euripides, Euripides, come down, If ever you came down in all your life!

'Tis I, Dikaeopolis, from Chollidae.

This Chollidae probably corresponded to the Pea Ridge often quoted in our day. Euripides declines to come down, but is presently made visible by some device of the scene-s.h.i.+fter. In the dialogue that follows, Aristophanes ridicules the personages and the costumes brought upon the stage by Euripides, and reflects unhandsomely upon the poet's mother, who was said to have been a vender of vegetables. Dikaeopolis does not seek to borrow poetry or eloquence from Euripides, but prays him to lend him "a suit of tatters from a worn-out tragedy."

For mercy's sake, for I'm obliged to make A speech in my own defence before the chorus, A long pathetic speech, this very day, And if it fails, the doom of death betides me.

Euripides now asks what especial costume would suit the need of Dikaeopolis, and calls over the most pitiful names in his tragedies: "Do you want the dress of Oineos?"--"Oh, no! something much more wretched."--"Phnix? "--"No; much worse than Phnix."--"Philocletes?"--"No."--"Lame Bellerophon?" Dikaeopolis says:

'Twas not Bellerophon, but very like him, A kind of smooth, fine-spoken character; A beggar into the bargain, and a cripple With a grand command of words, bothering and begging.

Euripides by this description recognizes the personage intended, _viz._, Telephus, the physician, and orders his servant to go and fetch the ragged suit, which he will find "next to the tatters of Thyestes, just over Ino's." Dikaeopolis exclaims, on seeing the ma.s.s of holes and patches, but asks, further, a little Mysian bonnet for his head, a beggar's staff, a dirty little basket, a broken pipkin; all of which Euripides grants, to be rid of him. All this insolence the visitor sums up in the following lines:--

I wish I may be hanged, my dear Euripides, If ever I trouble you for anything, Except one little, little, little boon, A single lettuce from your mother's stall.

This is more than Euripides can bear, and the gates are now shut upon the intruder.

Later in the play, Dikaeopolis appears in company with the General Lamachus. A sudden call summons this last to muster his men and march forth to repel a party of marauders. Almost at the same moment, Dikaeopolis is summoned to attend the feast of Bacchus, and to bring his best cookery with him. In the dialogue that follows, the valiant soldier and the valiant trencherman appear in humorous contrast.

LAMACHUS

Boy, boy, bring out here my haversack.

DIKaeOPOLIS

Boy, boy, hither bring my dinner service.

LAMACHUS

Bring salt flavored with thyme, boy, and onions.

DIKaeOPOLIS

Bring me a cutlet. Onions make me ill.

LAMACHUS

Bring hither pickled fish, stale.

DIKaeOPOLIS

And to me a fat pudding. I will cook it yonder.