Fletcher Flora - Lysistrata

“Indeed,” said Theoris, “it must have been terrible.”

“So it was,” said Lysistrata. “One might be inclined to think, after a mess like this, that men would get sensible and take up ordinary living again. Nothing of the sort. They kept right on being as pigheaded as ever about the war.

“One thing about it, Pericles got the plague himself and died of it, which served him right in my opinion, and the worst thing to come of it was that the men who got control of things afterward were even less sensible than he was, if you can believe it.

“There was one fairly sensible man named Nicias who thought it would be a good idea to stop the war and resume activities like fishing and farming and other kinds of work, but there was another man against him who was called Cleon the Tanner and he had no sense whatever. Naturally it was the one with no sense who was voted into office that gave him control of affairs.

“This Cleon was a spellbinder who removed his cloak and beat his thigh when he made a speech to the people, and he made a great point of passing himself off as a common workingman, which he surely wasn’t, because any common workingman would rather work than fight a foolish war with no sense in it. And Cleon was for the war, first and last, and the truth was, he made a lot of money out of it.

“There were a lot of battles here and there that didn’t prove much of anything one way or another, except the idiocy of Greeks, and finally, after quite a long time, there was a big fight in the country of Thrace, and Cleon got himself killed in this fight, which was a good thing. The only thing wrong with it, to be truthful, was that it didn’t happen much sooner than it did. After Cleon was dead, old Nicias finally got people to listen to him, and there was a peace made that didn’t last long, and one reason it didn’t last long was Alcibiades.

“Alcibiades was considered by many a glamorous character, and still is, and he was especially eager to be a war hero. His father was killed in some earlier battle, and after this, Alcibiades went to live with Pericles himself, who did a very sloppy job of bringing him up, if you can judge by results. Alcibiades was an insolent brat for a fact, and Socrates the philosopher took a fancy to him and tried to call him to virtue, as the saying goes, but Alcibiades didn’t answer the call appreciably. What he really needed, if you ask me, was a few good beatings. He ran around the streets and threw wild parties and slept with the hetairai, and finally he got married to a girl named Hipparete, whose father he’d previously slapped in the face publicly. But this didn’t settle him down much, and Hipparete tried to get a divorce, but couldn’t do it, and finally died young as the only way out of it. Alcibiades’ father had left him a lot of money, and he lived about as high as it was possible to live, but he also gave big donations to this or that cause, and this kept him popular, of course, for anyone who gives away money is always popular. The truth was, he was spoiled and arrogant and got away with a great deal. He finally did something that almost got him into serious trouble. He knocked the phalli off all the statues of Hermes around town.

“Hermes, as you know, is a god who is held in great respect in Athens, and it was considered the worst kind of sacrilege. It wasn’t ever definitely proved that Alcibiades did it, but everyone was certain that he did, and they intended to take him into court for it, but in the meantime, he’d got himself elected one of the Ten Generals and was off to Sicily on an expedition against Syracuse. After he was gone, it was discovered that he’d been participating in ceremonies mocking the Eleusinian Mysteries, and he’d done this with some of his cronies just for fun. But no one else seemed to see the humor in it, and in fact everyone was pretty upset, and they sent a ship to bring him back for trial, but he slipped off to Sparta and slept with the Queen and went on to Persia when the King got annoyed about it.”

“Certainly,” said Theoris, “he was very accomplished in certain ways.”

It was evident that she was already admiring Alcibiades very much, and Lysistrata looked at her sternly and shook her head.

“You will have less admiration for him,” she said, “when I have finished. Before the expedition sailed for Sicily, which turned out to be a great mistake, the crazy men of Athens, under the influence of Alcibiades, attacked the little island of Melos and captured the people there. They killed off all the men and slapped the women and children into slavery and gave the entire island to a gang of Athenians who went there to live and farm it. All of this was just a kind of warmup for the business in Sicily, the idea being to capture the town of Syracuse. Alcibiades thought that this was really going to be the road to glory, but as I said, he was jerked out of it because of the Eleusinian Mysteries thing. This was a lucky break for him in the end, because the Syracusans happened to be very tough and hard to beat.”

“You are right,” Theoris said sadly. “I am admiring him less and less.”

“Well, never mind. You will recover nicely, I imagine. This was a very big expeditionary force, and it practically depleted the Athenian treasury. There were almost thirty thousand troops and sailors on about a hundred and fifty triremes, and besides these there were many smaller boats hauling supplies. Three generals were in charge, including Alcibiades, but he was jerked out of it before the campaign got under way.

“After a lot of fighting back and forth for a long time, the Syracusans captured all the Athenian army that hadn’t already been killed, and they threw what was left into the stone quarries. The two generals were executed, instead of being permitted to die slowly in the quarries. One of these generals was no one but old Nicias, who hadn’t wanted to fight in the first place.

“This occurred not long ago, and all this foolishness has been going on for nearly twenty years, impossible as it seems, and Sparta is now back in the fight and defeating Athenian forces here and there around the country, and things are bad all over. In my judgment, it is time to end it, even at the price of abstinence.”

“I agree that it is a terrible war,” said Theoris, “but it is also a terrible price.”

“Well,” said Lysistrata, sighing, “however that may be, we must now forget the past and consider the present. It is practically certain that Lycon has gone off to the marketplace, where he will talk and loaf all day with his cronies, and it’s just as certain that he will bring them home to dinner this evening, and so you had better make sure that the kitchen force has plenty of wine and cheese and Boeotian eels. You had also better make sure that the table and couches are prepared in his rooms. As for me, I have decided that there are going to be some changes made around here, and I don’t intend to be bothered with it.”

Theoris went away to do as she was told, and Lysistrata got up and put on a clean peplos. Since the house was small and scantily furnished in the current fashion, there was very little to occupy her, the slaves doing most of what needed doing, and she concerned herself throughout the day with trifles. In the evening, after bathing at the marble basin in the bathroom, she applied the scented unguents and oils in the prescribed places and painted her cheeks and lips. Last of all, she put on a robe of thin purple material that was certain to send Lycon’s blood pressure soaring. She didn’t do this because she intended for an instant to concede, but only because she understood slyly that the sustenance of Lycon’s frustration was contingent upon renewed desire.

A short while later, as she had anticipated, he arrived from the market in the company of Acron and Cadmus.