On my dad, “MC Hammer”, and Dikaiopolis

Before I begin this post, let me recommend an excellent video about Aristophanes’ historical context that focuses on Acharnians and Knights: I can’t find the name of the guy who made this video, but he knows what he’s talking about and has a great intuitive sense of where Aristophanes came from and what he was

Can young people handle free speech?

Acharnians, Aristophanes’ first play that has survived in full, was produced at the Lenaia festival in January 425 BCE, a mere nine months after Babylonians. While the apparent aim of Acharnians is to advocate for peace–and that is indeed one of its goals–it is, I think, most fruitful to consider it first and foremost part

Becoming Aristophanes

[Edited June 10 2021] Aristophanes, the greatest comic dramatist of ancient Greece, was born in the Athenian deme of Kydathenaion sometime in the 440’s BCE. Below is a map of Attica, with Kydathenaion circled: The deme was the smallest, most local administrative unit in the Athenian government; it was the place one called home. There

Ten theses on why Aristophanes matters

“Aristophanes” is one of those ancient Greek names that is for many people I meet vaguely familiar but hard to place…you know you’ve heard it somewhere, probably read a thing or two he wrote, but what exactly? In future posts I will look in detail at who Aristophanes was, when and where he lived, and