27 Quotes By Aristophanes For A Broader Horizon
Aristophanes, also known as the father of comedy, was a Greek playwright, known for his humor which he inculcated in his plays. Only few of his 40 plays have been retrieved which eventually created a genre of its own known as ‘Old Comedy’. His notable works include The Clouds, The Wasps, The Birds, Lysistrata, The Frogs and The Poet and the Women. Compared to his contemporaries, his work depicted the lives of the people of ancient Athens more realistically. Comic Drama was a popular genre during his era but it was only due to Aristophanes that the Old Comedy genre truly bloomed. His criticism for primary figures in Athens in terms of religion, politics and arts, gave an impression of opposition of new radical thoughts which were prevalent in Ancient Greece. In the later years somehow, there seemed a gradual decline in the following of Old Comedy due to advent of New Comedy with realistic plots. We have collected Aristophanes’ most famous quotes from his writings. Browse through some of these quotes from this genius from Ancient Greece.
Youth ages, immaturity is outgrown, ignorance can be educated, and drunkenness sobered, but stupid lasts forever.
Open your mind before your mouth
Quickly, bring me a beaker of wine, so that I may wet my mind and say something clever.
By words the mind is winged.
To win the people, always cook them some savoury that pleases them.
Wise people, even though all laws were abolished, would still lead the same life.
High thoughts must have high language.
Let each man exercise the art he knows.
Love is merely the name for the desire and pursuit of the whole.
![[Y]ou possess all the attributes of a demagogue; a screeching, horrible voice, a perverse, crossgrained nature and the language of the market-place. In you all is united which is needful for governing.](https://www.wisdomly.net/images/quotes/aristophanes-5675.jpg)
[Y]ou possess all the attributes of a demagogue; a screeching, horrible voice, a perverse, crossgrained nature and the language of the market-place. In you all is united which is needful for governing.
It is from their foes, not their friends, that cities learn the lesson of building high walls
![[Y]ou [man] are fool enough, it seems, to dare to war with [woman=] me, when for your faithful ally you might win me easily.](https://www.wisdomly.net/images/quotes/aristophanes-5677.jpg)
[Y]ou [man] are fool enough, it seems, to dare to war with [woman=] me, when for your faithful ally you might win me easily.
A man can learn wisdom even from a foe
Under every stone lurks a politician.
How can I study from below, that which is above?
Chorus of old men: How true the saying: 'Tis impossible to live with the baggages, impossible to live without 'em.
Even if you persuade me, you won’t persuade me.
Under every rock lurks a politician.
Comedy too can sometimes discern what is right.
Lysistrata: To seize the treasury; no more money, no more war.
Shrines! Shrines! Surely you don't believe in the gods. What's your argument? Where's your proof?
Politics, these days, is no occupation for an educated man, a man of character. Ignorance and total lousiness are better.
Lysistrata: "Calonice, it's more than I can bear, I am hot all over with blushes for our sex. Men say we're slippery rogues--" Calonice: "And aren't they right?
Need a poet who can really write. Nowadays it seems like ‘many are gone, and those that live are bad’.12
![Chorus of women: […] Oh! my good, gallant Lysistrata, and all my friends, be ever like a bundle of nettles; never let you anger slacken; the wind of fortune blown our way.](https://www.wisdomly.net/images/quotes/aristophanes-5688.jpg)
Chorus of women: […] Oh! my good, gallant Lysistrata, and all my friends, be ever like a bundle of nettles; never let you anger slacken; the wind of fortune blown our way.
MEN Ah cursed drab, what have you brought this water for? WOMEN What is your fire for then, you smelly corpse? Yourself to burn?
