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A Literal Translation, with Notes.
Studies
Aristophanes in Print
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88 pages - You are on Page 56
DIONYSUS. To private gods of your own, which you have made after your own image?
EURIPIDES. Why, certainly!
DIONYSUS. Well then, invoke your gods.
EURIPIDES. Oh! thou Aether, on which I feed, oh! thou Volubility of Speech, oh! Craftiness, oh! Subtle Scent! enable me to crush the arguments of my opponent.
CHORUS. We are curious to see upon what ground these clever tilters are going to measure each other. Their tongue is keen, their wit is ready, their heart is full of audacity. From the one we must expect both elegance and polish of language, whereas the other, armed with his ponderous words, will fall hip and thigh upon his foe and with a single blow tear down and scatter all his vain devices.
DIONYSUS. Come, be quick and speak and let your words be elegant, but without false imagery or platitude.
EURIPIDES. I shall speak later of my poetry, but I want first to prove that Aeschylus is merely a wretched impostor; I shall relate by what means he tricked a coarse audience, trained in the school of Phrynichus.[472] First one saw some seated figure, who was veiled, some Achilles or Niobe,[473] who then strutted about the stage, but neither uncovered their face nor uttered a syllable.
[472] A dramatic poet, who lived about the end of the sixth century B.C., and a disciple of Thespis; the scenic art was then comparatively in its infancy.
[473] The Scholiast tells us that Achilles remained mute in the tragedy entitled 'The Phrygians' or 'The Ransom of Hector,' and that his face was veiled; he only spoke a few words at the beginning of the drama during a dialogue with Hermes.--We have no information about the Niobe mentioned here.
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