Aristophanes' THESMOPHORIAZUSAE (The Women's Festival) Complete

A Literal Translation, with Notes.

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SERVANT. ... is going to construct the framework of a drama. He is rounding fresh poetical forms, he is polishing them in the lathe and is welding them; he is hammering out sentences and metaphors; he is working up his subject like soft wax. First he models it and then he casts it in bronze ...

MNESILOCHUS. ... and sways his buttocks amorously.

SERVANT. Who is the rustic who approaches this sacred enclosure?

MNESILOCHUS. Take care of yourself and of your sweet-voiced poet! I have a strong instrument here both well rounded and well polished, which will pierce your enclosure and penetrate your bottom.

SERVANT. Old man, you must have been a very insolent fellow in your youth!

EURIPIDES (to the servant). Let him be, friend, and, quick, go and call Agathon to me.

SERVANT. 'Tis not worth the trouble, for he will soon be here himself. He has started to compose, and in winter[546] it is never possible to round off strophes without coming to the sun to excite the imagination. (He departs.)

MNESILOCHUS. And what am I to do?

EURIPIDES. Wait till he comes.... Oh, Zeus! what hast thou in store for me to-day?

[546] The Thesmophoria were celebrated in the month of Pyanepsion, or November.

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