Aristophanes Quotes

“Atheism or similar charges was not unusual among intellectuals, nor condemned by the masses. The prize-winning plays of Aristophanes were not merely atheist, but made fun of the gods and their prophets and oracles.”
― Benjamin Jowett, Phaedo

“I suppose I should have laughed even more uproariously at what happened next; as a newly anointed convert to the Old Comedy, I should have bounded to my feet, cried aloud, "Hallelujah!" and sung the praises of He Who Created Us, He Who Formed Us from the Mud, the One and Only Comic Almighty, OUR SOVEREIGN REDEEMER ARISTOPHANES, but for reasons all too profane (total mental paralysis) I could only gape at the sight of nothing less than the highly entertaining Aristophanic erection that Pipik had produced....”
― Philip Roth, Operation Shylock: A Confession

“Aristophanes, in Plato's "Symposium", is purported to suggest that human form was not always as it is today:

Originally, humans were spherical, with four arms, four legs, and two faces on either side of a single head. (In evolutionary terms, it's hard to see the advantage of this construction.) Such was their hubris that they dared to challenge the gods themselves. Zeus, in his wisdom, split the upstarts in two, each half becoming a distinct entity.

Since then, men and women have been running around in a panic, searching for their lost counterparts, in a desire to be whole again.

(Plato makes clear what he thinks of this theory by having Socrates casually dismiss it. We should at least give some credit to Aristophanes for originality.)”
― David Mazzucchelli, Asterios Polyp

“The audience want to see the pompous man made ridiculous, the braggart forced to eat his words, the cheater cheated; for this is right, this is what should happen to them; these characters are allegorical, this is what they exist for; they are facets of ourselves, isolated expressly to be ridiculed, not to be pitied or revered. This kind of humour is the essence of comedy and wit is the salt wherewith it is salted.”
― David Barrett