Plutarch Comparationis Aristophanis et Menandri compendium 1

[1] In general he ¹ much prefers Menander, and in particular he adds what follows:

Coarseness, he says, in words, vulgarity and ribaldry are present in Aristophanes, but not at all in Menander; obviously, for the uneducated, ordinary person is captivated by what the former says, but the educated man will be displeased. I refer to antitheses and similar endings and plays on words. For of these Menander does make use with proper consideration and rarely, believing that they should be treated with care, but Aristophanes employs them frequently, inopportunely, and frigidly; for his punning is applauded, he says, in

because he soused the bankers -

Though they never were that but damn curs, ²

and

This fellow blows an ill north-east or calumny, ³

and

Give him a belly-punch in his bowels and guts, ⁴

and

By laughter driven I soon shall be in Laughter-town, ⁵

and

Whatever shall I do to you, you wretched pot,

When gone the way of pots? ⁶

and

Since, women, what he does to us are evils wild,

For one who e’en himself in the wild-greens market grew, ⁷

and

But look, the moths have eaten up my plumes entire, ⁸

and

Lam.

I say, bring here my shield’s round orb all Gorgon-faced.

Dic.

I say, hand me a flat-cake’s orb all faced with cheese, ⁹

and many things of the same sort. Moreover, in his diction there are tragic, comic, pompous, and prosaic elements, obscurity, vagueness, dignity, and elevation, loquacity and sickening nonsense. And with all these differences and dissimilarities his use of words does not give to each kind its fitting and appropriate use; I mean, for example, to a king his dignity, to an orator his eloquence, to a woman her artlessness, to an ordinary man his prosaic speech, to a market-lounger his vulgarity; but he assigns to his characters as if by lot such words as happen to turn up, and you could not tell whether the speaker is son or father, a rustic or a god, or an old woman or a hero.

[1] To speak in sum and in general, he prefers Menander by far; and as to particulars, he adds what here ensues. Aristophanes, he saith, is importune, theatric, and sordid in his expression; but Menander not so at all. For the rude and vulgar person is taken with the things the former speaketh; but the well-bred man will be quite out of humor with them. I mean, his opposed terms, his words of one cadence, and his derivatives. For the one makes use of these with due observance and but seldom, and bestows care upon them; but the other frequently, unseasonably, and frigidly. For he is much commended, said he, for ducking the chamberlains, they being indeed not chamberlains ( ταμίαι) but bugbears ( Λαμίαι). And again,— This rascal breathes out nothing but roguery and affidavitry; and Beat him well in his belly with the entrails and the guts; and, I shall laugh till I go to Laughington ( Γέλαν); and, Thou poor sharded ostracized pot, what shall I do with thee? and, To you women surely he is a mad plague, for he grew up himself among these mad worts;—and, Look here, how the moths have eaten away my crest; and, Bring me hither the gorgon-backed circle of my shield; Give me the round-backed circle of a cheese-cake;—and much more of such like stuff. ¹ There is then in the structure of his words something tragic and something comic, something blustering and something prosaic, an obscurity, a vulgarness, a turgidness, and a strutting, with a nauseous prattling and fooling And as his style has so great varieties and dissonances in it, so neither doth he give to his persons what is fitting and proper to each,—as state (for instance) to a prince, force to an orator, innocence to a woman, meanness of language to a poor man, and sauciness to a tradesman,—but he deals out to every person, as it were by lot, such words as come next to his hand, and you would scarce discern whether he that is talking be a son, a father, a peasant, a God, an old woman, or a hero.