homo Aristophaneus

Definitions

A person with the characteristics and nature depicted in the comedies of the ancient Athenian playwright Aristophanes (c. 446 – c. 386 B.C.E.) as a literary figure, rather than a historically accurate Athenian person; an Aristophanic man.

rare, singular, singular-only

Equivalents

Examples

“Lest we exaggerate the difference between classes in real life, let⟳ us remember⟳ that our problem is essentially literary, not sociological: to explain⟳ the difference not between real peasants and real aristocrats, but between homo Aristophaneus and homo Platonicus.”

“Despite insistence that he was dealing with the literary man (‘homo Platonicus’ and ‘homo Aristophaneus’), and not the real Athenian aristocrat or farmer, [Kenneth] Dover tended to overlook the literary conventions: Pausanias in the ‘Symposium’ is not ‘homo Platonicus’ but simply one of the characters in the dialogue (who represents a fairly conventional aristocratic view⟳, according to all the evidence); Aristophanes’ world is presented through the rather murky glass of comic distortion and requires interpretation.”

“The evidence with which we must work⟳ is primarily artistic rather than popular. This means that what we will be examining is more homo Aristophaneus than real Athenian men and women, an artist's view⟳ of his world and the ways in which his imagination operated on the raw material of his life.”

“In 1964 [Kenneth] Dover thought abuse found in comedy and elsewhere revealed in homo Aristophaneus a different, more simple set⟳ of attitudes, and his work⟳ after 1964 can be seen as an attempt⟳ to apply⟳ the hostility towards sexual passivity he saw⟳ in this abuse onto the discourses of Plato and Aeschines.”

“We have⟳ to separate⟳ ourselves from Homo Aristophaneus of the 5ᵗʰ century B.C. The crucial difference is the use⟳ of pejorative language which we define⟳ as verbal references to certain areas of the human body which are considered social taboo – and therefore must be hidden, for we consider⟳ them "dirty". For Athenians, this was not something to be said in a euphemistic way, but as something to be enjoyed and talked about, as the human body was always available as a healthy and important part of life.”

Hellenic Heritage: Proceedings of the 2nd Riga International Hellenistic Conference

CEFR level