Frogs by Aristophanes key characters and quotes
All characters:
Xanthias
Dionysus
Heracles
Corpse
Frog Chorus
Charon
Chorus of Initiates
Aeacus
Maid
Pandoceutria
Plathane
Pluto’s Slave
Aeschylus
Euripides
Pluto
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Prologue
Dionysus
“…not ‘I’m feeling the pressure.’”
“…don’t…” “…shift your pole around and say you need a dump”
“Wait until I really need to puke.”
“I come away with a year off my life”
“what comes of spoiling him” - comic role reversal
“pick up the donkey and carry him instead”
“How scared he was of me” - in reference to Heracles’ reaction
“While I was on board, reading Andromeda… a sudden desire filled my heart”
“Just a little one - the size of Molon”
“Don’t make fun of me, my brother”
“have you ever felt a sudden craving for lentil soup?”
“a craving consumes me - for Euripides”
“Those that aren’t dead are dread-ful” - in reference to the tragedians left
“Once they’ve got their hands on a tragic chorus they piss on the opportunity” - criticises contemporary playwrights
“the airy apartment of Zeus”
“the foot of time”
“a mind that refuses to swear an oath, but a tongue that’s sworn already, never mind the mind” - garbled Euripidean line
“I’m crrrazy for it”
“Stick to what you know - food!”
“the ports, the bakeries, the porn-shops, the rest-areas…” - Dionysus lists what he wants to know about the underworld
“What is the quickest route to the underworld?”
“That must be some kind of choke” - pun
“The universal power of two obols!”
Heracles
“what is all this?”
“I just can’t stop laughing”
“that lionskin on too of your little yellow number”
“For a woman?”
“Then for a boy?”
“For a man?”
“you were with Cleisthenes”
“Thousands of times in my life” - in reference to lentil soup
“I understand perfectly about lentils”
“Even though he’s dead?”
“It’s a load of cobblers”
“obviously complete and utter rubbish”
“You crazy fool”
“one way by rope and stool - involves a bit of hanging around”
“via pestle and mortar” (hemlock), “Your extrrremities get frrrozen rrright off”
“Tip-toe down to the Ceramicus” and “when the spectators say ‘Go!’ you go too.”
“It costs two obols”
Xanthias
“Should I tell one of the usual?”
“Shall I tell them a really funny one?”
“I’ve such a load… I’ll fart it all away…”
“woe is me”
“Why didn’t I fight in that sea-battle!” - Arginusae, slaves that fought were freed
“scared that you’re a maniac”
“No mention of me, with my shoulder completely worn away”
“No mention of me!” - repeated
“the only mystery is why I’m such an ass, carrying all this”
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Journey to the Underworld and Frog Chorus
Xanthias
“Please hire one of the corpses they’re taking for burial”
“Sanctimonious little bastard”
“I happened to have a bit of an eye infection at the time.”
“Hello, master”
“I can hear a noise”
“Behind”
“it’s in front”
“it’s a woman - absolutely gorgeous!”
“Lord Heracles”
“Dionysus, then”
“After the storm, a calm weasel”
“your tunic’s turned brown from fright”
“The airy apartment of Zeus or the foot of time?”
Dionysus
“Do you want to carry this luggage to the underworld?”
“God, too much”
“Here are nine obols”
“You are an honest, decent chap”
“Calling Charon. Come in, Charon”
“Oh, yes, me!”
“How can I? I’ve never tried, never been at see, never been near Salamis”
“Right-o”
“I am beginning to feel a pain/ - in the arse”
“you probably don’t care”
“To hell with your co-ax”
“My bum is wet/ And just about to poo”
“Song-loving race, please stop!”
“I’m borrowing your refrain”
“I knew I’d stop your co-ax in the end”
“He was just bragging to make me afraid” - about Heracles
“Get behind me”
“Get in front”
“Priest, save me - I’ll get you a drink after the show.”
“don’t use that name”
“That’s even worse!”
“Which god should I blame for my undoing?”
Corpse
“How many pieces?”
“It’ll cost two drachmas”
“we have nothing to discuss”
“Strike me alive if…”
Frog Chorus
“Bre-ke-ke-kex, co-ax, co-ax”
“A song for Dionysus”
“our Bacchic cry”
“When revellers/ On the Day of Pots/ Pass drunken/ Through my sanctuary”
“Mind your own business”
“loved by the Muses… by horn-footed Pan… Tuneful Apollo likes me, too”
“we’ll sing all the more”
“forggle-bubble-splash-dash” - Aristophanes would invent words
“That will cause us horrible pain”
Charon
“Ō-op. Bring her alongside.”
“Get on quickly”
“Yes, by Zeus. At your service.”
“I don’t carry slaves… if they didn’t fight for their lives in that sea-battle.”
“Sit at your oar”
“Your seat’s here, fatty”
“Put your hands forward and pull.”
“Stop being an idiot”
“The amazing melodies or swan-frogs”
“Stop, stop.”
“Give me the fare and get out”
\ \ \ \ \
Parados
Chorus of Initiates
“Iacchus”
“Graced by the graces”
“Holy dance of the sacred Mysteries”
“Keep silence and step aside from our dances”
“Any who know not the rights of the noble Muses”
“Any uninitiated/ In the Bacchic rites”
“creaming off the five per cent”
“gets someone to sponsor our enemies’ ships”
“The politician who takes a bite out of a comic playwright’s/ Earnings”
“To the saviour”
“I’ve lots of good jokes to tell”
“Let my mirth and jests prove/ Worthy of your festival”
“discover/ The delight of our festive song”
“join us, join/ The goddess”
“For you split my sandals and tore my cloak”
“At seven he’d still not cut/ His adult teeth”
“Cleithenes’ arsehole is plucking out its hairs/ And tearing its cheeks”
“Calias…/ Went off to fight at sea, hunting pussy”
“our ways are pious/ To each and every one, strangers, guests and all”
Xanthias
“wafting of pine torches”
“those initiates prancing around”
Xanthias and Dionysus interact with people in the Underworld
Xanthias
“get up quickly before someone sees you”
“You are the most cowardly of gods”
“very brave, by Poseidon”
“not Heracles, but Xanthacles!”
“Someone’s heading for trouble”
“That’s how he behaved all the time”
“I know what you’re thinking and you can stop it now”
“I don’t want to be Heracles”
“‘I, a slave and mere mortal!’”
“Gents, your advice is not bad”
“I’d just had the same thought”
“He’ll try to take it back”
“Don’t you come near me, you bastard”
“I’ll make you a fair offer”
“take this slave of mine and torture him”
“Don’t hit him with a leak - not even a little one”
“If he is a god, he won’t feel it”
“Whichever of us you see crying or pleading first”
“Attatai!!!!!”
“At what time will the festival of Heracles in Diomea take place?”
Dionysus
“Heracles the mighty”
“I’ve made a craprifice”
“Place a sponge on my heart”
“crept down to my bowels”
“since you are so courageous, swap places with me”
“Stop talking nonsense, Xanthias”
“What gods? How stupid and senseless”
“the idea that you, a slave and a mere mortal, could be the son of Alcmene!”
“Would it be all that amusing/ If Xanthias… All tangled up/ In luxury blankets and/ Snogging a dancing girl”
“I start buffing my chick-pea”
“May I die most horribly, if I don’t love you, Xanthias”
“Xanthy Wanthy”
“if I take the disguise from you ever, ever again, may I, my wife, and my children - and poor, gummy-eyed Archedemus - be utterly destroyed”
“Someone’s in trouble”
“This man steals someone else’s things and then starts brawling?”
“I’m a god. If you don’t listen, you’ll only have yourself to blame”
“When exactly?”
“How come I didn’t even sneeze?”
“Oooh, oooh!”
“I see men on horseback”
“It’s the smell of onions”
“I just wish you thought of that before you started hitting me”
Aeacus
“You disgusting, shameless, arrogant, brutal, totally brutal, most brutallest man”
“Tie this dog-napper up quickly so we can punish him”
“You going to fight me then?”
“What a decent chap you are”
“By Demeter, I can’t find out yet which of you is the god”
Maid
“O Heracles, darling, you have arrived”
“two or three pots of lentil soup”
“Come on in and join me”
“there’s this girl inside for you who plays the pipes”
“several dancing girls”
\ \ \
Chorus of Initiates
“If sound heart and mind/ Who’s well travelled”
“A true Theramenes”
“Your task… Is to find that old spirit again/ And once more look fierce”
“If you are caught/ Looking silly or soft/ You won’t have a chance”
Pandoceutria
“This is the bastard who came into our inn one day and ate sixteen of our loaves”
“twenty braised steaks”
“an awful lot of garlic”
“you weren’t expecting me to recognise you again in those high-heeled boots”
“Go and call that man Cleon. He’ll protect us”
Plathane
“the very man!”
“all that fresh cheese… baskets and all”
“if you see Hyperbolus, get him for me, then we can batter him”
“I’d like to hurl you down that pit”
Parabasis
Chorus
“Muse, attend our sacred dancing”
“take pleasure in our song”
“keener to win than Cleophon”
“Perched upon a foreign leaf”
“‘I’ll die if it’s a tie.’”
Chorus Leader
“It is right for a holy chorus to encourage and instruct a city in what’s good for it”
“all citizens should be treated as equals”
“anyone has been tripped or thrown by Phrynichus’ moves and made a mistake, I say their slip should be overlooked”
“no man in our city should be without rights”
“men who fought in a single sea-battle received Plataean citizenship”
“I’m all for it; it’s about the only sensible thing you’ve done!”
“men close in kin to you, should be forgiven that one disaster, should they ask”
“especially when our city’s fate depends on the sea”
“our city treats its finest citizens like her vintage coins and the new gold”
“we use these base bronze things”
“It’s the same with politicians”
“the base-metalled, copper-topped foreigners and criminals we rely on”
“change your ways and go for gold again”
“its a fine bit of timber from which you’re hanging!”
Xanthias and Pluto’s Slave
Xanthias
“All he cares about is boozing and bonking” - about Dionysus
“He’d have been sorry if he had!”
“having a grumble when you get outside after a sound beating?”
“a bit of snooping?”
“listening in to everything your masters say?”
“Did Aeschylus have no other supporters?”
“They’re going to weigh up tragedy like a lump of meat?”
Slave
“that master of yours is a decent fellow!”
“he didn’t beat you when you answered back”
“You’ve just done what I love doing”
“I curse my master behind his back”
“it feels like I’m in heaven”
“yes, I like that too!”
“there’s nothing better!”
“It drives me crazy!”
“Orgasmic”
“he began to show off to the villains and muggers, the father-murderers and thieves” - Euripides
“The crowd kept yelling for a trial”
“he’s intending to do a Cleidemides and sit in reserve” - Sophocles
“their poetry will be placed in the balance”
“get out their rulers and word-measures, their set-squares…”
“their compasses and wedges”
The Agon
Dionysus
“Say a prayer, too, each of you, before your speech”
“Not a grunt”
“I rather liked the silences”
“Shut up”
“what sort of bird a yellow cock-horse is”
“everyone… gets back home/ And shouts at his servants asking…”
“Death” - what those who fail as poets deserve
“not a hint of sex from you” - to Aeschylus
“and how to fart in the face of the rower below”
“Hermes learned to rob tombs from his dad”
“Just buy the bottle”
“stop that singing now!”
“until I say ‘cock-a-doodle-doo’.”
Aeschylus
“you grocer’s sprout?”
“cocky-cripple monger”
“my poetry has not died with me as it has with him”
“Demeter, who nourishes my mind”
“Alas, I am undone!”
“you complete ignoramus” - to Dionysus
“Easier to explain than your own” - to Euripides
“Outrageous!”
“why should we admire a poet?”
“noble and tall” characters in his plays in contrast to “cheats and villains” in Euripides’
“My plays were full of war”
“taught people to yearn for a foe to defeat”
“Orpheus” “Musaeus” and “divine Homer” - compares himself to ancient poets
“No one can say there’s anything erotic in the women I have created”
“a poet should keep bad examples hidden”
“You degraded all the fine things I introduced”
“you dressed kings in rags to make them seem pitiable”
“you taught people to waste their time in idle chatter and gossip”
“Became? He never stopped!” - In response to Euripides calling Oedipus a “lucky man”
“with a little bottle of olive oil - I will destroy your prologues”
“lost his little bottle”
“He… borrows everything from brothel ballads to romantic love songs, traditional and exotic, dirges and dances”
“Spi-i-i-i-in”
“grief, grief” “tears, tears”
“River Spercheius, and haunts of grazing herds”
“Alone of all the gods, Death desires not gifts”
“Chariot on chariot, corpse on corpse”
Euripides
“I claim to be a greater artist than him”
“He’ll make a grand opening, gesticulating portentously”
“A ponderous, bragging bundle of boasts”
“I pray to other gods”
“Air… tongue… native wit and keen-scented nostrils”
“a charlatan and a cheat” - Aeschylus
“they’d utter not so much as a grunt”
“And the chorus would thump out ode after ode”
“he would utter a dozen words as weighty as an ox”
“Not one word he spoke was clear”
“tiny extracts”
“gossip straight from the press”
“The first person on stage would immediately explain the background”
“no character remain idle”
“slave and women, young and old, would speak just as much as their masters”
“My drama was democratic”
“I taught these people here to speak freely”
“I introduced domestic scenarios”
“For his cleverness and good advice”
“Shouldn’t you communicate on a human scale?”
“your mistake is even worse than I thought”
“Aeschylus has told us the same thing twice”
“If I say the same thing twice… spit on me”
“You’re talking nonsense”
“Ayee the blow, come you not nigh to the rescue?” - repetitive
“Phlatto-thratto-phlatto-thrat”
“If only the ship Argo had not flown on her winged way”
“Persuasion has not temple other than reason”
“a wooden cudgel/ Weighted with iron”
Chorus
“Linch-pins and perfectly carved concepts”
“The galloping words of attack”
“hurl forth riveted/ Phrases”
“Picking away at the words he’s split ‘til it’s all/ Puff and nonsense”
“carefully planned/ And crafty moves”
“Begin the steps of war!”
“Neither lacks spirit or daring”
“don’t let that temper of yours/ Take hold and whisk you off course” - to Aeschylus
“A violent clash is on us”
“Attack, strip back the layers”
“They’ve got the book and grasped the finer points” - about the audience
“I wonder how he’ll criticise/ This Bacchic king” - Euripides criticising Aeschylus
“I’d have suspected someone/ Was talking bollocks”
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The Final Decision
Dionysus
“Good friends, I won’t judge them”
“One I consider clever, the other I enjoy”
“Whoever seems most likely to give useful advice, he’s the one I think I should take”
“it is forced to use them”
“I’ll take Aeschylus”
“Aeschylus is the winner”
“I’m relieved at the outcome”
Pluto
“Then you won’t achieve what you came for”
“You may take whoever you prefer back with you”
“save our city with your good advice”
Aeschylus
“One shouldn’t raise a lion cub in the city. But once it’s grown, you’d better treat it well”
“Men of honour?”
“And it likes the wicked?”
“they consider the enemy’s land their own; their own land the enemy’s”
“their ships show the way; a way that shows there is no other way”
“give my chair to Sophocles”
Euripides
“I hate a man who’s slow to aid his country but quick to cause deep harm”
“trust what we now mistrust”
“used those we currently reject”
“our current misfortune is down to them, mightn’t we find salvation by doing the exact opposite?”
“you lousy shit” - to Dionysus
Chorus
“Blessed is the man/ WHo’s quick to understand”
“Here’s one who’s got some sense”
“Refinement doesn’t mean/ Sitting with Socrates in idle chatter”
“Grant the city good advice that brings great benefits”
“May our great troubles… End completely”