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Read Ebook: The Frogs by Aristophanes BCE BCE
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Ebook has 688 lines and 21596 words, and 14 pages
Editor: Charles W. Eliot
THE FROGS OF ARISTOPHANES
The Harvard Classics
Nine Greek Dramas
Translations By
E D A Morshead E H Plumptre Gilbert Murray And B B Rogers
With Introductions And Notes
VOLUME 8
INTRODUCTORY NOTE
THE FROGS OF ARISTOPHANES
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
THE GOD DIONYSUS
AESCHYLUS
EURIPIDES
HERACLES
PLUTO
A CORPSE
A MAIDSERVANT OF PERSEPHONE
A LANDLADY IN HADES
A CHORUS OF FROGS
A CHORUS OF INITIATED PERSONS
Women worshipping Iacchus;
Shall I crack any of those old jokes, master, At which the audience never fail to laugh?
XAN. Nothing else smart?
XAN. Come now, that comical joke?
DIO. With all my heart. Only be careful not to shift your pole, And--
XAN. What?
DIO. And vow that you've a bellyache.
XAN. May I not say I'm overburdened so That if none ease me, I must ease myself?
DIO. For mercy's sake, not till I'm going to vomit.
XAN.
What! must I bear these burdens, and not make One of the jokes Ameipsias and Lycis And Phrynichus, in every play they write, Put in the mouths of all their burden-bearers?
DIO.
Don't make them; no! I tell you when I see Their plays, and hear those jokes, I come away More than a twelvemonth older than I went.
XAN.
DIO.
Now is not this fine pampered insolence When I myself, Dionysus, son of--Pipkin, Toil on afoot, and let this fellow ride, Taking no trouble, and no burden bearing?
XAN. What, don't I bear?
DIO. How can you when you're riding?
XAN. Why, I bear these.
DIO. How?
XAN. Most unwillingly.
DIO. Does not the donkey bear the load you're bearing?
XAN. Not what I bear myself: by Zeus, not he.
DIO. How can you bear, when you are borne yourself?
DIO.
Then since you say the donkey helps you not, You lift him up and carry him in turn.
XAN.
O hang it all! why didn't I fight at sea? You should have smarted bitterly for this.
DIO.
Get down, you rascal; I've been trudging on Till now I've reached the portal, where I'm going First to turn in. Boy! Boy! I say there, Boy!
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