Tragedy and Comedy in the Frogs of Aristophanes

Abstract

Whenever we discuss the Frogs of Aristophanes we find ourselves discussing Athenian tragedy in the Frogs, because Frogs is the play that sends Dionysos down to Hades to recall the tragedian Euripides to Athens, the play that pits Aeschylus and Euripides against one another in a contest that provides one of the earliest specimens of Western literary criticism, and the play in which Aeschylus is finally resurrected to bring the Athenians the teaching that will save the city in its hour of distress. Athenian comedy in Frogs, in contrast, is a much less urgent topic, for while Frogs is a comedy, it does not seem to be about comedy in the same way that it is about tragedy. It includes no comic poets among its characters, it makes no mention whatsoever of comedy in the agōn of the tragic poets, and it even lacks the section of the parabasis praising Aristophanes' art, so familiar from the plays of the 420s. The few references to comedy that do appear in Frogs all occur in the first third of the play; after the parodos, there is silence.