Aristophanes In Britain Old Comedy In The Nineteenth Century Classical Presences Swallow

Aristophanes In Britain Old Comedy In The
Nineteenth Century Classical Presences Swallow
download
https://ebookbell.com/product/aristophanes-in-britain-old-comedy-
in-the-nineteenth-century-classical-presences-swallow-55056588
Explore and download more ebooks at ebookbell.com

Here are some recommended products that we believe you will be
interested in. You can click the link to download.
Aristophanes In Performance 421bcad2007 Peace Birds And Frogs
Hardcover Edith Hall Amanda Wrigley
https://ebookbell.com/product/aristophanes-in-
performance-421bcad2007-peace-birds-and-frogs-hardcover-edith-hall-
amanda-wrigley-10131116
Aristophanes Essays In Interpretation Yale Classical Studies No 26
Jeffrey Henderson
https://ebookbell.com/product/aristophanes-essays-in-interpretation-
yale-classical-studies-no-26-jeffrey-henderson-2227860
The Political Theory Of Aristophanes Explorations In Poetic Wisdom
Aristophanes
https://ebookbell.com/product/the-political-theory-of-aristophanes-
explorations-in-poetic-wisdom-aristophanes-5260158
The Rivals Of Aristophanes Studies In Athenian Old Comedy David Harvey
John Wilkins
https://ebookbell.com/product/the-rivals-of-aristophanes-studies-in-
athenian-old-comedy-david-harvey-john-wilkins-46469700

Humanist Comic Elements In Aristophanes And The Old Testament B M
Lazarus
https://ebookbell.com/product/humanist-comic-elements-in-aristophanes-
and-the-old-testament-b-m-lazarus-49455192
Playing Around Aristophanes Essays In Celebration Of The Completion Of
The Edition Of The Comedies Of Aristophanes By Alan Sommerstein Kozak
https://ebookbell.com/product/playing-around-aristophanes-essays-in-
celebration-of-the-completion-of-the-edition-of-the-comedies-of-
aristophanes-by-alan-sommerstein-kozak-7282194
The Rivals Of Aristophanes Studies In Athenian Old Comedy David Harvey
https://ebookbell.com/product/the-rivals-of-aristophanes-studies-in-
athenian-old-comedy-david-harvey-11047220
Playing Around Aristophanes Essays In Celebration Of The Completion Of
The Edition Of The Comedies Of Aristophanes By Alan Sommerstein Lynn
Kozak
https://ebookbell.com/product/playing-around-aristophanes-essays-in-
celebration-of-the-completion-of-the-edition-of-the-comedies-of-
aristophanes-by-alan-sommerstein-lynn-kozak-7280324
Volume Humanist Comic Elements In Aristophanes And The Old Testament
Benjamin M Lazarus
https://ebookbell.com/product/volume-humanist-comic-elements-in-
aristophanes-and-the-old-testament-benjamin-m-lazarus-50341378

CLASSICAL PRESENCES
General Editors
   .
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 3/8/2023, SPi

CLASSICAL PRESENCES
Attempts to receive the texts, images, and material culture of ancient Greece and
Rome inevitably run the risk of appropriating the past in order to authenticate the
present. Exploring the ways in which the classical past has been mapped over the
centuries allows us to trace the avowal and disavowal of values and identities, old and
new. Classical Presences brings the latest scholarship to bear on the contexts,
theory, and practice of such use, and abuse, of the classical past.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 3/8/2023, SPi

AristophanesinBritain
Old Comedy in the Nineteenth Century
PETER SWALLOW
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 3/8/2023, SPi

Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, OX2 6DP,
United Kingdom
Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford.
It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship,
and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of
Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries
© Peter Swallow 2023
The moral rights of the author have been asserted
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in
a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the
prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted
by law, by licence or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics
rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the
above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the
address above
You must not circulate this work in any other form
and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer
Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press
198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Data available
Library of Congress Control Number: 2023940941
ISBN 978–0–19–286856–5
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192868565.001.0001
Printed and bound in the UK by
Clays Ltd, Elcograf S.p.A.
Links to third party websites are provided by Oxford in good faith and
for information only. Oxford disclaims any responsibility for the materials
contained in any third party website referenced in this work.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 3/8/2023, SPi

For Mum,
and Grandad
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 3/8/2023, SPi

OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 3/8/2023, SPi

Acknowledgements
I am lucky enough, at this early stage of my career, to have had many great
mentors whose wisdom, generosity, and belief in me has been so invaluable. Laura
Snook, Arlene Holmes-Henderson, and Gonda Van Steen have each helped me to
develop as a classicist and teacher, fostered my passions and supported me every
step of the way. I would also like to thank Jon Hesk who, while I was an
undergraduate at the University of St Andrews,ﬁrst encouraged me to pursue
an interest in reception studies.
I would not have been able to complete my PhD without the generous support
of the London Arts and Humanities Partnership, and a huge thank you too to the
many archives I visited during my research, held at the APGRD, Girton and
King’s Colleges Cambridge, KCL, Lewisham Library, the Morgan Library,
Dulwich College, Balliol College Oxford, the British Library, NHEHS, and other
locations I have surely forgotten. Archivists are undoubtedly the best kind of
people. Some of my research trips were generously supported with funds from
KCL and LAHP, and the Centre for Hellenic Studies at KCL kindly supported
some of the publishing costs.
I am very grateful for amateur Gilbert and Sullivan for many hours of ridiculous
frivolity and for many dear friendships; I am also grateful for my family because
they help me feel far more human than academia ever could. Also, my students,
who inspire me every day.
Above all, my sincerest, deepest and ever-enduring thanks to my wonderful
PhD mentor and friend, Edith Hall. She has been supervisor to countless brilliant
academics, and yet somehow always made me feel like I was her entire focus. Her
support, laser-like insights, and conviviality kept me going and helped me shape
my ideas into something resembling coherence. No thank you could ever be
enough.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 3/8/2023, SPi

OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 3/8/2023, SPi

Contents
List of Illustrations xi
1. Introduction 1
2. Out of Exile: Thomas Mitchell and John Hookham Frere 23
3. Swine before Pearls: Aristophanes at Play in Percy Shelley’s
Swellfoot the Tyrant 42
4. Aristophanes Burlesqued: J.R. Planché’sBirdsand Victorian
Popular Theatre 63
5. W.S. Gilbert, The English Aristophanes 90
6. The Glory and the Shame: Debating the Aesthetics of
Old Comedy 122
7. Aristophanes in thePhrontisterion: Performances of
Old Comedy at Schools and Universities 166
8. Women’s Aristophanes: Old Comedy and the Fight for
Gender Equality 201
9. Towards a Modern Aristophanes 231
10. Conclusion 260
Bibliography 263
Index 283
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 3/8/2023, SPi

OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 3/8/2023, SPi

List of Illustrations
Cover:Lysistrata Haranguing the Athenian Womenby Aubrey Beardsley.
Pen and ink on paper. Beardsley and Smith 1896: 12.
4.1 A scene from Planché’sBirds.‘Haymarket Theatre’(18 April 1846)
ILN: 253. 85
5.1 The distribution of classical references in Gilbert and Sullivan
operettas. 92
5.2 Rutland Barrington as Ludwig as Agamemnon (via Louis XIV)
inThe Grand Duke. Gilbert and Sullivan Archive (2013)‘The Grand
Duke: Illustrations of the Original Production’[Online].
Available at: https://gsarchive.net/grand_duke/html/pictures.html
(Accessed 13 August 2022). 93
5.3 A scene fromThe Happy Landby D.H. Friston.ILN(22 March 1873) 273. 106
5.4 Character design for two Utopian men by Percy Anderson. Victoria
& Albert Museum, Theatre and Performance Collection, S.3197-2015.
© Victoria and Albert Museum, London. 112
5.5 Photograph of two unidentiﬁed‘Utopian maidens’by Alfred Ellis.
The Morgan Library & Museum, New York, Gilbert and Sullivan
Collection, Record ID 200684. 113
6.1Lysistrata Shielding her Coynteby Aubrey Beardsley. Pen and ink
on paper. Beardsley and Smith 1896: Title Page. 158
6.2Lysistrata Defending the Acropolisby Aubrey Beardsley.
Pen and ink on paper. Beardsley and Smith 1896: 30. 159
6.3Cinesias Entreating Myrrhina to Coitionby Aubrey Beardsley.
Pen and ink on paper. Beardsley and Smith 1896: 44. 161
6.4The Toilet of Lampitoby Aubrey Beardsley. Pen and ink on paper.
Beardsley and Smith 1896: 4. 162
6.5The Lacedemonian[sic]Ambassadorsby Aubrey Beardsley.
Pen and ink on paper. Beardsley and Smith 1896: 50. 163
6.6The Examination of the Heraldby Aubrey Beardsley.
Pen and ink on paper. Beardsley and Smith 1896: 46. 164
7.1 Eton performs the Megarian scene fromAcharnians, c. 1850.
Illustration by Sydney P. Hall; reproduced from Johnstone 1870: 292. 172
7.2 Harrow performs theBrekekekexchorus fromFrogs, 1894.
‘Speech Day at Harrow’(14 July 1894)The Graphic: 6. 173
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 3/8/2023, SPi

7.3The Frogs,Dulwich College, 1898. Dulwich College Archive, with
kind permission of the Governors of Dulwich College. 178
7.4The Clouds, Dulwich College, 1909. Dulwich College Archive, with
kind permission of the Governors of Dulwich College. 179
7.5The Acharnians, Dulwich College, 1912. Dulwich College Archive,
with kind permission of the Governors of Dulwich College. 179
7.6 The 1883 CambridgeBirds. The second messenger (F.R. Pryor),
Iris (L.J. Maxse), and Peisetairos (M.R. James) in classical costume.
Etching by Robert Farren, reproduced from Farren 1884. 185
7.7 The 1883 CambridgeBirds. The chorus. Etching by Robert Farren,
reproduced from Farren 1884. 185
7.8 The 1883 CambridgeBirds. The orchestra and stage divided.
Etching by Robert Farren, reproduced from Farren 1884. 186
7.9 The 1883 CambridgeBirds. The poet (J.D. Ouvry), the soothsayer
(H.F.W. Tatham), the informer (L.N. Guillemard), and the parricide
(A. Fleeming Jenkin). Etching by Robert Farren, reproduced from
Farren 1884. 186
7.10 The set of the 1897 CambridgeWasps.Cambridge Greek Play2015b. 187
7.11 The 1897 CambridgeWasps. An actor in classical dress.
Cambridge Greek Play2015b. 188
7.12 The 1897 CambridgeWasps. A chorus-member in costume.
Cambridge Greek Play2015b. 189
7.13 The 1897 CambridgeWasps. Two dogs (H.R.L. Dyne and W.C. Mayne).
Cambridge Greek Play2015b. 189
7.14 The chorus of the 1903 CambridgeBirds.‘“The Birds”of Aristophanes
at Cambridge’(5 December 1903)ILN: 11. 191
7.15 The set of the 1909 CambridgeWasps.Cambridge Greek Play2015d. 192
8.1 Janet Case as Athena, 1885 CambridgeEumenides.Cambridge Greek Play
2015e. 203
8.2Medea, Bedford College and University College (1907). RHUL
archive PH/6/2/4/13. 205
8.3 Gertrude Kingston as Lysistrata (1910), reproduced from
Housman 1911: 2. 225
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 3/8/2023, SPi
xii  

1
Introduction
The reception of Aristophanes provides the perfect case study for what can be done
with a reception of an ancient work, because so many different thingshavebeen
done with Aristophanes. Old Comedy was being received widely in Britain
throughout the nineteenth century, in both high and low art forms, in translations
and commentaries but also in performance, poetry, prose, art, music, and theatre.
This book will explore a rich array of mediums and texts where Aristophanes either
explicitly or subterraneously has had an inﬂuence. Over the course of the long-
nineteenth century, Aristophanes was repeatedly but diversely used as a vehicle for
addressing contemporary political and artistic concerns, and was constantly being
reinterpreted and reactivated in line with the receiver’s own position.
Early in the nineteenth century, Aristophanes was interpreted almost exclu-
sively as a proto-Tory moralist scourge; we will see the birth of that inclination in
this chapter, before turning to two Tory translators of Aristophanes in Chapter 2,
Thomas Mitchell and John Hookham Frere, whose play-texts nevertheless dem-
onstrate two very different visions of Toryism. In Chapter 4, we will explore why
J.R. Planché’s explicitly pro-oligarchic, moralizing burlesque ofBirdsfailed to win
popular applause; and in Chapter 5, we will see how W.S. Gilbert similarly receives
Aristophanes and activates him for a satiric, political purpose, though with less
explicit partisanship. The political counterpoint is Percy Shelley, whose radical
Aristophanic playSwellfoot the Tyrant, explored in Chapter 3, provocatively
activates Aristophanes as anti-monarchic.
As we look to the latter half of the century, receptions of Aristophanes shift
away from party politics towards aesthetic treatments of the poet (Chapter 6). The
key inﬂuence here is John Addington Symonds, who writes an encomium for
Aristophanes as a poet rather than a political voice in hisStudies of the Greek Poets
(1873). Although Oscar Wilde, Algernon Charles Swinburne, Robert Browning,
George Meredith, and Aubrey Beardsley would not all agree with this assessment
of Aristophanes, their receptions of Old Comedy all engaged in this same aesthetic
debate. The key question had become not what Aristophanes’politics were, but
whether his plays were beautiful. This is the background against which we discuss
aestheticizing performances of Old Comedy at schools and universities in
Chapter 7. Of course, any claims these versions of Aristophanes make to being
‘apolitical’should invariably be problematized. As we will see, the very act of
‘depoliticizing’Aristophanes was, in many cases, a political act in-and-of-itself
and never pursued without ulterior motive.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
Aristophanes in Britain: Old Comedy in the Nineteenth Century. Peter Swallow, Oxford University Press.
© Peter Swallow 2023. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192868565.003.0001

Theﬁnal trend in Aristophanic reception traced is a shift back to (overt)
politics. Aristophanes around theﬁn de siècleis no longer read as a proto-Tory
scourge, but through the politics of socially liberal causes. Thus, versions of his
plays advocated women’s education and female suffrage, and in Chapter 8 we
explore some examples of this, looking at radical adaptations of Aristophanes
written by activist women. In ourﬁnal chapter, looking towards the twentieth
century, we see how Gilbert Murray and George Bernard Shaw both used
Aristophanes to discuss modern hopes and fears for a world on the brink of a
devastating war, blending an aesthetic appreciation of Old Comedy with a will-
ingness to read it politically. In long-nineteenth-century Britain, the question is
notwhetherAristophanes was being read, butwhichAristophanes was being read,
andby whom.
What Is Reception, What Is Aristophanes, What Is Britain?
Let me begin by brieﬂydeﬁning the scope of my study. I am reluctant to set
explicit parameters for what I mean by the long-nineteenth century, aware that
I will transgress them, but roughly speaking I take it to run from the French
Revolution in 1789 to the end of World War I in 1918. Over the course of these
130 years, bookended by two major conﬂicts that reverberated across Europe and
the world, there was an unprecedented amount of social and political change. But
there is an internal consistency to the long-nineteenth century, at least within the
British context. Many tensions still troubling Britain in 1918 were the same as
those of 1789; the so-called Woman Question, Irish Home Rule, the electoral
franchise and expansion of suffrage, anxiety about industrialization and modern-
ization, constitutional questions about the role of the monarchy, and so on. That
said, the earliest receptions I examine in depth, Thomas Mitchell’s translations
and textual editions of Aristophanes and Shelley’s Aristophanic playSwellfoot the
Tyrant, are both dated to 1820 (and thereafter, in the case of Mitchell), a
generation after the French Revolution. I have tried to reserve the term
‘Victorian’for anything or anyone that falls between 1837 and 1901, the years of
Queen Victoria’s reign.
I have been stricter with my geographical scope; it deals exclusively with
Britain. While I discuss the inﬂuence of Germany, France, and North America
wherever relevant, my interest is always in what is happening in Britain. I have not
considered the British Empire, either, for reasons discussed below.¹ One limitation
of the present study is its tendency to focus on London, Oxford, and Cambridge,
particularly in regards to theatrical performances. My justiﬁcation for this
¹ Strictly speaking, John Hookham Frere published his translations of Aristophanes in Malta, then
part of the British Empire.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
2  

undeniably metropolitan focus is partially because London, Oxford, and
Cambridge were where Aristophanic receptions were being produced, and
where these receptions found an audience. My focus is also a reﬂection of the
archival record. While archives allow us to recover many pieces of information
about past societies, they are, ultimately, curated sources, and as such have always
privileged artefacts relating to the elite over anything else. This is most obvious in
Chapter 7, where I use newspaper reports on productions of Old Comedy to chart
the reception of Aristophanes in British schools. But newspapers have clearly
prioritized productions staged at a handful of elite public institutions, which may
have skewed the evidence. Put simply, there may well have been myriad more
receptions of Aristophanes happening across the country, across class divisions,
led by women as well as men—but if so, no archival record exists to prove this
(at least, as far as I have found).
Nevertheless, I would have ideally liked to be more inclusive, particularly of
women’s receptions (an issue I also address in Chapter 8). The present study
should, ultimately, only be treated as a starting point, and I anticipate and
welcome further research being done on this important topic. As this is theﬁrst
major study of Aristophanes’nineteenth-century British reception, I hope it will
be judged on that basis—as aﬁrstforay. With that being said, I have tried to be as
broad-minded as possible with the mediums studied, which range from the
popular theatre to academic translations and editions of texts.
Undoubtedly the hardest term in my title to deﬁne is‘Aristophanes’. In a purely
encyclopaedic sense, we can say that Aristophanes is the only playwright who
wrote in the genre of Old Comedy for whom we have an extant work. Eleven of his
plays survive, all performed in Athens between the middle of theﬁfth century
and the early years of the fourth, as well as signiﬁcant fragments. But beyond that,
what we mean when we say Aristophanes, or, worse, the adjectival‘Aristophanic’,
is debatable.‘We ought to tread with some caution when we see his name
invoked—especially when we see texts or writers of very different sorts being
labelled“Aristophanic”.’² The Aristophanes of Shelley was not the same
Aristophanes of Mitchell, although both were writing at similar times. On balance,
however, the most complex receptions of Aristophanes explored in this study are
successful (or at least, interesting) because they understand the vital force of Old
Comedy as a genre deﬁned by its sociality and by humour. Receptions which
attempt to co-opt Aristophanic politics, or cauterize Aristophanic humour in all
its richness, do so to their own demerit. I do not mean to ascribe a particular
political motive to Aristophanes, and I certainly do not want to suggest there is
only one way to receive his texts—that would be to undermine one of the central
precepts of reception studies, that‘meaning...isalways realized at the point of
² Kinservik 2016: 109.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
3

reception’.³ Attentive readers may identify my own politics as we go along, but
I do not relitigate the well-trodden scholarly debate over Aristophanes’political
views, either. That would also have no part in a discussion about reception, and
I would rather leave the debate to the receptions we will explore.
I have limited my scope only to those texts which display a speciﬁc textual
link to the works of Aristophanes, whether they are direct translations or adap-
tations, or because the authors of these receptions declare the link to Aristophanes
openly, or in a few cases because that subterranean intertextual link quickly
reveals itself on close examination.⁴For me, Aristophanes is a living being lying
behind each case study; the Aristophanic, in this narrow sense, is an almost
tangible, philological bridge between source and reception. I do not mean by
this to refer to the historical Aristophanes, certainly not any Aristophanes who
exists apart from his texts and their reception. So in this sense, when I use
‘Aristophanes’I am being metaphorical. But I have deliberately allowed slippage
between Aristophanes and his plays as a way of acknowledging his presence
underpinning every interaction with his texts. Barthes’powerful metaphor is
wrong—the author does not die. Certainly not classical authors, whose reputa-
tions are so often tied up in the way their texts continue to be read.
As Leonard advises,‘the“trace”of the past should be celebrated rather than
erased in the encounter between modern reader and classical text’.⁵This should
not preclude a wider deﬁnition of the Aristophanic which would incorporate texts
that share with Old Comedy a biting satire, an astute political consciousness and a
tendency towards destructive playfulness without any speciﬁc textual link;⁶what
we might call the‘Aristophanic spirit’certainly was alive and well in the Victorian
period and can be felt in everything from political journals likePunchto popular
entertainments and burlesques, even when it can’t be reduced to a simple
exchange.⁷Another monograph on this‘Aristophanic spirit’in long-nineteenth-
century Britain could and should be written. Rather, my decision to narrow my
deﬁnition of the philologically‘Aristophanic’is a purely practical one; there is
more than enough to be said about texts that are close receptions of Aristophanes,
so those are the ones I have chosen to focus on.
I have not, however, been so narrow in my use of the term‘receiver’—which is
to say, I am interested both in those who have received Aristophanes and then
refracted him on in rewritings, translations, adaptations or the like, but also those
who have received Aristophanes more passively,ﬁrst-hand, or through such
refractions. This is a study both of the texts produced under Aristophanic
³ Martindale 1993: 3.
⁴I here use‘text’in the broadest, Martindalean sense of the term as any work or medium that can be
read and interpreted.
⁵Leonard 2006: 118.
⁶What Heine calls hisWeltvernichtungsidee(1973:Bäder597); see Chapter 6.
⁷See esp. Chapter 4.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
4  

inspiration and the impact those texts have gone on to have on their audiences. Of
course, no reception of any text, however passing or uninspiring, can leave its
reader entirely unchanged.
The scope of this study in terms of the mediums covered prevents me from
outlining any monolithic methodology, other than to say in the broadest terms
possible that I will be interrogating each text or set of texts in the way that seems
most productive for those in question. At times, for example when we consider
school productions of Aristophanes in Chapter 7, this will take the form of a
survey of the material more than detailed analysis. There are also close textual
readings of speciﬁc key texts, like Shelley’sSwellfoot the Tyrantin Chapter 3 and
Shaw’sMajor Barbarain Chapter 9. In looking at translations and textual edi-
tions, I have brought in translation theory; I have used metrical analysis on poems
by Wilde and Swinburne in Chapter 6; in that chapter I also owe a debt to queer
theory; and so on. In general, I have followed the recommendation of Hall and
Harrop in the introduction toTheorising Performanceand‘order[ed my] theory
eclectically“à la carte”’.⁸
What persists is my use of reception theory (self-evidently) and the broader
framework of social history. My interest is always in the people reading
Aristophanes; how are they reading him, why, and how are they refracting him
back out into the world to be read again, even at a distance? I embrace Barthes’
understanding of a text as‘a multi-dimensional space in which a variety of writings,
none of them original, blend and clash’.⁹This blending and clashing of meanings is
the life-blood of reception, and the competing re-writings of Aristophanes’plays
have led to a varied reception of them in the long-nineteenth century. Reception is,
as Martindale notes, an active process,¹⁰but in the case studies I have chosen, also a
doublyactive process; it both actively receives, and actively refracts the reception.¹¹
But Martindale, following Derrida,¹² incorrectly minimizes the historicity of recep-
tion (Goldhill has robustly criticized him for this).¹³ Readers do not read in a
vacuum, so we must always consider the social and political context when exam-
ining any text; reception studies should not obfuscate the historical gap between
source and reception. And ifﬁnding out how Old Comedy was being read in the
long-nineteenth century tells us anything new about the genre, it will tell us much
more about the men and women doing the reading.
While I do occasionally make aesthetic evaluations, my methodology also rejects
Martindale’sﬁxation on texts that‘have been assigned positive aesthetic value’;¹⁴as
this study is concerned with social history, narrowing my scope to‘high art’would
be to neglect many important sources. What is different for the reception of
Aristophanes from, say, that of Aeschylus or Euripides is that he has only ever
⁸Hall and Harrop 2010: 4.⁹Barthes 1977: 146. ¹⁰Martindale 2006: 11.
¹¹ Jauss 1982: 19. ¹² Derrida 1988: 9f. ¹³ Martindale 2010; Goldhill 2010.
¹⁴Martindale 2010: 72.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
5

been semi-canonical; one only needs to look at his performance history in Britain
as compared to that of Greek tragedy to see that Aristophanes is not a widely
known or much-loved‘classic’, classical though he be. (This will be of central
importance to our discussion of Aristophanic burlesque in Chapter 4.) It has
therefore proven particularly vital to consider my texts’audiences, both intended
and actual; I am interested not only in receptions of Aristophanes, but also how and
with what Jaussian‘horizon of expectation’these texts were consumed.¹⁵
This study will follow a broadly chronological order, although my chapter on
W.S. Gilbert (Chapter 5) may be said to break the sequence. While it would make
a certain sense to take him after my Aesthetics chapter, to do so would create a
jarring shift in the genres being discussed.¹⁶I have also paid attention to thematic
and generic links between the chapters (which is why Chapter 5 directly follows
my chapter on burlesque). My intention here is to provide a persuasive and
comprehensible narrative indicating the shift in receptions of Aristophanes over
time. Finally, a brief note about Greek names; I have generally adopted the
spellings used by the authors I am discussing at any given time. There is therefore
no consistency across chapters about how I spell, for instance, Peithetairos.
Aristophanes So Far
Ever since Richard Jenkyns’(1980) and Frank M. Turner’s (1981) seminal works
on the subject, classical reception in the long-nineteenth century has been the
focus of sustained scholarly attention. Simon Goldhill’sVictorian Culture and
Classical Antiquity(2011) focusses on artistic responses to the ancient world,
saying little about more widespread, popular receptions of the classics that
ﬂourished in the nineteenth century; inClassical Victorians(2013), Edmund
Richardson explores several interestingﬁgures steeped in the ancient world,
from murderers to drunken burlesque theatre-writers, even if their nature as
outsiders makes them more interesting in themselves than as exemplars for
what is happening with classics at the time. More specialized studies have looked
at classics in the Victorian popular theatre,¹⁷the nineteenth-century classical
education system,¹⁸women’s responses to antiquity,¹⁹the intersection between
¹⁵Jauss 1982.
¹⁶That said, theﬁrst Gilbert play I discuss was written before Symonds published hisStudies of the
Greek Poets, so there is a chronological justiﬁcation to be made.
¹⁷Monrós Gaspar 2011: 125–204, 2015; Bryant Davies 2018a: 125–270, 2018b; Richardson 2003;
Hall 1999, Hall and Macintosh 2005: 350–429; see also Foster 2015.
¹⁸The undisputed expert here is Stray, who has written on Oxbridge extensively (1998, 2018,inter
alia). Little has been done on classical education at other universities, though a forthcoming volume by
Arlene Holmes-Henderson, Edith Hall, and James Corke-Webster,Classical Civilisation and Ancient
History in British Secondary Education,will hopefully provide a wider perspective.
¹⁹Hurst 2006; Olverson 2010; Hall and Wyles 2016; Prins 2017; Beard 2002.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
6  

classics and queer identity,²⁰classics and Victorian children’s culture,²¹ and more.
A People’s History of Classics(Hall and Stead 2020) hasﬁlled in many gaps
marring aﬁeld that has too often focussed on elite receptions of the ancient
world. Yet what has been almost entirely missing from these accounts of Victorian
classics has been Old Comedy. Jenkyns asserts that‘of all the great Greek writers
Aristophanes had the least inﬂuence in the last century. The Victorians did not
greatly value the comic muse.’²² Flip open the index of Goldhill or Richardson,
and you won’tﬁnd Aristophanes at all. If this book does nothing else, it will show
why such omission is unfortunate. Aristophanes deserves a place in the narrative
we tell about Victorian classicisms.
The study of Aristophanic reception has been slower to bloom, but is now
proving fruitful. Gonda Van Steen’s excellent monograph on Aristophanes in
modern Greece,Venom in Verse(2000), provided me with an early model of how
to approach my subject. Likewise, I owe much to three essay collections:
Aristophanes in Performance(2007), edited by Edith Hall and Amanda Wrigley;
Aristophanes and Reception(2014), edited by S. Douglas Olson; andBrill’s
Companion to the Reception of Aristophanes(2016), edited by Philip Walsh.
I am extremely grateful to Romain Piana, who graciously shared with me a copy
of his thesis on Aristophanic reception in eighteenth-, nineteenth- and twentieth-
century France. A study on the nineteenth-century reception of Aristophanes in
Germany was produced by Martin Holtermann in 2004, and in 1997 Marina
Kotzamani completed a thesis on late-nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century
productions ofLysistrata. Within Phiroze Vasunia’s excellent monograph onThe
Classics and Colonial India(2013) is a stand-out chapter on the Gujarati poet
Dalpatram Dahyabhai and his mid-nineteenth-century adaptation ofWealth,
produced under the shadow of British colonialism. I should also mention here
Greek Tragedy and the British Theatre(2005) by Edith Hall and Fiona Macintosh;
although about tragedy, not comedy, it has been invaluable. Yet none of these
focuses much on the speciﬁc intersection examined by this study, the long-
nineteenth-century British reception of Aristophanes.
Only two scholars have really approached this intersection before now. Philip
Walsh wrote his doctoral thesis onThe Modern Reception of Aristophanes(2008),
speciﬁcally looking at Britain, although the work is short and only offers a survey
of the material. Walsh has since published two papers drawn from this research,
one on the scholarly debate over Aristophanes’politics (2009) and one (in his
Brill’s Companion, 2016) on Old Comedy’s nineteenth-century translators. He
virtually bypasses the performance history of Aristophanes during this period.
Hall’sThe English-Speaking Aristophanes, 1650–1914(2007), published in
Aristophanes in Performance, is also a survey of the ground, though with its
²⁰Dowling 1994. ²¹ Marciniak 2016; Bryant Davies and Gribling 2020.
²² Jenkyns 1980: 79.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
7

greater scope and more attention paid to Aristophanic performance, it is even
lighter on speciﬁc details. This is something she readily admits; at the time of
publishing,‘the material ha[d] previously been so little researched that the major
part of the exercise inevitably takes the form of excavation of evidence and
narrative’.²³ This current study will therefore enhance the picture they have traced.
While Hall’s and Walsh’s studies have been insufﬁcient, they have allowed me to
move away from presenting another survey towards a more case-study-orientated
approach.
Aristophanes in the Empire?
This study has kept largely within the shores of Britain and has not explored
Aristophanes in the wider Empire. That is because I couldﬁnd little evidence that
Aristophaneswasreceived widely in the Empire, with the notable exception of
Dalpatram’s adaptation ofWealth. In part, this is a reﬂection on Aristophanes’
semi-canonical status, but there are other reasons why Aristophanes was kept out
of the hands of Britain’s colonial subjects. I shall take India as a case in point.
In the run-up to the passing of the 1835 English Education Act, which estab-
lished English as the language of instruction in India to replace teaching in Sanskrit
and Arabic, Council of India member Thomas Babington Macaulay released the
infamous‘Minute on Indian Education’. Throughout the memorandum, Macaulay
creates direct parallels between Indians learning English to the English learning
Greek, arguing that in both cases, the didactic process is civilizing. He argues for
‘the intrinsic superiority of the Western literature’over literature in Sanskrit or
Arabic, but there is no question of Indians being taught so-called Western Classics
instead.²⁴Nor indeed should local languages be taught, as‘the dialects commonly
spoken among the natives of this part of India contain neither literary nor scientiﬁc
information, and are moreover so poor and rude that, until they are enriched from
some other quarter, it will not be easy to translate any valuable work into them’.
English provided‘works of imagination not inferior to the noblest which Greece
has bequeathed to us’but was also‘the language spoken by the ruling class . . . [and]
spoken by the higher class of natives at the seats of Government’.
Based on Macaulay’s argument, two parallel but fundamentally unequal sys-
tems of education were maintained, underpinned by a hierarchy of language and
literature that placed Western Classics at the top, then English, then classical
South Asian languages, andﬁnally, at the very bottom, the demotic languages
actually spoken by the Empire’s colonial subjects. Britain’s social elite, for whom
Greece and especially Rome offered a model of Empire, were given a broadly
²³ Hall 2007: 66. ²⁴Macaulay 1835.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
8  

classical education; in much of the colonies, meanwhile, those subjects privileged
enough to receive an education were made to focus on English. Far from being a
benign project, the education system developed was deeply colonialist. As Kumar
explains,‘the curriculum . . . represented the values and visions of colonial bur-
eaucracy. The life of the local community found no reﬂection in the school’s
curriculum or in its daily routine.’²⁵One consequence of this educational apart-
heid was, of course, that most Indians were less able to receive Western classical
texts than their colonizers. It is hardly surprising, then, that Aristophanic recep-
tion in nineteenth-century India is limited.²⁶
At the same time,‘Victorian political and intellectual elites sought to manipulate
admission to the Indian Civil Service [at least in principle open to Indians] and used
it to further their own domestic agenda. As a consequence of their actions, Greek
and Latin played a prominent part in the training and examination of recruits to the
Indian Civil Service, especially in the second half of the nineteenth century.’²⁷This
effectively barred most Indian students from passing examinations. Restricting
access to Latin and Greek was therefore another tool of entrenching colonialism
and a means of excluding Indians from power, just as denying Indians education in
their own vernacular denied the value of their language. Needless to say, it made no
practical sense to prioritize Latin and Greek over English or local Indian languages
in the Indian civil service. The sole purpose of this prioritization was the creation of
an educational hierarchy through racial discrimination.
Across the Empire, the close guardianship of a Western classical education, its
simultaneously elevated status, and the denial of the language, culture, and history
of those Britain had colonized all worked together to exclude the Empire’s subjects
from any form of power. There is perhaps another, more speciﬁc reason why
Aristophanes in particular was kept carefully away from the colonized.
Aristophanic comedy is, after all, intrinsically political and demotic, and has
been repeatedly used to challenge oppression ever since the time of
Aristophanes himself. To take one example, Van Steen has demonstrated how
translations and performances of Aristophanes in Demotic Greek were a powerful
political tool in nineteenth- and twentieth-century Greece for shaping a national
identity.²⁸It would no doubt have been alarming, therefore, if Britain’s colonial
subjects began routinely to produce searing Aristophanic comedy, with all its
potential to examine and subvert power structures. If the colonialist project was
afraid to let the subaltern speak, it would be especially terriﬁed toﬁnd the
subaltern speaking Aristophanes.²⁹
²⁵Kumar 2005: 16.
²⁶As Vasunia points out, however, it is incorrect to say that Greek and Latin were not taught in
nineteenth-century India at all (2013: 22–26).
²⁷Vasunia 2005: 37; see also Majeed 1999. ²⁸Van Steen 2000.
²⁹There has of course always been anti-colonial resistance to the project of Empire, with or without
Aristophanes; see Gopal 2019.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
9

The Early-Modern Aristophanes in Britain
In discussing the reception of Aristophanes from the end of the eighteenth
century, I am not trying to resurrect‘the traditional model of the reception of
Aristophanes’, which supposed that‘Greek Old Comedy [was] almost unknown
until a nineteenth-century“rediscovery”’.³⁰That model is wrong. Early-modern
theatre practitioners and writers were not only aware of Aristophanic comedy but
actively receiving it in their own works. Many scholars have noted the sustained
inﬂuence of Old Comedy on Ben Jonson,³¹ Aristophanes’‘truest early modern
English descendent’,³² and we know he had read Aristophanes because his per-
sonal copy has survived.³³‘The earliest English-language version of any
Aristophanic play’,Ploutophthalmia Ploutogamia(a version ofWealth),‘was
written in the early 1630s’by a‘Son of Ben’, Thomas Randolph.³⁴The Woman’s
Prize, or the Tamer Tamed, John Fletcher’s early-seventeenth-century sequel to
Shakespeare’sTaming of the Shrew, draws onLysistrata. In theAreopagitica
(1644),‘Aristophanes furnishes Milton with a test case for his opposition to
censorship’and he (rather reluctantly) concludes that‘the price of freedom
from censorship is the endurance of Aristophanes’.³⁵The dramatist William
Davenant actually put Aristophanes on stage in 1656.³⁶Jonathan Swift also
received Aristophanes.³⁷The eighteenth-century satirical dramatists Samuel
Foote and Henry Fielding were both routinely described as‘the English
Aristophanes’³⁸(a title later conferred on W.S. Gilbert, see Chapter 5) and in
1742 Fielding published a translation ofWealthwith William Young; though
this is hardly the most caustic of Aristophanes’plays, the translators praise
Aristophanes as a satirist who‘attacked and exposed [Athens’] enemies and
betrayers with a boldness and integrity’
.³⁹At schools and universities,‘Aristophanes
ﬁgures prominently in the educational curriculum of early modern Europe and
England.’⁴⁰This early-modern material demands more attention than it has so
far received.
It is worth indicating here some of the key observations made by Miola, Steggle,
Kinservik, and Hall in their summaries of Aristophanes in the early-modern
period, and how his reception at this time differs from his long-nineteenth-
century reception. First, Aristophanic humour, particularly in the eighteenth
century, was often used as a by-word for personalized satire; this in particular
reﬂects why satirists such as Fielding and Foote were associated with him.
Although Fielding was satiricalandpolitical, Foote’s satire was‘apolitical . . .
involvingad hominemjokes and mimicry at the expense of what we would call
³⁰Steggle 2007: 52.
³¹ See ibid. 59–63; Miola 2014: 495–502 and esp. 498 n.20, for a summary and further doxography.
³² Miola 2014: 501. ³³ Steggle 2007: 59. ³⁴Hall 2007: 67; see Chapter 7.
³⁵Miola 2014: 492. ³⁶Hall 2007: 68f. ³⁷Ibid. 70. ³⁸Kinservik 2016: 109.
³⁹Fielding and Young 1812 [1742]: 116.⁴⁰Miola 2014: 481. See Chapter 7.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
10  

“celebrities”’.⁴¹ But by the start of the long-nineteenth century, Old Comedy’s
satirical scope is broader, and deﬁnitely political. I am not trying to suggest that
long-nineteenth-century readers were completely blind to Aristophanes’ad homi-
nem attacks, but theiremphasisis more on the partisan lines advanced and less on
the victims of his personalized satire. Shelley’sSwellfoot the Tyrantis an exception,
as it is to many of the general conclusions drawn in this monograph.
W.S. Gilbert’s brand of satire, though broadly less personalized, also offers echoes
of this eighteenth-century reading of Old Comedy. By and large, though, the
tendency we will see throughout is the comparison between Aristophanes and
burlesque, not satire. Undoubtedly, this is because satirical theatre was no longer
widely staged in the long-nineteenth century as a result of censorship.
Second, and this is a connected point, the early-modern reception of
Aristophanes was deeply concerned with the story, retold since Plato and subse-
quently used to rebuke Old Comedy, that Aristophanes’Cloudswas responsible
for Socrates’death.⁴² By the long-nineteenth century, this story was usually
ignored or treated as irrelevant or hyperbolic. In hisStudies of the Greek Poets,
Symonds asserted that‘theCloudshad not so much to do with the condemnation
of Socrates as some of the later Greek gossips attempted to make out’, and he
could take it as read that most of his readers already knew this.⁴³
Finally, there was a shift in the speciﬁc plays being received. Before the long-
nineteenth century, the most popular Aristophanic play in the European tradition
by far wasWealth. The play was‘theﬁrst to appear in Latin translation . . . . It
appeared on stage in Zwickau (1521), Zurich (1531) and Cambridge (1536 and
1588), and achieved two full-scale adaptations in English.’⁴⁴Perceived as an
innocent comedy sharing many generic features with New Comedy,Wealthwas
appealing to humourists and humanists alike, although it is notably lacking in the
personal satire that otherwise deﬁnes Aristophanic comedy in the early-modern
period.Cloudswas also popular, or at least infamous for its connection to
Socrates’death, and received itsﬁrst English translation in 1655.⁴⁵But by the
long-nineteenth century,Wealthwas scarcely being received.BirdsandFrogs
occupied a much more signiﬁcant position, and indeed the only professional
performance of Aristophanes in adaptation in the nineteenth century was of
Birds.⁴⁶Although Aristophanes
’‘women plays’were the least widely received
plays in the Victorian period, we will see the inexorable rise ofLysistrataat the
end of the nineteenth century and into the twentieth, as it gradually took the
position it occupies now, as the most widely received Aristophanes play.
⁴¹ Hall 2007: 74.⁴² Kinservik 2016: 113–117. ⁴³ Symonds 1873: 236.
⁴⁴Miola 2014: 492. These supposed performances ofWealthat Cambridge are dubious; see
Chapter 7.
⁴⁵Hall 2007: 67.⁴⁶See Chapter 4.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
11

So the early-modern reception of Aristophanes was active and variegated.
Aristophanes did not suddenly and inexplicably arrive on British shores in
1789, ready to be received in the British tradition free from any diachronic echoes
of a past tradition. That said, readings—translations, scholarly discussions, adap-
tations, appropriations, and performances—of Aristophanes picked up exponen-
tially in the long-nineteenth century. In a catalogue of translations (including
selections and adaptations) up to 1920, Giannopoulou has recordedﬁve British
publications in the seventeenth century and eight in the eighteenth, but sixty-
seven in the nineteenth.⁴⁷
Looking at the early-modern British reception of Aristophanes therefore offers
necessary diachronic context for our discussion; let us now introduce some
synchronic context by discussing, in turn, nineteenth-century British politics
and how it affected theatre; British historians’accounts of the genre during this
period; and then the German reception of Old Comedy at the start of the long-
nineteenth century.
Nineteenth-Century Politics: Reform, Reaction,
and Radicalism
A brief reﬂection on the state of British politics in the early-to-mid nineteenth
century, particularly as it pertains to the Tory Party, will provide vital context-
ualization for the discussions to follow. The early nineteenth century saw succes-
sive governments struggling to deal with, and inevitably being destroyed by, a host
of political issues—male suffrage, constitutional reform, Irish home rule, the Corn
Laws, Poor Laws, Factory Acts, the Woman Question, Catholic emancipation, and
other related concerns. The French Revolution of 1789 and subsequent political
movements in Europe provided the backdrop for this turbulent period of British
political history;⁴⁸likewise, agitations at home, culminating in the 1819 Peterloo
Massacre, were constant.⁴⁹
Partisanship in British politics developed over the course of the early nineteenth
century, leading to‘the existence by the end of the 1830s of a fairly clear-cut two-
party alignment in the House of Commons’between the Whigs and the Tories.⁵⁰
As Jenkins argues, however, these party groupings were‘sufﬁcientlyﬂexible to
ensure that party leaders could never presume upon the support of their back-
benchers’.⁵¹ Tory politicians by-and-large supported the Establishment—the mon-
archy, the government, the aristocratic and propertied classes, and the Church of
England; Tory‘Ultras’were therefore deﬁned by their reactionary politics. Whigs
were Reformists who valued above all personal freedoms and libertarianism.⁵² One
⁴⁷Giannopoulou 2007. ⁴⁸Spence 1996: 1–12. ⁴⁹See Chapter 3.
⁵⁰Jenkins 1996: 29.⁵¹ Ibid. 37.⁵² McCormack 2004: 26.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
12  

of their greatest contributions to politics in a period when they were almost
terminally locked out from power was to pass the Great Reform Act in 1832.⁵³
This legislation was pushed through with difﬁculty, and under the threat of
wide-scale violence, by the Whig Prime Minister Earl Grey. For theﬁrst time it
extended the franchise to middle-class men with a property qualiﬁcation while
also making elections fairer and abolishing‘rotten boroughs’. However, the
Reform Act failed to resolve class tensions because it did not address universal
suffrage. By expanding the franchise,‘the Whigs believed that they could
strengthen existing society, and giving the working classes the vote was never
part of the political equation’.⁵⁴For some within Parliament and without,
Reformist Whiggism did not go far enough.⁵⁵
The Radicals and the working classes they supported did not give up, and in
May 1838 the People’s Charter was published. This document called for annual
parliaments, salaries for MPs, the introduction of a secret ballot, equal boundaries,
and most signiﬁcantly, universal suffrage for men (women were still excluded).
Chartism saw universal male suffrage as the solution to the many inequalities
embedded in Victorian society. The movement, while undeniably Radical, sought
change through legitimate means and Parliament, not violent revolution.‘This
was a disciplined form of mass extra-parliamentary protest, its force essentially
moral and its violence rhetorical.’⁵⁶After a wave of strikes and a subsequent
crackdown in 1842,‘the Chartist leadership completed that disintegration which
had been threatening since 1839’,⁵⁷but Chartism was replaced by unions
and trade organizations, whichﬂourished from the 1840s. The unions were
more concerned with economic security than suffrage, although they continued
to offer a largely non-violent extra-parliamentary political voice to the
disenfranchised.
These social issues came to entirely dominate the 1841–1846 ministry of Sir
Robert Peel, a Tory politician who had opposed the Reform Act.⁵⁸His party was
more closely aligned with Reactionary sentiment, but he found himself carrying
out a signiﬁcant programme of Reform. Early measures such as the reintroduc-
tion of an income tax and moderate reform of the Corn Laws were obvious and
relatively uncontroversial, and in 1844 Peel forced through a law limiting factory
working to twelve hours a day rather than the ten hours supported by a majority
of the Commons;⁵⁹but controversial measures to address Ireland and the Irish
Catholics, as well as the full-scale repeal of the Corn Laws in response to the 1846
Potato Famine, ultimately led to the collapse of both his ministry and the Tory
Party. From the ashes, Peel built the Conservative Party, which continues to be
⁵³ Ramsden 1998: 42–44. ⁵⁴Brown 2002: 14.
⁵⁵The Great Reform Act was supported by Parliamentary Radicals but had only moderate effect on
the franchise (McCormack 2004: 35).
⁵⁶Brown 2002: 12.⁵⁷Royle 1996: 32.⁵⁸Evans 1991: 2.⁵⁹Adelman 1992: 41f.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
13

deﬁned by his shift from economic protectionism towards liberal free-trade
policy.⁶⁰The Whig coalition was also soon to break apart, into a new Liberal
Party.
It is easier to deﬁne the politics of this period by the prevailing forces of
Reaction, Reform and Radicalism than by party politics.⁶¹ With that dialectical
frame in mind, we can more easily compare the politics of Mitchell and Frere in
Chapter 2, for example, both of whom were Tories but whose politics were
different. Their different outlooks also shaped their distinct receptions of
Aristophanes. The question of Reform is the same fundamental issue lying behind
Shelley’s, Mitchell’s, Frere’s, and Planché’s receptions of Aristophanes, discussed
over the next three chapters—the Radical Shelley using Aristophanes to push for
fundamental structural change, the Canningite Frere presenting a more measured
Tory Reformist Aristophanes, and the Reactionaries Mitchell and Planché using
Aristophanes to argue for conservatism.
Theatre Reform
To understand how this political landscape intersected with the British stage, we
need to look further back to the eighteenth century. In 1737, Parliament passed
the Licensing Act, which curtailed the rights of almost all theatres to stage plays.
The act required plays to be licensed by the Lord Chamberlain (or, in reality,
his appointed deputies, the examiner and the comptroller);⁶² he assumed the
power to block offensive or overtly political material by deleting lines or banning
entire pieces. The act also limited performance to the pre-existing patented
theatres; since there were only two such licensed theatres in London—Drury
Lane and Covent Garden—it effectively closed the many unlicensed theatres in
the capital.⁶³
The act was initiated by the Whig Prime Minister Sir Robert Walpole at the
height of dissatisfaction with his premiership,‘a rather desperate gesture of
deﬁance by a man who had been in ofﬁce rather too long and who sensed that
enforced retirement was looming’.⁶⁴Politicking and corruption had laid him open
to satirical attack, most notably by Henry Fielding, whose plays at this time
relentlessly satirized Walpole. In the‘Publik Dedication’toThe Historical
Register for the Year 1736andEurydice Hiss’d, both political and both staged in
⁶⁰See Turner 2004.⁶¹ See Stead and Hall 2015.⁶² Shellard and Nicholson 2004: 15.
⁶³ The law was targeted at London’s many small playhouses; regional theatres were theoretically
covered, but largely overlooked. Later laws designed to clarify the situation only created more
confusion. The Universities of Oxford and Cambridge were given unlimited authority to curtail theatre
in their cities. On this complicated legal situation, see Thomas, Carlton, and Etienne: 2007.
⁶⁴Thomas, Carlton, and Etienne 2007: 27.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
14  

1737 just before the censor was introduced, Fielding acknowledged the pending
legal threat, noting that he had‘with Concern observed some Steps lately taken,
and others too justly apprehended, that may much endanger the Constitution of
theBritishTheatre’.⁶⁵He argued that the theatre belonged to the public, and
labelled the Prime Minister criminally corrupt.‘Corruption’, he argued,‘hath the
same Inﬂuence on all Societies, all Bodies, which it hath on Corporeal Bodies....
[Anyone who corrupts] ought to be treated in much the same manner with him
who poisoneth a Fountain, in order to disperse a Contagion’.⁶⁶But Walpole won
the PR war, and the Licensing Act was passed by Parliament with wide support
from legislators and theatre practitioners.
Although he lasted onlyﬁve years more as prime minister, Walpole’s censor-
ship law continued to curtail politicization of the stage for an entire century—at
the same time as the politicalstatus quowas being challenged both externally
and internally, and the threat of revolution hung over parliament and monarch.
Although amended in the nineteenth century, theatre censorship would persist in
Britain until 1968, in part due to apathy;‘there was no groundswell of opposition
to the principle of theatre censorship at any point during the eighteenth century:
nor was there to be any during the nineteenth century’.⁶⁷Seemingly, dramatists
had little desire to write overtly political plays, so fell in line with the Lord
Chamberlain. Indeed, playwrights and theatre managers engaged in widescale
pre-censorship, which enabled the Lord Chamberlain‘to keep the number of
prohibited plays to a minimum and forestall concerns about repression’.⁶⁸
The 1737 Licensing Act (and subsequent legislation in 1752 and 1755) allowed
scope for the performance of light‘entertainments’at unpatented theatres. It was
in response to this that the English burletta developed. The line between musical
entertainment and stage-play was mutable, and so was the deﬁnition of burletta;
it came to mean‘nothing but a play which could with safety be given at a minor,
or unpatented theatre’.⁶⁹The Lord Chamberlain demanded that music be
included to distinguish it from‘serious’spoken drama conﬁned to the patent
theatres, but the level of music included in performances was not always signiﬁ-
cant; a three-act play might only requireﬁve songs to pass the bar.⁷⁰And
ﬁnancial pressures compelled the old patent theatres to put on popular enter-
tainments as well, so that there was little serious spoken drama available.‘The
great mass of nineteenth century dramas are the melodramas, farces, spectacles
and extravaganzas turned out in their hundreds by the Planchés and the
Fitzballs.’⁷¹
⁶⁵Fielding 1737: v. Original emphasis. See Hall and Stead 2020: 148.⁶⁶Fielding 1737: vf.
⁶⁷Thomas, Carlton, and Etienne 2007: 46f.⁶⁸Shellard and Nicholson 2004: 4.
⁶⁹Nicoll 1955: 137.⁷⁰Ibid. 139.
⁷¹ Ibid. 58. Planché would no doubt take umbrage at this slight, as we will see in Chapter 4.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
15

In 1832, a parliamentary Select Committee was established to examine theatre
censorship and the patent theatres’monopoly over serious drama. Not coinci-
dentally, 1832 also saw the passing of the Great Reform Act;‘the demand for the
reform of theatre legislation was clearly part of a far wider desire in the country for
legislative reform’.⁷² The report proposed conferring all licensing powers within
London to the Lord Chamberlain’sofﬁce and allowing more theatres to stage
drama, arguing that the patent theatres’‘privileges have neither preserved the
dignity of the Drama, nor, by the present Administration of the Laws, been of
much advantage to the Proprietors of the Theatres’.⁷³ The legislation written to
enact the Select Committee’s recommendations failed, and theatre reform was
postponed until 1843.
Finally, with the support of Peel’s government, the 1843 Theatres Act was
passed. The new law broke the patent theatres’monopoly; it also extended the
Lord Chamberlain’s authority over most of London while specifying for theﬁrst
time that his censor should be used only to protect public decency. Now that all
theatres could stage entertainments with spoken dialogue and as much or as little
music as suited, while remaining clearly within the law, the genre of burlesque
became remarkably popular. Burlesques predated the Theatres Act, and the
generic shift from burlesque to burletta was small and largely semantic—
Planché wrote hisﬁrst speciﬁcally classical burlesque,Olympic Revels, in 1831,
subtitling it‘a mythological, allegorical burletta’,⁷⁴and when Thomas Dibdin
wrote a burlesque on theIliadas early as 1819, he described it as a‘Comic,
Pathetic, Historic, Anachronasmatic, Ethic, Epic, MELANGE’, forgoing either
title.⁷⁵But as Planché reﬂected in 1879, the term burletta, adopted by theatres
‘as a general and conveniently vague description of every variety of piece’per-
formed at an unpatented theatre,‘disappeared from the play-bills on the eman-
cipation of the minor theatres from their legal fetters’;⁷⁶it was no longer a
necessary generic distinction to avoid the wrath of the Lord Chamberlain. This
change was quite dramatic; 43 burlettas were licensed in 1841 and 1842, but
none by 1845 or 1846. By 1844, the term burlesque had overtaken burletta.⁷⁷
Paradoxically, burlesque and its sister forms (travesty, extravaganza, revue, etc.)
were at once allowed far greater freedom to experiment by the 1843 Act, and yet
maintained far more generic uniformity than burletta ever had.
⁷² Ibid. 55.⁷³Report from the Select Committee on Dramatic Literature, HC 1832: 5.
⁷⁴Planché 1879a: 37.⁷⁵Dibdin 2019: Paratext 3.⁷⁶Planché 1879a: 13.
⁷⁷Data taken from the Chamberlain’sOfﬁce Day Book 1824–1852 (BL Add MS 53702), which lists
all licensed plays and notes their genre. To avoid doubt, I have conﬁned my enquiries to the term
burlesque, ignoring occurrences of synonymous terms such as extravaganza. For this reason, fewer
burlesques were licensed in 1845 and 1846 than burlettas in 1841 and 1842; the licensing reform also
allowed for more variety in generic naming conventions, even if names were effectively synonymous. In
two instances, plays are referred to as‘burlesque burletta’—these I have counted once each across both
categories.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
16  

The British Historians’Aristophanes, from Gillies to Grote
One of the deﬁning characteristics of Old Comedy—at least, of the extant
examples—is its setting in the contemporary world; Aristophanes’plays usually
take place within Athens itself, or a parallel Athens where dung-beetles canﬂy and
kitchen utensils can testify in a law-court. For this reason (and despite the dangers
of reading comedy as an accurate source), historians have long used Aristophanes’
plays as evidence for Greek society. British historians engaged with Old Comedy
consistently in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and often used debates
over Aristophanes’politics within wider narratives about the concept of democ-
racy. It is therefore unsurprising that many early histories of Greece exerted a
signiﬁcant inﬂuence on the British reception of Aristophanes, particularly on the
debate about his politics. I provide here a summary of four important historians
and their interpretations of Aristophanes. This offers important context as we
begin to look at texts more speciﬁcally focussed on Old Comedy, although, since
Walsh has already examined this topic in depth,⁷⁸I do not go into extensive detail.
John Gillies published hisHistory of Ancient Greecein two volumes in 1786; it
was later translated into both French and German. It left its readers in no doubt
about Gillies’personal political views; theﬁrst volume opens with an address to
the king, and these lines:
The History of Greece exposes the dangerous turbulence of Democracy, and
arraigns the despotism of Tyrants . . . . It evinces the inestimable beneﬁts, result-
ing to Liberty itself, from the lawful dominion of hereditary Kings . . . .⁷⁹
Gillies argues that Old Comedy was a feature of democracy’s‘dangerous turbu-
lence’, institutionalized by a populist Pericles, who thus‘cherished a serpent in his
bosom’.⁸⁰Although he notes Aristophanes wrote a harangue against the dema-
gogue Cleon, there is strong disapproval in his assertion that‘the people of Athens
permitted, and even approved, the licentious boldness’of the poet;⁸¹ comedy‘was
never carried to the same vicious excess in any other age or country’.⁸²
William Mitford published theﬁve volumes of his vastHistory of Greece
between 1784 and 1818, in direct competition with Gillies even if the two men
shared a similar political outlook.⁸³ He was a Tory MP, and‘throughout his
history, he displays a consistent antipathy for democracy’.⁸⁴In the second and
third volumes, which covered theﬁfth centurythrough to the King’s Peace in
386, Mitford responds to Gillies’condemnation of Old Comedy by praising
Aristophanes. He emphasizes that Aristophanes was‘himself a man of rank,
personally an enemy to Cleon, certain of support from all theﬁrst families of
⁷⁸Walsh 2008, 2009.⁷⁹Gillies 1786: iii.⁸⁰Ibid. 487.⁸¹ Ibid. 592.
⁸² Ibid. 483.⁸³ Wroth 2004. ⁸⁴Walsh 2008: 76.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
17

the republic, and trusting in his own powers to ingage [sic] the favor of the lower
people’⁸⁵—an oligarch writing with aristocratic and popular support. He‘almost
alone, among the poets of the day, dared direct his satire on the public stage to
restrain the folly and correct the proﬂigacy of the tyrant multitude’.⁸⁶And
Aristophanes was asuccessfulpartisan; Mitford writes thatKnightshad an‘imme-
diate effect’and directly led to Cleon beingﬁned by the people.⁸⁷He does not
entirely dispute Gillies’moral aversion to Old Comedy; Aristophanes was
‘a consummate politician and a consummate buffoon’who wrote‘gross ribaldry’.⁸⁸
But largely, Mitford rates Aristophanes far higher than Gillies, and sees him as a
political ally. Mitford’s reception of Aristophanes was inﬂuential, particularly on
Thomas Mitchell, the translator and editor of Aristophanes (whom we discuss
in Chapter 2).
The preponderance of turn-of-the-nineteenth-century right-wing historians
instrumentalizing ancient Greece as an expression of their own oligarchic, mon-
archist views led to a response by more liberal historians later in the century; their
views on Aristophanes were, however, no less shaped by their political beliefs.
Connop Thirlwall produced hisHistory of Greecebetween 1835 and 1844. With
careful analysis, he argues that Aristophanes was not anti-democratic as‘in his
extant plays he nowhere intimates a wish for any change in the form of the
Athenian institutions’.⁸⁹Thirlwall’s answer to oligarchic readings of Old
Comedy is to deny its political effect;‘we have no reason to believe that it ever
turned the course of public affairs’, and did not even permanently affect Cleon’s
reputation.⁹⁰Nevertheless, Aristophanes displayed a‘depth of patriotic feeling’.⁹¹
Walsh argues that Thirlwall’s readings of Aristophanes are contradictory,⁹²
though this is a misinterpretation. Acknowledging Aristophanes’attemptsto
engage in political discourse, Thirlwall remains dubious about the poet’s ultimate
effectiveness.⁹³ The Anglican clergyman also deﬁnes Old Comedy as‘the grossest
things [being] publicly spoken of in the grossest language’,⁹⁴although does not
deny‘the sublimity...of itswit, humour, and fancy’.⁹⁵On this latter point, he
preﬁgures the scholarship of John Addington Symonds especially.⁹⁶
Thirlwall was a broad-minded Anglican liberal; George Grote, a friend of John
Stuart Mill and Jeremy Bentham,⁹⁷was far more radical. HisHistory of Greece
(twelve volumes published 1846–1856) was speciﬁcally designed as a corrective to
Mitford’s Tory narrative,⁹⁸although in a sense his reading of Aristophanes is
similar to Mitford’s. Grote uses Old Comedy as a source whenever it proves his
point, but is generally careful to note that Aristophanes did‘not profess to write
⁸⁵Mitford 1808a: 222.⁸⁶Mitford 1808b: 14.⁸⁷Mitford 1808a: 222.
⁸⁸Mitford 1808b: 22.⁸⁹Thirlwall 1838: 253.
⁹⁰Thirlwall 1836: 82. Walsh notes that he follows A.W. Schlegel in this (2008: 83).
⁹¹ Thirlwall 1838: 252.⁹² Walsh 2008: 83.⁹³ Thirlwall 1838: 252f.
⁹⁴Thirlwall 1836: 81.⁹⁵Ibid. ⁹⁶See Chapter 6.
⁹⁷Hamburger 2008. ⁹⁸Ibid.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
18  

history’;⁹⁹he is an unreliable source, and invariably on the wrong side of politics.
So Aristophanes lampooned what Grote saw as the great democratic institution of
Athenian juries¹⁰⁰—whose potency, we will see in Chapter 2, Mitchell and Mitford
had associated with French revolutionaries. Grote’s most radical innovation is his
balanced assessment of Cleon, despite the array of ancient sources and contem-
porary authors—Aristophanes especially—who criticized the politician as a dan-
gerous demagogue. Again, Aristophanes is an inaccurate source here; although
Knightsis‘consummate and irresistible’and‘deserves the greatest possible admir-
ation’as a dramatic work,¹⁰¹ its‘unrivalled comic merit...isonlyonereason the
more for distrusting the resemblance of its picture to the real Kleon’.¹⁰² Like
Mitford, Grote praises Aristophanes as an artist and avoids signiﬁcant moral
rebuke of Old Comedy as a genre. Both men argue that Aristophanes was an
oligarch. The difference in their interpretations of Old Comedy lies in their
personal politics, so that Mitford praises Aristophanes for this perceived parti-
sanship while Grote notes that Athenian‘democracy was strong enough to
tolerate unfriendly tongues’,¹⁰³ a nuanced criticism of the genre. Grote’s point
here is not that Old Comedy was politically ineffective, but rather that democracy
was strong enough to survive, however powerful the criticisms against it were.
These attempts to read the historians’own political views into Aristophanesﬁt
within a wider narrative of activating Old Comedy for partisan reasons, particu-
larly in theﬁrstﬁve chapters of this monograph. As we will see, for much of the
early nineteenth century, the default interpretation of Aristophanes was as a
partisan proto-Tory oligarch, as Mitford, Thirlwall, and Grote all portrayed him.
The German Aristophanes
If the birth of Hellenism in Britain around the close of the eighteenth century was
founded on GermanAltertumswissenschaft,¹⁰⁴the growth of British academic
interest in Aristophanes in the early nineteenth century was likewise predicated
on an earlier movement to consider Old Comedy in Germany. We therefore
should look to Germany to provide oneﬁnal piece of synchronic context in this
introduction.
The most signiﬁcantﬁgure in this German scholarly tradition was undoubtedly
the poet and critic August Wilhelm von Schlegel, whoseVorlesungen über dra-
matische Kunst und Litteratur, a series of lectures originally delivered in Vienna in
1808, then published in German in 1809 and in English in 1815, will hang over
almost every reception we look at. The lectures cover much more than
Aristophanes, although theﬁrst of the two volumes is dedicated to ancient theatre
⁹⁹Grote 1851a: 337. ¹⁰⁰Grote 1849: 535. ¹⁰¹ Grote 1851a: 661.
¹⁰² Ibid. 663. ¹⁰³ Grote 1851b: 452. ¹⁰⁴Stray 1998: 23–6.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
19

more broadly. Old Comedy is the subject of the sixth lecture. Schlegel interprets it
as‘a species of an entirely opposite description’to tragedy, but also as distinctly
different to modern and New Comedy.¹⁰⁵It is a‘more democratic species of
poetry’deﬁned by its liberty and excess.¹⁰⁶Schlegel offers a powerful defence of
Aristophanic obscenity;‘Aristophanes was an immoral buffoon’, yes,¹⁰⁷but he was
also a‘zealous patriot’defending the people,¹⁰⁸and Old Comedy’s licentiousness
was permitted because of the speciﬁc festival context.¹⁰⁹Schlegel defends
Aristophanes against the charge that he was responsible for Socrates’death,
asserting instead that both‘the sportive censure of Aristophanes was reduced to
silence, and the graver animadversions of the incorruptible Socrates were pun-
ished with death’for the same reason, the fall of democracy.¹¹⁰He also praises
Aristophanes as a poet.¹¹¹
But it is to theﬁfth lecture, on Euripides, that we must look for Schlegel’s most
enduring contribution to Aristophanic criticism. Schlegel’s criticisms of Euripides
are extensive and damning; from the outset, he asserts that‘we are compelled to
bestow severe censure on him on various accounts’.¹¹² Aristophanes is Schlegel’s
chief supporter in this assessment; he is introduced as a foil for Euripides, drawing
on Aristophanes’own representations of Euripides in his comedies. So when, in
the sixth lecture, Schlegel comments that there is‘no reason...tobelieve that we
witness [Old Comedy’s] decline in [Aristophanes], as in the case of the last
tragedians’,¹¹³ it is clear whom this comparison implies. Aristophanes was‘one
of [Old Comedy’s] most perfect poets’;¹¹⁴Euripides was the worst of the trage-
dians. Aristophanes did not destroy his genre, but Euripides killed off tragedy. In
Chapters 6 and 9, we will see how Schlegel’s dichotomy became signiﬁcant in the
writings of John Addington Symonds, Robert Browning, and Gilbert Murray.
A.W. Schlegel’
s brother, Friedrich von Schlegel, had also written an essay on
Aristophanes in 1794, although I have found no evidence that it was read widely in
Britain; it was not translated, which may explain its limited reach. The essay,
however, inﬂuenced his brother. Many of Friedrich’s points would later be
reiterated by August in theLectures. Friedrich Schlegel emphasizes aesthetic
appreciation of Old Comedy as an inherently pleasurable genre;‘pain can be a
highly effective medium for beauty, but joy [die Freude] is beautiful in itself.
Beautiful joy is the highest objective of beautiful art.’¹¹⁵Aristophanes’plays are
therefore‘divine’.¹¹⁶This contrast between comic pleasure and tragic pain may
preﬁgure A.W. Schlegel’s Aristophanes–Euripides dichotomy. This‘beautiful joy’
is dependent on Old Comedy’s licence, which Friedrich also compares explicitly to
¹⁰⁵Schlegel 1815: 190. Trans. Black. ¹⁰⁶Ibid. 195. ¹⁰⁷Ibid. 204. ¹⁰⁸Ibid. 203.
¹⁰⁹Ibid. 207; on this proto-Baktinian reading of Old Comedy, see Chapter 6. This invocation of
festival does not, for Schlegel, limit the genre’s political nature.
¹¹⁰Ibid. 203. ¹¹¹ Ibid. 207f.; see Chapter 6. ¹¹² Ibid. 138. ¹¹³ Ibid. 201.
¹¹⁴Ibid. ¹¹⁵Schlegel 1980: 4. Translations throughout are mine unless otherwise stated.
¹¹⁶Ibid. 6.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
20  

a carnival.¹¹⁷Unlike in A.W. Schlegel, however, Friedrich Schlegel argues that
Aristophanes’recourse to politics undermines his poetic quality.¹¹⁸
Both the Schlegels were Romantics, and their interest in Aristophanes speaks to
a broader phenomenon in German Romanticism.¹¹⁹Goethe had already trans-
lated part of theBirdsin 1780;¹²⁰in theAesthetics, Hegel praised Aristophanes for
bringing‘to perfection’a genre which is‘truly comical and truly poetic’.¹²¹
Wilhelm von Humboldt, who also translated Aristophanes, declared to his friend
Friedrich August Wolf that the comic‘is a true poetic genius . . . more than all the
tragedians, with such magniﬁcent diction and, despite all his licentiousness, so
pure, and his verses divine’.¹²² For whatever reason, however, the British
Romantics, despite their engagement with Greek tragedy, did not make the
same use of Aristophanes. Despite its author, Shelley’s Aristophanic play
Swellfoot the Tyrantis not a Romantic drama, as we will see in Chapter 3. We
must wait for the Aesthetic Movement (Chapter 6) to see a British appreciation of
Aristophanes as an aesthetic poet.
But the brothers Schlegel and their fellow Romantics were hardly the only
German scholars who wrote inﬂuentially on Aristophanes. In hisHistorical
Antiquities of the Greeks, published in German 1826–1830, then in English in
1837,¹²³ Wilhelm Wachsmuth portrays Aristophanes as a political and personal
satirist who lampooned a series of Athens’leading men. He agrees with A.W.
Schlegel that Old Comedy was an inherently democratic genre,‘sprung from the
wantonness and arrogance of the democracy of Megara’.¹²⁴Old Comedy targeted
its‘satire against the wealthier classes’.¹²⁵Wachsmuth, who clearly allies himself
with the oligarchs and Pericles, is not entirely approving, although he praises
Aristophanes’attacks against‘the worthless Cleon’and other demagogues.¹²⁶He
therefore presents Aristophanes as an oligarch writing within a broadly demo-
cratic genre:‘comedy owed to him the proud height it thus attained as the vehicle
of political censure’when used to attack Cleon.¹²⁷This is a different and more
nuanced reading than A.W. Schlegel’s. On balance, however, Wachsmuth con-
cludes that the politics of Old Comedy‘produced no serious impression whatever
upon the minds of the spectators’.¹²
⁸
Karl Otfried Müller’sHistory of the Literature of Ancient Greeceﬁrst appeared
in English translation in 1840, disseminated by the Society for the Diffusion of
Useful Knowledge, before being published in German the following year. It
devotes three chapters to Old Comedy. Like A.W. Schlegel, Müller emphasizes
¹¹⁷Ibid. 5. ¹¹⁸Ibid. 10. ¹¹⁹See Holtermann 2004: 91–121.
¹²⁰On Goethe’s sustained interest in Aristophanes, see Atkins 1954. ¹²¹ Hegel 1998: 1235f.
¹²² Humboldt to Wolf, 1 September 1795, Humboldt 1846: 133. See Porter 2000a: 253f.
¹²³ His section on Aristophanes was also appended to C.A. Wheelwright’s Aristophanes transla-
tions, likewise published in 1837.
¹²⁴Wachsmuth 1837: 205. Trans. Woolrych. ¹²⁵Ibid. 205. ¹²⁶Ibid. 214.
¹²⁷Ibid. 216. ¹²⁸Ibid. 227.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
21

the carnivalesque nature of Old Comedy, and indeed goes further by connecting
its origins with the ritual komos.¹²⁹He also agreed that it was an inherently
democratic genre;‘comedy could not be brought to perfection save by republican
freedom and equality’.¹³⁰But for Müller, Aristophanes was not a serious play-
wright. Even the politicalAcharnians‘is nothing but a Bacchic revelry;...the
author is, throughout the piece, utterly devoid of seriousness and sobriety’.¹³¹
Karl Ferdinand Ranke also published the LatinDe Aristophanis vita commen-
tatioin 1846. Finally, German scholarship was an important vehicle for the
dissemination of Aristophanes’texts. In 1829, August Immanuel Bekker pub-
lished the Aristophanic scholia; in 1840, Theodor Bergk released a collection of
fragments. From 1839, August Meineke published a series of editions of
Aristophanes’fragments, with the texts of his extant plays following in 1860.
British classicists did not refer to French sources often, despite the long history
of Aristophanic scholarship in France dating back at least as far as Anne Dacier’s
translations ofCloudsandWealthin 1684.¹³² In contrast, thepopularreception of
Aristophanes owes much to the French tradition.¹³³ But in terms of scholarly
receptions, we must look to Germany as the greater inﬂuence. There is one
signiﬁcant exception to this; for much of the early nineteenth century, the
deﬁnitive text of Aristophanes used by British scholars was that of the French
philologist Richard François Philippe Brunck.¹³⁴Brunck’s edition was published
in 1781 with accompanying Latin translation and notes. This allowed him to
publish and comment on the text without expurgation;‘at the same time that
Latin, as a scientiﬁc language or language of translation, generally disappears from
the notes of translations of tragedy, it emerges as a language of substitution for . . .
scholarly commentaries on obscene passages’in Aristophanes.¹³⁵Brunck’sinﬂu-
ence on the German tradition presumably accounts for why German philologists
focussed on Aristophanes’scholia and fragments.
We have explored the German scholarly reception of Aristophanes; in the next
chapter, we turn to two early and signiﬁcant British scholars whose readings of
Aristophanes—while dissimilar—reinforced the British reading of Aristophanes
as a staunch oligarch against the German tendency to emphasize the genre’s
connection to democracy.
¹²⁹Müller 1840: 3–5. Trans. Donaldson. ¹³⁰Ibid. 6. ¹³¹ Ibid. 22.
¹³² See Bastin-Hammou 2010; Wyles 2016. ¹³³ See esp. Chapter 5.
¹³⁴This edition even gets mentioned in Planché’sBirds(see Chapter 4). ¹³⁵Piana 2005: 195.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
22  

2
Out of Exile
Thomas Mitchell and John Hookham Frere
Before the start of the nineteenth century, Aristophanes was not widely read in
Britain. Few translations, and no commentaries, had been produced in English;
scholars who revelled in so much Greek literature from Homer to Sophocles, balked
at Old Comedy’s oblique frames of reference. As Walton notes,‘the translator of
Aristophanes is faced with a kind of dramatic piece for which we have no parallel’,
characterized by‘Aristophanes’fondness for anachronism, for absurdity, for the
fantastic’.¹ Thus, it was only with the growth of Hellenism and in the wake of Greek
tragedy’s burgeoning reputation that Aristophanic plays in the 1800s‘wereﬁnally
given sustained and sympathetic attention from translators’and editors.² Two of
the most inﬂuential scholars to work on these texts were Thomas Mitchell and John
Hookham Frere; each produced translations of several plays, with Mitchell also
writing commentaries onﬁve texts. Whether approaching Aristophanes in English
or in Greek, theﬁrst reception of Greek comedy any reader experiences is neces-
sarily mediated through the translation or textual edition the reader chooses to use,
and for many in the nineteenth century, that choice was Frere or Mitchell.³
Therefore, for many, the nineteenth-century Aristophanes was constructed at
least in part by these men. Both authors were Tories, and both interpreted
Aristophanes as a starkly political author reinforcing their own world-view, fol-
lowing German and British historians’interpretations of the Greek poet discussed
in Chapter 1. Both were also keen to suppress Aristophanes’crudity. At the same
time, Mitchell’s Aristophanes and Frere’s were subtly different beasts, and their
texts were read and utilized by different audiences.
Thomas Mitchell
Thomas Mitchell (1783–1845) was educated at Christ’s Hospital, a public school
in West Sussex, and Pembroke College, Cambridge. He graduated with a BA in
¹ Walton 2006: 157.
² Walsh 2016: 238. Not all Aristophanes’plays were received in the same way at the same point in
time; see Ch.1.
³ Previous English translations of some plays predate Frere and Mitchell;Wealthhad been trans-
lated as early as 1659. Of these, only Henry Francis Cary’s translation ofBirds(1824) can be said to
have been as important. See Giannopoulou 2007.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
Aristophanes in Britain: Old Comedy in the Nineteenth Century. Peter Swallow, Oxford University Press.
© Peter Swallow 2023. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192868565.003.0002

1806 and an MA in 1809 and became a fellow of Sidney Sussex College, but was
forced to stand down in 1812 after refusing to be ordained. Although he would
continue to work as a private tutor and publish academic works, Mitchell never
taught at a university again.⁴He was working on his Aristophanes translations by
1813,⁵and eventually released them in two volumes. Volume 1, published in 1820,
containedAcharniansandKnights; volume 2, published in 1822, containedWasps
andClouds, the latter in a reprint of Cumberland’s translation.⁶In the 1830s, he
also released several critical editions—AcharniansandWaspsin 1835,Knightsin
1836,Cloudsin 1838, andFrogsin 1839. These texts were designed as teaching
aids—each title page declared that the commentary was written for‘the use of
schools and universities’. Mitchell was proud that his efforts meant‘the conduct-
ors of our great public schools were in possession of...asafe textofﬁve of the
most important of the Aristophanic plays’(that striking emphasis his).⁷Despite
being immediately used by public schools, Mitchell’s works were never reprinted.
Mitchell’s translations are well-written and in charming verse, although his
language is notably dated, something for which Frere criticized him;‘the main
cause of the defect [in Mitchell’s translations]...istobeattributed to the adoption
of a particular style; the style of our ancient comedy in the beginning of the
16th century’.⁸This adoption of an archaic, heightened tone often leads him to
over-translate—for example, for the single line Aristoph.Ach. 11,‘ὁδ᾽ἀνεῖπεν,
εἴσαγ᾽ὦΘέογνι τὸν χορόν’, Mitchell provides four:
Sudden a hasty summons shakes the roof:
And—‘Hoa, Theognis! please to introduce
Your company of actors!’brazen-lung’d
Exclaims the Herald . . .⁹
This‘sixteenth-century’tone was a deliberate and idiosyncratic choice; as early as
1777, Rev. Robert Potter’s‘rightly admired’translations of Aeschylus,‘theﬁrst
complete English translation’of the tragedian published,¹⁰had demonstrated the
effectiveness of translating Greek tragedy into vernacular language. For compari-
son, take, for example, his rendering of theeisodosofAgamemnon:
⁴Goodwin 2004.
⁵In an article written for theQuarterly Review, Mitchell includes translated extracts fromWasps,
Peace,Knights,Clouds,Ecclesiazusae, andThesmophoriazusae. He did not publish full translations of
most of these texts, and his publishedWaspsdoes not reuse the translation prepared for this article, but
he does reuse theKnightsextract (the play’s prologue) in his later translation (Mitchell 1813: 139–161).
⁶Cumberland’sClouds‘has been too much admired, and, generally speaking, it is too masterly a
production . . . to render another version of it necessary’(Mitchell 1822: 3).
⁷Mitchell 1841: 5.⁸Hookham Frere 1820: 474.
⁹Mitchell 1820:Acharnians1.1.17–21. For both Frere and Mitchell, the line numbers I give are their
own, not those of Aristophanes.
¹⁰Hall and Macintosh 2005: 209.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
24  

The tenth slow year rolls on, since great in arms
The noble sons of Atreus, each exalted
To majesty and empire, royal brothers,
Led hence a thousand ships, the Argiveﬂeet,
Big with the fate of Priam and of Troy . . .¹¹
While still poetic, itﬂows more naturally than Mitchell’s hasty summonses and
brazen lungs. If vernacular verse was adequate fortragedy, Mitchell might have
felt entitled to translatecomedyin a similar tone. Instead, he consciously adopted
the archaizing‘particular style’Frere criticizes him for.
Mitchell breaks up each play into scenes and acts and provides ample notes,
although he omits several sections, for which he only provides a summary. His
commentaries are even more detailed, with footnotes offering interpretation and
lengthy quotations from other authors. Each commentary has a long introduction
and several appendices. Much of my discussion will focus on these metatextual
sections, since they provide the best evidence for his reading of Old Comedy.
As Turner has demonstrated, Mitchell’s interpretations are dependent on the
Tory MP and Greek historian William Mitford, whom Mitchell refers to as simply
‘the English historian of Greece’; Mitchell‘strongly perpetuated Mitford’s image of
Athens’.¹² But he is also familiar with German scholars. A.W. Schlegel is often
referenced, and at the start of hisAcharnianscommentary Mitchell also cites
‘Boeckh, Müller, Wachsmuth, Kruse, and others’.¹³ Mitchell’s own copies of the
Frenchman Brunck’s Aristophanes, heavily annotated, also survive in the British
Library archives.¹⁴Much of Mitchell’s commentary is speculative, however, draw-
ing on his imagination more frequently than actual evidence. For example, he
asserts thatKnightsconcludes thus:
Four-and-twenty bath-men, each armed with an enormous syringe or an ary-
taena, advance in slow procession; then come four men, bearing on their backs a
huge chopping-block, and on that block sits Cleon . . . Four-and-twenty street-
nymphs bring up the rear . . . The bath-men pour upon him deluges of dirty
water, while the ladies salute him with specimens of that language, which is
henceforth to be the only dialect he is to hear . . . The mock Cleon, wiping the foul
bath from his face, throws forward with extended arm a silent, but expressive
denunciation‘from me to thee’upon [the real Cleon in the audience]. The
pageant again moves on, and the theatreﬁnally breaks up amid convulsions of
¹¹ Potter 1808 [1777]: 153 = Aesch.Aga.40–7.
¹² Turner 1981: 209. ¹³ Mitchell 1835a: iii.
¹⁴These notes are written interchangeably in English, German, Greek, and Latin. Unfortunately,
Mitchell did not have a neat hand, so they are largely illegible. They do indicate that Mitchell almost
never referred to Brunck’s Latin translation but used the Greek; there are only very occasional notes
made on the Latin (BL cat. no.11705 dd 6).
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
      25

laughter, mixed with cries of‘No Cleon!’‘Down with the tanner!’‘Aristophanes
for ever!’¹⁵
A complete fabrication, Mitchell nevertheless sets it down without evidence or
qualiﬁcation—not for academics who can dismiss it as an unsupported theory but
for his more impressionable intended audience, schoolboys.
Mitchell’s passion for Aristophanes emerges from the many vivid ideas he
expresses about how Old Comedy was staged and should be interpreted, and
from all the years he dedicated to translating and editing these works. Yet, he
views much of Aristophanes as uncomfortable, even immoral. As he writes in an
1813 article for theQuarterly Review, in these plays:
The worst of things are called by the worst of names; and the meanest of our
appetites and grossest of our necessities are perpetually called in to make sport for
the audience, who, if we are to judge of them by those exhibitions, (and they certainly
took a singular delight in them,) can have been little better than semibarbarians.¹⁶
This censure is omnipresent across his editions, and is invariably tinged with
classism. It is for the lower members of society that Aristophanes debases
himself—and‘if [the reader] has any knowledge of“the sovereign multitude”of
Athens, he will not be surprized [sic] at the lowness of humour with which the
poet artfully endeavours to cheat them into good sense’.¹⁷He asserts that:
To the better part of his audience [Aristophanes’] admonitions might have the
ludicrous appearance of a Bacchus preaching sobriety from a tub; but to the
vicious no reproof comes so home as that which they hear from persons who
appear to think as little of virtue as themselves.¹⁸
He argues that the upper-class Athenians would not tolerate Aristophanes’crass-
ness if it weren’t a necessary concession to the immoral masses.
Mitchell’s translations utilize two methods for dealing with Aristophanes’dirty
humour. Sometimes, he avoids translating either the speciﬁc joke or the entire
section in which it is found. More commonly, however, he simply translates the
passage but sanitizes the crudity. For example, in theAcharnians, he translates
Aristophanes’joke about the King of Persia having constipation:
ἀλλ᾽εἰςἀπόπατονᾤχετο στρατιὰν λαβών,
κἄχεζενὀκτὼμῆναςἐπὶχρυσῶνὀρῶν.
Acharnians81f.
¹⁵Mitchell 1836: l.1357n. ¹⁶Mitchell 1813: 141f. ¹⁷Mitchell 1835a: p. 10.
¹⁸Mitchell 1813: 142.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
26  

As:
[He had] Physick’d his royal person on the mountains.
Eight months in that abode his highness purg’d him.¹⁹
Although he has lost the scatological humour, his translation is not wildly
inaccurate, and the sense of‘κἄχεζεν’is not absent from‘purg’d’.
In his commentaries, however, Mitchell excises almost every dirty bit of Greek.
He usually repairs any half-lines thus cut by stitching them together into new,
complete lines; where this is not possible, he uses three asterisks to indicate the
missing word or phrase. Otherwise, he offers no hint that the Greek has been
tampered with, utilizing his own internal line numbering to cover up the
Bowdlerization. As he explains,‘on the fouler stains of antiquity, it will form no
part of this publication to dilate’.²⁰The few crudities he leaves in are either
condemned as degenerate, or, occasionally, explained away as a necessary evil to
convey a serious point. Perhaps it is unsurprising that a nineteenth-century
edition produced for schoolboys would be edited in this way, but the extent of
Mitchell’s censorship, coupled with his blatant attempts to cover up the process, is
remarkable—certainly, Brunck had not felt the need to excise Aristophanes’
ﬁlthiness from the Greek text Mitchell uses.
Throughout these texts—and despite his rejection of Anglicanism—Mitchell
frequently identiﬁes himself with Toryism, conservatism, and the aristocracy, to
such a degree that he heaps praise on Sparta. This was an old-fashioned view to
take. In the previous two centuries, Sparta had been a model for many Whig
politicians;²¹ the Tory Mitford had praised Sparta in his History, however.²²
Mitchell concedes that Athens‘stands before us in the bodily frame and substance
of a glorious literature, of which we have all more or less partaken, and which has
entailed upon us a debt of gratitude and reverence’.²³ Yet Sparta, he asserts, was
‘a nation of gentlemen’,²⁴and it is with them that our allegiances should lie. The
Peloponnesian War‘was aristocracy against democracy, and the combination of
free Greeks against the evil ambition of one state’.²⁵The issue was fundamentally
constitutional. Sparta was ruled by the right sort of people, whereas Athens
was not:
However nations may sometimes be disposed to triﬂe with their own happiness
or honour in the choice of those whom they please to place at the head of their
affairs, the only safe guides in conferring such a distinction, can be substantially
but four: clear and unencumbered property,—the more of birth and blood the
better,—that general intelligence, which arises from the average developement
¹⁹Mitchell 1820:Acharnians1.3.25f. ²⁰Mitchell 1835a: l.79n. ²¹ Rawson 1969.
²² Ibid. 356f, 359. ²³ Mitchell 1835a: v. ²⁴Ibid. viii. ²⁵Ibid. xvii.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
      27

[sic] of the intellectual powers,—and that integrity which results from a proper
cultivation of the moral and religious feelings,—these constitute, as all experience
has proved, the only elements out of which wise and prudent counsellors and the
conductors of states, whether single or combined, can ever possibly be framed.²⁶
Mitchell’s language bears a striking similarity to [Xenophon]’sConstitution of
Athens, which likewise criticizes Athens for giving political control to the poor.
But he is not talking speciﬁcally about Athens; he is describing the best form for
anynation’s government to take. In the nineteenth century, three of his criteria for
membership of the ruling class were only practicably achievable by the aristocratic
or sufﬁciently wealthy: property required money; nobility was unattainable except
through marriage or preferment, which required money; and‘that general intel-
ligence’, by which one must surely read‘a classical education’, could only be
achieved by attending the right schools—which required money. Mitchell’sﬁrst
criterion is the most obviously signiﬁcant for contemporary readers—the
Acharnianswas published in 1835, three years after the passing of the Great
Reform Act, which for theﬁrst time extended suffrage beyond those who had
‘clear and unencumbered property’. One can sense Mitchell’s disapproval.
In support of these conservative sentiments, Mitchell reads Aristophanes as a
political commentator who toed his party’s line:
The‘Old Comedy’must have been to the political world of that time, what
certain newspapers and journals are to the political world of the present day—the
channels through which the leaders of party make known such parts of their own
policy, or that of their opponents, as they wish or think necessary to go forth to
the public. Aristophanes must in this point of view have been an invaluable
addition to the aristocratical or peace party.²⁷
Aristophanes’references to peace are interpreted as support for a theorized
‘aristocratical or peace party’led by Nicias.²⁸Following Mitford, Mitchell asserts
that Aristophanes was‘a man of rank’himself, although the lack of evidence for
this assumption is acknowledged.²⁹
KnightsandAcharniansboth lend themselves to Mitchell’s reading of
Aristophanes; by emphasizing the correct points the scholar is able to interpret
both as pro-aristocratic texts. He readsAcharniansas an anti-war play presenting
‘a series of satires upon the young statesmen of the day, who were impatient for
the continuance of the war’.³⁰Curiously, Mitchell titles his translation ofKnights
as‘Knights; or the Demagogues’, arguing that the original title’s meaning has been
obfuscated.³¹ Yet in his new title,‘demagogues’refers not to the chorus but to the
²⁶Ibid. vii. ²⁷Ibid. l.473n. ²⁸Mitchell 1820: p. 139. ²⁹Mitchell 1836: l.229n.
³⁰Mitchell 1820: 4. ³¹ Ibid. 135. He is following Wieland.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
28  

two competing slaves, and it is a loaded term. Mitchell emphasizes the play’s
references to the Battle of Sphacteria and interprets the plot as being an allegory
against lower-class demagoguery:
Whatever objections might be made to the former demagogues, still they
belonged, or had belonged, to the aristocracy of wealth, and to wealth, as
Nicias well knew, habitually belong caution and timidity, excellent guarantees
for public security. But a sausage-seller, a washer of intestines, a fellow earning a
base subsistence out of pig’s blood, and whose only earthly property was a knife, a
ladle, and a chopping-block!‘Merciful heaven,’as the uplifted hands and eyes of
Nicias signify,‘what is next to befall this unhappy state, and where will this
accursed movement end!’³²
It is characteristic that Mitchell highlights Cleon’s and the sausage-seller’s low
birth as a disqualiﬁcation, but his reading can be supported by the text.
Mitchell reads the transformation of Demus at the end of the play as
genuine and uncomplicated. Demus is now‘the glorious representative of the
days of Marathon and Plataea, in a mask borrowed from one of those younger
divinities, . . . reaching to the utmost altitude of heroic grandeur’.³³ The sausage-
seller has been reformed too:‘He is now Agoracritus, prime minister of Athens, and,
what is much better, a model on which few prime ministers might be ashamed to
form themselves . . . Bravo, Monsieur the new demagogue!’³⁴Mitchell both legitim-
izes his ideal demagogue and permits a didactic reading of the text. The ultimate
relationship between Agoracritus and Demus is not merely historical but should be
emulated in contemporary society; the play’s new prime minister is a‘model’for
the ages.
Frogsis less political thanKnightsorAcharniansas a text, but Mitchell’s
commentary is not without classist political interpretation here either. In the
scene following theparabasis(738–813), Aristophanes presents a hilarious por-
trait of Xanthias and (presumably) Aeacus discussing their masters’manyﬂaws
and revelling in their own. But as Hall has shown,³⁵Mitchell interprets this in such
a way as to minimize criticism of the masters and emphasize revulsion towards the
slaves (whom he euphemistically terms‘lacqueys’[sic]):
And do our two lacqueys hold adrycolloquy? Forbid it every feast of Bacchus, of
which we ever heard! forbid it all the bonds which have tied lacqueyism together,
since the world ofmanandmasterﬁrst began! A dry colloquy? Whence then the
peculiar adjuration in the text, and all those conﬁdential communications, which
we shall presently have to encounter, communications rarely made butpost
³² Mitchell 1836: l.142n. ³³ Ibid. l.1282n. ³⁴Ibid. l.1267n. ³⁵Hall 2007: 76f.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
      29

pocula,orinter pocula? . . . We can admit here but one huge commonﬂask, and
two separate cups; Xanthias, of course, drinking thrice to Aeacus’s once, and in a
goblet, which had its depth equalled its breadth, the lank, spare partner in his
potations might absolutely haveﬂoated in it.³⁶
Needless to say, there is nothing in the text to actually suggest Xanthias and
Aeacus are drinking, but Mitchell’s assumptions ignore this.
It is in hisWaspsthat Mitchell shows the greatest amount of politically
motivated interference, however. He interprets the play as a diatribe against
property conﬁscations, which he claims attacked the noble elite and allowed the
state to gather money for raucous festivals to appease the masses.³⁷Although
Mitchell is concerned about the power common Athenians wielded in their
political institutions, it is the democratic nature of Athenian jurisprudence
which alarms him the most:
The real power of the Athenian Demus, as he himself well knew, lay in the courts
of law. There was his throne, and there his sceptre: there he found compliment,
court, and adulation rained upon him so thick, that his imagination began at last
to believe what hisﬂatterers assured him, that he was a god, and not a man. And
a god in some sense he was; for property and fortune, honour and infamy, life
and death, were in his hands . . .³⁸
Mitchell is sure to draw parallels between Athenian property conﬁscation and the
horrors of the French Revolution.³⁹Bdelycleon, who stands up against his juryman
father, is interpreted‘as a single representative of that class of Athenian society,
whom the Chorus of the Equites represents in its united form’⁴⁰—although of
course if the son is a nobleeques, then the father would have to be as well.
Mitchell’s interpretation quickly comes up against an even greater problem.
Aristophanes’Waspscan be split into two halves. In theﬁrst part, the juror
Philocleon is cured of his addiction by his son, Bdelycleon. This narrative easily
conforms to Mitchell’s reading—the juror redeemed through his noble son. But in
the second part, after theparabasis, Philocleon takes advantage of his new-found
leisure and becomes degenerate, worse even than when he was a juror. The
perceived moral lesson,‘Don’t be an Athenian juror’, is lost. In Mitchell’s trans-
lation ofWasps, therefore, the scholar splits the play into these two separate
halves, naming theﬁrst sectionWaspsand the secondThe Dicast Turned
Gentleman. He claims,‘it is clear that this comedy ought to have ended immedi-
ately with these addresses of the CHORUS [theparabasis], or even before them.
³⁶Mitchell 1839: l.702n. ³⁷See [Xenophon],Constitution of Athens3.2.
³⁸Mitchell 1835b: vi. ³⁹Mitchell 1822 165f. quoting Mitford 1808b: 9.
⁴⁰Mitchell 1835b: l.63n.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
30  

The action was complete; and whatever else is added must be a mere superfeta-
tion.’⁴¹ But Aristophanic plays arenevercharacterized by a strong plot unity, and
this is the only play Mitchell splits into two. The new title he coins for his second
half is also misleading—if the dicast does indeed become a gentleman (and note
the loaded term), he does so only brieﬂy before relapsing.
Mitchell’s intervention is even more drastic in his commentary; here, he cuts
the entire second half of the play, ending the text with theparabasis.
Characteristically, he does not signal this deletion with a footnote; the sole allusion
to it is an oblique comment in the introduction:‘That the action of the play is too
far extended for modern ears, there can be little doubt: and it is therefore hoped,
that the curtailments here made will be less objected to.’⁴² Any reader who only
has access to Mitchell’s edition would not notice this extraordinary editorial
decision. Whether through isolating it or simply deleting it, then, Mitchell acts
to minimize the concluding section ofWasps, allowing him to emphasize only the
part which conforms most easily to his politicized reading of Old Comedy.
For most of the nineteenth century, Mitchell’s texts were the main vehicles
through which the schoolboys and university students who would go on to run the
country read Aristophanes—they also, conveniently enough, happened to be
handbooks for social and political conservatism. As one contemporary reviewer
asked, do‘Mitchell, and those with whom he sides,. . . not press their case a little
too hard?’⁴³ Mitchell is perfectly conscious of what he was doing;‘That the
political opinions advanced in these productions would be unacceptable to
some, the editor was well aware’, he writes.⁴⁴At the same time, he is also aware
of Aristophanes’huge potential to inﬂuence his readers:
Could language like [Aristophanes’] sink deep into the ears of solitary scholars,
and have no corresponding effect on the minds of those to whom theﬂower of
our youth is entrusted—that youth, who at some future day must have, or ought
to have, the guidance of those by whom such language is held?⁴⁵
His unforgivingly partisan scholarship is intended to teach Aristophanes, but only
the Aristophanes Mitchell believes in.
John Hookham Frere
We know that John Hookham Frere was familiar with Mitchell’s translations
because he reviewed theﬁrst volume for theQuarterly Reviewin 1820. A letter in
his memoirs indicates that he received the second volume in 1824, along with
⁴¹ Mitchell 1822: p. 281.⁴² Mitchell 1835b: iii.⁴³ Sandford 1835: 326.
⁴⁴Mitchell 1835b: xiii.⁴⁵Mitchell 1841: 16.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
      31

Cary’sBirds,⁴⁶which he noted‘is much better than Mitchell’s translations’.⁴⁷The
introduction to Frere’sKnightsalso cites Mitchell’s earlier version.⁴⁸It is impos-
sible to be certain whether Frere was familiar with Mitchell’s commentaries. In
turn, it isn’t clear whether Mitchell had read Frere’s translations, although he
quoted Frere’sQuarterly Reviewarticle in hisAcharnianscommentary.⁴⁹
Hookham Frere (1769–1846) was the son of a Tory MP and went to Eton,
where he formed a close friendship with the future prime minister George
Canning.⁵⁰He then moved to Caius College, Cambridge, earning a BA in 1792
and an MA in 1795. He won a number of prizes for classical compositions in verse
and prose and became a fellow.⁵¹ In 1796 he was elected Tory MP for West Looe in
Cornwall (a‘rotten borough’) and began work in the Foreign Ofﬁce.⁵² Hisﬁrst
major foray into the literary world was as a writer for theAnti-Jacobin, a satirical
periodical designed to combat republican sentiment stirred up by the French
Revolution and edited by Canning. It was so popular that it was shut down after
only eight months’publication, possibly at Prime Minister Pitt’s personal inter-
vention⁵³—despite a limited circulation, it had offered a little too much satire from
writers a little too close to the establishment.
Frere was sent as ambassador to Portugal in 1800,⁵⁴then to Spain in 1802.⁵⁵He
lost his post in 1804 after failing to stop Spain joining the Napoleonic War and
falling out with the Spanish prime minister. In 1808, Spain revolted against
Napoleonic rule and Frere was re-appointed ambassador,⁵⁶this time lasting
only eight months before being relieved of duty again for interfering in military
matters.⁵⁷Feeling betrayed, he resolved to withdraw from public life despite being
offered a seat in the House of Lords or another appointment in St Petersburg.⁵⁸
After his wife Lady Erroll caught a‘severe cold’while visiting the Parthenon
Marbles, Frere left England permanently in 1820, settling in Malta.⁵⁹
It was after this political embarrassment that Frere turned to Aristophanes. He
started translating the plays in 1817,⁶⁰and‘during 1818–1819 . . . devoted much of
his time to the translations, by which, probably, rather than his original works, his
rank among the poets of the present century will be determined’.⁶¹ Although it
would not be published for almost twenty years,The Frogshad been completed and
some copies printed by 1824, andAcharnianswas almostﬁnished as well.⁶² Frere
⁴⁶Bartle Frere 1874: 193.⁴⁷Ibid. 195.
⁴⁸Hookham Frere 1874a:Knightsl.65. ⁴⁹Mitchell 1835a: l.73n.
⁵⁰Bartle Frere 1874: 13. As‘foreign secretary from 1822, [Canning] allowed [British philhellenes] to
raise money privately’in support of the Greek War of Independence while Britain was still formally
neutral (Hanink 2017: 143).
⁵¹ Bartle Frere 1874: 18.⁵² Ibid. 20.⁵³ Ibid. 40f.⁵⁴Ibid. 52.
⁵⁵Ibid. 54.⁵⁶Ibid. 82.
⁵⁷Ibid. 97; House of Commons Debate: Historical Hansard 24 February 1809 series 1 vol. 12.
⁵⁸Bartle Frere 1874: 98.⁵⁹Ibid. 180–182. ⁶⁰Ibid. 179f.⁶¹ Ibid. 177.
⁶² Ibid. 192. Frere was not happy with this original print run due to poor punctuation, but a copy
surviving in the British Library archives indicates nothing but stylistic changes between this edition and
later reprints.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
32  

continued working on Aristophanes slowly over the course of the next two
decades, eventually producing complete versions ofFrogs,Acharnians,Knights,
andBirds. In 1837, two London publishers declined to publish his translations⁶³
but he was encouraged to print them at the Government Printing Ofﬁce of Malta,⁶⁴
a projectﬁnally completed in 1839 over twenty years after the translations were
started. Further imprints were completed in 1840 in London. Frere maintained
that this was a private print run, though the truth is more complicated. He
produced a full 500 copies. Many of these he sent to friends and intellectuals, but
he also sent 250 copies to booksellers acrossﬁve universities,⁶⁵and 160 were sent to
a bookseller in Chancery Lane.⁶⁶Although this still speaks to a small circulation,
Frere’s texts were by no means kept private.
The dissemination of Frere’s text really begins with its extensive reprinting
history, however, and for this reason his inﬂuence is felt more strongly in the
second half of the nineteenth century than earlier. Frere’s translations, including
previously unpublished extracts fromPeaceproduced late in his life, were
included in a collected edition of his works produced posthumously in 1872,
then reprinted in 1874; this was theﬁrst time the translations had been widely
available to the public. Then in 1886, hisAcharnians,Knights, andBirdswere
printed in Sir John Lubbock’s Hundred Books series; these same plays were
printed in Morley’s Universal Library series in 1886, 1887, 1890, and 1895, as
only the third classical text of the series after Dryden’s Virgil and Chapman’s
Homer. The Everyman’s Library printed all four of Frere’s completed plays in
1909, 1911, 1917, 1924, and 1949; The World’s Classics series likewise printed
them in 1907, 1912, and 1928. There was even a copy of Frere’sKnightsprinted in
California in 1992, no doubt by publishers grateful toﬁnd a translation out of
copyright. Across versions, this indicates that the text, although designed as a
private work, had a public afterlife stretching into the twentieth century. Although
Frere originally circulated it only amongst his educated friends and the univer-
sities where they received their education, his text was latterly published repeat-
edly by book series designed to bring classic works of literature to everyday readers
without such advantages, who did not know Aristophanes in the original Greek.
By the end of the nineteenth century, Frere’s texts had even come to be
associated with the performance of Aristophanes. In 1873, the Scottish engineer-
ing professor Henry Charles Fleeming Jenkin privately producedThe Frogsin
Edinburgh, and used Frere’s translation—this was Aristophanes
’‘earliest known
British performance in the English language’outside adaptation.⁶⁷Editions of
Frere’s texts were also produced for several of the Oxford and Cambridge Greek
plays;⁶⁸while the actors were speaking Greek, much of the audience would read
along with Frere’s English text. There was probably little overlap between the
⁶³ Ibid. 279.⁶⁴Ibid. 276.⁶⁵Ibid. 296.⁶⁶Ibid. 314.
⁶⁷Hall 2007: 85.⁶⁸Ibid. 85.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
      33

audience of an Oxbridge Greek play and the readership of the Everyman’s Library
series, yet Frere was a vehicle through which both constituencies received
Aristophanes.⁶⁹
Frere’s translations are remarkable for their adoption of vernacular language
and for their verse form, which by-and-large replicates the metre used in the
original Greek as it was understood at the time.⁷⁰He describes his own translation
style as that of the‘Faithful Translator’(whereas Mitchell is apparently a‘Spirited
Translator’).⁷¹ The Faithful Translator will utilize neutral language to avoid jarring
the reader, replacing any local reference with a generalization, whereas the
Spirited Translator will always try and replace idiom with idiom. Frere acknow-
ledges the difﬁculty of translating Aristophanes,‘encumbered with local and
individual allusions’as he is,⁷²ina‘faithful’manner—indeed, his translations
are never completely free from idiom and he makes no attempt to suppress
Aristophanes’many obscure allusions to his contemporaries. But for the most
part, Frere’s translation theory is applied and makes his editions engaging,
timeless, and easily comprehensible. He doesn’t always feel required to stay as
close as possible to the original Greek. For example, he replaces the difﬁcult-to-
translate word game at the start ofThe Knights:
: Now say‘Let’s run’, like you’re wanking, gently atﬁrst, then‘away’, and
then close the gap.
: Let’s run. Away. Let’s run. Let’s run away.
AristophanesKnights24–26
With a similar, but distinct, word game in English:
: Say‘Let us’ﬁrst; put theﬁrst letter to it,
And then the last, and then put E, R, T.
‘Let us Az ert.’
I say,‘Let us Azert.’
’Tis now your turn—take the next letter to it.
Put B for A.
:‘Let us Bezert’I say—
:’Tis now my turn—‘Let us Cezert,’Isay;
’Tis now your turn.
:‘Let us Dezert,’I say.⁷³
⁶⁹For university productions of Old Comedy, see Ch.7.
⁷⁰For a history of Aristophanic metre and text, see Parker 1997: 94–119.
⁷¹ Hookham Frere 1820: 481.⁷² Ibid. 484.⁷³ Hookham Frere 1874a:Knightsll.27–38.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
34  

His‘translation’performs the same role as the Greek passage—Nicias still leads
Demosthenes to consider deserting through wordplay—while picking up on none
of Aristophanes’language speciﬁcally. Yet it is not jarring, as an attempt to
translate the Greek literally might be. (He also removes the reference to mastur-
bation.) InThe Acharnians, he ingeniously translates Pseudartabas’name as
‘Shamartabas’,⁷⁴and translates the Theban’s dialogue into‘a regional accent,
which approximates Scots’.⁷⁵Frere’s vernacular translations are deﬁned through-
out by this sheer readability. The title page ofThe Birdseven notes that his
translation was‘intended to convey some notion of [the comedy’s] effect as
an acted play’,⁷⁶which implies consideration of how Aristophanes might be
re-performed—as it was later in the century. Mitchell is only interested in the
plays’originalperformance contexts.
However, like Mitchell, Frere is uneasy about Aristophanes’crassness, and
takes the greatest liberties when translating his humour. Rarely, he will simply
not translate a passage. He notes thatFrogs416–430 is‘not capable of translation’
because it lampoons‘some of the characters of the State’, but adds that it was
‘accompanied by a great license of abuse and ribaldry’.⁷⁷As he translates similarly
localized passages elsewhere without complaint, we may assume that the‘abuse
and ribaldry’is the real reason he leaves the lines untranslated. Frere does not
always signal when he has left out a section from his translation, but he does so far
more often than Mitchell. More usually, though, Frere simply disguises the
rudeness of a passage through his translation. For example, to return to
Acharnians81f., Frere translates the lines as:
[He had] Gone with his army to the Golden Mountains,
To take his ease, and purge his royal person;
There he remain’d eight months.⁷⁸
Just like Mitchell, he renders the meaning of the lines and even suggests at
the scatological humour, but refuses to embrace it. Indeed, both translators
render the obscenity‘κἄχεζεν’as the sanitized‘purge’. Yet while Frere also
blames Aristophanes’inappropriateness on‘the lower class’for whom he was
writing, following Mitchell,⁷⁹he is not as passionate in his censure. Rather, Frere
goes to extraordinary lengths to explain away both the passages’inclusion in
Aristophanes’plays and his own refusal to translate them fully, claiming that
Aristophanes would be pleased to be rid of them:‘In discarding such passages . . .
the translator is merely doing that for his author, which he would willingly have
done for himself’.⁸⁰The (supposedly aristocratic) Aristophanes was ashamed of
⁷⁴Ibid.Acharniansl.115. ⁷⁵Eastman 2015: 97.
⁷⁶Hookham Frere 1874a:Birdsp. 145. ⁷⁷Ibid.Frogsp. 259.
⁷⁸Ibid.Acharniansll.101–103. ⁷⁹Hookham Frere 1820: 491.⁸⁰Ibid. 491.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
      35

his own appeals to the lower classes. Reading Mitchell, one is routinely reminded
of Aristophanes’and the Athenians’irredeemable wickedness. Reading Frere, one
ﬁnds a patient but embarrassed apologist for Aristophanic crudity.
As I have stressed, there is nothing altogether surprising in Frere’s and
Mitchell’s careful editing; nineteenth-century sensibilities often led to editorial
censorship. We might compare the‘Family Shakespeare’, editions of the Bard’s
plays produced by Henrietta and Thomas Bowdler from 1807 (whence we get the
word Bowdlerization).⁸¹ These editions were similarly diligent in expunging
‘defects’from the text‘which are of such a nature as to raise a blush on the
cheek of modesty’.⁸² Far from diminishing the popularity of Shakespeare,‘the
Bowdler text was enormously successful and ran through at least twenty editions
over the course of the nineteenth century’, encouraging a range of rival textual
editions of expurgated Shakespeare.⁸³
Like Mitchell, Frere sees Aristophanes’plays as didactic. However, he suggests
their educational purpose is well-disguised, perhaps in acknowledgement of the
controversy surrounding this point:
The object of the poetic and dramatic art is to instruct without offence; to give
men hints of their faults and errors . . . but so, that neither the author nor the
actor shall appear in the character of an accuser, or even of a monitor, which,
among equals, is always odious.⁸⁴
Frere does not deny poetry’s power, of course. In his youth, he had written some
ﬁery poetry of his own in the satirical anti-republican newspaperAnti-Jacobin,
with acknowledged didactic intent. In one poem, Frere uses classical imagery to
describe his verses as warriors:
Oh! Come [Muse], with taste and virtue at thy side,
With ardent zeal inﬂamed, and patriot pride;
With keen poetic glance direct the blow,
And empty all thy quiver on the foe:—
No pause—no rest—till weltering on the ground
The poisonous hydra lies, and pierced with many a wound.⁸⁵
And the biting nature of his verses elsewhere justiﬁes this metaphor:
ToLondon,‘the rich, the defenceless’, she comes—
Hark! my boys, to the sound of the Jacobin drums!
See Corruption, Prescription, and Privilegeﬂy,
⁸¹ See Murphy 2003: 344–354. ⁸² Bowdler 1818: x.⁸³ Murphy 2003: 171.
⁸⁴Hookham Frere 1820: 478.⁸⁵Hookham Frere 1874b:New Moralityll.37–42.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
36  

Pierced through by the glance of her blood-darting eye.
While patriots, from prison and prejudice freed,
In soft accents shall lisp the Republican creed,
And with tricolor’edﬁllets and cravats of green,
Shall crowd round the altar ofSaint Guillotine.⁸⁶
Yet this is not the proactive,ﬁrebrand sort of poetry Frere assigns to Aristophanes.
His translations never reach the fever-pitch of his youthful writings. If Mitchell’s
Aristophanes was a Toryﬁrebrand, Frere’s was no less political, and still Tory—
just more subtle.
Frere’sKnightsis presented in just this vein. His Cleon is, like Mitchell’s, a
rogue,‘a fawning, obsequious slave, insolent and arrogant to all except his master,
the terror of his fellow-servants’.⁸⁷But there is no sustained assault against the
demagogue in the metatext. Frere’s loyalties are clearly with Nicias and
Demosthenes, and he praises‘the blunt heartiness and good fellowship of the
one, and the timid scrupulous piety of the other’.⁸⁸Yet no reference is made to
Mitchell’s war and peace parties, and he acknowledges that the play light-
heartedly burlesques these two noble politicians.⁸⁹At the outset, Demus is nega-
tively described as‘the John Bull of Athens, a testy, selﬁsh, suspicious old man, a
tyrant to his slaves’,⁹⁰and his transformation is drawn out more than in the
original Greek to seem grander. Take, for instance, the chorus’greeting to the
transformed Demus:
χαῖρ᾽ὦβασιλεῦτῶνἙλλήνων:καί σοι ξυγχαίρομενἡμεῖς.
τῆςγὰρ πόλεωςἄξια πράττεις καὶτοῦ’ν Μαραθῶνι τροπαίου.
AristophanesKnights1333f.
Frere translates the passage as:
We salute you, and greet you, and bid you rejoice:
With unanimous heart, with unanimous voice,
Our Sovereign Lord, in glory restored,
Returning amongst us in royal array,
Worthy the trophies of Marathon’s day!⁹¹
Two lines of Greek have been extended toﬁve. The Greek‘χαῖρ᾽‘is translated
twice in‘we salute you, and greet you’. The Greek‘σοι ξυγχαίρομενἡμεῖς’is
expanded to‘bid you rejoice: / With unanimous heart, with unanimous voice’,
⁸⁶Ibid.La Sainte Guillotinell.9–16, written with George Canning.
⁸⁷Hookham Frere 1874a:Knightsp. 67. ⁸⁸Ibid. p. 68.⁸⁹Ibid. p. 68.
⁹⁰Ibid. p. 66.⁹¹ Ibid.Knightsll.1819–1823.
OUP CORRECTED PROOF –FINAL, 1/8/2023, SPi
      37

Random documents with unrelated
content Scribd suggests to you:

sisar jälleen varmasti tunsi käsiään pitelevän puoliskonsa ja oli
vieläkin suuremman liikutuksen vallassa, päättyi tuo koetuksista rikas
hetki sillä, että nuorukaiset hypähtivät ylös ja vastustusta
kohtaamatta syleilivät kaunokaisiaan, ja tämän ohella vaihdettiin niin
tulisesti suukkosia, ettei mokomampaa ennen. Siinä huomasi, että
nuorukaiset olivat kylläkin rivakasti ylöspäin kohonneet, voittaen
pituudessa nuo ei suinkaan lyhyet naisensa.
Sen huomasi Martti Salanderkin, joka odottamatta seisoi
kummankin parin keskellä ja olisi voinut siinä kenties vielä kauankin
seisoa. Mutta hän laski kätensä kaksosten olkapäille ja sanoi:
"Antakaahan nyt piisata jo tälle päivälle, nuoret herrat! Ja te
kaunoiset naiset olkaa hyvät ja erotkaa heistä! Tässä seisoo isä, liika
henkilö teistä, kuten näyttää!"
Nuo neljä armastelijaa kavahtivat kauas toisistaan, Setti ja Netti
päästäen hämmästyksen huudon, mutta Isidor ja Julian piankin
tointuen.
"Herra Salander, tämä kaikki käy kunniallisesti, me olemme
kihloissa teidän tyttärienne kanssa!"
"Me olemme nimittäin kaikki täysi-ikäisiä, mikäli tiedämme!"
sanoivat pojat hiukan röyhkeästi; Salander huomasi kumminkin
hyvin, että se tapahtui paremmin avuttomuudesta kuin uhmasta.
"Se ilahuttaa minua", vastasi hän, "se jossakin määrin poistaa
minulta vastuunalaisuuden, jos jotain tyhmyyksiä tapahtuisi. Sillä
välin voin minä tulla avuksenne ja selvittää tuon jalon riitanne
odotettavasta omaisuudesta sekä edeltäpäin lievittää lasteni huolta
siitä, että kysymyksessä olisi halpamainen rahanaiminen, tekemällä

yksinkertaisesti tyttäreni perinnöttömiksi, jos he edelleenkin pysyvät
vanhempiensa halveksumisessa sekä sopimattomassa elämässään!"
Nuo sanat "perinnöttömäksi tekeminen" kulkivat yhteisenä vienona
väristyksenä noiden neljän kihlatun läpi. Niiden tyly kaiku sai tytöt,
jotka eivät sellaista olleet koskaan minään mahdollisena pitäneet,
heti itkemään, heidän ensialuksi osaamatta mitään ajatella; ja mikäli
kuun hämyisessä loisteessa saattoi huomata, nyykähtivät Weidelichin
veljestenkin päät alas.
Kukaan ei puhunut aluksi sanaakaan. Salander käytti hiljaisuutta
hyväkseen, lopettaakseen kohtauksen.
"Kerta kaikkiaan", sanoi hän tyynesti, "toivon minä molempien
vanhempain nimessä, että tämä salainen seurustelu tulevaisuudessa
lakkaa; se on jokaiselle parasta. Saanko minä saattaa nuoret herrat
takaportille, jonka kautta he ovat tulleet, voidakseni ottaa avaimen
haltuuni? Tyttäreni jättävät puutarhan tavallista tietä. Ottakaa
jäähyväiset!"
Nuo itkevät tytöt valmistausivat tottelemaan käskyä; mutta kun he
kohtauksen aikana olivat jälleen tuntomerkeistä eksyneet ja pojatkin
seisoa jurrottivat siinä epävarmoina ja liikkumattomina, ojensi
kumpikin kätensä väärälle henkilölle, tarjoten pamppailevin sydämin
huuliaan suudeltavaksi. Pojat eivät kumminkaan mielineet jättää
asiaa semmoisekseen, vaan muuttivat reippaasti aseman, vaihtoivat
tyttöjä sekä käsiä ja syleilivät kumpikin omaansa, jonka jälkeen he
hämmingistä lamautuneina seurasivat herra Salanderia, Settin ja
Nettin vaipuessa surkumielisinä alas kivipenkille.
Kun heidän isänsä oli laskenut kaksoset pienestä muuriportista,
kierauttanut avainta kaksi kertaa ja pistänyt sen taskuunsa, palasi

hän takaisin kaivon luo.
"Niin, nyt mennään äidin luo", huusi hän tytöille, "hän on kotona
huolissaan! Kello on jo sivu kymmenen!"
Hän kulki heidän edellään taloon ja konttoriin, jossa paloi vielä
valkea. Sillä aikaa kuin tytöt siellä tointuivat kokemastaan
säikäyksestä niin hyvin kuin mahdollista, mietti Martti isä puhetta,
minkä hän heille pitäisi ja minkä hän tahtoikin pitää; mutta kuta
kauemmin hän noita täysikypsyneitä neitosia katseli, sitä
vaikeammalta tuntui hänestä voida puheilla paljokaan vaikuttaa. Hän
tyytyi sen vuoksi viskaamaan heille muutamia pisteliäitä murusia,
jättäen äidin huoleksi ydinosan välttämättömästä esitelmästä.
"Tämäkö se nyt on", sanoi hän heidän eteensä pysähtyen, "sitä
suurta harvinaisuutta, jota te olette tavoitelleet? Aiotteko sillä
hyvinkin loistaa? Kaksi miestä, joita te ette voi toisistaan eroittaa, jos
on vähänkin hämärä! Sen nyt tosin voisi auttaa eräällä ehdolla
naimasopimuksessa, nimittäin että heidän tulisi käyttää kummankin
erilaista partaa, toinen esimerkiksi täysipartaa, toinen viiksiä. Mutta
tarkemmin harkiten, heillähän valitettavasti ei vielä lainkaan ole
minkäänlaista partaa eivätkä ylimalkaan saakaan koskaan sellaisia,
jotka olisivat kyllin tiheät, jotta ne voisi tuntomerkeiksi muovailla!"
Pilkka ei tuottanut toivottua vaikutusta; se vain syvästi katkeroitti
tyttöjä, niin että he uudelleen rupesivat itkemään, kerettyään jo
huolellisesti silmänsä kuivata.
"Oi, rakas isä", nyyhkytti Setti, "ei siitä ole ikinä mitään hyötyä,
eihän se ole meidän vallassamme! Niin kauan kun he pysyvät meille
uskollisina, emme heitä hylkää!"

"Niinkö?"
"Niin, isä!" huudahti nyt Netti, "sillä kuinkapa me muuten
voisimme todistaa valintamme oikeaksi kuin pysymällä heille lujasti
uskollisina?"
"Siinä se on, se sitkeä harhaluulo!" ajatteli Salander.
"Ja mitä kihlattujemme nuoremmuuteen tulee", jatkoi vanhempi
tytär jokseenkin miellyttävästi, "niin tarvitsevat he vaimoikseen ei
ainoastaan helliä vaan myöskin äidillisiä naisia, jotka osaavat heitä
ohjata! Heidän omalla äidillään ei ole niitä ominaisuuksia, joita
vaadittaisiin reipasten nuorukaisten ohjaamiseen. Mutta me, Netti
sen voi todistaa, olemme jo saavuttaneet jalostavan vaikutusvallan
heihin nähden, he kuuntelevat meitä ja mieltyvät siihen mitä me
sanomme."
Netti antoi vitkastelematta todistuksensa: "Se on totta mitä Setti
sanoo, he ovat jo paljon säädyllisempiä, jopa sivistyneempiäkin kuin
oppiessamme heitä tuntemaan!"
"Tuo herran nimessä kuulestaa joltakin, siinä voi jotain perää olla!"
ajatteli edestakaisin asteleva herra isä; "mutta siinä tapauksessa
niiden junkkarien on täytynyt olla kutakuinkin hillittömiä!" Ääneensä
sanoi hän: "Tänään ei tästä jutusta tule sen valmiimpaa! Tulkaa,
lähdetään!"
Hän sammutti valkean ja vei nuo ahdistetut neitoset huomaamatta
kadulle. Äänetönnä asteli hän heidän rinnallaan; että hän ei ottanut
iloisesti kuten muulloin lapsiaan kädestä, vaan sitävastoin kuului pari
kolme kertaa huokaavan, alkoi heidän sydäntään taas likistää, kuta
lähemmäs kotia he tulivat. Ja kun he astuivat huoneeseen, jossa äiti

aivan yksinään istui pöydän ääressä ja kutoi sukkaa, tunsivat he
kukoistavasta neitoijästään huolimatta syvästi hairahtuneensa. He
eivät sentään yrittäneetkään makuuhuoneeseensa pujahtaa, vaan
istuutuivat hiljaa seinän viereen ja katselivat surullisina lattiaan.
"Hyvää iltaa, eukko!" sanoi Salander, "siinä ovat linnut satimessa!
He pyytävät sinulta anteeksi ja lupaavat toistaiseksi jättää kaiken
enemmän ulos lentelemisen! Sillä he ovat olleet enemmän
ajattelemattomia kuin kevytmielisiä ja joka tapauksessa enemmän
kevytmielisiä kuin pahoja!"
"Sitä vielä puuttuisi, että sitä pitäisi sanoa enemmän pahuudeksi
kuin kevytmielisyydeksi!" vastasi Maria Salander ylös katsomatta.
Tämän lyhyen sananvaihdon esineet eivät olleet sellaisiin sanoihin
tottuneet eivätkä olisi koskaan uskoneet heille niin tehtävän.
Turvattomina he siinä yhä vaieten istuivat.
"Jos teillä on vielä nälkä", sanoi äiti, "niin voitte mennä kyökkiin;
täällä on aikaa sitten ruoka korjattu pöydältä. Vuoteen löydätte
myöskin hyvin, olettehan jo tarpeeksi vanhoja!"
He nousivat ylös ja menivät peräkkäin kyökkiin, jossa he vain
sytyttivät kynttilän ja ilman syömättä nousivat rappusia ylös
makuuhuoneeseensa. Ullakossa heidän päällään makasi vuoteessaan
hiirenhiljaa palveliatar, joka vähää ennen oli sinne hiipinyt.
Alhaalla kutoi huolestunut äiti edelleen, edes silmukkaakaan
pudottamatta.
"Sinä olet siis todellakin tavannut heidät yhdessä?" kysyi hän
mieheltään.

"Tietysti olen! Ensinnä marssivat kirkkaassa kuutamossa
lapsemme esille ja sitten ne pahanpäiväiset Weidelichin nuoret; minä
pistäysin piiloon kaivon takana olevaan pensaikkoon, näin kaikki mitä
tapahtui ja kuulin melkein kaikki mitä puhuttiin. Heti alussa täytyy
minun sanoa, että minä, lukuunottamatta sitä salakähmäisyyttä, jolla
he ovat meitä pettäneet, en nähnyt enkä kuullut mitään, mikä ei olisi
luvallista kunniallisille rakastuneille; melkeinpä väittäisin, etten
nähnyt enkä kuullut edes kaikkea luvallistakaan, mikäli ainakin minä,
luvallasi sanoen, meidän omasta käyttäytymisestämme muistan.
Lapsilla näytti olevan merkillinen vaikutusvalta niihin lurjuksiin —"
"Suo anteeksi, Martti", keskeytti hänet Maria, "mutta sinä puhut
nurinkurisesti ja narrimaisesti! Päinvastoinhan on totta, että niillä
lurjuksilla on onneton vaikutusvalta lapsiimme!"
"Ei niin, Maria! Tämä tarkoittamasi pakkovalta on itsessään
tytöissä, niissä nuorukaisissa se ei koskaan voisi olla; se on tuo
harhaluulo, josta he kärsivät! Kuitenkin, annahan kun kerron
edelleen!"
Hän kuvaili hänelle tapausten koko kulun niin tarkoin ja
havainnollisesti kuin mahdollista, jolla aikaa äiti milloin epäilevän,
milloin kummastuneen, mutta koko ajan suuttuneen näköisenä
katsoi eteensä, pudisti päätään ja alkoi jälleen kutoa.
Äkkiä heitti hän sukan pöydälle.
"Minä en voi sille mitään! He ovat minua äitinä loukanneet; minä
en ole tottunut, senjälkeen kuin sain lapsia, enkä kotoanikaan ole
saanut tottumusta puhua visseistä asioista, joita ei saisi olla
olemassakaan. Minä uskon nytkin vielä, että hyväluonteiset lapset
menestyvät parhaiten, jos he näkevät kotiväen, nimittäin isän ja

äidin elävän itsensä avoimesti ja nuhteettomasti, ilman siitä
saarnaamatta. Ja nyt tämä kahden tyttären vuosikausien viekkaus
juuri äitiä kohtaan!"
"Ei sinun pidä sitä yksistään siltä kannalta ottaa. Se on nyt herran
nimessä kerta tapahtunut, uusi tapaus ihmiselämästä, mistäpäs ne
tulisivat, jollei yhä uusia tapauksia esiintyisi? Ehkä viheliäinen
huvinäytelmä, ehkä mieltäylentävä vakava draama!"
"Ja kuinka nyt on laita? Mitä on odotettavissa?"
"Kuten sanoin sinulle, he selittävät ei jättävänsä kaksosia, he
ajattelevat tehdä heistä mitä tahtovat ja mikä hyvää on! Mutta että
heidän seurustelunsa tähänastisessa muodossaan lakkaa, siitä minä
olen jokseenkin varma. Sillä kun minä annoin kuulua sanat
perinnöttömäksi tekemisestä, tunsin minä selvästi, että herrasväki
nöyrtyi. Minun täytyi se tehdä, koska heidän puoleltaan jo puhuttiin
täysi-ikäisyydestä."
Rouva Salander kävi tällöin kuolemankalpeaksi ja tavoitti kädellään
sydänalaansa.
"Tehdä perinnöttömäksi!" toisti hän valittavalla äänellä, "voitko
sinä sitten tehdä sen tuollaisen asian takia?"
"Oikeastaan ei se suinkaan ollut helppoa", vastasi Martti
mahdollisimman vakavasti, "hyvä asianajaja voisi kumminkin
sopimattoman käytöksenkin, jatkuvan vanhempien halveksimisen ja
pettämisen, lasten kiittämättömyyden jo sellaisen sorvata esille niin,
että keskinkertaisen terävänäköiset tuomarit sen kyllä hyväksyisivät
perinnöttömäksi tekemisen syynä."

Maria Salander pani kutomakojeensa kokoon. Kyyneleitä vieri
hänen poskilleen, hänen niistä piittaamatta.
"Niin pitkälle on siis jo tultu", sanoi hän, sammuttaessaan lamppua
ja ottaessaan kynttilää maatamenoa varten, "niin pitkälle, että tässä
talossa täytyy sellaisen sanan kaikua! Menettää kaksi lasta!"
Martti tuki ja ohjasi horjuvaa vaimoaan ja lohdutti häntä
käydessään: "Oi, ajattelehan nyt toki, että minun täytyisi olla jo
kuollut, kun testamentti avattaisiin ja sen kimppuun alettaisiin käydä!
Jos minä sitten maanpovessa maatessani voittaisinkin oikeusjutun,
niin voisittehan sinä ja poikasi Arnold antaa tytöille kaiken jälleen!"
Isidor ja Julian olivat hyvin säikähtyneinä ja noloina jääneet
seisomaan pimeälle kadulle puutarhan muurin taakse ja sitten
päättäneet palata takaisin lauluharjoituksiin, paremmin poissaoloaan
peittääkseen. Kuultuaan harjoituksia vielä kestävän istuivat he
tarjoiluhuoneeseen, missä väliaikaa pitävät laulajat virkisteleivät, ja
he tekeysivät kuin olisivat he koko ajan olleet saapuvilla. Sitten vasta
lähtivät he Varpuseen, jossa vanhempain kodissa oli heille
kummallekin laitettu ja sisustettu pieni soma lukuhuone.
Vähitellen alkoivat he kyetä puhumaan illan tapauksesta, mutta
eivät tulleet siitä hullua hurskaammiksi. Vallankin kaksi seikkaa
tuosta tapauksesta kohosi heidän eteensä: Ennen isän tuloa heidän
kihlattujensa moite ahneudesta johtuvan rakkauden takia, ja sitten
ensimainitun uhkaus tyttärien perinnöttömäksi tekemisestä.
Molemmat seikat olivat salaisessa suhteessa toisiinsa. Neidit eivät
tahtoneet olla perinnön vuoksi rakastettuja ja isä evätä sen heiltä,
jos he yleensä sallisivat itseään rakastettavan. Mutta voisiko ukko
todellakin tehdä heidät perinnnöttömiksi? Tästä seikasta heillä
alkavina notariuksina oli jonkinlaista kokemusta, oli selvillä sitä

koskeva perintölain osa. Neuvottelun tulos oli kutakuinkin järkevä:
He pitivät parempana mukautua herra Salanderin käskyyn ja
lakkauttaa yhtymiset tyttöjen kanssa, estääkseen kysymystä missään
tapauksessa kärjistymästä. He arvelivat, ettei tytöilläkään olisi
mitään halua jouduttaa tuota epämääräistä vaaraa, ja etteivät he
voisi yksistään täysi-ikäisyydestä elää, jos välit vanhempain kanssa
rikkoutuisivat; ja he pelkäsivät morsiantensa äitiä vielä enemmän
kuin isää.
Sitä vastoin päättivät he pitää yhteyttä kirjeellisesti yllä ja siten
odottaa aikaa, joka heidän suunnitelmansa ja toiveensa kruunaisi.
Molempien rakastettujensa uskollisuudestahan he olivat varmat,
samoinkuin omastaankin ja kun he asian tätä puolta koskevaan
keskusteluunsa sirottelivat joukon poikamaisia ja keveitä
sanakukkasia, sai heidän keskustelunsa mitä kummallisimman sävyn.
Ja kuitenkin olivat he tässäkin tosissaan, muutoinhan olisi täytynyt
hullusti käydä, jolleivät tuollaiset nuoret veitikat olisi kyenneet
olemaan kiitollisia sellaisen sisarusparin antautumisesta.
Kotona päättivät he vaieta asiasta, ettei mamma saisi aikaan uutta
häiriötä.

IX
Salanderin kotielämässä näytti avomielisyyden hyvä kotihengetär
makaavan jossakin sairaana. Tukalata päivää odottaen olivat Setti ja
Netti, jotka tuona onnettomana yönä eivät olleet nukkuneet,
luvanneet toisilleen alistua lapsellisella nöyryydellä syvästi
loukkautuneen äidin tuomioihin, mutta myöskin pysyä valinnalleen
järkähtämättömän uskollisina.
Kun he aamulla ilmestyivät arkihuoneeseen, ei kukaan puhunut
sanaakaan ja sittenkuin kun isä oli poistunut ja he olivat yksin äidin
kanssa, pysyi tämä yhä vaiti asiasta, eipä antanut edes vähintäkään
viittausta siitä, että tyttöjen olisi tunnustuksille ruvettava. Niin kului
se päivä loppuun, samoin seuraava ja kaikki muutkin päivät. Äiti
puolestaan ilmeisestikin hautasi tuon onnettoman jutun
äänettömyyden yöhön, toivoen saavansa sen sillä tavoin
raukeamaan. Isä tekeysi myöskin kuin olisi hän sen täysin
unhoittanut, ja ainoastaan Leena kuiskasi heille kerran, ettei hän
saanut siitä puhua, jollei mielinyt tulla poispannuksi.
Arnold kirjoitteli tavallisuuden mukaan kotiin, milloin vanhemmille,
milloin sisarille. Isälle ja äidille osoitetut kirjeet luettiin julkisesti eikä
yksikään sana niissä ilmaissut, että hän olisi tiennyt jotain äidin

huolista, ja mitä hän sisarille kirjoitti, oli yhtä vilpitöntä ja veljellisen
vapaata kuin konsanaan.
Ulos mennessään he eivät huomanneet vähintäkään merkkiä
vartioimisesta; heiltä ei lainkaan kysytty, minne he aikoivat mennä,
ja vielä vähemmin piti heitä kukaan silmällä. Takaisin palatessaan ei
kukaan huolehtinut, missä he olivat olleet, jolleivät itse sitä
sanoneet.
Niin elivät nämä komeat ja täyskypsyneet neitoset epävarmoina
asiain kulusta ja harhailivat kuin varjot tietyksi tulleine
kaksoissalaisuuksineen. He tunsivat olonsa sitä epämieluisemmaksi,
kuta enemmän suhteet alkoivat levottua ja lujittua vanha
sovinnollinen yhteys; sillä äiti teki aina sen vaikutuksen kuin voisi
pimeys yhdestä ainoasta sanasta levittää jälleen huntunsa. Kerran
päivällistä syötäessä istui Salander pöydässä yksin tyttöjen kanssa,
äiti kun oli matkustanut erästä maalla kuollutta sukulaista maahan
saattamaan. Salander veti taskustaan muutamia toimistosta
tuomiaan yksityiskirjeitä ja tarkasti niitä lähemmin.
"Siinä on yksi Arnoldiltakin, mitähän se kirjoittaa?" sanoi hän ja
laski avatun kirjeen pöydälle. Setti otti sen ja luki. Arnold kertoi
välttävän hyvin päässeensä tohtoriksi, niin ja niin paljon menneen
siihen rahaa ja miettineensä nyt käyttää hyväkseen lupaa matkustaa
Lontooseen ja Pariisiin sekä käyttää siihen yhden vuoden.
"Se on minusta oikein kielitaidon vuoksi, jossa hän vielä on
takapajulla", sanoi tuo entinen sekundaariopettaja, "muusta minä en
niin paljoa välitäkään. Englannista puhuessaan on hänen opittava
sanomaan dschury ja Pariisista kertoessaan schyri, enempää ei hän
kerkeä, mitä lakitieteeseen tulee, puolessa vuodessa onkeensa
ottaa."

Sillä välin oli Setti pannut kirjeen pois sitä päähän asti lukematta
sekä piti nenäliinaa silmäinsä edessä. Samalla tavoin teki Nettikin,
joka oli ottanut kirjeen ja samoin sitä silmäillyt.
"Mitä nyt? Mikä teillä on?" kysyi isä hämmästyneenä, "miksette lue
loppuun?"
Hän otti itse kirjeen, etsi keskeytetyn kohdan ja luki ääneensä:
"Nyt tervehdin minä myöskin sydämellisimmästi suloista siskopariani!
Lyhyyden vuoksi olen minä, saadakseni tuon kalliin kaksoiskäsitteen
pikemmin mielessäni esille, yhdistänyt nimet Setti ja Netti ja
ajattelen ainoastaan Snettistä, joten he mielessäni esiintyvät. Mutta
kuinka te voitte? Eikö tunnu ilmassa vielä mitään kihlauksen
tapaista? Ettehän juuri enää ole mitään tytön tyllyköitä! Minulle se
kyllä on hyvä, jos tapaan teidät vielä kiltisti kotona; sillä hittokos sen
niin rantustelevista naisista voi tietää, mimmoisia lankoja he vielä
velimiehelleen valitsevat!"
"Vai niin!" murisi isä hyväntahtoisesti, "olisinpa tiennyt mitä siinä
on, niin olisi kirje pysynyt taskussani. Mutta pankaahan liinanne pois
ja syökää soppaanne!"
Hänen puhetapansa lohdutti hiukan tyttöjä; olihan se sentään
ystävällisintä, mitä he koko aikana olivat kuulleet, ja he söivät isän
kanssa loppuun saakka.
Kun palvelustytöllä ei ollut enää tekemistä huoneessa ja Martti
levollisesti lopetti viinilasiaan, joksi aikaa naiset talossa vallitsevan
tavan mukaan jäivät vielä paikoilleen istumaan, aloitti hän jälleen
ystävällisellä äänellä keskustelun.

"Koska tuohon ikävään, meitä kaikkia lumouksessaan pitävään
juttuun tuli Arnoldin viattoman pilan takia kajotuksi, niin
puhelkaamme siitä järjellisesti hiukan enemmän! Te käyttäytte hyvin
arvokkaasti; me uskomme, äiti ja minä, että te todellakin vältätte
seurustelua niiden nuorten miesten kanssa. Kuitenkaan emme
tulevaisuuteen nähden tiedä mitään ja tokko te itsekään olette sen
enemmän siitä selvillä? Ehkä, ajattelimme me, selvenevät he siitä
vähitellen ja löytävät jälleen itsensä, ja ilmankin noita kahta
kaksostähteä! Silloin tulee juoksupoika postista ja kertoo nähneensä
neiditkin luukulla. Toivatko he kirjeitä? kysyn minä, ja hän sanoo: 'Ei,
he noutivat kirjeitä, joita siellä heille oli.' Hyvä, minä tiedän jo mitä
se on, vastasin minä. Oletteko siis yhteydessä heidän kanssaan
poste restante?"
"Kyllä!" vastasivat molemmat tytöt yhtaikaa.
"Ja missä tarkoituksessa? Tulevaisuuteenko luottaen vai
tarkoituksellako lopettaa ystävyys? Te näette, että minä osaan puhua
samaan henkeen kuin mikä tuossa tunnetussa kirjevaihdossanne
vallinnee! Ystävämme eivät luovu, niin kauan kuin he ovat varmoja
kahdesta sydämestä, jotka eivät sitä heiltä vaadi!"
Tämän sanoi Netti ja Setti lisäsi: "Kuinka me todellakaan
tahtoisimme toiveistamme luopua, menettää rakastettumme ja sen
sijaan koko elämämme vaihettaa pilkkaaviin juorupuheisiin, jotka
sitten vasta oikein alkaisivatkin?"
"Hyvä valtti!" sanoi isä, surkumielin ajatellen puolisoaan, joka aina
yhtä kiinteän vastustuksen valtaamana mahdollisesti tällä samalla
hetkellä istui hautajaispöydässä kaukaisessa suruhuoneessa.

"Lapsi kullat!" jatkoi hän hetkisen vaiettuaan, "kuinka kauan te
sitten oikeastaan mielitte tuota luultua onneanne odottaa? Jospa
minä vain sen tietäisin! Niin, kunpa te olisitte kahdenkymmenen
ijässä, kuten sulhonne, ja nämä sen sijaan teidän ijässänne, niin se
joltakin kuuluisi!"
"Aina tuota samaa!" huusivat tytöt yhdestä suusta, "olkaa toki
kärsivällisiä, muutamassa vuodessa näytämme samanikäisiltä heidän
kanssaan, he tulevat niin vanhoiksi kuin me ja me yhtä nuoriksi kuin
he, kun vain ensin pääsemme yhteen! Heistä tulee miehiä! Muutoin
saavat he heille sopivan aseman pikemmin kuin moni luuleekaan, ja
silloin on tämä viheliäisyys lopussa!"
"Valtti!" huudahti isä nauraen, mutta kovin ihmeissään tyttäriensä
puheista; "tuo kaikkihan kuulestaa siltä kuin eläisimme sankarien
ajassa, jolloin miehet ja naiset pysyivät ikuisesti nuorina!
Odottakaamme sitä, ja toivoakseni teidän ei tarvitse, jos tahtonne
mukaan käy, kokea aikaa jolloin te todellakin tarvitsisitte sankarin
voimia! Nyt lopetamme istunnon. Tänä iltana on minun mentävä
erääseen vaalien takia pidettävään kokoukseen, josta en voi jäädä
pois. Niin ollen olisi hyvä että te minun sijastani menisitte asemalle
äitiä noutamaan. Tiedän, että se tekee hänelle hyvää, kun hän
odottamatta tapaa teidät siellä!"
Tytöt lupasivat sen tehdä ja hiukan punastuivat salaisesta ilosta,
minkä saamansa tehtävä heille tuotti.
Martti Salander meni liikkeeseensä, työskenteli siellä pari tuntia ja
sitten vielä hyvän aikaa vaaliasioissa, katsellen läpi kirjeitä ja muita
papereita sekä yhtä ja toista huomautellen.

Kysymyksessä oli erään Münsterburgin piirin Suurta Neuvostoa
koskevien vaalien ehdokaslistan selvittely, entisten jäsenten
arvosteleminen, eroavien korvaaminen ja uusien jäsenten ottaminen.
Salander sai yhä vielä iloita siitä, että hän oli riippumaton ja vapaa
kaikesta vaalikuumeesta, hän kun useista palveluksistaan ja
moninkertaisista vaatimuksista huolimatta oli jäänyt syrjään
muodollisista viroista ja arvonimistä.
Mutta nyt pakkasi hänestä salaa tuntumaan siltä, että hänen kuten
monen muunkin, olisi hyödyllisintä esiintyä ja puhua ratkaisevassa
paikassa, nimittäin lakiasäätävässä neuvostossa; sillä mitä se häntä
auttoi, joskin hän vapaissa yhdistyksissä ja kokouksissa ajoikin läpi
mielipiteensä tappioksi vastustajalleen, joka sitten kuitenkin istui
virastossa ja sai siellä yksin päänsä pitää.
Mutta hän ei saanut, vaikka se onkin tavallista, ehdottaneeksi
itseänsä, se on tuttavallisesti ilmaisseeksi toisille johtajille haluavansa
tulla valituksi; ja ettei siltä näyttäisikään, otti hän julkisesti osaa
tämänpäiväiseen kokoukseen, jota vastoin ne, jotka toivoivat
tulevansa valituiksi tai tiesivät siten käyvän, jäivät pois. Eivät tosin
kaikki, sillä muutamat tulivat kokoukseen vapaasti ja itsetietoisesti.
Neljän Tuulen salissa, joka oli eri puolueiden ja seurain
kokouspaikkana, tapasi Salander kahden pitkän pöydän ympärillä
sankat joukot kansalaisia, yhtä suurien miesjoukkojen seisoskellessa
vielä ympäri seiniä ja keskenään puhellessa. Näiden joukossa
kiertelivät kokoonkutsujat, neuvotellen tuolla ja täällä sekä kesytellen
jotakin vastuksellisempaa poliittista kannunvalajaa. Salanderkin liittyi
heihin. Hän oli etupäässä herättänyt sen ajatuksen, että molempain
pääpuolueiden olisi sovinnollisesti otettava toisensa lukuun; hän itse
kuului demokraatiseen puolueeseen, jonka valta joku aika sitten oli

kansan keskuudessa alkanut horjua, ja siksipä pitikin hän yhtä
viisaana kuin kohtuullisenakin, että vanhoille liberaaleille suotaisiin
taas enemmän tilaa. Hän oli nimittäin alkanut suosia uudenaikaista
vähemmistöedustusta, jota puolustivat ei ainoastaan valtiolliset
ajattelijat vaan myöskin kaikenlaiset käytännön miehetkin, joita
itseään se lähinnä saattoi hyödyttää, vaikkakaan he tähän saakka
eivät olleet mitään muuta järjestelmää hyväksyneet.
Kun pöydät vähitellen yhä enemmän täyttyivät, antoi esimies
merkin alkamiseen. Salander kohtasi, raivautuessaan yhä esille
rientävien välitse eteenpäin, muutaman nuoren miehen, joka näytti
hänestä tutulta ja joka hattuaan nostaen tervehti häntä
kunnioittavasti, mihin hän kohteliaasti vastasi.
Hänen oli mentävä pitkin toisen pöydän sivua, päästäkseen
paikalleen sen yläpäässä johtajien joukossa. Matkalla sinne kohtasi
hän taasen tuon nuoren miehen, joka uudisti saman kohteliaisuuden
ja nosti hattuaan, tällä kertaa kumartaen. Se ei näytä mielivän
lainkaan panna hattuaan pois, ajatteli hän juuri, kun häneltä samalla
putosi kuin suomukset silmistä; nehän olivat kaksoset! Kas vain, he
osoittivat ottavansa osaa maansa asioihin; se on hyvä nuorille
miehille ja todistaa heissä vakavaa mieltä! Jolleivät he pahempaa
puuhaile, niin ei heidän laitansa niin huonosti olekaan!
Puolittain hajamielisenä näistä ajatuksistaan ja päivällä tyttöjen
kanssa tapahtuneen keskustelun muisteluista pääsi hän vihdoinkin
paikalleen, ja tilasi lasin viiniä, mikä tässä osassa salia oli
arvokkaisuuden vuoksi juotava vain hyvin hitaasti, ikäänkuin
huomaamatta.
Keskustelut alkoivat esimiehen pitämällä valtiollisella puheella ja
äänten laskijain ynnä muiden toimimiesten vaalilla, jonka jälkeen

alettiin ehdotuksia käsitellä. Perustana oli muutamia painettuja
listoja, jotka sitä varten valitut esilukijat suullisesti esittivät, ja viisi
kuusi nimeä ratkaistiin pian yksimielisesti. Mutta jo seitsemänteen
nimeen tultaessa, kun esimies kysyi, tahdotaanko muita ehdotuksia
tehdä, kaikui perältä voimakas ääni, joka huusi: "Minä ehdotan herra
Martti Salanderia, kauppiasta Münsterburgista!"
Ja eräästä toisesta salinnurkasta huusi joku yhtä kuuluvasti:
"Kannatetaan!"
"Jaa! Niinpä vain! Jo paljon afisioita!" ynnä muuta sentapaista
mutinaa kuultiin pöydän ääressä, ja jokainen kääntyi katsomaan
ehdotuksen tekijää.
Mutta esimies kilisti lasiaan ja lausui hiljaisuuden tultua: "Minä
kysyisin kokoukselta, käymmekö nyt heti käsittelemään uutta
ehdotusta vai menemmekö sitä ennen läpi esillä olevat ehdotukset,
joista ilmeisestikin päästään pian ja yksimielisesti!"
"Minä pysyn ehdotuksessani!" huusi ensimäinen ääni ja toisesta
nurkasta seurasi sitä heti äänekäs "kannatetaan!" Esimies julisti: "On
ehdotettu vaalilistaan otettavaksi herra Martti Salanderia piirimme
seitsemäntenä jäsenenä Suureen Neuvostoon! Pyydän ehdotuksen
tekijöitä ilmoittamaan itsensä!"
"Notariuksen sijainen Isidor Weidelich!" kajahti entisestä paikasta
vieläkin kuuluvammin, ja kannattajan nurkasta huusi toinen,
selvästikin Julian veli: "Hyvä! hyvä!"
Kaikki kääntyivät taas katsomaan.

"Mikä Weidelich se on? Kuka hän on? Tuoko nuori mies tuolla?"
kuului ääniä.
Esimies kilisti uudelleen ja huusi: "Joka haluaa, että nyt heti
käytäisiin käsittelemään herra Isidor Weidelichin vaaliehdotusta,
nostakoon kätensä!"
"Ylös!" huusi joukko nuoria miehiä, heiluttaen käsiään ilmassa, ja
heitä seurasi hiukan epäröiden käsi toisensa jälkeen; kun se lakkasi,
koetti esimies laskea ääniä. Käsiä oli viisikymmentäkuusi.
"Näyttää olevan enemmistö! Vai vaaditaanko vastaäänestystä?"
Kaksi tai kolme nostivat kätensä, mutta antoivat niiden jälleen
laskeutua, nähdessään yksin jäävänsä.
"On siis päätetty heti ryhtyä herra Martti Salanderin
vaaliehdokkuuteen. Siis joka äänestää, että hänet asetettaisiin
lähinnä seuraavalle sijalle listalla ja tämän kokouksen nimessä
suositeltaisiin kansalle vaalia varten, se suvaitkoon nostaa kätensä!"
Harvoja ja tuskin ollenkaan huomattavia poikkeuksia lukuun
ottamatta kohosivat kaikki kädet hyväksyvän ääntensorinan
kaikuessa, mikä osoitti, että Salanderin valinta näytti läsnäolevista
kansalaisista itsestään selvältä asialta.
Hän, juuri valituksi tullut mies, oli harmin ja kiihtymyksen vallassa.
Sydämensä salaisen toivomuksen, päästä viimeinkin hänelle hyvin
sopivalle sijalle neuvostossa näki hän kaksosveljesten rohkean ja
ripeän yrityksen kautta toteutuneeksi ja samalla äänestyksen
keskeytetyksi puheenjohtajan epäkohteliaiden turhantarkkuuksien
takia, yhteensattuma, joka ei voinut lainkaan miellyttää.

Miettiessään, ettei hän sellaisissa oloissa voisi ryhtyä oman
valintansa hyväksi puuhaamaan eikä neuvoston paikasta vallankaan
kaksosille olla kiitollisuuden velassa, oli hän noiden hajanaisten
tunteiden vallassa ollessaan lyönyt laimin oikean hetken ratkaisevan
vastalauseen panoon ja oli niin levotonna ja neuvotonna, että hän
koskematonna säilyneen lasinsa tyhjensi lyhyin siemauksin melkein
pohjaan saakka, kun puheenjohtaja samalla vahvisti onnellisen
tuloksen vissillä juhlallisuudella, tahtoen toimitusta jatkettavaksi. Hän
kiitti tuosta arvokkaasta luottamuksesta, mutta selitti olevansa
pakoitettu hylkäämään ehdokkuuden syistä, joita hän tässä ei voinut
selvitellä, sekä pyysi hyvin varmoin sanoin uuden vaalin
toimittamista. Nyt vasta esiintyi kaksi vanhempaa miestä,
taivuttaakseen häntä peräytymään. Näille oli hän sydämessään
todella kiitollinen, mutta päätöksessään pysyi hän lujana, ja niin
ryhdyttiin jatkamaan toimitusta, kunnes se tavallisine
välikohtauksineen ja odottamattomine asiankäänteineen soljui
loppuun.
Puheenjohtajakin, jolla oli samoinkuin Salanderillakin salaisia
toiveita, tuli uusia ehdokkaita asetettaessa Martin ehdotuksesta
valituksi, jolla tämä levollisin mielin täytti kansalaisvelvollisuutensa,
hän kun tunsi ensimainitun kunnon mieheksi.
Kotimatkalla oli hänellä voitettavanaan kovin ristiriitaisia tunteita.
Hänelle laajempaa vaikutusta varten välttämätön virka, kuten hän
uskoi, täytyi hänen sivuuttaa, koska hän ei voinut sitä ottaa vastaan
niiden kädestä, jotka lahjoittivat sen hänelle kuin hihastaan
pudistaen. Mitä olisi Maria rouva siihen sanonutkaan, jos olisi
puhuttu, että Weidelichin veljekset olivat julkisesti häntä
ehdottaneet! Ja sittenkin, niin harmissaan kuin hän olikin noille
poikanulkeille, kuten hän heitä nimitti, tunsi hän vasten tahtoaankin

hitusen suopeutta heitä ja heidän epäonnistunutta yritystään
kohtaan. Sitten hävetti häntä, takertuessaan niin vähäpätöiseen
ansaan, ollessaan ensi kertaa monivuotisen toimintansa jälkeen
aivan neuvostotalon kynnyksellä sekä täytyessään tunnustaa, että
häneltä puuttui tuota karskia häikäilemättömyyttä, mikä on
välttämätöntä ripeään menestykseen poliittisella uralla.
Lopulta tuli hän tyytyväiseksi menettelyynsä, kun hän ajatteli
seurauksia ja kaikkia suurempia vaatimuksia, mitkä häntä olisivat
kohdanneet, jos hän kerta olisi astunut virkaelämän poluille. Ei, sanoi
hän, tietoisuus siitä, että kaksi nuorukaista ovat minut kilvelle
nostaneet, olisi seurannut minua kaikkialla, ja varmaankin olisivat he
itsensä hyvin epämukavalla tavalla jalkoihini kietoneet! Ja mikä
tänään ei tapahdu, voi onnellisemmalla hetkellä paremmin tapahtua!
Käytöksestään niitti hän myöskin kauniin palkan, kun hän kertoi
kokemansa vaimolleen ja tämä häntä sen johdosta kovin ylisti. Hän
oli tavannut tämän kotona tyytyväisellä ja lempeällä tuulella, hän
kun oli tytärten vastaan tulon käsittänyt ja selittänyt parantumisen
alotteeksi, jonka vuoksi hän viettikin iltaa ystävällisessä
seurustelussa heidän kanssaan, minkä tytöt taasen maata
mennessään selittivät omalla tavallaan.
Kaiken tämän tunteiden sekamelskan pääaiheuttajat, Julian ja
Isidor, kävivät kokouksen jälkeen neuvottelemaan eräässä kaupungin
oluttuvista.
"Huonosti meiltä onnistui toivomaamme appiukkoon nähden!"
arveli heistä toinen.
"Mitä lemmittyjemme isäukkoon tulee, niin, luulen ma, ottaa hän
huomioon tilaisuudessa osoittamamme hyvän tahdon, eikä hän

pahakseen ole sitä missään tapauksessa ottanut!" vastasi toinen;
"mutta muutoin on esiintymisemme täysin onnistunut, hänhän tuli
valituksi aivan yksimielisesti!"
"Todellakin, niin kyllä, kuka olisi ajatellut, että me kaksi jo ensi
kerralla valtiolliseen kokoukseen mennessämme tekisimme
neuvosherran?"
"Sen minäkin sanon, että se on hyvä alku! Täytä ja juo! Sitä tulee
meidän jatkaa! Jos me jatkuvalla menestyksellä politikoimme, niin
tulee se olemaan meille hyvin edullista! Päällikköni sanoo tahtovansa
vielä tänä vuonna luopua; minun täytyy nyt jo tehdä melkein kaikki
työt!"
"Ja minun esimieheni ei tule enää valituksi, jahka hänen virka-
aikansa päättyy, se on hyvin todennäköistä."
"Silloinpa sinä voit jo nyt valmistella maaperää piirissäsi! Juo
pohjaan!"
"Sinun vuorosi täyttää! Kuulehan mitä minulla äsken juolahti
mieleen, minä tahtoisin sitä tyystin harkittavaksi!"
"Laukaise pois!"
"Minä arvioin hyödylliseksi, ettemme menisi samaan puolueeseen,
silloin voisimme paremmin omaksi hyväksemme toimia! Useinhan
perheissä sattuu, että yksi veljistä on harmaa, toinen musta, kolmas
punanen, ja kaikki menestyvät hyvin sellaisinaan; yksi hankkii ystäviä
toiselle, puhumalla hänestä hyvää ja suosittelemalla häntä!"
"Se on selvää! Todellakin, kun ajattelee! Sinä taivaan talikynttilä!
Mutta miten meidän on kakku jaettava? Onko sinulla määrättyä

harrastusta, prinsiippiä?"
"Minullako? Ei vielä, sen hankimme myöhemmin kokemuksen
kautta, jos se niin välttämätöntä on! Mutta nykyään on minulle
samantekevää, mitä nuottia minä vihellän; ylimalkaan ei ole tarvis
aina jaaritella, jollei kerta olla asiassa käsinä!"
"Maljasi!" —
"Kippis!"
"Katsos, näin juuri minä ajattelen! Ainoastaan yksi mutka on
asiassa, nimen edullinen tai vähemmän edullinen kaiku! Nyt ovat
demokraatit vallassa ja käyvät miehistä; vanhoja liberaaleja
nimittävät he jo vanhoillisiksi. Konservatiivinen miellyttäisi enemmän
korvaa, mutta yksinkertainen rahvas ei käytä sitä nimeä!"
"Siinä on jotain hassua! Jo tuo nimi vanha liberaali tai vanha
vapaamielinen haiskahtaa yömyssyltä!"
"Ja sentäänkin, toiselta puolen alkaa käsite demokraati tuntua
kovin kirpeältä! Ja notariuksella on pääasiallisesti kapitaalin kanssa
tekemistä!"
"Niin kyllä, mutta sinä unhotat, että myöskin velkaantuneilla
talonpojilla, velallisilla, konkurssitilassa olevilla ja kaikenkarvaisilla
köyhillä ihmisillä on tekemistä notariuksen kanssa, sitähän sinulle ei
tarvitse sanoa! Ja näitä on enemmistö notariuksen vaaleissa kuten
muuallakin!"
"Totta sekin! Kuules nyt, koska hyvät ja huonot puolet käyvät
kaikissa yksiin, niin ehdotan minä puolueet keskenämme arvalla
jaettavaksi!"

"Neiti, arpamalja!"
Kun se tuotiin, tarttui Julian siihen ja pudisti sitä. "Kuinkas nyt
menetellään? Minun mielipiteeni on, että jätämme kaikki pikku
puolueet huomioon ottamatta ja pelaamme vain kahdesta
pääleiristä!"
"Siis demokraati tai vanha liberaali! Siihen riittää yksi heitto; joka
heittää useimmat silmät, siitä tulee se mitä edeltä päätetään, toinen
ottaa toisen nimen."
"Siis voittajasta tulee demokraati, häviölle joutuneesta vanha
liberaali! Käykö se?"
"Kyllä!"
"Juo ensin pohjaan, tahdin mukaan, kippis!"
"Sitte laukastaan, kippis!"
Julian pudisti uudelleen kolmea arpanappulaa ja kaatoi maljan
pöydälle. Esissä oli kahdeksantoista silmää, kaikki kolme kuutosta.
"Se on siis valmis!" huusi Isidor.
"Ei, sinä heität myös, voithan sinäkin saada yhtä monta silmää ja
sitten me ryypätään!" sanoi veli Julian.
Toinen heitti, mutta sai vain kolmetoista silmää. "Onneksesi, herra
demokraati!" huudahti hän ja toinen, Julian, huusi: "Onneksesi,
herra vanha liberaali, rahvaankielellä vanhoillikko!"

X
Nuo muutoin yksimieliset veljekset erosivat julkisuudessa vain sikäli
kuin kumpikin harrasti käydä niissä kansalaispiireissä, jotka
vastasivat kunkin puoluenimeä. Kun heillä oli vielä niukasti poliittista
älyä ja ajatusvarasto vähäinen, tuntui heistä vaikealta päästä
puheillaan huomatuiksi, mutta sen sijaan päättivät he läsnäolollaan
ja puheenjohtajille omistetulla mielistelevällä tarkkaavaisuudella
hankkia näiden suopeuden. Vähitellen osoittausivat he hyödyllisiksi
esille tulevain pienempäin kirjoitustöiden avulla, joita he halukkaasti
ottivat huoltaakseen, sekä samoin tiedonannoillaan vastapuolueen
leiristä, kertoen näiden aikeista ja päätöksistä, hullunkurisista tai
ikävistä tapauksista, mieskohtaisista rettelöistä ja sen semmoisista,
joista he joka kerta viivyttelemättä toisilleen kuiskailivat. Tämän
johdosta mainittiin heitä puoluelaistensa kesken sukkeliksi ja asioista
hyvin selvillä oleviksi politikoiksi, he kun kertoivat uutisensa varovasti
ja kuin sivumennen. Muutoin on luultavaa, että tämä viimemainittu
piirre ei johtunut niinkään ilkeästä petturuudesta kuin siitä
kevytmielisestä menettelystä, jota he olivat ottaneet puolue-elämän
kanssa pelatakseen. Vielä muitakin, viattomampia kujeita harjoittivat
he ahkerasti. Jos he menivät johonkin julkiseen kokoukseen,
yhdistykseen taikkapa vain ravintolaan, pitivät he huolta siitä, että
heiltä tuli ja meni kansliaansa kiireellisiä asiakirjeitä ja sähkösanomia

tai että heitä persoonallisesti kutsuttiin ulos. Tälle kyllä naureskelivat
kokeneet virkoihin pyrkijät, mutta varovasti ja suopeasti. He pitivät
sitä jonakin perin kunnollisena, ikäänkuin valtiomiesmäisyytenä,
eivätkä suinkaan kavaltaneet kansajoukon tietoon tuota heille tuttua
salaisuutta.
Veljekset menestyivät mitä parhaiten ja voittivat kukin
paikkakunnallaan päivä päivältä arvonantoa ja suosiota kansan
kesken. Heidän varmat toiveensa esimiestensä virkoihin
pääsemisestä eivät tosin täyttyneet. Toinen, joka oli aikonut luopua,
tuli äkkiä kateelliseksi ja harkitsi toisin; se taas, jonka virka-aikansa
loputtua piti tulla syrjäytetyksi, teki epätoivoisia ponnistuksia, kulkien
mieskohtaisesti äänestäjäin kotona itseään suosittelemassa, niin että
hän niukalla enemmistöllä tuli jälleen valituksi. Mutta hänen
sijaisensa Julian, joka oli peittelemättä virkaan pyrkinyt, sai niin
paljon ääniä, että hän niiden perusteella sai esiintyneiden
ehdokasten joukossa lähimmän virkaan pääsyoikeuden.
Nuo kaksi nuorta miestä eivät asiain niin ollen kauemmin
vitkastelleet ryhtyä puuhiin oman notariaattipiirinsä ulkopuolella sekä
käyttää hyväkseen hankkimiaan ystävyyssuhteita, ja niinpä ei kovin
kauan kestänytkään, ennenkuin kumpikin valittiin notariukseksi
hyvinvoipiin ja varakkaisiin seutuihin, Isidor, vanha liberaali,
pohjoiseen ja Julian, demokraati, itään Münsterburgista.
Varpusessa riemuittiin. Rouva Amalia Weidelich huudahti: "Kaksi
maakirjuria poikina!" Ja Jaakko isä sanoi: "Niin, sinä olet saavuttanut
sen, mitä kunniaan tulee! Mutta notariusten tulot eivät liene enää
loistavat! Meidän on vielä edelleenkin uhrattava!"
"Oo, elä siitä huolehdi!" kiivastui äiti, "semmoiset pojat ne eivät
kauaksi aikaa siihen asemaan jää!"

"Joka tapauksessa", jatkoi Jaakko Weidelich häiriytymättä,
"tarvitsee kumpikin heti talon, vakavan asuinpaikan; sillä eihän
maakirjurin virkatoimia täyttäen voi talonpoikaistaloissa vuokralla
asua! Rahaa sekin maksaa!"
Pojat rauhoittivat isäänsä. Sievän talon tai vaikkapa kohtalaisen
maatilan saamiseen ilmestyisi juuri heidän virkatoimissaan edullisia
tilaisuuksia konkurssitilojen, perinnönmyyntien ja muiden omistaja-
muutosten sattuessa, jolloin sukkela notarius, joka pitää silmänsä
auki ja jotain uskaltaa, ennen kaikkia olisi tilaisuudessa eteensä
katsomaan.
Isä Weidelich ei oikein ymmärtänyt sellaista asiankulkua;
vanhoista, hänen aikuisistaan maakirjureista ei oltu sellaista kuultu;
ei hän sentään itsekään ollut mikään voiton halveksija ja huomasi
sen lopulta sitäkin paremmaksi, kun siihen soveltui raamatunlause:
"Ei sinun pidä riihtä tappavan härjän suuta kiinni sitoman!"
Tuo kunnon äiti ei kyennyt enää sanaakaan lausumaan, niin
liikutettu, niin hämmästynyt hän oli, nähdessään poikansa istuvan
omissa herrastaloissaan, asuen maalla kaukana toisistaan.
Sillä aikaa kuin nuo nuoret notariukset virkoihinsa astuessaan ja
niitä hoitamaan ruvetessaan vielä toistaiseksi asuivat edeltäjäinsä
taloissa, etsi kumpikin ympäri piiriään tilapäistä asuntoa. Siten
esiintyi tilaisuus tutustuttaa itseään asukkaille ja hankkia ystäviä.
Etteivät nykyisellä elämänurallaan enää vaihetuksiin joutuisi, olivat
he ulkonaista olemustaan muuttaneet niin paljon kuin mahdollista.
Julian oli leikkauttanut tuuhean tukkansa lyhyeksi ja kasvattanut
sievät viikset, Isidor tasoittanut tukkansa pomadalla ja laittanut
jakaukselle; lisäksi piti edellinen mustaa huopahattua, leveää kuin
vaununpyörä, jälkimäisen hattu oli taasen kuin soppatalrikki.

Onni laittoi niin, että kumpikin sai lyhyessä ajassa tilaisuuden
hankkia itselleen halvasta hinnasta kauniin maatilan ja entisen
omistajan sijasta kirjoittaa ainoastaan oman nimensä maakirjoihin.
Tämän jälkeen voivat he myydä niistä maata niin paljon, että he
asuivat melkein verottomina. Julianin asunto oli idässä, suuressa
Lindenberg'in kylässä; talot olivat laajalla alalla hajallaan ympäri
vuoren juurta, mutta uusi kanslia kukkulallaan loisti valkoisena
ympäristöön. Isidor oli hallintopaikakseen valinnut Unterlaubin
seurakunnan ja hänen hankkimansa sievä maatalo sijaitsi samoin
hauskalla, viheriän pyökkimetsikön keskestä kohoavalla kummulla,
jota sanottiin "Soittolaksi." Kun Weidelichin vanhukset vissinä
vuodenaikana kauniilla ilmalla nousivat Varpusen luona oleville
kukkuloille, saattoivat he etäisyydessä nähdä molempien talojen
valkoisten muurien ja akkunain laskevan auringon valossa
kimmeltävän ja säkenöivän.
Mutta ei ainoastaan taivaan valo, vaan ihmistenkin suosio näytti
kirkastavan noita onnellisia asumuksia ja niiden omistajia; sillä kun
jälleen oli hitusen aikaa kulunut, kuoli Isidorin paikkakunnalla muuan
vanha Suuren Neuvoston jäsen ja toinen Julianin piirissä asuva otti
olojen pakosta eronsa. Vanhat liberaalit tahtoivat suruissaan vanhan
asetoverinsa kadottamisesta koetella kerta nuorilla voimilla ja
nostivat Soittolan nuoren notariuksen kilvelle; demokraatit idässä
vetivät Lindenbergin Julianin esille jo hänen suuren hattunsakin
vuoksi; sillä tämä hattu, joka oli kuin puhuva esikuva miehen
mielenlaadusta, muodosti oivallisen vastakohdan Isidorin jakaukselle
kammatulle tukalle ja sileälle naamalle sekä oli ylipäätään kuin
taisteluvaatimus kaikille toisinajatteleville.
Heidät kutsuttiin tuon kaksisatahenkisen neuvoston seuraavaan
kokoukseen ja kun vaalit oli hyväksytty, vietiin heidät sisälle saliin

valaa tekemään; jo ennen istuntoa olivat he vahtimestarin
opastuksella etsineet edeltäjäinsä paikat ja ottivat ne lyhyen
alkutoimituksen jälkeen haltuunsa.
Kun he siinä nyt istuivat, yksi siellä, toinen täällä, oli kumpikin yhtä
hiljaa ja kuitenkin tarkkaamattomina, niin että he tuskin tiesivät mitä
juuri käsiteltiin. Kun uusia ehdotuksia jaettiin, syventyivät he selaillen
niitä tutkimaan ja saivatkin käsiinsä langan, johon neuvottelu
uudesta lakiehdotuksesta punoutui. Mutta jo ensi kertaa
äänestettäessä, mikä tapahtui aamun kuluessa, olivat he poissa
salista, he kun olivat seuranneet hyviä tuttaviaan, jotka olivat heille
lehtereiltä viittoneet sekä livistäneet näiden kanssa aamiaiselle
muutamaan ravintolaan. Äänestystä ei voitu puuttuvain jäsenten
takia ylipäätään suorittaa ja niin täytyi lähettää vahtimestareita
hakemaan poissa olevia lähellä olevista ravintoloista, jonka kuluessa
neuvostohuoneessa istuva, vakavampi ja odotukseen enemmän
tottunut osa senaattoreja kuunteli jotain kertomusta. Vahtimestarit
asettausivat heille hyvin tuttujen hämäräin ja melun täyttämäin
ravintolahuoneiden oville ja äänekkäällä huudolla pyysivät noita
hyvin arvoisia herroja äänestykseen tulemaan. Meluten kohosi tuo
nälkäinen seurue aamiaispöydästä ja, kaksosveljekset keskellään,
työntyi se sankkana pilvenä kiiruusti noista ikivanhoista ovista ulos.
Isidor ja Julian pitivät tapausta lystikkäänä ja kasvot
naurunvireessä tulivat he neuvostoon, puheenjohtajankorokkeella
istuvan harmistuneen presidentin sanoessa vieressään istuvalle
ensimäiselle varapresidentille: "Tämähän käy pian ollen kuin
koulussa, kun poikia sisään ajetaan!"
Lakiehdotuksen käsittelyä jatkettiin, mutta se ei tahtonut luistaa,
jonka vuoksi presidentti ehdotti istunnon keskeytettäväksi ja

pidettäväksi iltapäiväistunto. Kokous hyväksyi sen ja hankki siten
uuden hauskuttelutilaisuuden noille kahdelle nuorimmalle jäsenelle,
jotka vaelsivat ravintolaan päivälliselle, kumpikin omain
hengenheimolaistensa parvessa. Siellä he sulivat täydellisesti hetken
tunnelmaan, unhoittaen korttien ja mustan kahvin ääressä
syntyperänsä sekä vihkiytyen tasa-arvoisiksi toveriensa kanssa.
Kun kahden tunnin kuluttua palattiin neuvoston istuntoon, tunsivat
he olevansa jo kuin kotonaan. He alkoivat tänä ensi päivänä jäljitellä
vanhempien jäsenten ja monitoimisten miesten tapoja; niinpä Julian
jätti penkkinsä istuakseen muutaman pöydän ääreen, joka
kirjoitustarpeilla varustettuna seisoi keskellä salia. Ottamatta
huomioonsa pöydällä olevia pieniä paperiliuskoja irroitti hän
muutamasta parasta paperia sisältävästä kirjasta suuren arkin, avasi
sen ja paperiveistä käyttämättä repäsi hän sen, kansliataituruuttaan
näyttääkseen, vapaalla kädellä ja yhdellä vetäisyllä linjasuoraa
keskeltä halki.
"Ratsch!" toisti naapurilleen herra presidentti, jonka korviin tuo
karmea ääni otti, "tuosta tuhlarista minä en ikinä tekisi
finanssiministeriä! Kuinka hän menetteleekään tuon kalliin paperin
kanssa, joka ei hänelle mitään maksa!"
Mutta Julian jatkoi paperiliuskojen kahtia repimistä, kunnes hän sai
sellaisen, johon sopi kirjoittaa, kastoi kynän musteeseen, katsahti
miettivästi ylös kattoon ja alkoi sitten jotakin kirjoittaa, väliin
vähäsen kuunnellen, voidakseen keskustelun kulkua seurata. Lopuksi
käännähti hän puhujaan päin, nojautui tuolinselustaan, asetti
jalkansa päällekkäin ja näytti, kynä korvan takana, kuuntelevan
tarkasti, melkeinpä jännittyneenä. Sitten rupesi hän taas

kirjoittamaan, kuivasi vihdoin, luki kirjoituksen, käänsi sen kokoon ja
meni takaisin paikalleen.
Kohta sen jälkeen lähti Isidor pöydän luo, jossa hän otti arkin
postipaperia ja kirjoitti liukkaalla kädellä kirjeen. Mutta
allekirjoituksen laati hän hitaasti ja harkiten, kunnes hän yhtäkkiä
pani kynän vikkelään liikkeeseen, pyöräytellen sitä ensin hetkisen
ilmassa, sitten paperilla, raapustaen nimen ympärille sakean verkon
vinkan-konkkeja. Lopuksi räiskäytti hän sinne keskeen taitavasti
kolme pistettä, ylösrakennukseksi lehteriltä häntä katseleville
ihmisille. Sitten taittoi hän kirjeen kokoon, pisti sen kuoreen ja
kirjoitti osoitteen, ojensi kynänvarren ja viittasi vahtimestarille, joka
seisoi tarkkaavaisena paikallaan. Palvelushaluisena riensi tämä
varpaillaan käyden esiin, rinnassaan kolmella ketjulla kiinnitetty
hopeinen kilpi, otti vastaan kirjeen, pisti siihen suulakan ja asetti
pöytään kiinnitetyn painimen alle, painaen siihen pienemmän
valtiovaakunan, jonka jälkeen hän vei sen ulos tai oikeastaan antoi
raskaassa tammiovessa olevan luukulla varustetun aukon kautta
ulkopuolella seisovalle juoksupojalle. Sillä välin lepäili Isidor
nojatuolissa pöydän luona, kädet ristissä katsellen lehterillä olevaa
yleisöä.
Puheenjohtaja sanoi vierustoverilleen: "Tahtoisinpa väittää, että
tuo on varmasti tilannut itselleen puoli tusinaa Frankfurtin
makkaroita, jotka hän tänä iltana aikoo viedä mukanaan kotiinsa!"
"Myöskin hän on voinut kirjoittaa puolisen miljoonaa frangia
kiinnitystään vastaan", vastasi varapresidentti nauraen; "te ette
muutoin näytä kovinkaan suosivan meidän uusinta
neuvostonuorisoamme!"

Welcome to our website – the perfect destination for book lovers and
knowledge seekers. We believe that every book holds a new world,
offering opportunities for learning, discovery, and personal growth.
That’s why we are dedicated to bringing you a diverse collection of
books, ranging from classic literature and specialized publications to
self-development guides and children's books.
More than just a book-buying platform, we strive to be a bridge
connecting you with timeless cultural and intellectual values. With an
elegant, user-friendly interface and a smart search system, you can
quickly find the books that best suit your interests. Additionally,
our special promotions and home delivery services help you save time
and fully enjoy the joy of reading.
Join us on a journey of knowledge exploration, passion nurturing, and
personal growth every day!
ebookbell.com

Aristophanes In Britain Old Comedy In The Nineteenth Century Classical Presences Swallow

About This Presentation

Slide Content

Tags

Categories

Download

Quick Actions

Statistics

Related Slideshows

Aristophanes In Britain Old Comedy In The Nineteenth Century Classical Presences Swallow

About This Presentation

Slide Content

Slide 1

Slide 2

Slide 3

Slide 6

Slide 7

Slide 8

Slide 9

Slide 10

Slide 11

Slide 12

Slide 13

Slide 14

Slide 15

Slide 16

Slide 17

Slide 18

Slide 19

Slide 20

Slide 21

Slide 22

Slide 23

Slide 24

Slide 25

Slide 26

Slide 27

Slide 28

Slide 29

Slide 30

Slide 31

Slide 32

Slide 33

Slide 34

Slide 35

Slide 36

Slide 37

Slide 38

Slide 39

Slide 40

Slide 41

Slide 42

Slide 43

Slide 44

Slide 45

Slide 46

Slide 47

Slide 48

Slide 49

Slide 50

Slide 51

Slide 52

Slide 53

Slide 54

Slide 55

Slide 56

Slide 57

Slide 58

Slide 59

Slide 60

Slide 61

Slide 62

Slide 63

Slide 64

Slide 65

Slide 66

Slide 67

Slide 68

Slide 69

Slide 70

Slide 71

Slide 72

Slide 73

Slide 74

Slide 75

Slide 76

Slide 77

Slide 78

Slide 79