People in the play: Eeuelpides, Peisthetaerus, Trochilus - servant of Epops, Epops (Tereus) - the Hoopoe, A Priest, A Poet, An Oracle- Monger, Meton a Geometrician, A Commissioner, A Statute-Seller, A Messenger, A Guard, Iris, A Herald, A Sire-Striker, Cinesias, a Dithyrambic Poet, A Sycophant, Prometheus, Poseidon, Triballian, Heracles, A Servant of Peisthetaerus, Chorus of Birds
Summary: In “The Birds” by Aristophanes, characters express a desire to fly and escape their earthly troubles. They discuss bird laws, including a humorous take on a son wanting to beat his father. The play explores themes of freedom, ambition, and the absurdities of life through whimsical dialogue and interactions.
That’s why we are journeying on this journey now, Trudging along with basket, pot, and myrtles, To find some quiet easy-going spot, Where we may settle down, and dwell in peace. (View Highlight)
You were a man at first, as we are now, And had your creditors, as we have now, And loved to shirk your debts, as we do now; And then you changed your nature, and became A bird, and flew round land and sea, and know All that men feel, and all that birds feel too. (View Highlight)
Even so, when men slay victims to the Gods, Unless the Gods pay tribute, ye in turn Will grant no passage for the savoury steam To rise through Chaos, and a realm not theirs. (View Highlight)
But this, this bird-life here, you know it well, What is this like ?
Ho. A pleasant life enough. Foremost and first you don’t require a purse.
Eu. There goes a grand corrupter of our life! (View Highlight)
For never shall be found any distant spot of ground, Or shadowy mountain covert, or foamy Ocean wave, Or cloud in Ether floating, which these reprobates shall save From the doom that upon them I will wreak. (View Highlight)
Canst thou tell Why they came Here to dwell ? Ho. Love of you, Love of your Life and ways Was the lure. Here they fain Would remain Comrades true All their days. (View Highlight)
Full of wiles, full of guiles, at all times, in all ways, Are the children of Men still we’ll hear what he says. (View Highlight)
If therefore, by birth, ye are older than Earth, if before all the Gods ye existed, By the right of the firstborn the sceptre is yours; your claim cannot well be resisted. (View Highlight)
Birds being Sovereigns, to them must be paid all honour and worship divine, (View Highlight)
O man, ‘tis indeed a most pitiful tale Thou hast brought to our ears; and I can but bewail Our fathers’ demerit, Who born such an Empire as this to inherit Have lost it, have lost it, for me!
But now thou art come, by good Fortune’s decree, Our Saviour to be, And under thy charge, whatsoever befall, I will place my own self, and my nestlings, and all. (View Highlight)
Now therefore do you tell us what we must do; since life is not worth our retaining, Unless we be Lords of the world as before, our ancient dominion regaining. (View Highlight)
Ch. But how shall we furnish the people with wealth ?
It is wealth that they mostly desire.
Pe. Choice blessings and rare ye shall give them whene’er they come to your shrine to inquire. (View Highlight)
If they’ve plenty of wealth, they’ll have plen- ty of health; ye may rest quite assured that they will. (View Highlight)
We will tell you of things transcendental; of Springs and of Rivers the mighty upheaval; The nature of Birds; and the birth of the Gods: and of Chaos and Darkness primeval. (View Highlight)
in the bosom abysmal Of Darkness an egg, from the whirlwind conceived, was laid by the sable-plumed Night. And out of that egg, as the Seasons revolved, sprang Love, the entrancing, the bright, Love brilliant and bold with his pinions of gold, like a whirlwind, refulgent and sparkling!
Love hatched us, commingling in Tartarus wide, with Chaos, the murky, the darkling, And brought us above, as the firstlings of love, and first to the light we ascended.
There was never a race of Immortals at all till Love had the universe blended; Then all things commingling together in love, there arose the fair Earth, and the Sky, And the limitless Sea; and the race of the Gods, the Blessed, who never shall die.
So we than the Blessed are older by far; and abundance of proof is existing That wc are the children of Love, for we fly, unfortunate lovers assisting.
And many a man who has found, to his cost, that his powers of persuasion have failed, And his loves have abjured him forever, again by the power of the Birds has prevailed; (View Highlight)
Love, whom I love the best, Dearer than all the rest, Playmate and partner in All my soft lays, Thou art come! Thou art come!
Thou hast dawned on my gaze, 1 have heard thy sweet note, Nightingale! Nightingale! (View Highlight)
Ye men who are dimly existing below, who perish and fade as the leaf, Pale, woebegone, shadowlike, spiritless folk, life feeble and wingless and brief, Frail castings in clay, who are gone in a day, like a dream full of sorrow and sighing, Come listen with care to the Birds of the air, the ageless, the deathless, who flying (View Highlight)
A Rumour’s a bird, and a sneeze is a bird, and so is a word or a meeting, A servant’s a bird, and an ass is a bird.
It must therefore assuredly follow That the Birds are to you (I protest it is true) your prophetic divining Apollo. (View Highlight)
Truly to be clad in feather is the very best of things.
Only fancy, dear spectators, had you each a brace of wings, Never need you, tired and hungry, at a Tragic Chorus stay, You would lightly, when it bored you, spread your wings and fly away, Back returning, after luncheon, to enjoy our Comic Play. (View Highlight)
Ch. Invent some fine Magniloquent name, drawn from these upper spaces And clouds.
Pe.
What think you of Cloudcuckoobury P Ch. Good! Good! (View Highlight)
Mes. And then its height, I measured that, is just Six hundred feet.
Pe.
Poseidon, what a height!
Who built it up to that enormous size ?
Mes. The birds, none other; no Egyptian, bearing The bricks, no mason, carpenter was there; Their own hands wrought it, marvellous to see. (View Highlight)
Ch. For in what is it lacking That a man for his home can require ?
Here is Wisdom, and Wit, and each exquisite Grace, And here the unruffled, benevolent face Of Quiet, and loving Desire. (View Highlight)
‘Tis she who keeps the thunderbolts of Zeus, And all his stores—good counsels, happy laws, Sound common sense, dockyards, abusive speech, All his three-obols, and the man who pays them. (View Highlight)