Democratic Swarms: Ancient Comedy and the Politics of the People

278 Pages·2022·4.978 MB·English

by  Page DuBois

Democratic Swarms

˙∙˙∙˙
Democratic
Swarms
∙˙∙˙∙
Ancient Comedy and the
Politics of the People
Page duBois
The University of Chicago Press
Chicago and London
The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637
The University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London
© 2022 by The University of Chicago
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced
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Published 2022
Printed in the United States of America
31 30 29 28 27 26 25 24 23 22 1 2 3 4 5
ISBN- 13: 978- 0- 226- 81574- 9 (cloth)
ISBN- 13: 978- 0- 226- 81575- 6 (e- book)
DOI: https:// doi .org /10 .7208 /chicago /9780226815756 .001 .0001
Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data
Names: DuBois, Page, author.
Title: Democratic swarms : ancient comedy and the politics of the
people / Page duBois.
Description: Chicago : University of Chicago Press, 2022. | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2021037433 | ISBN 9780226815749 (cloth) |
ISBN 9780226815756 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Greek drama (Comedy)— History and criticism. |
Greek drama (Comedy)— Political aspects. | Drama— Chorus (Greek
drama) | Democracy— Greece— Athens.
Classification: LCC PA3161 .D83 2022 | DDC 882/.0109— dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021037433
♾ This paper meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.48- 1992
(Permanence of Paper).
For John

Contents
Preface · ix
Introduction · 1
Chapter 1
The Tragic Individual: The Tyranny
of Oedipus and Antigone · 17
Chapter 2
The Swarm · 47
Chapter 3
Chorus · 79
Chapter 4
Utopias · 117
Chapter 5
Parrhesia: Saying It All · 155
Chapter 6
Democracy, Communalism, Communism · 175
Chapter 7
Epilogue: The Politics of the Present · 199
Acknowledgments · 209 Notes · 211
Selected Bibliography · 245
Index · 257

Preface
What is important is not an authoritarian unification, but a kind of infinite
swarming of desiring machines, . . . everywhere.
Félix Guattari, Molecular Revolution
My favorite performances of ancient Greek comedies straddle several de-
cades. I saw a modern Greek troupe perform Aristophanes’ comedy the
Acharnians in the open-a ir amphitheater in Epidaurus, in Greece, many
years ago with my friends Froma and George Zeitlin. It was a summer eve-
ning, warm and a little breezy. The amphitheater has been celebrated for
millennia because of its extraordinary acoustics; tour guides send the guided
up to the highest ranks of stone seats, and then, at the center of the orches-
tra, the dancing floor, drop a pin. Tourists marvel at the sound. The night
we saw the Acharnians, the chorus was dressed in wild and brilliant colors,
leapt about in slapstick and kept the audience in stitches. There were lots
of references to the contemporary and messy politics of Greece in that mo-
ment, and although I didn’t follow all of the modern Greek, or the jokes,
I was caught up in a jubilant, mesmerizing participation in a crowd that
loved the spectacle of dancing and singing and the mockery of the powerful.
Another favorite performance happened at the University of California
at San Diego, where I teach. My beloved colleague William Fitzgerald in-
vited the Aquila Theatre troupe, led by Peter Meineck, to present a version
of Aristophanes’ Frogs. The central character of this play, which concerns
Greek tragedy and tragedians, is the god Dionysos, who is ridiculed for
much of the action. In the Aquila troupe’s presentation the god was dressed
as an Elvis impersonator. In the closed space of a tiny theater, with a small
group of actors making up the chorus of frogs as well as playing the other
roles in the play, the performance in its own way produced hysterical laugh-
ter and delight. I remember anxiety, fearing that the students who attended
might not get the Elvis thing, and the brilliantly evocative music of this dis-
play, but they were laughing as hard as I was.
This book calls for reading and watching ancient Greek comedy again,
ix