Essay on Lysistrata in Both the Play Lysistrata and the Movie Chi-Raq

Lysistrata

Lysistrata was written by Aristophanes,' and it is a very masterful comedy that circles sex, war and gender. It is a comedy that is considered to be a fantasy, a very absurd idea in the ancient Athenians. The name Lysistrata is the name of the character in the play meaning "Destroyer of war." The play is about how women ended a huge war using their feminine means- a fete that could not be achieved by men. The war had lasted for ten years between Athens and Sparta, and Aristophanes was in despair so wrote a comedy-fairy tale where the world is contrary, and women were smarter and stronger than men. Despite women being viewed as the lesser gender in ancient Greece, the women characters feel the need to confront the patriarchal society they live in at the time.

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Despite the fact that Lysistrata seems to have equal status to men, in instances such as where she argues with the magistrate confident as well as dress him as a woman (Linker, 2016, pg. 67). The status of women in the Greece society at the time was timid, and Lysistrata had to rally them over and over again. The magistrate also, claims that women were hysterical and suggested that their men need to control them better. The women's place is viewed to be at their home where they take care of their fathers or husband, and they do not influence ancient Greece.

It is the way the women are viewed in this society that leads Lysistrata to a device the grand idea of achieving peace in Greece. The women take advantage of the men's weakness in the patriarchal community to ensure that peace between Athens and Sparta is achieved. Lysistrata devises a plan that forbids women to have sex with men until peace is made in Greece. The ending of the play is quite hysterical because the men finally gave in to the women's plot and order was achieved. The play ends with both the men and women dancing together on the achievement of peace depicting that the two genders need each other even if they are not considered equal in the society.

Chi-Raq

The movie Chi-Raq gets its name from the slang tag for Chicago, about the number of deaths that outperforms that of the American Forces in Iraq (Petermon, 2016, pg. 31). The writer of Chi-Raq, Spike Lee, claimed that he loosely based the plot of the movie the Greek comedy Lysistrata. The film, much the same as the play Lysistrata, centres around women's mission of denying me sex as an endeavour to stop the expanding rate of weapon brutality in the city of Chicago. The movie tackles the urgent matter of the black-on-black violence, which has been avoided by other filmmakers and the role of women in stopping this violence.

The film further glimpses into the isolated area of Chicago characterized by poverty, unemployment, gang violence and senseless killings. Lysistrata with the help of her peace-activist neighbor in the movie decides that the only way that men could stop gun violence is to withhold sex. Lysistrata believed that when the men causing the gun violence are deprived of sex, compassion, and companionship, the men will be stripped power of love hence causing them to rethink about the abuse.

The movie also uses imagery, as a powerful tool that has been used to dehumanize the black people. The director, therefore, saw it a vital tool that can also be used to create diverse images of the black community as well as tell new stories of the community. Therefore, playing Lysistrata as a black woman helps paint a picture of the black to possess the power and influence of the men, authority and having the embodiment that will help create change.

Conclusion

The story of Lysistrata in both the play "Lysistrata" and the movie Chi-Raq tries to define the role of masculinity of women in society, but the interpretation lies with the beholder either reading the play or watching the movie (Klein, 2014, pg. 12). Lysistrata can either be interpreted as the influential feminists who objectively want to organize women and end the violence in Greece and Chicago respectively. Also, the other interpretation can be that the women are weak in the society with no power and voice and the only way they could use is their sexuality. The men can also say that they will go back to the violence and uphold peace as soon as they get sex.

Works Cited

Klein, Emily. Sex and War on the American Stage: Lysistrata in performance 1930-2012. Routledge, 2014.

Linker, Maureen. "Commentary on"Ad Stuprum: The Fallacy of Appeal to Sex." (2016).

Petermon, Jade D. "The shadow behind the real: Spike Lee does Chicago." FILM QUART 70.2 (2016): 30-37.