ISBN Lysistrata book 308 pages

In addition to its many topical references to social life religion and politics in classical Athens the Lysistrata is one of our best sources for the life of women in antiquity: unlike epic tragedy and oratory Attic comedy draws its characters and plots from everyday life and provides a unique glimpse into the situation of everyday Athenians. Henderson's standard edition of Aristophanes' play provides much new evidence for those working on anthropological and sociological aspects of Athens as well as those working in traditional philological fields. The text is brought fully up to date with the advances made in Aristophanic scholarship over the past sixty years. In particular it is the first to report all the manuscripts papyri and testimonial sources of the text offering a new account of its history and a detailed review of the transmission of the Aristophanic corpus as a whole. Henderson's text and apparatus criticus is supplemented by a full Introduction giving details of the background to the play its content staging philological interest the textual transmission and by a detailed Commentary.