As soon as Protomakhos finished breakfast, he got up. So did Menedemos. Sostratos joined them. Protomakhos said, “Well, now we’ll see how our modern poets stack up against Aiskhylos.”
“Bet on Aiskhylos,” Menedemos said.
“I like some of the modern work,” Sostratos said. Protomakhos dipped his head.
Menedemos said, “As far as I’m concerned, you’re both welcome to it. Most modern tragedians think they have to be different to be clever, and most of the differences are no good. That’s how I see it, anyhow.”
“Some truth to that, certainly,” Protomakhos said. “Only some, though, I think, O best one. Some of the poetry that’s written nowadays is very fine.”
Sostratos went into the theater prepared to agree with the proxenos. This time, despite Protomakhos’ protests, he and Menedemos paid for their host’s seat. Protomakhos responded by chasing a honey-cake seller up an aisle to buy some of his wares for the Rhodians. As soon as he was out of earshot, Sostratos said, “Please tell me you didn’t.”
“Didn’t what?” Yes, Menedemos was too innocent by half.
“You know what. Make a play for the proxenos’ wife. You know you were eyeing her. You admitted it. Her walk!” Sostratos clapped a hand to his forehead.
“All right. I’ll tell you I didn’t make a play for her.” Menedemos leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. “But, my dear, am I telling you the truth?”
Before Sostratos could find any answer for that, Protomakhos came back with the honey cakes. Sostratos sat there eating and licking his fingers . . . and worrying. He didn’t stop worrying even when the plays started. Maybe his own glum mood made him less receptive to them than he would have been otherwise—or maybe Menedemos had a point, and they really weren’t very good. Over that day and the next, about half the tragedies he saw imitated old models so closely, he wondered why their poets had bothered setting pen to papyrus. The others were definitely new, which did not, to his ear, mean they improved on their predecessors.
One of those innovative plays, a Dolon by an Athenian named Diomedon that ran on the third day of the tragedies, left Menedemos furious. “That was an outrage,” he kept saying as Sostratos and he and Protomakhos left the theater. “Nothing but an outrage.”
“How? In the way the poet treated Odysseus?” Sostratos thought he knew what was bothering his cousin.
And he proved right. Menedemos dipped his head. “The way he mistreated Odysseus, you should say. You know the story in the Iliad, I hope?”
“Yes, my dear,” Sostratos said patiently. “I haven’t your passion for , but I do know the poems. Odysseus and Diomedes are out spying for the strong-greaved Akhaioi, and they run into Dolon, who’s spying for the Trojans. They run him down, he begs for his life, but they kill him instead of holding him for ransom.”
“That’s close, but it’s not quite right, and the differences are important.” Menedemos was still fuming. “In the Iliad, Dolon begs Diomedes for his life, and Diomedes is the one who sends him down to the house of Hades. But what did this so-called tragedian do? He made Odysseus into the villain, that’s what. He had him string Dolon along, swear a false oath to him that he wouldn’t be hurt if he talked, and then, once he told all he knew, what does the poet have Odysseus do? He makes him turn to Diomedes and say, ‘Truth is wasted on the foe,’ and then Diomedes kills Dolon! That isn’t right.”
Protomakhos said, “Best one, poets have been showing Odysseus as a treacherous conniver at least since the days of Sophokles. And you can’t deny that that’s part of his character in the epics.”
“I don’t deny it,” Menedemos said earnestly. “That is part of his character. But it’s not the only part, and the tragedians do him wrong by making it out to be all of what he is. Odysseus is sophron: he gets the most out of the wits he has. He’s not so great a warrior as Akhilleus, but he has more sense in one toe than Akhilleus does in his head.”
“That isn’t saying much,” Sostratos put in.
“Well, no,” Menedemos agreed. “Odysseus, though, is the man who can do everything well. He outwits Polyphemos the Cyclops, he can build a boat or a bed, he fights bravely whenever he has to, he can plow a field, and he’s the one who, at Agamemnon’s assembly, keeps the Akhaioi from giving up and sailing home.”
“You admire him,” Protomakhos said.
“Who wouldn’t admire a man like that?” Menedemos said. “Except a tragedian who thinks he knows more about him than does, I mean.”
“Don’t you think modern poets are entitled to take what they need from the Iliad and Odyssey?” Sostratos asked. “We’d be missing a lot of our tragedy if they didn’t, you know.”
“Taking what they need is one thing. Of course they can do that,” Menedemos replied. “Deliberately twisting what they take, though, turning it into the opposite of what it was . . . That goes too far. And I think that’s what this Diomedon did. You notice the judges didn’t give him a prize. Maybe they felt the same way.”
“Your cousin has strong views,” Protomakhos said to Sostratos.
“He’s a free Hellene. He’s entitled to them,” Sostratos replied. “We don’t always agree, but we have fun arguing.”
“What did you think of Dolon?” the proxenos asked him.
“I’d forgotten it was Diomedes who killed him in the Iliad” Sostratos confessed. “That being so, I think this poet may have gone a bit too far myself.”
“Ah, well,” Protomakhos said with a shrug. “You Rhodians have been luckier in your government lately than we have. I can see how an Athenian might want to write a play about a clever, devious politician who stops at nothing to get what he wants.”
“Oh!” Sostratos’ eyes widened. “You’re telling me this isn’t just about Odysseus. It’s about Demet—”
Menedemos stepped on his foot. “If it is about Demetrios of Phaleron,” he hissed, “how big an idiot are you for shouting it to the housetops? Do you want Macedonians breaking down Protomakhos’ door in the middle of the night to haul you away and see how many interesting things they can do to you—and to our host—and to me?” To him, plainly, the last was most important.
But he was just as plainly right. Sostratos admitted as much, adding, “Even so, it does make me more inclined to forgive Dolon.”
“Well. . . maybe,” Menedemos said grudgingly. “I still don’t care for what it did, but our kind host has shown a reason why.”
“Comedies tomorrow,” Sostratos said. “You won’t have to worry about ferreting out nasty political messages there.”
“I wouldn’t have had to worry about ferreting them out in Aristophanes’ day, either,” Menedemos said. “He came right out and shouted them in people’s faces.”
“We can’t get away now with what he did then,” Protomakhos said. “He couldn’t get away with it, either, by the end of his career. Look at Ploutos. It’s about wealth, but it’s not about, or not very much about, the people of the time. It looks forward to the kinds of comedies poets write nowadays, in fact.”
“The kinds of comedies people write nowadays ...” Menedemos muttered.
“He’s not much for them,” Sostratos told Protomakhos. “I told him to wait till he’d heard one by Menandros. I certainly hope he’s finished the piece you said he was working on.”
“I don’t know one way or the other,” the Rhodian proxenos replied. “We’ll find out tomorrow.”
“So we will.” Sostratos sounded cheerful.
“So we will.” Menedemos sounded anything but.
At supper that evening, Protomakhos made no remarks about going out to celebrate the Dionysia. Menedemos didn’t urge him to go out or ask questions about whether he would. Sostratos hoped that meant his cousin really hadn’t seduced or tried to seduce the proxenos’ wife. Menedemos enjoyed making him nervous almost as much as he enjoyed adultery.
The next day dawned chilly, with a nasty wind whipping down from the north. Protomakhos wrapped himself in a himation before heading for the th
eater. It was cold enough to tempt Sostratos to do the same, but he didn’t. Menedemos acted as if the weather had nothing to do with him. “Aren’t you fellows going to freeze?” Protomakhos said.
“We’re sailors,” Sostratos replied. “When was the last time you saw a seafaring man in anything but his chiton?”
“Have it your way,” Protomakhos said. “But if your teeth chatter too loud to let me hear the lines, I’ll be annoyed at you.”
They got splendid seats. The cold weather kept lots of people indoors till after sunup. Sostratos’ teeth did chatter. He clamped his jaw tight as he could to keep Protomakhos from noticing.
Out swaggered the actors for the first comedy. They didn’t wear big phalloi strapped to their waists, as they would have done a couple of generations before. Their masks were more realistic, less burlesqued, than they would have been in earlier times, too. Indeed, little except the play itself distinguished them from tragic actors, and some performers worked in both types of drama.
Their play, unfortunately, did not distinguish itself. The verse limped—a couple of times, badly enough to make Sostratos wince. Even by the loose standards of comedy, the plot was stupid. And the jokes fell flat. As the dancers of the chorus twirled out to separate one act from another—they didn’t also sing, as they would have in Aristophanes’ time—Menedemos turned to Sostratos and said, “How does a play this bad ever get produced?”
“I don’t know,” Sostratos answered. “But I’ll give you an even more frightening thought, if you like.”
“What’s that?” Menedemos sounded as if he doubted Sostratos could come up with one.
But Sostratos did: “Just remember, only Dionysos knows how many worse comedies were written, comedies not even a maniac would want to bring to the stage.”
His cousin shuddered. “You’re right. That is frightening.”
As the play dragged on, the audience grew more and more restless. People shouted at the actors. They threw onions and squash and cabbages. One of the actors, after nimbly dodging a squash, turned to face the crowd. In smoother verse than the comic poet had given him, he said,
“If you think these lines are hard to listen to,
Remember—we have to bring them out.”
He got a bigger laugh for his own words than he had for the poet’s. The vegetables stopped flying.
“So much for this comic poet’s reputation,” Sostratos murmured.
“Yes, but the other question is, how much has the actor hurt himself with his quick tongue?” Protomakhos said. “Some people won’t want to hire him now, afraid he’ll step out of character again.”
At last, mercifully, the comedy ended. The one that followed was better—but then, bad wine was better than vinegar. Menedemos said, “I don’t think has much to worry about this year.”
Sostratos would have liked to argue with him. He knew he couldn’t, not by what they’d seen so far. But then the herald announced the third and final comedy: “Kolax, by Menandros!”
“Now you’ll see something worth seeing,” Sostratos said.
“Not a bad title: The Flatterer,” Menedemos said. “But what will he do with it? If he makes a hash of it the way these last two fellows did ...” He leaned back and folded his arms across his chest, as if challenging Menandros to impress him.
To Sostratos’ vast relief, the poet did not disappoint. His portrait of a flatterer was alarmingly realistic; the strutting soldier against whom the title character played came from a breed all too common since Alexander’s time. And his cook might have been Sikon, straight from Menedemos’ household.
He certainly sounded as full of himself as Sikon did:
“A libation! You—the one following me—give me the sacrificer’s portion.
Where are you looking?
A libation! Come along, my slave Sosias. A libation! . . . Good.
Pour! Let us pray to the Olympian gods
and Olympian goddesses: to them all, male and female.
Take the tongue! On account of this, let them give salvation,
Health, enjoyment of our present good things,
And good fortune to us all. Let us pray for that.”
Everything ended happily, as it was supposed to in comedy, with the flatterer arranging for the soldier to share the girl’s favors with her neighbor. The play got more applause than the other two put together. Turning to Menedemos, Sostratos asked, “What did you think?”
“That . . . wasn’t bad.” Menedemos sounded oddly reluctant, as if he didn’t want to admit it but couldn’t help himself. “No, that wasn’t bad at all. It wasn’t —”
“It’s not supposed to be ,” Sostratos broke in.
“I was going to say that very thing, if you’d given me the chance,” his cousin said with some irritation. “It’s not , but I enjoyed it. You were right. There. Are you happy now?”
“Yes,” Sostratos said, which disarmed Menedemos. He went on, “I was pretty sure I would like it—I’ve always enjoyed Menandros’ comedies. But I could only hope you would. I’m glad you do.”
“If it doesn’t win the prize for comedy, someone’s been spreading silver amongst the judges again,” Protomakhos said.
“We’ve had that happen a few times at , too,” Sostratos said. Menedemos made a nasty face to show what he thought of it. Sostratos asked, “How common is it here? I remember rumors in my student days.”
“I’ve seen more really bad choices these past ten years than I can ever remember before,” the Rhodian proxenos answered. “I suspect that has to do with ...” He shrugged. “Well, you know what I mean.”
Sostratos didn’t, not at first, but he also didn’t need long to figure out what Protomakhos meant. “Lots of things for sale these days?” he asked casually, not mentioning Demetrios of Phaleron by name: he’d learned his lesson.
Protomakhos dipped his head. “You might say so. Yes, you just might say so.”
But then the head of the panel of judges cupped his hands in front of his mouth and called, “The winner of the prize for comedy this year is The Flatterer, by Menandros!” People who hadn’t left the theater cheered and clapped their hands. A thin man of about thirty-five sitting in the second row stood up, waved rather sheepishly, and then sat down again.
“He can do better than that,” Protomakhos said, clucking in disapproval. “He’s been winning prizes for ten years now. He ought to show that he thinks he deserves them.” He shrugged. “Well, no help for it. And we’ll be going back to our regular lives in a couple of days. The Dionysia comes only once a year.”
“I’m glad we got here in time for it, though,” Sostratos said. “Now Menedemos and I can start thinking about making enough profit to cover all these idle days.” He looked north and west, toward the agora. “We’ll do it.”
6
Xenokleia clung to Menedemos and wept in the darkness of her bedchamber. “What are we going to do?” she wailed— but quietly, so no sound seeped out through the door or the shutters. “The Dionysia ends after tonight, and I’ll never see you again.”
Kissing her, he tasted the salt of her tears. He’d thought she would show better sense; she had to be three or four years older than he was, somewhere on the far side of thirty. He tried to make light of things: “What do you mean, you’ll never see me again, sweetheart? Don’t be silly. All you’ll have to do is look down from that window into the courtyard, and there I’ll be. My cousin and I are going to stay in Athens most of the summer.”
She cried harder than ever. “That’s even worse,” she said. “I’ll see you, but I won’t be able to talk to you, won’t be able to touch you. ...” She did, very intimately. “You might as well let a starving man see a banquet but keep him from eating.”
That was flattering and alarming at the same time. He’d thought he’d found an affair with which to enjoy himself at the Dionysia. But Xenokleia thought she’d found . . . what? A lover to carry her away, as had carried off ? If so, she was due for disappointment. And you ma
y be due for trouble, Menedemos told himself. “There’s something you need to do,” he said to her.
“What? This?” Her hand closed on him again. He felt himself starting to rise. Had he met her a few years earlier, they would already have been coupling once more. He needed a little longer between rounds than he had in his early twenties.
But, despite the distraction, he tossed his head. “No, dear. Sometime soon, you need to seduce your husband. Put on something saffron and make up your face. When he takes you, stretch your slippers up toward the roof.” He knew he was quoting from the oath in Lysistrate, but Aristophanes had said it better than he could.
“You tell me that now? When we’re like this?” Xenokleia seized his hand and set it on her bare breast. Though she and Protomakhos had a married daughter and a young grandson, her breasts were as firm and upstanding as a younger woman’s—she probably hadn’t nursed her baby herself.
Menedemos knew she was angry. He also knew he had to risk that anger. “I do, darling,” he said seriously. “If you happen to be with child, he’d better be able to think it’s his.”
“Oh.” To his relief, Xenokleia’s anger evaporated. She sighed. “After you, he’ll be moldy salt-fish after mullet.”
“You’re sweet,” he said, and, poising himself above her, stretched her feet up toward the roof, though she wasn’t wearing slippers. Afterwards, she started to cry again. “Don’t do that,” he told her, running a hand along the sweet curve of her hip. “It was fun. We enjoyed it. Remember that. Forget the rest.”
“It’s over.” Xenokleia wept harder than ever.
“Maybe we’ll find another chance, if your husband goes to a symposion or something,” Menedemos said. “But it was good—for what it was—even if we don’t.”
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