Monday, May 07, 2007
Lysistrata and the Bacchae
I see these plays as having two parallel themes which are interwoven between each other, providing a stimulating view of the two works. Love and Madness can each define the other, love is a kind of madness and madness an emotion just as removed from reality as love. While in Lysistrata love is used as a weapon against the madness of war, in the Bacchae, Madness is the weapon and love is the target. Comedy and tragedy often use love as a teaching tool, comedy using love as a reward and result for doing the right thing, a reaffirmation of the current social strictures, while tragedy uses love by removing it as a means to show how great a void it leaves behind and what great sufferings can occur through connections with love. My understanding of these plays beyond the surface level of entertainment and enjoyment is through a detailed analysis of my cat, evil kitty.
Evil, Evil Kitty, Evil Cat.
While I write this, she is sitting on my lap. She is both muse and teacher. She is not "my cat" but rather I am "her person". I feed her and clean up after her. I pet her and keep her warm when she is cold. I play with her and entertain her. She owns me.
While I am obliged to care for her out of my love for her, she does not reciprocate my love in the same way. While I love touching her, she hates it. She likes bitting me and I barely tolerate that. She has taught me love very often involves blood and pain. She has also taught me scarring is always both physical and mental. Lastly, she shows me a capacity for infinite forgiveness is required to balance out the predatory instincts of someone who kills for fun.
My obligation to Evil forces me to examine love and madness in Bacchae and Lysistrata as measured against her. The madness in Bacchae of Pentheus' sporagmos at the hands of his own mother only compares to Evil Cat killing a pregnant mouse and arranging the five baby fetal mice along with the gallbladder into a perfect equilateral triangle five inches on each side. I will not post a picture of something that graphic. Several of my friends witnessed. They didn't learn anything from it; they reacted with incredible revulsion. I questioned why my cat would be so ok with killing a pregnant mouse. Perhaps she didn't know it was pregnant and thought it looked particularly chewy and delicious. I've seen her around kittens and she teaches them every possible way to misbehave. I've seen her teach kittens how to open every type of door and cabinet, remove a drain from a sink, tear toilet paper off the roll and tear the cardboard roll down too, chew laces and hide shoes, destroy anything made out of paper, and generally cause mayhem. Evil Kitty understands the importance of the next generation. Perhaps she was surprised to find baby unborn mice, with tiny formed feet and head and eyes, and arranging them into a triangle was some form of burial of which I am not aware. The only way this type of sporagmos can be performed without madness befalling the executor is to live without fault. There can be no fear of retribution. When you don't ask questions about what you do, when you live in certainty, only then can actions such as fetal geometry or the sparagmos of your own son. Dionysus takes away our ability to ask questions, or in this case not to ask questions, and prevents us from recognizing our level of comfort with what we are doing. While this may not matter for casual events, something like sparagmos requires a level of lucidity which Dionysus purposefully takes away. Now I don't know if that means my cat would feel guilty for catching a mouse if she were drunk, but I don't think she'd be capable of it. I don't want to find out either.
Love in Lysistrata is a weapon. Do what Lysistrata says or the men don't get any fun. Well, I've turned the tables on Evil. She knows she has to be nice to me or I won't want to feed her. She purrs cuddled in my lap, she rubs her head against my ankle, she licks my hands and face while I'm laying down, and she lets me rub her and touch her for a few seconds before viciously attacking my arm. This behavior is amazing to everyone who knew this cat back in new york. Most of them didn't believe she could be rehabilitated from mostly feral to the trusting playful kitty she is now. When I introduce new people to her, she takes to them almost instantly because she sees that I am not threatened by them. While giving love is important, accepting love is even more important and difficult. Accepting love can often mean the changing of ones ways. Modifying preexisting patterns to accommodate some new requirement is one hallmark of real love. While changing occurs, it must be a change which unifies and brings together people who would other wise remain different. Lysistrata does more than end the warring of the Greek city states, she unites the women and appears as one of the first feminists in plays. Her character may be performed a bit over the top but it is genuine. Love must be genuine the changes made in its name to remain. I know Evil Cat loves me and I know she knows I love her. I feed her not out of obligation but out of love and I see her recognize that every day.
I see these plays as having two parallel themes which are interwoven between each other, providing a stimulating view of the two works. Love and Madness can each define the other, love is a kind of madness and madness an emotion just as removed from reality as love. While in Lysistrata love is used as a weapon against the madness of war, in the Bacchae, Madness is the weapon and love is the target. Comedy and tragedy often use love as a teaching tool, comedy using love as a reward and result for doing the right thing, a reaffirmation of the current social strictures, while tragedy uses love by removing it as a means to show how great a void it leaves behind and what great sufferings can occur through connections with love. My understanding of these plays beyond the surface level of entertainment and enjoyment is through a detailed analysis of my cat, evil kitty.
Evil, Evil Kitty, Evil Cat.
While I write this, she is sitting on my lap. She is both muse and teacher. She is not "my cat" but rather I am "her person". I feed her and clean up after her. I pet her and keep her warm when she is cold. I play with her and entertain her. She owns me.
While I am obliged to care for her out of my love for her, she does not reciprocate my love in the same way. While I love touching her, she hates it. She likes bitting me and I barely tolerate that. She has taught me love very often involves blood and pain. She has also taught me scarring is always both physical and mental. Lastly, she shows me a capacity for infinite forgiveness is required to balance out the predatory instincts of someone who kills for fun.
My obligation to Evil forces me to examine love and madness in Bacchae and Lysistrata as measured against her. The madness in Bacchae of Pentheus' sporagmos at the hands of his own mother only compares to Evil Cat killing a pregnant mouse and arranging the five baby fetal mice along with the gallbladder into a perfect equilateral triangle five inches on each side. I will not post a picture of something that graphic. Several of my friends witnessed. They didn't learn anything from it; they reacted with incredible revulsion. I questioned why my cat would be so ok with killing a pregnant mouse. Perhaps she didn't know it was pregnant and thought it looked particularly chewy and delicious. I've seen her around kittens and she teaches them every possible way to misbehave. I've seen her teach kittens how to open every type of door and cabinet, remove a drain from a sink, tear toilet paper off the roll and tear the cardboard roll down too, chew laces and hide shoes, destroy anything made out of paper, and generally cause mayhem. Evil Kitty understands the importance of the next generation. Perhaps she was surprised to find baby unborn mice, with tiny formed feet and head and eyes, and arranging them into a triangle was some form of burial of which I am not aware. The only way this type of sporagmos can be performed without madness befalling the executor is to live without fault. There can be no fear of retribution. When you don't ask questions about what you do, when you live in certainty, only then can actions such as fetal geometry or the sparagmos of your own son. Dionysus takes away our ability to ask questions, or in this case not to ask questions, and prevents us from recognizing our level of comfort with what we are doing. While this may not matter for casual events, something like sparagmos requires a level of lucidity which Dionysus purposefully takes away. Now I don't know if that means my cat would feel guilty for catching a mouse if she were drunk, but I don't think she'd be capable of it. I don't want to find out either.
Love in Lysistrata is a weapon. Do what Lysistrata says or the men don't get any fun. Well, I've turned the tables on Evil. She knows she has to be nice to me or I won't want to feed her. She purrs cuddled in my lap, she rubs her head against my ankle, she licks my hands and face while I'm laying down, and she lets me rub her and touch her for a few seconds before viciously attacking my arm. This behavior is amazing to everyone who knew this cat back in new york. Most of them didn't believe she could be rehabilitated from mostly feral to the trusting playful kitty she is now. When I introduce new people to her, she takes to them almost instantly because she sees that I am not threatened by them. While giving love is important, accepting love is even more important and difficult. Accepting love can often mean the changing of ones ways. Modifying preexisting patterns to accommodate some new requirement is one hallmark of real love. While changing occurs, it must be a change which unifies and brings together people who would other wise remain different. Lysistrata does more than end the warring of the Greek city states, she unites the women and appears as one of the first feminists in plays. Her character may be performed a bit over the top but it is genuine. Love must be genuine the changes made in its name to remain. I know Evil Cat loves me and I know she knows I love her. I feed her not out of obligation but out of love and I see her recognize that every day.
# posted by Mick @ 6:55 PM 
