Aristophanes' Lysistrata, like all Greek comedy would have been performed with the actors wearing huge artificial phalluses. Greek humor was vulgar and bawdy. Beardsley would have known this, hence the grotesque mashup of Greek costumery and 18th century costumes in his Lysistrata illustrations. When I learned about this detail of the original comedy costumery, it made these bizarre illustrations somewhat more comprehensible, though his desire to suppress them was a healthy impulse. Even as art, they are far from his best work, and we would have been better off if he had made better use of his talent. His late conversion is a happy end to a troubled life.
Very interesting. I was actually working on an article about Beardsley myself, and was going to talk about his unfinished Tannhäuser work, as well as many of the points you mentioned, up until his conversion. I feel a little disappointed that someone beat me to it, and that they wrote it so well I don’t have very much to say that’s original.
Aristophanes' Lysistrata, like all Greek comedy would have been performed with the actors wearing huge artificial phalluses. Greek humor was vulgar and bawdy. Beardsley would have known this, hence the grotesque mashup of Greek costumery and 18th century costumes in his Lysistrata illustrations. When I learned about this detail of the original comedy costumery, it made these bizarre illustrations somewhat more comprehensible, though his desire to suppress them was a healthy impulse. Even as art, they are far from his best work, and we would have been better off if he had made better use of his talent. His late conversion is a happy end to a troubled life.
Fascinating, I didn't know that about the costumes
Yeah, the whole things makes a lot more sense ...
Very interesting. I was actually working on an article about Beardsley myself, and was going to talk about his unfinished Tannhäuser work, as well as many of the points you mentioned, up until his conversion. I feel a little disappointed that someone beat me to it, and that they wrote it so well I don’t have very much to say that’s original.
Thank you very much. I think you should still write it, though! I'd enjoy reading it, especially if you're taking a different angle.
I read this on my email, but this was a great read, thank you!
Thank you Daniel, I appreciate it
Very well done! Thank you.
Thank you for reading it and leaving this nice comment!