The Birds

A detailed Summary of The Birds

Satire defined is "A composition in verse or prose holding up a vice or folly to ridicule or lampooning individuals... The use of ridicule, irony, sarcasm, etc, in speech or writing for the ostensible purpose of exposing and discourage vice or folly" (Johnston, 5). In other words, satire is the use of humor to expose moral behavior of man. In the Aristophanes' play The Birds, satire is used to mock the common Greek's dream of ruling the gods that they worship. It mocks the power that they seek to become the supreme ruler of the world. To understand Aristophanes use of satire, one must first understand the role satire plays in sending out its message.

At the basis of satire is a sense of moral outrage. This outrage is wrong and needs to be exposed. The goal of a satire is to correct this misconduct of man in a humorous way that makes the audience relate to the problem and try to correct it. Satire "seeks to use laughter, not just to remind us of our common often ridiculous humanity, but rather to expose those moral excesses, those correctable sorts of behavior which transgress what the writer sees as the limits of acceptable moral behavior" (Johnston, 5). In exposing these foibles, one could discover not to behave in su

After reading The Birds, one would realize the humor that exists in it and what the purpose of it is. It points out the waste of energy Pisthetaerus puts into his utopia to end up where he started. By realizing this mistake he has made, Aristophanes would achieve his goal that he set forth by using satire. By setting up Pisthetaerus looking glamorous then having him serve birds at the feast shows how ridiculous his efforts are in achieving total power over all. "The fact that this 'celebration' is going to involve a feast on dead birds among divine guests who are a travesty of divine majesty and power is a reminder of something important lost" (Johnston, 12).

Adding exaggeration and distortion to the target, the satirist then emphasizes the characteristic he wishes to attack. "The target must be close enough to the real thing for us to recognize what is going on, but sufficiently distorted to be funny, an exaggeration, often a grotesque departure from normality" (Johnston, 17). After deciding to create a city strategically located between heaven and earth, so the birds can rule god and man, Pisthetaerus eats a magical root that has the powers to give birth to wings. Although it is evident that humans growing wings is not imaginably possible, the birth of wings does give birth to the power that Pisthetaerus craves more of. This power he craves helps him achieve more of his goal to escape his current conditions to one that submits to no higher deity.

IV. Attack on Target to Distort- Pisthetaerus grows wings

V. Unrelenting attack on Target- Power keeps on coming to Pisthetaerus' and birds's ways

Shipley, Joseph T. The Crown Guide to the World's Great Plays. New York: Crown, 1984. 38-39.

ch a manner by realizing his or her mistakes.

Johnston, Ian. "Lecture on Satir

Some common words found in the essay are:
Pisthetaerus Greek, , Pisthetaerus Zeus, VI Final, Distort- Pisthetaerus, Target- Power, York Bantam, Harper Row, America Online, York Crown, expose moral, power pisthetaerus, moral behavior, expose moral behavior, achieve goal, birds rule, final blow, god pisthetaerus, pisthetaerus achieves, luce 300, johnston 5,

Approximate Word count = 1217
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: English