2. Xanthias is the servant or slave who accompanies Dionysos during the first half of the play. What are the major characteristics of the master-servant relationship, and how do they change from one situation to another? Is Xanthias in fact the dominant character of the first half? What does his relationship to Dionysos tell us about the god? Does this relationship establish comedy itself as a topic of the play, and, if so, what does it say about that topic?
3. A famous crux of the play has to do with the relationship of its two halves. They seem quite separate and perhaps inconsistent. The agon that takes up most of the second half is not prepared for by the first. Dionysos seems quite a different character in the second half. Xanthias has disappeared, and with him has gone much of the slapstick comedy of the first half. Are there interpretive ideas that allow the audience to connect the two halves in a meaningful way?
4. Another crux of the play concerns the chorus of frogs, who give the play its name. The frogs appear before the formal entrance of the chorus, which is not made up of frogs, and, after serenading Dionysos across to the underworld, they are not seen again. How would you conjecture that Aristophanes presented them on stage, and how would you present them now. (The stage directions in Lattimore's translation are merely his conjecture.) Do they appear on stage or sing from behind stage? Does the audience see them? Does Dionysos see them? Beyond being entertaining, do they have any structural or thematic function in the play?
5. The primary chorus of the play comprises initiates to the Eleusinian mysteries. These were very popular and very secret rites. (We still do not know what they were.) The initiates were devoted to the earth or agriculture goddess Demeter and her companion Iacchos, who was also identified with Dionysos. What is their function in the play? They are religious figures, but the message of their parabasis (pp. 531-33, not p. 509, as Lattimore claims) is political. Is there a relationship between the two?
6. The first character that Dionysos and Xanthias encounter in the Prologue is Dionysos' half-brother Herakles (a.k.a. Hercules), but Dionysos is already dressed in the traditional lion skin of Herakles. There seem to be three elements of this disguise: (1) the significance of the costume, (2) the conversation between Dionysos and Herakles, and (3) the various reactions to the disguise in the underworld and the exchange of costumes between Dionysos and Xanthias. In what ways is this disguise significant?
7. Frogs, like other comedies by Aristophanes, is filled with references, not always polite, to sexuality and other physical functions. It is filled as well with comic violence, the most funny and prolonged being the beating of Dionysos and Xanthias. Is the significance of the physical humor of the play simply that it is funny, or is there more to be said about it?
8. The agon between Aeschylus and Euripides in the second half of the play is certainly the most memorable part of the play. What are the differences between the two in style, subject, and general approach. Beyond their differences as writers, what larger issues do they stand for? Why should a choice between them be of such significance for Athens as a city?
9. The contest between the playwrights is to be decided according to various and strange modes of judgment. To what degree do these resemble genuine literary or dramatic criticism, to what degree are they merely jokes? What is the relation of the comic and the serious in the scene? In what ways does the agon help to define the play as satiric? Why does Dionysos, at the prompting of Pluto, choose to return with Aeschylus? What are the implications of this choice? In what ways would Aeschylus help Athens survive?
10. One characteristic of Old Comedy is the specific (and insulting) naming of names. Frogs therefore provides a useful opportunity for considering the propensity of satire to attack historical individuals. What is the nature of the insults? Are they made on behalf of the author or on behalf of a larger community? Is the assumption that the audience will agree in condemning the victim? Do the insults point to larger issues?
11. There is considerable disagreement among scholars as to where Aristophanes' political sympathies lie. Is he a conservative supporter of the oligarchs or a proponent of moderate democracy? But there seems to be a degree of political urgency to Frogs, a sense that Athens is in serious danger. Have the advice of the Chorus, the comments of Euripides and Aeschylus, and Dionysos' choice of a poet to save the city adequately addressed the political situation?
12. In Old Comedy, the various roles of the play were taken by three speaking actors. Occasionally (as in Frogs) a fourth actor was used for minor parts. Can you figure out which roles were taken by which actors? Does the overlapping of parts suggest significant connections?
13. Who are the members of the audience? What is its relation to the actors of the play, to the story, and to the issues it addresses? How does the play interact with the audience? Are all or some of the characters aware that they are in a play, or does the play seek to give the illusion of reality? Why is the role of the audience important here?
14. The structure of Frogs is topsy-turvy, the reverse of the usual pattern of Old Comedy. In most comedies the agon takes place in the first half, and the second half consists of episodes. In Frogs the opposite is true. Frogs is unusual in other respects as well. The chorus of frogs before the entrance of the real chorus is a surprise, and the parabasis is particularly short. What might an Athenian audience have made of these departures from the norm?
15. The play begins with Dionysos and Xanthias joking about jokes-and particularly about the kind of jokes appropriate to comedy. Is Frogs a comedy in which a central topic is comedy itself? If so, what does it imply about the nature and function of comedy?