About the work
Aristophanes' comedy was performed at the City Dionysia in 414 BC and won second prize. Its premiere came shortly after the Athenian fleet had set sail for the Sicilian Expedition, though the play never refers to the war directly.
Plot
Two Athenians, Pisthetaerus and Euelpides, leave their disappointing home city and persuade the Hoopoe and the assembled birds to found a city high among the clouds, Cloud-Cuckoo-Land. By intercepting the smoke of human sacrifices meant for the gods, they starve Olympus into submission. Pisthetaerus eventually negotiates with a delegation of gods, takes over Zeus's rule and marries Basileia, the personification of his power.
Cultural significance
Many regard the play as Aristophanes' most accomplished comic fantasy, rich in bird mimicry and music, and it has been read both as an allegory of the overreach behind the Sicilian Expedition and as pure escapist entertainment. Goethe adapted it in 1780, and a 1959 production in Athens was banned after protests.