Women in power

The creative team behind the performance Women in Power selected Aristophanes’ lesser-known comedy Assemblywomen as their foundational text, reimagined in a new translation by Maja Sunčić titled Parliamentarian Women. The play was last performed at Drama Ljubljana during the 1964/1965 season under the title Women in the People’s Assembly. Aristophanes’ original concept, in which women take control of the state, was not intended as a revolutionary idea. As the translator notes, this revolutionary moment does not fit into the comedic genre, whose main function is “a comic discussion about the state of the country.” The action unfolds against the backdrop of the Peloponnesian War, a protracted conflict that devastated the prosperity and finances of the state. This bleak context sets the stage for the absurd proposal to give power to women, an idea that would have been unimaginable to the Athenians of the time, as women were disenfranchised and excluded from public life, except in religious contexts.
The comedy delves into a hypothetical scenario where women assume power in society. While the protagonist, Praxagora, envisions a radical egalitarian society without private property or state control, this vision is ultimately depicted as fundamentally flawed and destined to fail.
Women in Power, directed by Juš Zidar and adapted by Maša Pelko and the creative team, examines this break from patriarchy, daring to question what a world led by women, free from traditional hierarchies, might truly look like. The production further explores the idea of an
egalitarian community grounded in individual responsibility and the common good:
“Aristophanes offers us an idea that resonates today – an egalitarian community that entrusts the salvation of the world to women.”
However, Maša Pelko’s dramaturgical perspective emphasises that Aristophanes’ work is rooted in sexist assumptions about women's inability to rule – an idea that is considered unacceptable today. The adaptation responds to this by splitting the text into two parts: The first part examines Aristophanes’ largely intact text through contemporary staging and comedic techniques, while the second part challenges the idea that human nature is fundamentally selfish, arguing that this selfishness undermines any system, regardless of who is in power.
Aristophanes’ portrayal of selfishness proves to be a significant obstacle to building a successful society: “Selfishness is the main reason for the political and economic turmoil in Athens.
Through comedy, Aristophanes emphasises that human selfishness prevents any lasting systemic change.” The modern adaptation transfers this criticism to today’s society, which is characterised by a widespread culture of narcissism.
And the solution? In her dramaturgical analysis Through Selfishness Towards the Other, Maša Pelko comes to the following conclusion: “We must grow beyond the world to which we have become accustomed, in which we have comfortably settled and internalised its rules, so that we can imagine new structures instead. What feminist philosophy and active participation in the  world fundamentally mean is not only how to destroy something, but above all how to build something new.”