The Birds

Peisetairos is the central character of Aristophanes’s The Birds. He is an intelligent and cunning man from Athens who, dissatisfied with the drudgery of city life, seeks to settle among the birds together with his friend Euelpides. Peisetairos is instrumental in convincing the birds to found Cloudcuckooland, using his cunning to sell them on his plan.

Peisetairos’s defining trait turns out to be his ambition. Despite his and Euelpides’s claim that they left Athens to get away from politics, the law courts, and other tedious aspects of city life, Peisetairos ultimately creates a kind of replica of the city he left behind, with himself as the ruler. Peisetairos is willing to do anything to achieve his goals. He uses his superior intelligence to outsmart his opponents and convince them to do what best suits him. Peisetairos can thus be selfish and manipulative, using the birds for his own ends without regard for their well-being. He also exhibits hubris in his determination to unseat the gods as the supreme power of the cosmos. Unlike the heroes of Greek tragedies, however, his hubris is rewarded rather than punished.