Lysistrata

1. A comedy by Ancient Greek playwright Aristophanes, a comic account of one woman's (Lysistrata) extraordinary mission to end the Peloponnesian War by denying men sex.

   Seeing our sexual culture through this data, one might think we are at war, and Lysistrata a real person.

   2025 September 30, Suzy Exposito, “I don’t like dating apps – I went to a ‘flirting party’ instead”, in The Guardian, →ISSN

   4 more examples

   The authors have drawn to some extent on the Lysistrata to aid them, but have fallen as far short of the fun as of the indecency of that memorable play.

   1887, George Saintsbury, A History of Elizabethan Literature

   The idea of a sex strike is as old as Aristophanes. Undoubtedly after a tiff with Mrs. Aristophanes, he wrote his “Lysistrata,” a comedy about wives who end the Peloponnesian War by resisting their husbands.

   1998 April 26, Jenny Lyn Bader, “Is Sex Necessary?”, in The New York Times, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC

   So I created the same women and started with the same story, but then just played it out in a contemporary setting. Also, unlike in “Lysistrata,” the sex strike doesn’t work.

   2024 April 17, Eric Grode, quoting Bekah Brunstetter, “Video Games Are a Playwright’s Muse, Not Her Hobby”, in The New York Times, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC

   Making sex a quid for some quo can be, as in “Lysistrata,” a dramatic strategy, but it probably isn’t the best one.

   2025 February 5, Kwame Anthony Appiah, “Is It OK That I’m Withholding Sex Until My Husband Sorts Out His Invoices?”, in The New York Times Magazine, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC

2. uncommonA female given name from Ancient Greek.

   I drop the note on the floor and take another sheet and write "YES. Lysistrata Lee."

   1960 October 28, Pauline Ashwell, “The Lost Kafoozalum”, in Analog Science Fact & Fiction

plural Lysistratas

1. A woman who withholds sex in order to get her way.

   Despite all this, the Western media framed these women as modern-day Lysistratas.

   2020, Helen Morales, Antigone Rising: The Subversive Power of the Ancient Myths

   1 more example

   Lysistratas among the Indian [Iroquois] women proclaimed a boycott on lovemaking and childbearing.

   1993, Jane Caputi, quoting Stan Steiner, Gossips, Gorgons and Crones: The Fates of the Earth, page 225