ARISTOP MANES
Lysistrata and Other Plays
THE ACHARNIANS, THE CLOUDS, LYSISTRATA
Translated with an Introduction and Ni>Ips by
A IAN II. SUMMERS'] I- I N
revised edition
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Contents
Chronology vii
Introduction xi
Further Reading xlix
Translator's Note li
Note on the Text liv
Preface to The Achamians j
THE AC1 [ARNIANS 1 j
Preface to The ('.lauds 65
THE CLOUDS 75
Preface to Lysistrata 113
LYSISTRATA 14'
Notes 195
DEC 2 1 2004
Preface to The Clouds
In the 42.0s \iC (irccce, ami in particular Alliens, was in an intellectual ferment. New forms of education were being developed; fundamental questions were being asked about ethics and values; teachers of rhetoric were training their pupils to argue for and against the same thesis with equal persuasiveness; scientific explanations of natural phenomena were challenging traditional assumptions that they were the acts of gods; the very existence of the gods and the possibility of objective knowledge were being called into doubt. Inevitably it was in general the young and impressionable who were most likely to take up the new thinking with enthusiasm. Their lathers, brought up in the old ways, might reject the new ideas simply because rhey were new, or might very rationally fear that a society not built on a firm foundation of accepted values would lack cohesion and could easily slide into anarchy or despotism -or be defeated, and possibly destroyed, by its external enemies, who, being Spartan, would certainly not be obliging enough to handicap themselves in the same way. And who were these men who made a living as teachers ol this new learning - the sophists, as they were called?' What were rhey, some lelt, but quacks and spongers, taking money from the gullible for corrupting them intellectually and morally?
Aristophanes was himself a man of 1 he new generation, and at least one of his rivals saw him as being strongly influenced by the new learning (see Introduction, p. xxi); but in this respect, as in others, his comedies take the traditionalist point of view. In his very first play. The Banqueters, he had dramatized a contrast, and a contest, between two brothers, one with a Ira-
66
iii h clouds
ditional and the other with a sophistic education; and in The Clouds, produced at the City Dionysia of 423, lie returns to this theme, as a rustic father and his cityfied son conic into contact with the new learning in all its major aspects - natural science, rhetoric, the new morality and the new irreligion.
It made good dramatic sense for all these tendencies to be embodied in a single individual. Aristophanes could have created, if lie had wanted to, a fictitious composite of the leading 'sophists' of the day - Protagoras, Antiphon, I )iogenes of Apol-lonia, and others. Many, indeed, would argue that that was precisely what he did. Hut the tradition of Old ('omedy was that major satirical targets should he given the identities, and usually the names, of actual contemporaries (like Lamachus in The Achiirnians and Cleon [Taphlagon'j in The Knights); and Aristophanes gave his fictitious composite the identity and the name of Socrates.
Socrates is now widely thought of as the father of Western philosophy, a status he owes principally to the literary, dramatic and intellectual genius of his follower Plato. There is no evidence that his contemporaries in general regarded him as a man of any exceptional merit at all-. Me was known to be interested in ethical issues; he was a tireless interrogator who would not let any assertion pass unquestioned, no matter how widely believed it might he; he showed a striking disregard for the accepted comforts and pleasures of life, to the extent that he must often have been fairly smelly (Plato confirms, what we might otherwise have supposed to be a comic slander, that he rarely bathed or wore shoes). He had attracted to himself a significant number of young men of wealthy families who discussed intellectual questions with him and each other, listened to his conversations and sometimes tried to imitate his methods themselves. In late 424 he hail come to public notice in another way. by having behaved with notable courage during the Athenian retreat after the battle of Delium - typically not noticing or caring if his confident bearing was interpreted by his comrades as evidence of a disdainful attitude towards them. If for this reason he was particularly unpopular in the winter of 414/^, it may help to explain why he was made a significant figure in two ol the
the clouds 67
comedies produced the following spring (the other was Connus, by Ameipsias). On the oilier hand, there is no good evidence that he questioned the existence or power of the gods, or neglected (or encouraged others to neglect) their traditional worship/ nor that he taught rhetoric, nor that he propounded specific doctrines about natural phenomena as he is made to do in The ('.loads. Why then does Aristophanes in this play attribute 1 to him all those characteristics of other intellectuals that were widely regarded as subversive?
In the first place, once he had decided to have a single major sophist as a central figure in his play, and to identify him with an actual person, Socrates was the obvious choice. Most of the (other) leading sophists' were not Athenians, and even those who were (like Antiphon), taught mainly in private and had public reputations based more on hearsay (or, for the minority who read books, on their writings) than on first-hand knowledge. Socrates was always in public places; his lifestyle was in certain respects unconventional, as we have noted; anil (if we are to believe Plato) his appearance had something of the comically ugly about it. In the second place, while questioning received wisdom is a very different thing from denying it, there were undoubtedly many in Socrates' time, as there are now, who diil not understand the difference - anil who assumed, furthermore, that anyone who questioned/denied some traditional beliefs probably rejected idl of them. And (if, again, we are to trust Plato) Socrates, while constantly questioning the beliefs of others, generally avoided any explicit statement of liis own beliefs. It could plausibly be argued that of all the intellectuals of the late fifth century, he would seem to the outsider to be the one who excelled in negative criticism but had least to offer in the way of constructive ideas.
On the face of it, The Clouds might well seem to be, in the words of Sir Kenneth Dover, 'an invitation to violence or repressive legislation" against Socrates and other sophists. In fact it is unlikely that Aristophanes or anyone else, in 423, dreamed that ii might have such consequences. Euripides too was portrayed in comedy as an atheist anil a subverter of morality, but he never seems to have had any difficulty in getting
CiS THE CLOU l)s
a chorus for the City Dionysia when lie wanted one. When, twenty-four years later, Socrates was prosecuted for 'corrupting I he young' anil for 'not believing in the City's gods hut in other strange deities', it is likely that the prosecution was in reality a political one. Several of Socrates' close associates had been among the thirty-man junta who had tyrannized over Athens in 404/3, among them the junta's most extremist leader, Critias; and the many traditional practices which he had been known to question had apparently included the Athenian democratic practice of appointing most magistrates by lot. lUit to question a specific political institution was not an offence; and even if a jury could have been persuaded that Socrates had incited ( aitias and others to overthrow the democracy in 404, such a prosecution would have been barred by the amnesty lo which every citizen had sworn when democracy was restored! Accordingly a charge was laid under the conveniently vague rubric of 'impiety' - and backed by exploiting, among other things, the jurors' recollections ol The Clouds and other comedies. The object was probably no more than to frighten Socrates into leaving Athens; the main author ol Socrates' death was Socrates himself.' Ami if this was true in ^99, certainly in 41? no one could have imagined that this man, tiresome and useless eccentric though he was, would one day be put to death for it.'
In any case, Socrates is hardly the only unsympathetic character in this piny - even leaving aside the figure ol Wrong,'' the personification ol the immoralism allegedly taught in his school. The initial predicament of the play's central character, Strepsi-ades (whose name means 'Twister'), may be more his misfortune than his fault (though ii was proverbially foolish to marry a wife accustomed to a lifestyle beyond the husband's resources), but he is ready and indeed eager to evade the payment of just debts by dishonest means (the chorus twice describe him as 'in love' with wickedness). I lis son Pheidippides is no model of sonship or piety even before he goes to Socrates' school; in the very first scene of the play we see him not only disobeying his lather but breaking an oath,  and we already know that his extravagance has been a major cause ol his father's financial plight." Wrong's antagonist. Right, the champion of the old
THE ClOUUS 69
education, has an erotic interest in young boys which is overdone even for fifth-century Athens, particularly in the case of one who holds himself out as a teacher." And the Clouds, as they in the end admit, act as agents pniriirateurs: perceiving that Strepsiades and Socrates are minded to follow the path of vice, they positively and explicitly encourage them both to stay on that path, in order that they may fall over the cliff at the end of it, as they duly do. That, to be sure, is lor lifth-centurv (Greeks a recognized pattern of divine behaviour; but it is a tragic, not a comic, pattern.1" Indeed, the plot of The Clouds as a whole is tragic in basic structure, though not of course in its detailed execution: two criminal enterprises (Strepsiades1 plan to practise dishonesty, and Socrates' to teach it) interact in such a fashion that, partly through divine action, they recoil on their originators - though others (notably the innocent if rather ludicrous Creditors) also suffer along the way.
The Clouds, in fact, is an unusually dark comedy, and it was apparently too dark for its original audience. When it was produced at the City Dionysia of 423, it proved a flop." The winner was Cratinus. who hail been ridiculed in The Acharnians and The Knights as a senile, smelly, incontinent drunkard, but who now triumphed with The Wicker Flask, a brilliant satire on . . . himself. As we can see from the parabasis of The Wasps (lines 1016-17, 1043-50), Aristophanes bitterly resented this failure, and in or about 419 he set to work revising the play, apparently with a view to a second production. The revision, however, was never completed, possibly because the Archon refused to grant a chorus for what was, after all, not a new play; the revised play was never produced in Athens, and indeed the script as we have it could not have been staged under the rules of the Athenian comic competition12 and contains passages that arc inconsistent with each other," though the inconsistencies do not affect the plot. There survive about a dozen quotations from the 'first' Clouds (two ol which arc identical with passages in the surviving text),1'1 and they lend to support the statement in one of the play's ancient headnotes (hypotheses) that while there were many minor differences between the two versions," the only passages to have undergone fundamental change are
70 III E CLOUDS
(i) thr speech in the parahasis (lines 5 1 8-dz) in which the lailure of the original production is discussed, (ii) the debate between Right and Wrong (or more probably some part ol it), and (iii) the ending ('where the school of Socrates is burned' - it is not clear how early this section is to he taken as commencing). In a modern production, it can safely he assumed that the various rough edges will not he noticed.
NOTES
1. The word sophistes originally meant merely ;in actual or professed expert; but since every field of traditional expertise already had a specific designation, this non-specific term came to designate those who claimed to he expert not in any traditional field hut in the new intellectual pursuits. By the 420s it had already acquired a derogatory time (see, e.g., line 33 1).
z. He may well have questioned the truth oi certain myths (for example, those telling of conflicts among the gods), hut there was nothing improper about this: no two poets narrating or dramatizing a myth ever did so in quite the same way, and Pindar, that arch-praiser of traditional aristocratic virtues, more than once explicitly condemns a well-established myth as immoral.
j. There is little reason to doubt that most of Socrates' contemporaries, if asked whether he was a sophist, would have replied that he was; over half a century after his death a speaker in an Athenian court refers offhandedly to 'Socrates the sophist' (Aeschines, Against Timarchus
173)-
4. He could have saved himself by leaving Alliens before his trial; 01 by taking a more conciliatory attitude towards the jury during it, especially when arguing against the prosecution's demand for the death penalty; or by escaping from prison during the interval of a month between his conviction ami execution.
s;. The only person known to have been sentenced to death in classical Athens purely for religious unorthodoxy is Diagoras of Melos (alluded to in line N30), who seems to have gone beyond theoretical arguments and attacked specific religious observances, notably the Eleusinian Mysteries.
6. I use Dover's names Right and Wrong for the two characters who in the (ireek text are called, literally, 'the Superior Argument' and 'the Inferior Argument'.
THE CLOUDS 7!
7. Not every oath in the dialogue of (ireek comedy is necessarily to be taken at its lull value, but wc are surely meant to notice the contradiction when I'heidippidcs first promises, with an oath 'by Dionysus', to do whatever it is his father wants him to do (lines 90-y 1 ), and then, seventeen lines later, having heard what his father's request is, says, with an oath 'by Dionysus', that he will not comply at any price,
8. Note that a man who had squandered his inherited property was 1 disqualified from speaking in the Assembly (like, e.g., those who had assaulted a parent, thrown away then shield in battle, 01 engaged in male prostitution). I'heidippidcs' offence is in one way even worse, since he is squandering property which he has not yet inherited!!
9. That Athenians were concerned about the possibility of sexual exploitation ol boys by their teachers is evident front the existence in the fourth century of a law forbidding teachers to open their schools before sunrise or keep them open after sunset (Aeschines, Against Timarchus to).
1 o. (liven lapidary expression by the ghost of Darius in Aeschylus' Persians (line 742), in reference to (he disaster that has befallen his son Xerxes: 'When a man is eager for something, i he god lends him a hand." 1 1. How bad a Hop we do not know (or sure, since it is uncertain how many comedies were produced at this festival (see Introduction, note 37). If there were three. The Clouds finished third; if there were five, it may well have come fourth or fifth.
12. In lines 885—92, as the text stands, five actors are required (for Socrates. Slrepsiades, Right, Wrong and I'heidippidesl. I lad the revised play ever been produced, there would doubtless have been a choral song between what are now lines 888 and 889.
13. In the parahasis, one speech (lines 575-94) urges the Athenians to punish ( leim, with reference to events of 42.5 and 42.4, while in another (lines 55 1 --v 1 mention is made of several plays ol which the earliest. Eupolis' Maricas, is known to have been produced after ( aeon's death. Outside the parabasis, however, the surviving text contains nothing that needs to be taken as a reference or allusion to any event later than spring 423.
14. The remaining ten have a combined length of thirty-five (ireek words.
15. In particular, one or two self-contained passages such as choral songs seem to have been deleted and had not yet been replaced by new material at the time work on the revision was abandoned. What was probably once a complete second parahasis, comprising 1 wo songs and two speeches, is now represented by a minute snatch of lyric and a single speech Mines 1 1 1 i-^o).
scene: For the time being, an indeterminate space, possibly to be thought of as (be courtyard of Strepsiades' bouse. Two men are lying asleep - or rather, one, Pheidippides, is sleeping soundly under an enormous weight of blankets, while his father Strepsiades is restlessly tossing and turning. Finally be abandons all attempts at sleep, and sits up.
strepsiades: O Lord Zeus, how long the night is! Will it never end? When will ir he clay? Come to think of it, I heard the cock crow ages ago. And the servants are still snoring! They'll never have dared to in the old days. Damn this war! One can't even discipline one's own slaves.' And what about this dutiful son of mine? He never wakes up before sunrise cither; just farts merrily away wrapped up in live or six blankets. Well, there's nothing for it: let's cover up and snore too. \ lle lies down again and tries tosleep, but soon gives up.\ It's no good, I can't. I'm being bitten all over. Not by bugs - by horses and bills and debts, on account of this son of mine, him and his long hair" and his riding ami his chariot and pair. Even his dreams are all about horses. Result, every time the date gets past the twentieth, I'm fairly dying with fear as the interest gets ready to take another step up. [Calling through the door behind him] Boy! |/\ slave appears.] light a lamp and bring my accounts here. I want to see how many people I owe money to and how much the interest comes to.
[The si ave goes out, anil presently returns with a lamp and a number of waxed tablets. He gires strepsiades
7*
I 11 I   CLOUDS
the tablets, and stays holding the lamp for him to read by. | I ci me sec now, what have we got ? To Pasias, twelve hundred drachmas.4 What was that for? Why did I borrow it? Oh yes, when I bought the koppa-bred horse. Heavens, I might jnsi as well have copped ii right then and there!
ľ i iiJ i tu ľ ľ 11 > ľ s [/// his sleep]: Watch it, I'll i Ion, you're cheating. Stop culling across me.
si i! ľ ľ s i a i > ľ.s: You see? That's what's ruined me. Even in his sleep it's racing, racing, racing.
pheidippides: How many laps is the war-chariot race?
strepsiades: Not as many bends as you've driven your father round! [Looking at his accounts again] Now what was the next one after I'asias? Mm - three hundred for a small footboard and a pair of wheels.
pheidippides: Lei the horse have a roll, groom, and lake him home.
strepsiades: A roll! You're been rolling all right - iu my money! I've already got court judgments against me, and i here are i red i tors ih real cuing i o sci/.e my goods in lieu o I interest! |strei'siadks' voice has now risen so much that it wakes his son up. \
pheidippides: Really, dad, what's wrong with you, tossing and twisting about all night long?
strepsiades: I'm getting bitten by a bailiff, or something, iu the bedclothes.
ľ 11 li u i ľ ľ i UK s: Willi all respect, could you let me gel a bit of sleep? \ l le lies down as before. ]
STREPS!ADF.S: Fine, you do that, but just remember that all my debts will be yours one day! (iods. I wish I could strangle the matchmaker who put the idea in my head of marrying your mother! I had a marvellous life in the country, not caring about etiquette or tidiness or washing, rich in bees and sheep and olives. And then I married this city girl, the niece of Megacles the son ol Megacles, no less, a stuck-up, spoilt little Cocsyra of a woman!* On our wedding night, I went to bed smelling of new wine, drying-racks, (leeces and allluencc -and she of perfume, saffron, Irench kisses, spending, overeating and erotic rituals. Don't get the idea she was idle.
ill I  CLOUDS 77
though. She did work at clothes-making-got through a great deal of wool - until I showed her this cloak of mine and said s [holding nj> his threadbare cloak - under which he has been sleeping - and revealing a distinctly flaccid phallus], "Missus, you're wearing away my resources!"' [The lamp held by the slave goes out. ] slave: The lamp's out of oil, sir.
strepsiades: Well, did I ask you to use the thirsty one? Come
here - I'll make you regret it. slave {evading him]'. Why should I? \lle disappears through'
the door. I
strepsiades [calling after him]: because you put in such a fat wick, that's why. [During the next fen1 Hues he is getting up and putting on the cloak. \ Well, when me ami my [with heavy c,n sarcasm] good lady had this boy, we had a great row about what to call him. She insisted on getting a horse into the name, something ending in -hippus or the like - Xanthippus, ( haerippus, (,'allippides* - while I wanted to name him I'hei-donides after his grandad. Well, we argued for quite some lime, but in the end we came to terms and settled for Pheidip-picles." Then she used to hold him in her arms and sav, 'When you're a big boy and drive in procession to the Acropolis in your chariot, wearing a lovely smooth robe, like your Uncle 70 Megacles . . .', until I took him and said, 'When you drive the goats home from the tells, like your daddy did before you, wearing a leather smock . . .' 1 > 111 ii was no good. I le inner look any notice of anything I said, and now he's brought the family fortunes down with galloping consumption.'" Well, -; anyway, I've been hunting all night for a way our, and I've found one - a narrow path, but a marvellous one. It'll lend me out of the wood, il I can only get thai boy to help. liul I need to wake him up liist. Now what's the sweetest way to wake him up? I Iniin . . . [Bending over rit i-i m it i m:s; in sugary tones] Pheid/ppides! PhciJ/ppides, darling! xn ri 11 11 n it 11)us  [waking up, and sluggishly rising]: Whar-1 isiddad?
strepsiades: I want you to kiss me and put your right hand in mine."
8s
78 THE CLOUDS
pheidippides [doing so]: There you are. What's up? strepsiades: Tel! me, do you love me?
pheidippides [pointing to a statue near the door]: Yes, by
Poseidon here, the Lord of horses. streps!auks: No Lord of horses, please! He's the god that's brought all this trouble on me. Well, my boy, if you really love me from your heart, will you do something for me? pheidippides: What do you waul me to do for you? strppsiades: To change your ways, right now, and go ami
take the course of study I'm going to suggest. pup. 1 Di ppides: Come on, now, what are you asking for? strepsiades: You'll do it? PHK!i)iPPit>F.s: I will, by Dionysus.
now the remaining bedclothes hare been removed, and the two men are out in the orchestra. We can imagine them, therefore, as being in the street. Behind them, ice now perceive, are two bouses. ()ue is their borne. strepsiades points la the other. \ strepsiades: Look over this way. You see that nice little door
and thai nice little house? pheidippides: Yes. What is it, actually, father? i   strepsiades: It is a Thinkery for intellectual souls.1' Thai's where the people live who try to prove that the sky is like a baking poi all round us, and we're the charcoal inside it." And il you pay them well, they can teach you how to win a case whether you're in the right or not. 0   pheidippides: Who are these people?
strepsiades: I don'l quite remember their name. They're very
line reflective intellectuals. pheidippides: Yecch! I know lite villains. You mean those pale-faced bare-footed quacks such as that wretched Socrates and ('hacrcphoii. >s strepsiades: Now, now, quiet there, don't lalk so childishly! If [emotionalh'\ von care at all whether your lather gets his daily bread, do please forge! about racing and go and join them.
pheidippides: By Dionysus, no, not if you gave me all l.eogoras' pheasants."
the clouds
79
m in psiAiH-s [desperately]: My most beloved son    I beg of .
you - do go and study wilh them! pheidippides: What do you want me to learn? STREPSIADES: They say they have two Arguments in there -Right and Wrong, they call i hem - and one of them, Wrong, can always win its case even when justice is against it. Well, n5 if you can learn this Wrongful Argument, then of all these debts I've run into because oi you, I needn't pay anyone an obol" of them ever. pheidipimdes: I'm not going to do it. I low could I ever look my cavalry friends in the eye again, with a face looking as 1x0 though all the colour had been scraped off it? stkepsiades: Then, holy Demeter! you'll never eat anything ol mine again, not you nor any of your damn thoroughbreds.'" I'll throw you out ol my house and you can go 10 hell. PHEIDIPPIDES: No, to Uncle Megacles, if necessary, Hewoil'l leave me horseless. But actually, this is where I'm going n5 [pointing towards his own house], and I couldn't care less what you say! | He goes inside. | STREPSIADES [to himself]: Thai was a hard knock, but I'm noi going to take it lying down. So may it please the gods, I shall go to the Thinkery and gel taught there myself. \ Hesitating\ Bill how can I? I'm old ami slow and forgetful; how can I study all this logic chopping ami hair-splitting? [Emboldened   1 »o again] But I've gol to. No more dilly-dallying; lei me knock. [He knocks on the school door, and calls in sugary tones] Boy! Boyeee!
STUDENT \/rom inside]: Go to blazes! [Opening the door]
Who's been making all that racket? STREPSIADES: Strepsiades is my name, son ol I'heidon, Iron)
Cicynna."
STUDENT: What kind of lool are you? Do you realize thai by its your violent and unphilosophical kicking ol the door" you have rendered an important discovery totally abortive?
STREPSIADES: Do forgive me; I live a long way off in the country. But do tell me, what was it that aborted?
STUDENT [mysteriously]: It is not permitted to divulge it to T,|o non-members of the institute.
So
I HH. CLOUDS
s i Ri-rsiAi irs: Well, ihat's all right, you can tell me. I've come
to the I hinkery in order to be a member. student [coming out and closing the door]: Very well, !>ui you must treat this as a holy secret.   Socrates, a moment ago, ts     asked Chaerephon how many ol its own feet a flea could jump. One of (hem had just hilten Chaerephon's eyebrow and jumped over on to Socrates' head. strepsiades: And how did he measure it? 10   student: In a very elegant way. I le melted some wax and put the Ilea's leer into it, so that when it sel the Ilea had a stylish pair of slippers on. And then he took the slippers olf and used them to measure out the distance {illustrating bv taking a step or two, toe touching heel]. strepsiades: lord /.eus, whal a subtle intellect! student: like lo hear about another ol Socrates' clever jj ideas?
strepsiades: I beg you, yes. please tell me. student: Chaerephon of Sphettus20 once asked Socrates whether he was ol the opinion dial glials pre id need their hum by way ol the mouth or the rear end. si REPS1ADES: So what was his opinion about the gnat? do   s i "u den'i: 'The iniesi inal passage ol the gnat', he said, 'is very narrow, and consequently the wind is lorced lo go straight through to the rear end. And then the arsehole, being an orifice forming the exit from this nanow passage, makes a noise owing to the force of this wind.' i,s   strepsiades: So a gnat's arsehole is like a trumpet. I low gutterly marvellous! I can see that defending a lawsuit successfully is going to he dead easy for someone who has such precise knowledge ol the guts of gnats. student: Then the day before yesterday he was robbed of a /ci      great thought by a lizard.
strepsiades: I low on earth did that happen? student: Well, he was doing some research on the movements and revolutions ol the moon, gazing upwards, open-mouthed, and then this gecko shat on him from the ceiling''1 in the dark. streps i Ai>r s [laughing heartily]: Oh, I liked that one - a gecko shitting in Socrates' face!
in r. t i.n u ns
8 i
student: And then yesterday we found we had nothing to eat
at dinner time. strepsiades: Well then, whal trick did he pull off? student: lie sprinkled a little ash on the table, bent a skewer to make a pair ol compasses, and then . . . nicked somebody's cloak while he was in the gym wrestling.22 strepsiades: And we still admire old Thalcs?2' Come on, hurry up, open the door, and let me see Socrates right away! I'm bursting to learn! Open the door!
[The student opens the school door. A wheeled platform is rolled out, on which are a number of other students, thin, l>ale and sickly looking, all motionless in altitudes presently to be described, as if utterly absorbed in scientific thought. |
strepsiades: In Heracles' name, where did you catch these creatures?
student: What arc you so surprised about? What did you think they were?
strepsiades: Spartan prisoners from I'ylos,2-1 if you ask me. Why on earth arc those ones [pointing to one group of students] staring at the ground?
student: They are doing research on things that are under the earth.
strepsiades: Oh, looking lor edible bulbs, you mean! Well, you don't need to search for them any more; I know where you can find lovely big ones. Hut what are that lot up to [pointing]} They're completely doubled up!
student: They are investigating the lowest reaches ol the underworld.
strepsiades: So why is iheir arsehole looking at the sky? student: It's learning to do astronomy all by itself. [To the
other students] (Jo inside; what'll he say il he sees you out
here?
strepsiades: No, not yet! Can't they stay a bit? 1 want to tell
them about a little problem I have. student: Can't do that. Mustn't stay too long outside in the
fresh air.
[The other students go inside. At the rear of the platform
i8j
the clouds
can now be seen a ma/' and a number of mathematical and
scientific instruments. \ STREPSIADES [examining some of the instruments}-. What on
earth are these tilings? student: This is for astronomy. STREPSIADES: And litis?
student: Geometry.
strepsiades: Geometry? What's that useful for? student: Well, measuring out land," for instance. STREPSIADES: You mean in an overseas settlement?2' student: Any land you want.
STREPSIADES: What a marvellous idea! A really democratic,
beneficial invention! stu dent: And this, you see, is a map of the whole world. 1 .ook,
here's AI hens.
sir eps IADES {inspecting the map\: 1 low do yon make that out?
Doesn't look like Athens to me; 1 can't see any jurymen on
their benches. STUDENT: No, really, this area is Attica all right. strf.t'siai)f.s: Then where is my village, Cicynna? STUDENT: It's there.27 And look, here's the island of luiboea,
lying Stretched out opposite us, all along here. STREPSIADES: Yes, we stretched it Hat all right, me and I'ericles
and the rest of lis.'" Where's Sparta? STUDENT [pointing]: Right here.
STREPSIADES: loo near, too near! You'd better have another thought or two about that - get it to be a very long way away from us.
s nn n-N i: It's not possible.
strepsiades [raising bis slick\: Isn't it? Then take that! \Bnt before he can strike the Student, socrates swings into view, airborne, like a god in tragedy, standing on a board suspended by four cords from the jib of a crane. | Who in heaven's name is that man hanging from the nieathook?
STUDENT: It's him\
STREPSIADES: I Iiin? Who's him?
STUDENT: Socrates.
i
TUP CLOUDS 8',
strepsiades [reverentially]: Socrates! Could you give him a
good shout, please? STUDENT: No, I haven't got time, you do it yourself. [Exit
hastily and fearfully into the school.] strepsiades \gazing up at Socrates; in sugary tones]: Socrates!
Socrates, darling! socrates \godlike]: Why call'st thou me, () creature of a day? strepsiades: Well, for a start, I'd very much like to know
what you're doing up there. Socrates: I am walking upon air and attacking the mystery of
the sun.
strepsiades: Well, if you must attack the Mysteries'" of the gods, why can't you do so on the ground?
socrates: Why, lor accurate investigation of meteorological phenomena it is indispensable to get one's thoughts into a state of suspension ami mix its minute particles into the air which they so closely resemble. If I had remained on the ground and investigated the upper regions from there, I would never have made nit}' discoveries - the earth exercises too powerful an attraction upon the moisture contained in thought. The same thing occurs in the case of cress.'"
strepsiades [baffled]: I don't know what you mean, all this about thought attracting moisture to cress. Do come down to me, Socrates darling, so you can leach me what I've come to learn.
socrates \as he is lowered to ground level]: And what have
you come to learn? strepsiades: 1 want to be made an orator. Interest bills and
heartless creditors are laying me waste with fire, the sword
and ilistress warrants.
socrates: Mow did you manage to get so much in debt, unawares?
strepsiades: I was laid low by a vicious attack of horse lever. But anyway, I want you to teach me one of your two Arguments - the one that always pays oil anil never pays up. h 145 doesn't matter what fees you charge; I'm prepared to swear by the gods that I'll pay them.
15
' I"
84
i ii e clouds
SOCRATES: What do you mean, swear by the gods? The first thing you'll have to learn is that with us the gods are no longer i in rem.
STREPSIADES {confused |: Then what is the currency you swear
by? Iron coins like they have at Byzantium? o   SOCRATES: Do you want to learn for yourself the real, plain
truth about religion? sir f. i's i a i) if s: Why, yes, if that's possible, soc:rati's: And to talk face to face with our divinities, the
Clouds? STREPSIADES: Definitely.
sock a i is [motioning hint towards the vacant platform]: I hen
please sil on the sacred bed. STREPSIADES [doing so\: '['here you arc.
SOCRATES [giving him it wreath of unattractive looking vegetation]: Now put this on your head.
sir epsiades [alarmed\\ What's this for? Socrates, please, don't go and make a sacrifice of me, like that Athainas."
SOCRATES: No, this is just parr ol our normal initiation ceremony.
STREPSIADES: Rut what good will it do me? ir.o  SOCRATES [picking up a hag\: You'll become a really smooth, smarmy talker - the finest flower in the oratorical garden. Now don't move, [lie sprinkles /lour from the hag over Strepsiades.]
i repsiadeS: Did you say become fine flour, or be plastered wii h ii ?!
SOCRATES:
Keep silence now, anil hear my prayer. 1) I onl, 0 King, O boundless Air, ()n whom the earth supported rides, () Ether bright, anil you besides Who make the thunder roar so loud, Vuii awesome (loddesses of < loud, t) hearken to your Thinker here: Arise and in the sky appear!
run CLOUDS
«5
sir eps i a Di's [hastily pulling his cloak over his head |: Not yet, not yet, don't let them soak Me till I'm covered with my cloak. Why was I such a silly chap That I left home without a cap?
SOCRATES:
Come, glorious Clouds, display your power. [Turning successively to the four points of the compass]31
Whether in father ()cean's bower
You join the Nymphs in sacred rites.
Or on Olympus' snow swept heights
You sit, or draw with pails of gold
From Egypt's streams, or brave (he cold
Of Mimas' peak (il there you be)
Or round Maeotis" inland sea:
Where'er you be, my prayer hear.
Accept my offering, and appear! |/le pours a little incense on the altar in front of his door, and sets light to it. After a short silence, the CHORUS are heard singing in the distance.]
chorus:
Let us rise, we Clouds eternal.
Shining bright with radiant dew. From the roaring Ocean's bosom
To the sky," the world to view.
Let us see the distant mountains
And the holy earth below. Where we irrigate the tillage
And the babbling rivers flow.
While lar off the breakers thunder [roll of thunder]
'Neath the sun's unwearied rays: Shake the rainy mist front off you
And to earth direct your gaze.
1 HE C LOUDS
hi
socrates: Almighty Clouds, von heard my prayer indeed. |'fo Strepsiades] Did you hear their voice, and the awe-inspiring bellow of thunder that accompanied it?
STREPS LADES: Yes, and I revere them immensely- so much that in response to that thunder I'm wanting to make a great big noise down below,''1 they make me shake so with fear. If it's lawful - well, actually, even if it's not - / need a crap!
socraits: No buffoonery, please; you're not acting in a comedy now! Keep silence; there is a great swarm of divinities in musical movement.
chorus [nearer]:
Maitls of Rain, come now where Pallas
Rules the loveliest laud on earth. Rich ami shining land of Cecrops Pull of men of valiant worth;
Where the initiated worship At the great F.lcusis shrine, Through its opened gales beholding Secrets of the world divine;
Where stand lofty, beauteous temples
Pull of gifts beyond all price; Where no season lacks its share of least, procession, sacrifice;
Where they hold to Dionysus
|oyous feast at start of spring, I lear the pipes and hear the chorus
In melodious contest sing."
STREPSiAl>r.s: Do rell me, Socrates, who are these ladies who 11 ^      sing so majestically? They're not some kind of female heroes, are they?"1
socra'i irs: No, indeed. They are the celestial Clouds, the patron goddesses of the layabout. Prom them we get our intelligence,
jio
run CLOUDS 87
our dialectic, our reason, our fantasy and all our argumentative talents.
STREPSIADES: No wonder that when I hear their voice, my soul feels it could lly! I want to be a quibbler! I want to split hairs! I want to be able to deflate my opponent with a pointed little sound-bite and bring arguments to undermine his! If there's any way to do it, 1 do so want to see them face to face!
\/\t this point the first of the chorus begin to appear at the top of the auditorium; during the following dialogue they file down silently along the gangways, form up at the bottom, and enter the orchestra. They have the faces of young women; only their costumes suggest anything cloudlike.]"
SOCRATES I pointing towards the top of the auditorium]: I 00k over there, towards Mount Parties."1 I can see iliem coining quietly down now.
STREPSIADES: Where, where? Show me.
Socrates [pointing lower and to his left]: Yes, here (hey come, a whole host ol them, through the glens and the woods -[noticing that STREPSIADES is staring at the empty sky] no, l:rn\ .1 bil to the side.
STREPSIADES [looking in the indicated direction, but too late to see the Chorus]: What are you talking about? I can't see a thing.
SOCRATES [pointing to where the CHORUS are forming up in
ranks]: There in the cntryway! STREPSIADES: Ah yes, 1 can just see them now. SOCRATES: So you should, unless you've got pumpkins where
your eyes should be.
STREPSIADES: Yes, I ilo - and how wonderful! The whole place is full ol them.
SOCRATES: And you mean you never knew, never thought, 1 hat they were goddesses?
STREPSIADES: I leavens, no - I thought they were mist, dew, vapour, ihat son of thing.
socrates: You're obviously not aware that they give sustenance to a vast tribe of sophists, high-powered prophets,'0
1*5
88
335
345
TIIF CLOUDS
355
teachers of medicine, long-haired idlers with fancy signet-rings - and especially the airy quacks who write those convoluted dithyrambs. They're very happy to sustain them in idleness, because they bring clouds so much into their poetry.
sir EP5IADES: Ah, that accounts for all that about 'the fearsome advance of watery clouds edged with twists of radiance' and 'locks of the hundred-headed Typhon' and 'conflagrating squalls' and 'crook-taloned air-floating birds of the airy sea' and 'showers of moisture front the dewy clouds'. And tor that rubbish they get feasted'" on gorgeous slices ol barracuda and the avian flesh of thrushes!
Socrates: All thanks to these ladies, and quite right too.
s iki-I'stadus: Tell me, though, if they really are clouds, how come they look so human, so much like women? The other clouds - I mean the real ones - don't look like that at all.
SOCRATES: Oh, how </o they look?
STREPSIADES: Well, it's hard to say exactly, but they sort ol look like lleeces laid out to dry, anil certainly not in the least like women. I mean, these ones have noses]
SOCRATES: Well, can I ask you a question or two?
si REPSIADE5: Go right ahead.
SOCRATES: You've looked at the sky sometimes, haven't you, and seen a cloud shaped like a centaur, or a leopard, or a wolf, or a hull?
STREPSIADES: Yes; so what?
SOCRATES: They can take any shape they fancy. So il they
see one of those shaggy long haired savages like the son
of Xenophantus," they make bin of his mania by turning
themselves into centaurs. STREPSIADES: And il they catch sighi ol someone who helps
himself to public money, like Simon,   what do they do? sen RATES: They expose him by turning into wolves. STREPSIADES: Ah, now I understand why they looked like deer
yesterday! They must have seen that great coward Cleonyinus,
the one who dropped his shield! SOCRATES: That's right; and now, you see, they've just seen
Cleisthenes," so they've turned into women!
1*0
I'll It c LOU DS Ku
strepsiades \to the Chorus]: Then hail to you, mighty Ladies; Could you - if you ever do, do this - could you. Queens of the Universe, show me the power of your heavenly voices?
CHORUS:
Mail, grey-headed seeker for language artistic,
And you, our high pries! of Rue twaddle! For although, among specialists cosmologistic.
Old Prodicus" has the besi noddle. Still we favour you greatly, because of the way
Yon swagger and glance with disdain," Endure much derision, go barefoot all day,
And on our account act really vain.
STREPSIADES: Holy Earth, what a voice! I low divine, bow awesome, bow fantastic!
socrates: Yes, you know, these are the only real divinities; all ?r>s
the rest is bunkum. strepsiades: What on earth do you mean? You don't think
Olympian Zeus is a god? socrates: /.ens? Who's Zeus? Whai rubbish you talk! There
is no Zeus!
STREPSIADES: What do you mean? Who makes the rain, then?
That's the fust thing I want to know. socrates [indicating the Chorus]: They do, of course, and I'll prove it to you very clearly. I lave you ever seen il raining ,,-„ when the sky was blue? Surely Zeus, if it kuis him, would be able to send rain even when the Clouds were oui of town! strepsiades: You've certainly got a good point there though I really did think before that rain was just Zeus pissing through a sieve. Hut tell nte loo, who makes the thundct i bat sends shivers up my spine? socuates: They do too, when they roll about. 17s strepsiade5: You'll stop at nothing. I low do you mean? socrates: When they are suspended in the sky, filled with a large quantity of water, they are necessarily compelled to
mov
e while full of rain, collide with each oth
their weight they burst open with
ei, and ow
tug to
t crash.
9°
THE clouds
strepsiades: All, but who compels them to move? Thai's got to be Zeus! 380   socrates: No, it's a celestial vortex.
strepsiades: Vortex? I never knew that before. So Zeus is dead, and Vortex has taken his place on the throne! lUil you still haven't explained to me what causes the thunder. socrates: Didn't you hear? I said that it occurs when water-filled clouds collide with each other and owing to their density this makes a noise. (85   strepsiades: Who's going to believe that?
socrates: You yourself ate a living proof ol it. You have, no doubl - say at the l,anathcnaca'"; - had a bit too much soup and got an upset stomach, and then suddenly a bit of wind has set it all rumbling? strepsiades: That's just tight. It makes a great nuisance ol itself right away, and the soup crashes around and roars wo      fearfully just like thunder. Hirst quire quietly, 'prrrr prrrr', then it takes a step up, 'prrrr prrrr', and then when I crap, it really is a thunderclap, 'prrrrrrrrrrrrV, just like they do \indicating the Chorus]. socrates: Well, if a little tummy like yours can create a fart like that, is it surprising that from an infinity of air you can get a mighty roll of thunder? strepsiades: I sec; so that's why we talk about a 'thunderous (art'!1  but how about the fiery thunder^o//? Where does it come from, to strike us and burn us to a cinder, or maybe singe us alive? Obviously that's Zeus' weapon against people who perjure themselves. socrates: You stupid, antiquated relic! If Zeus strikes down perjurers, why hasn't he burned up Simon, Cleonymus and I heorus? They're perjurers if anyone is! Instead ol which, he strikes his own temple, and the holy headland ol Simium,™ not lo mention any number of his own sacred oak trees — or would you say they were guilty ol perjury? strepsiades: I don't know, bill whal you say does seem to
make sense. What is the thunderbolt, in that case? socrates: When a dry wind rises ro high altitude and is trapped ,10s      inside a cloud, it blows the cloud up from within likea bladder
195
.100
rur. clouds 9 1
and so necessarily bursts it and tushes out with very high momentum owing to its density, which together with die accompanying friction causes it to self ignite.
strepsi adk.s: Why, dial's exactly what happened lo me once at the Diasia.'1" I was roasting a haggis for the family, I forgot to slit it. and it puffed itself up and i hen went off with a bang,   .. 10 spitting blood right in my eyes and giving me burns in the lace. ^ ■ r
socrates: I assume, then, that in future you will recognize .121 only the gods that we believe in, that is, Chaos, the Clouds and the Tongue?
strepsiades: I will never sacrifice or pour libation or burn incense to any other god. And if 1 met one in the sheet I wouldn't speak 10 him.50 .iir.
chorus:
O you who desire our high wisdom to learn, What kudos in Athens and Greece you will earn -If you're ready to toil, if your memory's good,
If you've got the ability to think. If standing anil walking don't tire you, nor Deprivation of warmth, food anil drink, lfe.xcrci.se, wine and all follies you slum.
If your values are those of the smart. Who worship success both in counsel and deed And in ilelt oratorical air!
4ix
11 <;
strepsiades: Well, I'm tough all right, and I do a lot of |ir> thinking - mostly ol a sleepless night - and my digestion is used to strict economy and quite ready to dine off nothing but herbs; so have no fear - I meet your qualifications - here I am - get to work on me! 411
leader: Just tell us, then, whal you want us to do for you. As w a worshipper ol ours anil a seeker after wisdom, you will never come to grief.
strepsiades: It's only just one tiny little thing I waul, hoi)' Clouds: to be the best orator in Greece, by at least a hundred   1 jo miles.
9*
THE CLOUDS
435
'I'l0
450
leader: No problem. In future there will be nobody who tarries more resolutions in ihe Assembly than you do.
strepsiades: Not big political speeches, that's not what I'm after. I just want to be able to twist and turn my way through the thickets ol the law ami give my creditors the slip.
leader: Well, that's certainly not much to ask. We'll see you get it. Just put yourself confidently in (he hands of our ministers here.
strepsiades: I'll trust you, and do it. I'm necessarily com /relied to do it, by pedigree horses and a blasted pedigree wife!
So I give mysell entirely to the school - I'll let them beat me. Starve me, freeze me, parch me, flay me, 1 don't care
how they ill-treat me, II they teach me how to dodge my debts and get (he reputation
()f the cleverest, slyest fox that ever baffled litigation. Let men call me glib, audacious, rash, a liar bold and nimble,
Lawcourt veteran, walking statute-book, a pest, a
tinkling cymbal, Loathsome supple rogue, dissembler, sticky customer and braggcr.
Villain, whipping-post and twister, or a logic-chopping nagger-
let them call me any name they choose, and over and above it
bet them chase me through each court, and 1 assure you
that I'll love it! II the Thinkcry can make ol me a real forensic winner, I don't mind if they take out my guts ami serve them up for dinner!
iiioRUS:
We can see you're not a coward, and you've got the disposition
To become, if taught by us, a great and famous rhetorician,
the clouds 91
With an enviable lifestyle -strepsiades:
Can I credit what you're telling? im
chorus:
Yes, they'll sit all niglu with patience at the entrance to your dwelling
To consult you aiul 10 pick your brains and learn a .170
method shifty To escape from paying damages of forty grand or fifty; And by hiring out your intellect you'll gain a reputation 17s That will reach right up to heaven anil resound in every
nation!"
lea der [to Socrates]: lime to take your pupil through the preliminaries. You must stir up his mind a bit, test his intelligence.
Socrates: Tell me, what kind ol a mind do you have? I must know that in order to bring my latest artillery to bear on you.
si repsiades: Pardon? Are you planning to lay siege to me or something?
socrates: No, only to ask you a few questions. Do you have
a gooil memory? strepsiades: "les and 110. Very gooil if somebody owes me
something - vet")' bail it 1 owe it to someone else. socrates: I see. Do you think you're a natural speaker? strepsiades: A natural speaker, no. A natural swindler, yes. socrates: Well, how on earth do you expect to learn anything? strepsiades: I'll manage.
socrates: Very well, if I set a choice morsel of cosmology in front of you, you must make sure you snap it up.
strepsiades: I'm not going to be led learning like a dog!
socrates \aside\: Do Greeks come this stupid?'' [To Strepsiades] I lear, old sir, that in the course of your education physical punishment may be necessary. [An anxiety strikes him] Tell me, what do you do if someone hits you?
strepsiades: After getting hit I wait a short time, then raise a cry ol assault, then wait a very short time, anil then go to law.
SOCRATES: All right; take off your cloak, please, [lie lays his hand on Strepsiades' cloak. \
i«s
4"i
9,| rH£ CLOUDS
STREPSIADES [resisting, evidently on the assumption that he is al'out to he heaten[: Why, what have 1 done wrong?
SOCHATF.S: Nothing; only (he rule here is, no outer garments in the inner sanctum.
strepsiades [still clinging to the garment]: What do you think I'm planning to do? Plant something inside and then accuse you of stealing it?"11
SOCRATES: Do stop talking nonsense and lake it off! [STREPSIADES reluctantly complies, leaving the cloak on the ground. |
stritsi adf.S: Tell me, Socrates, if I'm a really keen and hardworking student, which of your other pupils will I most resemble?
socnAi ps: Nobody will be able to tell you from Chaerephon.
STREPSIADES: I'll be one of the walking dead!
socratf.s [going to the school door, picking up Strepsiades'
cloak on the way]: Will you stop blethering and hurry up and
come in here with me? STREPSIADES: I will if you give me a honey-cake to feed
the serpents with. I'm frightened of going down into thai
cave
154
[STREPSIADES moves gingerly towards the door. (in reaching it, he hesitates to cross the threshold, fearfully eyeing the floor within. \ SOCRATES: What ate you peering down like that for? Get a move on!
[stkf.psiades goes inside, followed by socrates.]
CHORUS:
( io in, brave pilgrim, anil be sure
That Fortune will be gracious. And blessing in profusion pour
On your attempt audacious, because, though far advanced in years.
You do not hud it scary To get a tincture of ideas
Quite revolutionary!
9
the clouds
leader [addressing the audience]:55
I swear by Dionysus, him who nurtured me in youth, Athenians, that I'll tell you now the frank and simple truth. So may I be victorious and men think well of me, I thought that you an audience intelligent would be. And also thought I'd never written any play so witty As this - and that is why I first produced it in this city. A lot of toil went into il - and yet my play retreated By vulgar works of vulgar men unworthily defeated. For your sake I took all these pains, and this was all your gratitude!
But even so, I promise I will never lake that attitude To you, or ever let you down. For since I earned the attention
And praise of certain men (whom it's a pleasure just lo mention)
Willi Model Son ami Pansy Boy,'"' which, like an unwed mot her.
I lelt outdoors in hopes it would be picked up by another
and you with kindness
(It was; she brought it home to you,
great
Adopted it and made it yours to rear and educate) -Since then, I say, I have from you a pledge as good as sworn To look with favour on all plays that might ol me be born. So here's my latest, like Fleetrn looking here anil there To Hud an audience that's a lock cut from her brother's hair."
And what a modest girl she is!s" She doesn't play the fool By bringing on a great thick lloppy red-tipped leather tool'"" To give the kids a laugh, or making fun of men who're bald;61
Requests to dance a cordax"' simply leave the lass appalled. And no old man with walking-stick beats up some tiresome pest
In hopes to drown the groaning at another feeble jest. No torches, yelps, or violence, or other weak distraction: She comes before you trusting in her words anil in her action.
560
565
570
96 THE C LOU DS
Tin like that too: I'm not stuck up, nor yet .1 smooth-faced cheat
Who pretends a play is new when it is really a repeat:6' I always think up new ideas, not one ol which is ever The same as those that went before, and all of them are clever.
I went for Cleon, hard and low, when he was in his pomp, But never would I have the flat effrontery to stomp Upon him, once I'd floored him - quite unlike these tedious others
I larping upon I lvperbolus,M his failings and his mother's! The first of them was Kupolis, the stinking thief, who bashed
I lyperbolus in Mciricas,''' which was my Knights rehashed (I Ie also plundered Phrytiichus, though on a smaller scale: A cordax-dancing drunk old woman,** gobbled by a whale.)
I lermippus then and all the rest on one another's heels Attacked Hyperbolus - and stole my image ol the eels!s If anyone still laughs ai them, well, I can't say I mind
II fools like that to humour such as I provide are blind; bin if inv comic novelties receive your approbation, Posterity will praise the wisdom of this generation.
CHORUS:
/ens, thou almighty Ruler',s of the heavens.
Thee first we call to join our dance today; Thou too who wield'st the stern anil savage trident,
Lord of the Earthquake, come to us, we pray, bat her renowned who nourishes! all creatures,
Ether, most holy, thee we also call; And him who drives the fiery solar chariot,
Whose brilliant rays pervade earth, sky and all.
LEADER:
We Clouds, my dear spectators, feel we must Say that the way you treat us is unjust. More blessings than all other gods we bring To you; yet you make us no offering,
hie clouds
Not even a libation. Just reflect What care we take your city to protect. If you send troops out on a foolish mission. Our rain or thunder stops the expedition. Then, be I ore you with high command invested That Paphlagonian tanner," we protested: With knitted brow we thundered, lightning flared. The moon forsook her path,   the sun declared That, if thai villain won, he'd quench his flame.72 And you elected Cleon just the same! Athenians always make the wrong decision The first lime round; we gods, though, make provision To see you get a second opportunity To rectify your blunders with impunity. We'll tell you how to do so ibis time too. Get Cleon charged with theft, that's what i<> do, And bribery, convict him, shove his head Into the stocks, and then, just like we said. Whatever errors you have made before. You'll get back all you lost by them, and more!
CHORUS:
Thou who art throned on ( vtilhus' rocky summit, '
Graciously hear us, Phoebus, Delian lord; Thou too, blest Maid, '' who dwell'si in the I phesians'
Temple ol gold, by I ydian maids adored. Thou our Protectress, ' wielder of the aegis.
Alliens' own goddess, Pallas, hear our song; Last him whose torches blaze on Mount Parnassus,
Bacchus, we call, amid his revel-throng.
LEADER:
Before we started on our journey here We met the Moon, who said she wished good cheer To Athens and to all her allies nue. But had a bone or two to pick with you. She says you wrong her, seeing she has blessed You alwavs in a way that's manifest.
97
180
600
r,o5
6 i o
9R
itie clouds
For instance, each of you, each mouth, can save A drachma, which you'd have to give a slave For torches, when you're going out at night:
6i5 So much, and more, you profit hy her light.
But for all this, she says, your thanks are scurvy -You've turned the calendar all topsy-turvy.7* The gods turn up for meals and have to wait Because you've sacrificed a day too late,
(-,!„ Then blame and threaten her - and meanwhile you,
Instead of feasting, torture, rack and sue.77 And when we mourn some hero of the past7" -Memnon, Sarpedon - keeping solemn fast, Too often, down on earth, we see you revel. Some of our wrath we vented on that devil. This year's chief envoy to Thermopylae,79
6315 I [yperbolus: we took his wreath away,""
In hopes that he would realize, late or soon, That days are rightly reckoned by the Moon!
[sue rates comes out of the school, looking exasperated.] socrates: In the name of Respiration and Chaos and Air and all that's holy, I've never met such a clueless stupid forgetful 6)0      bumpkin in all my life! The most trifling little thing I teach him, he forgets before he's even learnt it! Never mind, I'll bring him out here in the daylight and see if that helps. [Calling towards the door] Strepsiades! Where arc you? Can you bring your bed out here? STREPSIADES [coming out, dragging a bed]: If the bugs will let me.
635   socrait.s: Come on, lay it down there, and then pay attention.
strepsiades ]doing So]: All right.
SOCRATES: Now what do you want to be taught first, that you haven't ever been taught before? Come on now. Words? Rhythms? Measures?81
strepsiades [eagerly]: Measures is what / wanrto know more f..|o about! Only the other day a corn-dealer cheated me out of two whole quarts.
SOCRATES [impatiently]: That's not what I'm talking about.
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What measure do you consider the most aesthetically attrac
five - the three-measure or the four-measure?*3 strepsiades [confidently]: I think nothing beats the gallon. socratf.S: What on earth are you wittering about? strepsiades: Yon want to bet that there aren't four measures «.,,
in a gallon?"'
socrates: Oh, 10 hell with you, you stupid peasant! Let's try rhythms, perhaps you'll understand those better.
strepsiades: I will if they'll help me feed my family.
Socrates: It'll do wonders for you in social conversation, if you understand what kind of rhythm is armamental and what 6%o kind is digital.14
STREPSIADES: Digital? But 1 know all about that already.
socrates: Fell me what you know.
Strepsiades: Fver since I was a boy, it's meant this [sticking
out his middle finger*5]. socrates: You rustic moron!
strepsiades: But danimii, I don't want to learn any of this
kind of stuff. socrates: What do you want to learn, then? strepsiades: That - that argument, the one you call Wrong! socrates: Ah, there are many other things you have to learn
first. For instance, which animals are truly masculine? strepsiades: Well, I know that, if I haven't gone pony. Ram, r.r.o
billygoal, bull, dog, fowl. socrates: And feminine?
strepsiades: F.we, nannygoat, cow, bitch, fowl.8* socrates: See what you're doing? You're calling the male and
female by the same name 'fowl'. strepsiades: How do you mean? socrates: How do I mean? 'Fowl' - 'fowl'.
STREPSIADES [after some thought]: Ah, I get you! What ought cr>, I to call them?
socrates: 'Fowless', and for the male 'fowler'.1*7
strepsiades: Fowless? I loly Air, dial's brilliant! Just lor idling me that I'll fill your kneading-trough with barley meal.
socrates: Hold il again. You called it a trough. Much too 670 masculine a name for such a feminine object.**
ioo THE clouds
strepsiades: What do you mean, a masculine name for a
feminine object? socrates: In the same way as Cleonymus is."' strepsiades: I don't understand. socrates: 'Trough' is parallel to 'Cleonymus'. (.75   strepsiades: But Cleonymus never had a trough to his name
- he did his kneading in a round mortar"" [lie illustrates bis
meaning with the help of his phallus). Well, what should I
call il from now on? socrates! 'Trough-ena', like you say 'Ath-ena'. strepsiades: Troughciia, that's feminine? socrates: That's right, i.sn   sir i: ps iai ii: s: So 1 should have said '( 'leonyiiiena never had a
troughena'?
socrates: But you've still got to learn about names, which of
them are masculine and which are feminine. strepsiades: No, I know which are feminine. socrates: Which?
strepsiaiies: Lysilla, I'hiliiiua, Cleitagora, Demetria. cki   socrates: And which are masculine?
strepsiades: Lots. [Thinkshard] Philoxenus . . . Melesias ...
Amynias"' . . . socrates: Silly, those aren't masculine. strepsiades: You don't think they are?
socrates: Not a bit. If you met Amynias, what would he the
first thing you'll say to him? strepsiades: Til say - I'd say 'Hello, Minnie!' Socrates: There you are; you've called her a woman. strepsiades: And rightly loo - the way she manages lo dodge the call-up. But what's the point of my learning all these things? Everybody knows them already. socrates: Never mind that. |ust lie down there [indicating the
heel | -strepsiades: And?
socrates: And try and think out one of your own problems.
strepsiades: Not there, I beg you! If that's what you want me to do, can't I do it lying on the ground?
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socrates:That is not an oplion.
STREPSIADES [taking off his shoes, tying on the bed anil finding the covers over him]: God help me, I've really been thrown to the hugs now!
[socrates goes into the school, taking Strepsiades' shoes u/ith him. I
CHORUS:
Think closely, follow every track, Anil twist and turn anil double back,
And when you don't know how To come to a conclusion true. Jump to another point of view.
And banish sleep -
strepsiades:
Yow-ow!!
ciior us:
What ails thee, friend? Why criest so?
strepsiades:
I'm being ravaged by a loe.
These buggers'2 from the bed; They gnaw my ribs, they drain my soul, l'ull out my balls anil probe my hole [indicating his amis] -They'll quickly have me dead!
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CHORUS;
Nay, bear it not so grievously. STREPSIADES:
That's line advice to offer me.
The state I'm in right now! No cash, no tan, no shoes, 110 blood, |ust whistling in the dark anil mud, And all but done lor - voww!
[lie returns to his private agony. SOCRATES puis his head out of an upstairs window. \ SOCRATES: 1 ley, you, whai are von up 10? Thinking, I trust?
id1 imf CLOU US
strepsiades: Yes, very much so. socrates: And what thoughts have you had? 7i,   streps ia11 es: Maiidy about whether there'll be any of me left
when the bugs have finished! socrates: Oh, go to Mazes! [He disappears from the window.] strepsiades [shouting in bis general direction]: I'm there
already, mate! [He moves as if intending to get out of bed.] leader: Now, now, don't be a softie; cover yourself up well.
You've got to find some really juicy ideas to cheat your
creditors.
strepsiades ]meekly retreating under (he bedclothes]: 1 only 730 wish someone would throw a juicy, sexy . . . idea or two over me, instead of these!
socrates [coming out, and going up to Strepsiades]: Let's have a look and see what this fellow is doing. [Kicking Strepsiades through the bedclothes] Here, are you asleep?
strepsiades [uncovering his head]: No, I'm not.
socrates: Well, have you got hold of anything yet?
strepsiades: No.
socrates: What, nothing?
streps 1a d f.s [throwing off the bedclothes with his left hand]:
Only one thing - my thing - I've got hold of thai! 735   socrates \tbrowiug the bedclothes back over him]: Cover up,
will you, and get thinking, right away! strepsiades: What about? Do tell me, Socrates. socrates: No, you tell me what you want to discover first. strepsiades: If I've told you once I've told you a thousand
times. About interest - how not to pay it. 740   socrates: All right; cover yourself up, open out your thinking,
refine it, and explore the matter in detail, making sure you
draw the correct analytical distinctions. strepsiades [obeying]: Yoww! They're at me again! socrates: Keep still. And if one of your ideas seems to have
reached a dead end. let go of it, withdraw for a bit, and then 74s      get your mind at work on it again, shifting it around and
weighing it up.
strepsiades [getting eagerly and thankfully out of bed]: Socrates! My beloved Socrates!
I Hf. C 1.(1 11 II S
SOCRATES: Yes, old man?
strepsiades: I've got an evasive idea for dealing with interest. socrates: Present it to me.
strepsiades: Tell Hie —
socrates: Yes?
strepsiades: Suppose I bought a woman slave from Thessaly, a witch, and got her to draw down the moon one night, and then pin it in a big round box, like they do mirrors, and kept a close watch on it.
socrates: What good would that do you?
strepsiades: Why, il the moon never rose, I'd never pay any interest.
socrates: Why not?
strepsiades: Why not? Because it's reckoned by the month, of course.
socrates: Very good. Let nie give you another one. Someone sues you for 30,000 drachmas. 1 low do you get rid of the case?
strepsiades: How - how - I don't know. Let me work it out.
socrates [as strepsiades cogitates]: Don't keep your thought penned up inside you all the lime. Try letting it out into the air lor a bit, dangling it on a string like a pel beetle.
strepsiades: I've found a marvellous way of stopping that lawsuit. I fancy you'll think so too.
SOCRATES: Like what?
STREPSIADES: I lave you seen that stone the druggists sell - the
beautiful transparent one you can light fires with? SOCRATES: You mean glass?"
strepsiades: That's right. Well, suppose when the clerk was entering the case on his tablet, I stood like this with the glass between hint and the sun and melted i lie wax where 1 he entry for my case was?
socrates: Nice one, by (he Craces!
strepsiades: Whew, I'm glad 1 managed to strike thai 30,000-
drachma case off the list! SOCRATES: See if you can get this one. STREPSIADES: Yes?
socrates: You're a defendant, you've got no witnesses, you've nearly lost the case - how would vou avoid conviction?
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STREi'SiADES: That's child's play. Socrates: Cio (in.
sirEPSIADES: I.ike this. When there was still one case to he
heard before mine was called - I'd run oil and hang myself. Socrates: That's no good. sir EPSIADES: Why not? Once I'm dead, I can't be put on trial! socratks: You're talking twaddle. (Jet out. I'm not going to
teach you any more. sir eps iad es: Oh, why? Do, please, Socrates, for the gods' sake.
85 SOCRATES: But anything you do learn, you forget straight away. For instance, tell me now, what was the first thing I taught you?
sir epsiades: I el me see now, what came first? hirst, what was first? Something we were kneading barley meal in - help, what was it ?
/mo SOCRATES: Oh, to hell with you, you amnesiac old fool! \lle turns bis hack on Strepsiades, hut remains within earshot.]
sir eps 1 a dps \in despair]: I lelp, what will become of me now? If I can't learn tongue-wrestling, I'm done for. Holy Clouds, can you give me any advice? <>s   1 padfr: Well, what we advise is this: if you have a grown-up son, send him here to be a student instead ol you.
STREPSIADES: Yes, I'vea son, {sarcastically] a line fellow. What am I to do, though? He doesn't want to study.
LEADER: And you can't make him? Soo STREPSIADES: No. He's too strong to bully, and he comes Irom a long line ol slinking rich women.0' Never mind, though, I'll go for him; and if he won't come, make no mistake, I'll throw hint out ol my house. [To Socrates] Go inside and wait till I come hack; I won't be long. \lie moves towards his own house. I
CHORUS [addressing Strepsiades as he goes into his house]: I low greatly blest you soon will be, 80s Only through our aid!
Your lightest wish this man will see Swiltly is obeyed.
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tOJ
[Turning to Socrates as he goes into the sch( >< >/1 You see how high his bean's uplifted -
Make your profit fast! For favouring winds ere now have shifted --luck don't always last.
[strepsiades, very angry, conies out of his house, driving a bewildered pheidippides he/ore him.] strepsiades: In the name of Mist, leave this house at once. (Jo
and nibble at Megacles' pillared portico. pheidippides: What on earth's happened to you, dad? Why,
Zeus in heaven, you act as though you were out of your mind! strepsiades: 'Zeus ill heaven' - ha! I low stupid can you get?
Believing in Zeus - a big boy like you? | He laughs heartily. ] pheidippides: What's so funny about that? strepsiades: Thai you could he such a baby and have such
primitive ideas. Never mind. (omc to daddy and he'll tell you
something that a grown-up needs to know. |piieidippides
conies over, ami STREPSIADES whispers, audibly, in his ear.]
Promise you'll never tell this to anyone? pheidippides [giving his right hand in pledge]: Promise.
What's the secret? STREPSIADES: You were swearing by Zeus just now, weren't
you?
PHEIDIPPIDES: Yes.
strepsiades: Well now, isn't education a wonderful thing?
Pheidippides - there is no Zeus. pheidippides: Then who's taken over?
STREPSIADES: Vortc\ is king now; he's driven Zeus Irom power.
pheidippides: What on earth are you blethering about? strepsiades: I assure you, it's perfectly true. Ptii-idippides: Who says so, anyway?
STREPSIADES: Socrates of Melos,  anil Ghaerephort, you know,
the expert on fleas' Icet. PHElDt Pl'l des: And you believe nutters like thai ? You must be
totally off your head. STREPSIADES: flush! Don't talk rudely about them. They're
lof)
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Sis
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brilliant men. and so sensible too - they live so economically: they never get their hair cut, never oil themselves, never pay For a wash in the public baths - whereas you go there so often, you've washed away my estate, as if I were dead and it was yours to squander! Now you go to (hem, right away, and let them teach you instead of me.
pheidippides: Huh! What can that lot teach that's any use?
sirepsiades: What a thing to ask! They teach you everything that's worth knowing. They'll soon teach you how dense and stupid you are. I lerc, just wait a moment, will you? \ He goes into his house.]
pheidippides [to himself]: Coils help me, my father really is mad. What am I to tit)? Get the court to certify him, or just drop a word about it to the undertaker?
\llis reflections are interrupted by the return of strepsiades, followed by a slave who carries two wicker cages containing, respectively, a cock and a hen. | strf.psiades |pointing to the cock]: Tell me now, what do you
call this? PHEIDIPPIDES: A fowl.
si repsiades: Thai's very good. And this one?
pheidippides: A fowl.
strepsiades: What, both the same? You are making yoursel!
a laughing-stock! You'd belter not do it again. In future call
this one a fowless and the other one a fowler, pheidippides: Fowless? Was that 1 he kind of bright idea you
were taught while you were with those sous pi the soil?9* strepsiades: Yes, and a great ileal more too; but every time I
was taught anything I forgot it straight away - I'm just too
old for that sort ol 1 hing. pheidippides: I suppose that's how you came to lose your
cloak?
strepsiades: I didn't lose it, I - I invested il in education. ph ei i) 1 ppi dps: And vour shoes? What did you do with them, you old fool?
strepsiades: I lost them 'for essential purposes', as Pericles once said." Conic on now, let's go. If vou lhink you're doing wrong, remember you're doing what I asked you. I remember
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107
[emotionally] that I was already doing what you were asking me when you were a babbling six year old. i spent my very first ohol of jury pay to get you a little toy cart for the Diasia! pheidippides: I swear you'll be sorry for this one day. ]But he. km reluctantly follows strepsiades over to the door of the Thinkery. ]
STREPSIADES: Cood for you, my boy! Socrates! Come out and sec what I've got here! |sucrates comes out.] Here's my son. lie didn't wain to come, bui I managed to persuade him.
SOCRATES: t dare say he's immature and doesn't yet know the ropes here.
pheidh'imdes \aside]: I'd like 10 see you tied up with some, S70 and gelling a good laslunp;!'>K
strepsiades: Damn you, how dare you curse your teacher?
Socrates: Did you hear his slack pronunciation - the drawl, the sagging lips? h's not going to he easy to leach him to win cases and master the technicalities ami make good, empty 875 debating points. And yet it's true that for six grand, I lyper-bolns did manage to learn it.
strepsiades: Don't worry, you can teach him. He's always been precocious. Do you know, when he was a little boy only that high [indicating with his hand], he was building toy houses at home, and making model boats, anil little carts of rk^ figwood, and — can you imagine? - frogs oul of pomegranate peel! Well, anyway, make sure he learns your iwo Arguments - Right, or whatever you call it, and Wrong, the one that takes a had case and defeats Right with it. If he can't manage s>u both, then at least Wrong-that's essential.
SOCRATES: He'll be taught by the Arguments in person; 1 won't be there.0"
strepsiades ]as socrates goes inside]: Don't forget, he's got to be able to argue against any kind of justified claim at all. "'" [F.titer, from the school, right, a distinguished-looking old man dressed in the style thought to he typical of Athenian aristocrats of the Persian War period. He is followed hy the smirking figure of wrong, a young man of about Pheidippides' age hut of much less healthy appearance - except for his large phallus. ]
, 10 I HE CLOUDS
LEADER [to Right]: Now, you who fostered by your education The glorious ancient virtues of our nation, vfio     Deploy for us the voice you love to use, explain your personality and views.
RIGHT: I'll tell you about the way boys were brought up in the old days - the days when I was all the rage and it was actually fashionable to be decent. F:irst of all, children were supposed to be seen and not heard - not a sound. Then, all the boys of the district were expected to walk together through the streets 96i to their music-master's, quietly and with decorum, and without cloaks, even if it was snowing confetti - and they did. And when they got there he wotdd make them learn some of the old songs by heart - like 'Pallas, great sackcr of cities' or 'let the glad strain sound afar' - singing them to the traditional tunes their fathers handed down, anil on no account pressing their thighs together. And if any of (hem did anything disreputable, tying up the melody in knots with changes of mode and rhythm - the sort of thing Phrynis1" introduced, which they all do now - why, he was given a sound thrashing for insulting the Muses. Then in the gymnasium, when they sal down, they were expected to keep their legs well up, so as not to - so as not to torment us with desire; and when they got up, they had to smooth down the sand, so as not to leave any marks on it for their admirers to feast their eyes on. What's more, [sternly] they never oiled themselves below the belt, [dreamily] and their privates looked like peaches, all velvety and dewy; and you wouldn't see a boy being his own 9s)o pimp, walking along making eyes at his lovers and putting on a soft tender voice, oh no! They weren't allowed to take so much as a radish head at dinner, or any of die dill or celery if their elders wanted it; they never ate posh fish, they never giggled, they never stood with their legs crossed -WRONG [mockingly]: I low thoroughly quaint! I low redolent »s>; of cicada brooches,109 oxslaugliter trials1"" and Cedeides!"" RIGHT: be that as it may, that's the sort of discipline that I used to rear the men who fought at Marathon. What docs your
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kind do for our young men? You leach them to wrap (hem selves in cloaks up to the eyebrows. And when I saw one of i hem dancing at the I'anathenaea,"' and he lei his shield drop to his haunches, why, I nearly choked - the insult to our beloved goddess! [To I'heidippides] So choose Right, my lad, choose mc, and have no fear. Keep away from the Market Square, and the public baths too. II ever you do something shameful, show you're ashamed. If someone makes fun of you, flare up. If you're sitting down and an older person approaches, stand up. I )on't show disrespect for your parents, or do anything disgraceful that would defile the face of Mod esty."2 Don't run afier dancing-girls; you never know what may happen - suppose some little whore chucks an apple at you as a conie-and-get-me?"' your reputation's gone in an instant. Don't ever contradict your father or call him an antediluvian;'" of course he's older than you, that's how he was able to bring you up before you could fly on your own, so you shouldn't insult him with it.
WRONG: Don't listen to him, lad otherwise, by Dionysus, you'll end up just like the sons of I lippocrates anil be called a boring little baby.'"
right: What matters is that you'll be spending your time in the gymnasium, getting sleek anil healthy, not like these people who are always chattering away in the Market Square about some abstruse topic or other, or being dragged into court over some piffling quibbling filthy little dispute. No, you'll go down to Academe's Park"6 and take a training run under the sacred olive trees, a wreath of while reeds on your head, with a nice decent companion of your own age; in autumn you'll share the fragrance of leafy poplar anil carefree convolvulus, and you'll take dclighi in the spring when the plane tree whispers to the elm!
100^
If my sound advice you heed, if you follow where I lead, You'll be healthy, you'll be strong anil you'll be sleek;
You'll have muscles that are thick anil a pretty little prick -You'll be proud of your appearance and physique.
t
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1040
If contrariwise you spurn my society and turn
To these modern ways, you'll have a pale complexion, And with two exceptions, all of your limbs will be too small -
The exceptions are the tongue and the e-lection;"'
You will sing the trendy song 'To be virtuous is wrong,
And every kind of wickedness is right', And you'll catch the current craze for Antimachus's
ways -
That is, forgetting buggered every night. CHOR US:
O how sweet are your words and how modest your thought. You noble and glorious sage! How we envy the happiness of those whom you taught -They lived in a real Golden Age!
[To Wrong]
He's impressed us tremendously, and we advise
That you should be careful to choose Some real novel arguments, sure to surprise.
And to showcase your sexiest Muse.
LEADER:
It looks as though you'll need the newest weapons of your school
In order to defeat your foe and not face ridicule. wrong: As a matter of fact, right through his speech I've been positively bursting with eagerness to refute it and smash it to smithereens. That's why the people at the Thinkery call me Wrong: I was the one who invented ways of proving anything wrong, established laws, soundly based accusations, you name it. Isn't that worth millions - to be able to have a really bad case and yet win? Well, let's have a look at this educational system he's so proud of. Me says, for example.
i 11 e < louds
[turning to Pheidippides] that he won't let you have any hot
baths. [To Right] On what principle do you object to them? right: Hot baths are hiul. They make a man a coward. wrong: I lolil it! I've scored one there, right away, and there's
no way you can wriggle out of it. Tell me, of the sons of Zeus,
who would you say was the bravest man and performed the
greatest number of labours? right: The best of them was unquestionably I leracles. wrong: And have you ever heard of I leracles having a cold
bath?"8 [RIGHT is speechless.] Well, was he the bravest of
them all, or wasn't he? 10 Giir [spluttering]: That - thai - that's just the sort of clever
stuff thai you hear the young lads coming out with all day! So
they flock to the public baths and leave the wrestling-schools
empty.
wrong: Then you object to their hanging around the Market Square. I see nothing wrong with it at all; quite the contrary. If it was such a bad thing, I lomer would never have described all his sages, such as Nestor, as 'marketeers'."" lo consider next the tongue. I Ic says it's bad for the young to exercise it too much; well, I say it's good. And then he talks about modesty or decency or something - another pernicious evil! Come on, prove ine wrong: tell me of anyone who's been done any good by being modes! and decent.
right: Many people, b'or example, that was how 1'eleus came to be given a knife.12"
wrong: A knife! Well, well! What a rich haul, 1 must say! Hvcu llyperbohis from the lamp market - now he's made a mint by being wicked, but he never got a knife!
RIGHT: And it was also because of Peleus' virtue that he got Thetis as his wife.1"1
WRONG: Yes, and that was why she deserted him as well.1" II he'd been a little less virtuous he might have been a more satisfactory performer under the covers. Women do //opsonic disrespectful handling in bed, von know, you hulking old ruin! [To Pheidippides] listen to all the things thai virtue can't do for you, my lad-all the pleasures you won't be able to have. No boys. No women. No gambling. No fancy food.
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No booze. No belly laughs. Will your life be worth living, without all these? [pheidippides indicates the answer is
,075 W.'"] F thought not. Let me turn now to - to the demands of Nature. Let us say you've fallen in love with a married woman - had a bit of an affair - and then got caught in the act. As you are now, without arguing skills, you're done for. But if you come and learn from me, then you can do what you like and get away with it - indulge your desires, laugh and play, have no shame. And then suppose you do get caught
10S0 with somebody's wife, you can say to him, straight out, 'I've done nothing wrong. Just look at Zeus; isn't he always a slave to erotic desire? And do you expect a mere mortal like me to be stronger than a god?' right; And suppose your advice doesn't work? Suppose he gets radish-buggered and ash-plucked?12'1 Then he'll have the arsehole of a faggot for the rest of his life. Argue yourself out of that one!
,oK5   wrong: So if he does have the arsehole of a faggot, what's wrong with that? right: You mean, what could be worse than thai ? wrong: What will you say if I prove you wrong about this? right: Til have nothing to say after that.
wrong: Very well then, From what class of persons are prosecution advocates drawn? right: From the faggots.
wrong: I agree with you. And our actors - I mean, of course,
the tragic ones? right: From the faggots.
wrong: Right again. And from what class do we get our
politicians? right: From the faggots.12' ,,,      wrong: Then don't you see you were talking nonsense?
Why, look at the audience; what do you think most of them
are?
right: I'm looking.
wrong: And what do you see?
right: Good gods, the faggots have it by a street! At least, I
THE clouds r 1 t
know he's one [pointing], and him, and him there with the 1100 long hair -WRONG: Well then?
right: You will. Mere, you sods out there, in the name ol the gods, take my cloak - Tin defecting! \He throws his cloak towards the right-hand side of the audience, in the direction of some of the men he has previously pointed out - to reveal that he is wearing underneath if an inner garment of distinctly feminine colour and line. He then runs into the auditorium and Up a gangway on the left hand side - pausing to dally flirtatiously with the odd spectator - and eventually vanishes from view at the ;wr.|1*''
wrong [to Slref>siades\: Well, now, which do you want? Are no, you going to lake your son away, or do you want me to leach him lo be an orator?
STREPSIADES: < >h, leach him - don'l spare the rod, il necessary - and be sure to give his teeth a good cutting edge. He should be able to handle small cases with one side of his mouth while using the other side for the bigger ones. ,, to
WRONG: Don't worry; when you gel him back, he'll be a lop-class sophist.
PHEIDIPPIDES [aside]: A pale-faced wretch, more like, if you ask me.
CHORUS [as WRONG leads PHEIDIPPIDES into the school and STREPSIADES linns towards his house]: Farewell; [to Strepsiades] but we bet it 'l ou'll come io regret it!'2'
[STREPSlADESj taking no notice, almost dances into his house in great joy. |
LEADER [addressing the competition judges]:
We would like to tell you, judges, of the blessings we'll mj accord
I hose who give to both this chorus and this play their just reward.
i \6
THE CLOUDS
II you want to put the ploughshare to some fallow laud you've got,
Then we'll see that even in time of drought there's rain
upon your plot. If you keep a vineyard, we'll protect it from the double
bane
mo      Both of soaking with too much and parching with too little rain.
But if any mortal treats the Clouds of heaven with despite.
We have power to reduce him to a miserable plight. Both his olives and his grapes and all his other crops will fail:
i r2s      I'rom our powerful slings we'll smite them with those slingshots you call hail. II we see him making bricks, we'll rain, and then we'll give him proof
Of our anger when our hailstones smash the tiling of his roof.
And if he is getting married (or a friend, or a relation) We will ruin the festivities with our precipitation. So all in all, you judges, this we earnestly advise: p no      You'd be better off in Egypt1'* than not giving us first prize!
[strepsiades comes out of his bouse. lie is counting on his fingers.]
strepsiades: Twenty-sixth, twenty-seventh, twenty-eighth; ;dici that comes the twenty-ninth, and then that day 1 fear ami dread above all others, the last day of the month, 'Old
mi and New Day'!12" All my creditors swear that il I don't pay up, they're going to hand in their court deposits"" and see me ruined. And when I ask them for a reasonable little favour-'Please don't call the loan in now' - 'Cive me some more time' - 'Couldn't we just write it off?' - they all say that's not their
1140 idea of getting paid and call me a villain and say they'll sue. Well, let them. If Pheidippides has really learned to he an expert orator, they can't hurt me. I'll soon know if he has.
Let's go to the Thinkery. {Knocking on the school door] Boy! I [ere, I say! Hoy! socrates [opening the door]: I )elighted to see you, Streps tades.
strepsiades: Same to you. {Offering him a present] I wonder if you'd accept this?"1 Just as a token of my appreciation. But my son - has he learnt that Argument that we were listening to not long ago? socrates: Yes, he has. strepsiades: I loly Fraud, how wonderful! SOCKait.S: Yes, you'll now be able to defend any and every
lawsuit successfully. strepsiades: I'ven il the loan was made before witnesses? socrates: Even if there were a thousand of them. strepsiades [adopting a tragic pose and tone]: Then raise aloft a mighty cry of joy! O weep, ye moneylenders, for yourselves, Your capital, and your compound interest! No longer can ye work your will on me. Such is the son that's reared within these halls. The brilliant wielder ol a two-edged tongue. My shield and bulwark, saviour of my house, bane of my foes, dispeller of my griefs! Run, run within, and call him out to ine. [socrates goes inside.] Thy father calls, beloved son; appeal. socrates [re-emerging with Pheidippides]:
Here is your offspring. strepsiades [embracing him]:
(> my dai ling boy!
socrates:
You may depart with him,
strepsiades:
I whoop with joy!
[socrates goes back into the school, strepsiades has a good look dt Pheidippides - whose face, we can see, is many shades paler than previously - and lets out a cry of rapture. ]
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strepsiades: What a gorgeous complexion, son! You've got 'Not guilty' and 'On the contrary' and that famous Attic-phrase 'You can't he serious' written all over your lace - and that injured-innocent look, that does the trick even il you're caught red-handed! You were my ruin before; now you must be my salvation.
pheidippides: Why, what are you afraid of?
strepsiades: Old and New Hay.
pheidippides: What, is there a day that's both old and new? strepsiades: Of course there is - and that's when they say
they're going to hand in their court deposits. pheidippides: Well, they're going to lose their money. It's not
possible for one (.lay to be two days. strepsiades: How not possible?
pheidippides: Not unless it's also possible lor one woman, say, to be old and young at the same time.
s pre ps Ia d e s: But that's what the law says: 'summonses to be answerable on Old and New Day'.
phf.idippides: Ah, but the meaning of the law has been misunderstood.
strepsiades: So what does it mean?
pheidippides: Well, our lawgiver Solon was a good demo crat,"' right?
streps 1 a des: Yes, but whal's thai goi to do with Old and New Day?
pheidippides: So he fixed the summonses to be for two days, Old Day and New Day, intending that the deposits should be lodged on New Day, also known as New Moon.1"
strepsiades: Well, in that case, why mention ()ld 1 )ay at all?
pheidippides: To give the defendant a chance to appear a day early and settle [he dispute, so as not to have builerllies in his tummy on the morning of the New Moon.
strepsiades: But then why don't the magistrates accept deposits on the New Moon? They only accept them on the day before.
pheidippides: They're acting like the people who taste the
food the day before a festival: early taste, early steal. strepsiades: Nice one! Here \to the audience], why are you
THE <:i.oiios
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lot just silting there like stones, not even laughing? They're a flock of sheep, a heap of earthenware - we intellectuals can exploil them as we please! |7r> Vheidippides] We're in luck, von and me, and 1 iliink a song of celebration is called for.
'O blest Strepsiades,
What brilliance you display. And what a son you have!'
So everyone will say. My friends and neighbours all.
In envy at the sight, When you go into court
And win each case you fighi!
(lomc in now and let's have a party! \ They go into Strepsiades' bouse. I
[Enter first creditor - a very fat man - accompanied by l>is witness.]
EiKST creditor: Why should anyone want to lend out his money? Better to face the embarrassment of saying no at the outset rather than have all ibis trouble afterwards. I lere I am, having to bother you with my problems because I need a witness, and also having lo make an enemy in my own village. All the same, while I live, I won't put Athens to shame.1" [He is now al Strepsiades' door, and calls out loudly] I hereby summon Strepsiades -
strepsiades [coming out]: Who's here?
first creditor: - to attend on Old and New Day.
strepsiades |/o the audience]: I call you to witness that lie summoned me for iwo different days. |7b the creditor] What is this about ?
El rsi' creditor: The twelve hundred drachmas you borrowed
to buy the ash-coloured horse. strepsiades: Morse! Can you believe it? And you all know
that I hate everything to do with horses! FIRST creditor: Nol only did yon borrow it, but you swore
by all the gods that you would pay.
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STREPSIADES: Ah, well, that was before my Pheidippides had
learnt his invincible Argument. FIRST CREDITOR: And now he has, you intend to repudiate the debt?
strepsiades: Well, you don't think 1 sent him to school for
nothing, do you? FIRST CREDITOR: Are you prepared to swear by the gods, in a
place of my choosing,"' that you don't owe me the money? strepsiades: Swear by which gods? FIRST creditor: Zeus, I lermes and Poseidon."* strepsiades: Delighted. I'd give you three obols for the privilege.
first creditor: Well, of all the shameless - ! strepsiades \patting him on the stomach]: You know, you'll
make quite a good wine-skin once we'd cured your hide. first creditor: You impudent - ! strepsiades: Four gallons it would hold, I think. •irst creditor: By Zeus anil all ihe gods, you needn'l think
you'll get away with this. strepsiades [laughing uproariously]: 'Thegods'l 'Zeus'! I low
incredibly funny - for those of us in the know! FIRST creditor: You'll pay for this, make no mistake. Anil I'm not leaving till you've given me a straight answer. Are you going to pay me back my money or not? strepsiades: Wait a moment and I'll tell you. [He goes into his house. |
first creditor [to his witness]: Whai do you think he's going
to do? Pay, or what? strepsiades ]coming out with a kneading-trough]: Where's
the man who was demanding money from me? [To First
Creditor] Tell me what this is. FIRST creditor: That? A kneading-1rough, of course. strepsiades: Anil an ignorant person like you dares demand
to be paid? Do you expect me to pay so much as an obol to
someone who speaks ol a trough instead of a troiighena? first creditor: So you're not going to pay? strepsiades: Not that I know of! Now clear off, will you? (let
away from my door! I lurry up!
the clouds
first creditor: All right, I'm going. But let me tell you, I'm going to lodge that deposit, or may I be damned! [Exit, accompanied by WITNESS.] STREPSIADES [callingafter them]: Then you'll just be throwing it away after the twelve hundred. And [ d< >n'i really want thai to happen to you just because you were silly enough to use a word like 'trough'.
[Enter SECOND CREDITOR, a much younger man. We if bruised and limping.] si i oni) CREDITOR [tragically,singing]: Ah me! Ah me!
sir El's i aki'S: Who's this singing laments? Not one of Carcinus'
gods,"' is it? second creditor:
Why wishest thou to know who ! may be?
I am a man ol sorrows, s rREPSlADES: Then keep them to yourself. second CREDITOR:
0 cruel divinity that smashed my chariot!
Pallas, thou hast destroyed me utterly.13" STREPSIADES: Why, wlinl  has Tlepolemus ever done you wrong?
SECOND CREDITOR: Stop making Inn ol me, my man. Tell your son in pay me back the money he had from me. I le ought to anyway, and especially when I'm in a state like this.
STREPSIADES: What money is this you're talking about?
SECOND credi i or: The money he borrowed.
STREPSIADES: Looks to me you are in a bad way!
SECOND CREDITOR: Yes, by the gods, I fell off my chariot.
strepsiades: The nonsense you talk suggests you fell oil the proverbial donkey!""
second creditor: Nonsense? I only waul mv own money back!
strepsiades ]in the tones of a doctoi breaking bad news]: I
doubt if you're ever going to recover fully. SECOND CREDITOR: Why not?
STREPSIADES: I'm fairly sine that you're suffering from some form of concussion of the brain.
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second creditor: I'm fairly sure thai you're going to gel a
summons from me, if you don't pay up. STREPSIADES: Tell me now: do you think that when Zeus rains, iz8o      it's new rain every time, or do you think the sun sucks up
water from the ground so that he can use it again? second creditor: I don't know, and I don't care. STREPSIADES: Then how can you claim the right to have your
money hack, if you have no knowledge of meteorology? 1*85   second creditor: Look, il you're short of cash, you can jusl
pay the interest for now. strepsiades: This 'interest' - what exactly is it ? second creditor: Why, it's just the way that a sum of money
keeps getting bigger, month by month, day by day, as time
runs on.
1290   strepsiades: All right. Now ilieu: do vmi think the sea has more water in it now than it used to? second creditor: No, it's the same size; there would be
something wrong if it wasn't. strepsiadks: So the rivers ru 11 into the sea and yet the sea doesn't iz«5      get bigger - so how can you claim thai as lime runs on your money should gel bigger? You wrelched fool! (.0 and chase yourself away from this house! I'oy - fetch me a goad!
[A slave conies out with a charioteer's goad, and strepsiades immediately sets to work on the creditor with it.]
second creditor: Help! Assault!
strepsiades: Gee up! What are you wailing for? (»ei moving,
you branded nag! second CREDITOR: This is criminal outrage!140 strepsiades: Move, won'l yon? i )r else I'll get yon moving by 1100     poking you right up your thoroughbred arse! [TfeecREDiTOR
takes to bis heels.] Retreating, eh? I thought I'd get rid of you
that way - you and your chariots and wheels and all! \He
goes inside. |
CHORUS:
Is he not in love witli evil, This old man - in love, I say?
the ui.ouds
1 *3
Having borrowed all this money, He's determined not to pay!
But before this day is ended
He'll be rendered broken-hearted, And this sophist"1 then will surely
Rue the wickedness he started.
Lor his son's a rhetorician
(Which is what his dad desired) Armed with Wrong to vanquish even
Argument by Right inspired.
Any case, however righteous.
He is trained to overcome: Soon his father will be praying
To the gods to strike him dumb!
{Screaming is hear,I from within, and a moment later strepsiades rushes out. clutching his face and in great agitation; pheidippides follows him. looking utterly unconcerned. \
strepsiades: I lelp, neighbours! 1 lelp, kinsmen! I lelp, men of Cicynna! I'm being beaten up - rescue me! Zeus, my head -my cheeks! |To Vbe'uli}>(>idcs[ You abominable villain, do you dare hit your father?
pheidippides [coolly]: Yes. I do.
strepsiades [fo the Chorus and the audience]: Do you hear
him? He admits it! pheidippides: Of course I do. strepsiades: You loathsome young hooligan!141 pheidippides: More, more! Don't you know I love being
called bad names? strepsiades: You gaping arsehole!
•IDIPP1DES
: Sh
ower me with more o
.fib
strepsiades: I low dare you hit your father?
pi i El dip pi dps:
prove to you
that I
was pei
feet I y justified
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omg
so.
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streps 1 ades: justified! You utter villain, how could that possibly be?
pheid1pp1df.s: You argue your case, I'll argue mine, and I guarantee to prove it.
STEEPSIADES: Prove what you've just said?
pheidippides: Very easily. Now then, which of the two Arguments do you want?
strepsiades: Arguments? What Arguments?
pheidippides: You know   do you want Right or Wrong?
streps iades [bitterly]: 1 certainly have had you taught to argue against justice, if you're going to be able to argue convincingly that it's right and proper for a father to be beaten up by his son.
pheidippides: I fancy I will, though; when you've heard me, you won't have a word to utter against me.
strepsiades: I'll be very interested to hear what you'll have to say!
ch orus:
Consider carefully how you can win. The facts compel lis to believe The boy has something up his sleeve: ,3,0 Observe the shameless frame of mind he's in!
leader:
Now tell us how it came about that this big row took place -Why trouble, though, to ask you to? You will in any case! strepsiades: I'll explain, right from the start, how the quarrel began. You know we were having a big feast. Well, I asked him to take his lyre and sing a song by Simonidcs, ' I he Shearing of Mr Ram'.1'" And straight away he says, 'That's so antiquated, that is - playing the lyre and singing at a drinking party - what do you think we are, women grinding corn?'
pheidippides: exactly! 1 wonder i didn't clock you right then and there. Telling me to sing*. Who did you think you were entertaining, a treeful ol cicadas?
streps iades: That's exactly the way he went on at me - just the way he's talking now. 'And,' he added, 'Simonides was a
III E CI.Oll IIS
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rotten poet anyway.' Well, 1 could barely restrain myself -but I did. I asked him at least to lake a myrtle branch11' in his hand and recite me something from Aeschylus. That set him off again - 'Oh, yes, Aeschylus is a prince among poets - a prince of hot air and barbarous bombast, who creates words the size of mountains.' Well, by this time my heart was fairly thumping, you can imagine. Hut 1 bit my lip hard and said, 'AN right then, you give us something horn one of your sophisticated modern fellows, whoever they are.' So he launched straight into some speech by Kuripides, about how a brother - the gods preserve us - how a brother was screwing his sister - his jidl sister!Well, I just couldn't stand it any-longer. I pitched into him, calling him all sorts of foul names, and then - you know what happens - we were shouting at each other hammer and tongs. And in the end he jumps up and stairs giving me a pasting, hitting me, throttling me, pounding me to mincemeat. pheidippides: Ami you deserved it, Slagging off Kuripides! He's a genius!
strepsiades [sarcastically]: Oh, yes, a genius indeed, you -what can I call yon?-oh, forget it, I'll only get hit all over again.
pheidippides: Ami you'll deserve it again, by Zeus.
STREPSIADES: Deserve it? You impudent puppy, who was it brought you up from a baby, trying to understand from your infant babbling what it was that you wanted? If von said 'broo', I understood and gave you a drink. If you cried 'mamma'. Til letch you bread. Anil the moment you said 'kakka', I'd grab yon, take you outside anil hold you over the pit. Noi like what happened when you were throttling me just now. I was screaming and shouting that I needed a crap - and did you lake me outside, curse you? No, you just kept choking me until I did a kakka on the spol!
chorus:
Youth's all agog to hear his case, I ween.
For he's committed such a deed
I hat, should his coming plea succeed. An ok! man's hide will not be worth a bean!
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leader |/o Vheidipptdes]:
It's up to you. clistui her of old certainties, to light
Upon convincing arguments to show that you were right.
PHEIDIPPIDES: It's so delightful to he acquainted with the t-ioo wisdom of today, and to he a hie to despise convention. There was a time, you know, when my thoughts were of nothing hut horses, and in those days 1 couldn't say three words together that mack' sense. Hut now my father himself has enabled me to put all that behind me. Tin intimate with all the newest and subtlest ideas, principles and arguments, and 1405 Tin confident I can demonstrate that it is righl ami proper to chastise one's lather.
strepsiades: 1 just wish you'd go hack to your horses. I'd prefer it even if you kept lour of the damn things, rather than heat me to a pulp like v<nTve done now.
pheidippides: As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted - I will begin by asking you a question or two. When I was a child, did you heal me? i.,io   strepsiades: 1 did, because I cared for you and wanted to do you good.
pheidippides: So healing equals caring. In that case, why is it not also right and proper lor me to care lor you in i he same way, by healing yon? On whai principle can you claim to have the privilege ol immunity from physical assault, when I did not? I was born free, after all, just as you were. To put it hi5 poetically: 'The son gels thumped; do you think the lather shouldn't?'1'"' You will, no doubt, argue thai the custom is only for children to be beaten; but I would wish to point out that old age is proverbially a second childhood. And after all, one docs expect a higher standard of behaviour from the old than the young, so it's only proper thai when they do i.ill short they should be severely punished, mo strepsiades: But you won't find, anywhere, a law that allows this to he done to a fatherl pheidippides: So what? livery law inusi have been made at some time, and made by a human being like you or me, who used argument to persuade his contemporaries. Why should I he debarred from making another, new law lor the Inline,
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12.;
saying that sons may also beat (heir fathers? We won't seek reparations for all the times we were beaten before this law-came into force; we'll wipe them off the slate. Consider, again, the animal kingdom - cockerels, for example - where offspring fight their fathers. And what difference is there between them and us, except that they don't move resolutions in assemblies?
strepsiades: Well, if you're so keen on the life of a cockerel, 1430 why don't you go the whole way and cat manure and sleep on a perch?
pitei in ppides: It's not the same thing, silly. Not according to Socrates it isn't.
strepsiades: Well, in that case you'd better not hi i me, because
if you do, you'll live to regret it. pheidippides: Oh. why?
strepsiades: Because, just as I have the right to chastise you, so you will have the right to chastise your son, if you have 1435 one -
pheidippides: And what if I don't have one? Then I'll never
be able to get my own back for the heatings I got from you, 14^
and you'll he laughing all over your (.lead face!" And here's 1440
another point too for von to consider. strepsiades: No more, please - they'll be the death of me. pheidippides: Oh, I don't know. This experience you've had
may prove less bad for you than you think. strepsiades: Why, what good could this behaviour of yours
possibly do me? pheidippides: Easy. I'll heal up mum loo. strepsiades: What?!This is really too much! pheidippides: Suppose i prove to vou, with the help of my
trusty Wrongful Argument, that it's right and proper to beat i.H,
one's mother?
strepsiades: If you do, you're very welcome to throw yourself off the Acropolis.1'" And you can take Socrates and that 1410 precious Argument with you. | I'o the Chorus] (llouds, this is your fault. I put my whole fate in your hands, and this is what you've done to me.
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LEADER:
Nu, not out fault; you brought it on yourself -You turned"'" yourself to evil crookery.
streps ia des: But why didn't you tell me at the time? I'm an old man, and a countryman too; why did you have to lead me on?
leader:
We do the same to anyone that we Perceive to be in love with wickedness: We cast him into misery, so lie May learn that it is right to fear the göds.
streps i ad es: Ah, holy Clouds, that's harsh - but you're right: 1 shouldn't have tried to cheat my creditors out of their money. I To Vheidippides] My dear, dear son - come with me and 1465      let's murder thai villain Chaerephonl," and Socrates for the way they swindled both of us. i'll El u 11'l'i n i-s: No, 110! I couldn't harm my teachers! STREPS lades: Aye, aye! Revere the great Paternal Zeus! phe1dipimoes: Paternal Zeus indeed! 1 low out of date you 1470      are! Do you mean you think Zeus exists?
strkpsiades: lie docs.
p'heidippides: No, he doesn't, be doesn't! 'Vortex is king now; he's driven Zeus from power.'
streps 1a dps: No, he hasn't. I only believed that because of this image here1'1 \fiointing to a whirlpool-shaped cup standing On a pillar in (rant of the Thinkery], i low stupid could I be, to lake a piece of earthenware like you for a god! 1475 pheidippidks: If you want to yammer to yourself, you can do it on your own. [lie goes inside.]-
streps 1 ades: blow mad, how insane I was, to let Socrates persuade me to discard the gods! [Addressing the image of Hermes on a pillar in front of his house] Dear I lermes, don't MSo be cross with rue, don't destroy me. I lave pity on me, if a set of clever windbags made me take leave of my senses For a time. Give me some advice. Should I launch a prosecution
iii b c 1.0 u n s
against them,"' or what do you think? \He pauses for a reply - and fancies he can see the image moving its head to signify 'no'.] You're right. I shouldn't bother cooking up lawsuits -1 should go right away and set this school for slick talkers 011 ,48, (ire. [Hailing into his house] Xanthias, come here, and bring a ladder and a mattock with you! | /if/5 slave xanth 1as comes out. carrying the items requested.] Now gel up on the roof of that Thinkery and hack it down, if you love your master, until you've brought the whole house down on them! (xanthias climbs up the ladder and sets to work.] And someone bring i.,9o me a lighted torch. I'm going to make this lot pay for what they've done; it'll take more than big talk to save them this time!1-"
[Another slave gives him a torch. By now there is a large hole in the roof; many tiles must have fallen inside the building.] a student [within]: Help, help!
[xanthias comes down, passing the mattock to streps 1-ades, who, with the lord.' in his other hand, climbs up the ladder. ]
streps i ades: Do your job, torch; let's light things up!'" [He throws the lord) into the building, and a fire is soon blazing; meanwhile strepsiadfs hacks away at the rafters with the mattock. Several students rush out of the front door, and see him above them, ] .student: I ley, you, what are you doing there? ,49, strepsiadfs: Doing? Chopping logic with your rafters, of course.
I ci 1 a er f.pn o n appears at an upper window. He has a deathly pale face, with large eyes and the ears of a hat. ] cm a er e p f i o n : f lelp, who's set our bouse on lire? strepsiadfs:  Remember i lie last cloak  you stole? That's who.
chaerephon: You'll kill us, you'll kill us!
streps 1a des: "that's jusi what 1 waul to do - if my mattock iSoo doesn't fail me, and if I don't fall off and break my neck first.
sogrates [coming out as smoke billows through the door]: You there on (be roof, what are you doing?
130 i HE CLOUDS
strepsiades: t am walking upon air and attacking the mystery
of the sun.*1"5 socrates [coughing]: I lelp, I'm going to suffocate! 501;  chaerephon [sfill at his window, seemingly trapped]: Help, I'm going to he burnt alive! |//e climbs through the window and jumps - straight on to Socrates, ivho is knocked flat.] strepsiades [descending the ladder, while socrates and chaerephon disengage themselves from each other and scramble to their feet]: What did you expect, the way you wantonly insulted the gods ami scrutinized the hack side'5' ol the Moon? [To bis slaves, as socrates, < haerephon and the students lake to flight] Chase them, stone them, hit them, for all their crimes! Remember, they wronged i he gods! |si repsiades and the slaves pursue Socrates and Co., the slaves hurling some stones after them. When both pursued aiulpursuers have disappeared, the leader turns to her a tlleagues.j
leader:
510 Lead the way our: we've done, I think I'll say.
Sufficient choral service for today.
LYSISTRATA