Week 10

Aristophanes,  (born c. 450 bc—died c. 388 bc), the greatest representative of ancient Greek comedy and the one whose works have been preserved in greatest quantity. He is the only extant representative of the Old Comedy—that is, of the phase of comic dramaturgy (c. 5th century bc) in which chorus, mime, and burlesque still played a considerable part and which was characterized by bold fantasy, merciless invective and outrageous satire, unabashedly licentious humour, and a marked freedom of political criticism. But Aristophanes belongs to the end of this phase, and, indeed, his last extant play, which has no choric element at all, may well be regarded as the only extant specimen of the short-lived Middle Comedy, which, before the end of the 4th century bc, was to be superseded in turn by the milder and more-realistic social satire of the New Comedy.

Life and career

Little is known about the life of Aristophanes, and most of the known facts are derived from references in his own plays. He was an Athenian citizen belonging to the clan named Pandionis, but his actual birthplace is uncertain. (The fact that he or his father, Philippus, owned property on the island of Aegina may have been the cause of an accusation by his fellow citizens that he was not of Athenian birth.) He began his dramatic career in 427 bc with a play, the Daitaleis (The Banqueters), which appears, from surviving fragments, to have been a satire on his contemporaries’ educational and moral theories. He is thought to have written about 40 plays in all. A large part of his work is concerned with the social, literary, and philosophical life of Athens itself and with themes provoked by the Peloponnesian War(431–404 bc). That war was essentially a conflict between imperialist Athens and conservative Sparta and so was long the dominant issue in Athenian politics. Aristophanes was an opponent of the more or less bellicose statesmen who controlled the government of Athens throughout the better part of his maturity, and he lived to see the revival of Athens after its defeat by Sparta.

Dramatic and literary achievements

Aristophanes’ reputation has stood the test of time; his plays are still frequently published and produced in numerous translations, which manage with varying degrees of success to convey the flavour of Aristophanes’ puns, witticisms, and topical allusions. But it is not easy to say why his comedies still appeal to an audience more than two millennia after they were written. In the matter of plot construction, Aristophanes’ comedies are often loosely put together, are full of strangely inconsequential episodes, and often degenerate at their end into a series of disconnected and boisterous episodes. Aristophanes’ greatness lies in the wittiness of his dialogue; in his generally good-humoured though occasionally malevolent satire; in the brilliance of his parody, especially when he mocks the controversial tragedian Euripides; in the ingenuity and inventiveness, not to say the laughable absurdity, of his comic scenes born of imaginative fantasy; in the peculiar charm of his choric songs, whose freshness can still be conveyed in languages other than Greek; and in the licentious frankness of many scenes and allusions in his comedies.

The plays

Babylonians

This comedy, which is extant only in fragments, was produced at the festival of the Great Dionysia. The festival was attended by delegates of the city-states, which were theoretically “allies” but were in practice satellites of Athens. Because Babylonians (426 bc; Greek Babylōnioi) not only virulently attacked Cleon, the demagogue then in power in Athens, but also showed the “allies” as the slaves of the Athenian Demos (a personification of the Athenian citizen electorate), Aristophanes was impeached by Cleon. Though the details are not known, he seems to have been let off lightly.

Acharnians

This is the earliest of the 11 comedies of Aristophanes that have survived intact. Acharnians (425 bc; Greek Acharneis) is a forthright attack on the folly of the war. Its farmer-hero, Dicaeopolis, is tired of the Peloponnesian War and therefore secures a private peace treaty with the Spartans for himself in spite of the violent opposition of a chorus of embittered and bellicose old charcoal burners of Acharnae. Dicaeopolis takes advantage of his private treaty to trade with the allies of the Spartans. The Athenian commander Lamachus tries to stop him, but by the end of the play Lamachus slumps wounded and dejected while Dicaeopolis enjoys a peacetime life of food and wine.

Knights

This play shows how little Aristophanes was affected by the prosecution he had incurred forBabylonians. Knights (424 bc; Greek Hippeis) consists of a violent attack on the same demagogue, Cleon, who is depicted as the favourite slave of the stupid and irascible Demos until he is, at last, ousted from his position of influence and authority by Agoracritus, a sausage seller who is even more scoundrelly and impudent than Cleon.

Clouds

This play is an attack on “modern” education and morals as imparted and taught by the radical intellectuals known as the Sophists. The main victim of Clouds (423 bc; Greek Nephelai) is the leading Athenian thinker and teacher Socrates, who is purposely (and unfairly) given many of the standard characteristics of the Sophists. In the play Socrates is consulted by an old rogue, Strepsiades (“Twisterson”), who wants to evade his debts. The instruction at Socrates’ academy, the Phrontisterion (“Thinking Shop”), which consists of making a wrong argument sound right, enables Strepsiades’ son to defend the beating of his own father. At the play’s end the Phrontisterion is burned to the ground.

Wasps

This comedy satirized the litigiousness of the Athenians in the person of the mean and waspish old man Philocleon (“Love-Cleon”), who has a passion for serving on juries. In Wasps (422 bc; Greek Sphēkes) Philocleon’s son, Bdelycleon (“Loathe-Cleon”), arranges for his father to hold a “court” at home, but, since the first “case” to be heard is that of the house dog accused of the theft of a cheese, Philocleon is finally cured of his passion for the law courts and instead becomes a boastful and uproarious drunkard. The play’s main political target is the exploitation by Cleon of the Athenian system of large subsidized juries.

Peace

This play was staged seven months or so after both Cleon and Brasidas—the two main champions of the war policy on the Athenian and Spartan sides, respectively—had been killed in battle and, indeed, only a few weeks before the ratification of the Peace of Nicias (March 421 bc), which suspended hostilities between Athens and Sparta for six uneasy years. In Peace (421 bc; Greek Eirēnē) the war-weary farmer Trygaeus (“Vintager”) flies to heaven on a monstrous dung beetle to find the lost goddess Peace, only to discover that the God of War has buried Peace in a pit. With the help of a chorus of farmers, Trygaeus rescues her, and the play ends with a joyful celebration of marriage and fertility.

Birds

This play can be regarded merely as a “comedy of fantasy,” but some scholars see Birds (414 bc; Greek Ornithes) as a political satire on the imperialistic dreams that had led the Athenians to undertake their ill-fated expedition of 415 bc to conquer Syracuse in Sicily. Peisthetaerus (“Trusty”) is so disgusted with his city’s bureaucracy that he persuades the birds to join him in building a new city that will be suspended in between heaven and earth; it is named Nephelokokkygia, translatable as “Cloud-cuckoo-land.” The city is built, and Peisthetaerus and his bird comrades must then fend off the undesirable humans who want to join them in their new utopia. He and the birds finally even starve the Olympian gods into cooperating with them. Birds is Aristophanes’ most fantastical play, but its escapist mood possibly echoes the dramatist’s sense of Athens’ impending decline.

Women at the Thesmophoria

In Women at the Thesmophoria (411 bc; Greek Thesmophoriazousai) Euripides has discovered that the women of Athens, angered by his constant attacks upon them in his tragedies, mean to discuss during their coming festival (the Thesmophoria) the question of contriving his death. Euripides tries to persuade the effeminate Agathon, a tragic poet, to plead his cause. Agathon refuses, and Euripides persuades his brother-in-law Mnesilochus to undertake the assignment. Mnesilochus is disguised with great thoroughness as a woman and sent on his mission, but his true gender is discovered and he is at once seized by the women. There follow three scenes in which he tries unsuccessfully to escape; all three involve brilliant parodies of Euripides’ tragedies, and all three attempts fail. Finally, Euripides himself arrives and succeeds in rescuing his advocate by promising never again to revile women.

Frogs

This is a literary comedy. In Frogs (405 bc; Greek Batrachoi) Dionysus, the god of drama, is concerned about the poor quality of present-day tragedy in Athens now that his recent favourite, Euripides, is dead. Dionysus disguises himself as the hero Heracles and goes down to Hades to bring Euripides back to the land of the living. However, as a result of a competition arranged between Euripides and his great predecessor, Aeschylus, Dionysus is won over to the latter’s cause and returns to earth with Aeschylus instead, as the one more likely to help Athens in its troubles.

Women at the Ecclesia

In Women at the Ecclesia (c. 392 bc; Greek Ekklēsiazousai) the women of Athens dress as men, take over the Ecclesia (the Athenian democratic assembly), and introduce a communistic system of wealth and property.

Wealth

The last of Aristophanes’ plays to be performed in his lifetime, Wealth (388 bc; Greek Ploutos; also called “the second Wealth” to distinguish it from an earlier play, now lost, of the same title) is a somewhat moralizing work. It may have inaugurated the Middle Comedy.

Shortly after producing Wealth, Aristophanes died, leaving two plays (which have not survived), theAiolosikon and the Kokolos, which his son staged (c. 387 bc); both of them are generally assumed to have been mythological burlesques.

Week 10

SOCRATES

Socrates was born circa 470 BC, in Athens, Greece. We know of his life through the writings of his students, including Plato and Xenophon. His "Socratic method," laid the groundwork for Western systems of logic and philosophy. When the political climate of Greece turned, Socrates was sentenced to death by hemlock poisoning in 399 BC. He accepted this judgment rather than fleeing into exile.

Early Years

Born circa 470 BC in Athens, Greece, Socrates's life is chronicled through only a few sources—the dialogues of Plato and Xenophon and the plays of Aristophanes. Because these writings had other purposes than reporting his life, it is likely none present a completely accurate picture. However, collectively, they provide a unique and vivid portrayal of Socrates's philosophy and personality.

Socrates was the son of Sophroniscus, an Athenian stone mason and sculptor, and Phaenarete, a midwife. Because he wasn't from a noble family, he probably received a basic Greek education and learned his father's craft at a young age. It is believed Socrates worked as mason for many years before he devoted his life to philosophy. Contemporaries differ in their account of how Socrates supported himself as a philosopher. Both Xenophon and Aristophanes state Socrates received payment for teaching, while Plato writes Socrates explicitly denied accepting payment, citing his poverty as proof.

Socrates married Xanthippe, a younger woman, who bore him three sons—Lamprocles, Sophroniscus and Menexenus. There is little known about her except for Xenophon's characterization of Xanthippe as "undesirable." He writes she was not happy with Socrates's second profession and complained that he wasn’t supporting family as a philosopher. By his own words, Socrates had little to do with his sons' upbringing and expressed far more interest in the intellectual development of Athens' young boys.

Athenian law required all able bodied males serve as citizen soldiers, on call for duty from ages 18 until 60. According to Plato, Socrates served in the armored infantry—known as the hoplite—with shield, long spear and face mask. He participated in three military campaigns during the Peloponnesian War, at Delium, Amphipolis, and Potidaea, where he saved the life of Alcibiades, a popular Athenian general. Socrates was known for his courage in battle and fearlessness, a trait that stayed with him throughout his life. After his trial, he compared his refusal to retreat from his legal troubles to a soldier's refusal to retreat from battle when threatened with death.

Plato's Symposium provides the best details of Socrates's physical appearance. He was not the ideal of Athenian masculinity. Short and stocky, with a snub nose and bulging eyes, Socrates always seemed to appear to be staring. However, Plato pointed out that in the eyes of his students, Socrates possessed a different kind of attractiveness, not based on a physical ideal but on his brilliant debates and penetrating thought. Socrates always emphasized the importance of the mind over the relative unimportance of the human body. This credo inspired Plato’s philosophy of dividing reality into two separate realms, the world of the senses and the world of ideas, declaring that the latter was the only important one.

Philosopher

Socrates believed that philosophy should achieve practical results for the greater well-being of society. He attempted to establish an ethical system based on human reason rather than theological doctrine. He pointed out that human choice was motivated by the desire for happiness. Ultimate wisdom comes from knowing oneself. The more a person knows, the greater his or her ability to reason and make choices that will bring true happiness. Socrates believed that this translated into politics with the best form of government being neither a tyranny nor a democracy. Instead, government worked best when ruled by individuals who had the greatest ability, knowledge, and virtue and possessed a complete understanding of themselves.

For Socrates, Athens was a classroom and he went about asking questions of the elite and common man alike, seeking to arrive at political and ethical truths. Socrates didn’t lecture about what he knew. In fact, he claimed to be ignorant because he had no ideas, but wise because he recognized his own ignorance. He asked questions of his fellow Athenians in a dialectic method (the Socratic Method) which compelled the audience to think through a problem to a logical conclusion. Sometimes the answer seemed so obvious, it made Socrates's opponents look foolish. For this, he was admired by some and vilified by others.

During Socrates's life, Athens was going through a dramatic transition from hegemony in the classical world to its decline after a humiliating defeat by Sparta in the Peloponnesian War. Athenians entered a period of instability and doubt about their identity and place in the world. As a result, they clung to past glories, notions of wealth, and a fixation with physical beauty. Socrates attacked these values with his insistent emphasis on the greater importance of the mind. While many Athenians admired Socrates's challenges to Greek conventional wisdom and the humorous way he went about it, an equal number grew angry and felt he threatened their way of life and uncertain future.

Execution

The jury was not swayed by Socrates's defense and convicted him by a vote of 280 to 221. Possibly the defiant tone of his defense contributed to the verdict and he made things worse during the deliberation over his punishment. Athenian law allowed a convicted citizen to propose an alternative punishment to the one called for by the prosecution and the jury would decide. Instead of proposing he be exiled, Socrates suggested he be honored by the city for his contribution to their enlightenment and be paid for his services. The jury was not amused and sentenced him to death by drinking a mixture of poison hemlock.

Before Socrates's execution, friends offered to bribe the guards and rescue him so he could flee into exile. He declined, stating he wasn't afraid of death, felt he would be no better off if in exile and said he was still a loyal citizen of Athens, willing to abide by its laws, even the ones that condemned him to death. Plato described Socrates's execution in his Phaedo dialogue: Socrates drank the hemlock mixture without hesitation. Numbness slowly crept into his body until it reached his heart. Shortly before his final breath, Socrates described his death as a release of the soul from the body.

Week 10

Socrates and Aristophanes

Aristophanes, “The Clouds”

[Strepsiades notices Socrates descending from above in a basket suspended from a rope]
        Hey, who’s the man in the basket—up there?
STUDENT: The man himself.
STREPSIADES:                   Who’s that?
STUDENT:                                             Socrates.
STREPSIADES: Socrates! Hey, call out to him for me—                                          [220]
        make it loud.
STUDENT:                 You’ll have to call to him yourself.
        I’m too busy now.
[The Student exits into the interior of the house]
STREPSIADES:                       Oh, Socrates . . .
        my dear little Socrates . . . hello . . .
SOCRATES: Why call on me, you creature of a day?
STREPSIADES: Well, first of all, tell me what you’re doing.                         270
SOCRATES: I tread the air, as I contemplate the sun.
STREPSIADES: You’re looking down upon the gods up there,
        in that basket? Why not do it from the ground,
        if that’s what you’re doing?
SOCRATES:                                         Impossible!
        I’d never come up with a single thing
        about celestial phenomena,
        if I did not suspend my mind up high,
        to mix my subtle thoughts with what’s like them—                                        [230]
        the air. If I turned my mind to lofty things,
        but stayed there on the ground, I’d never make                                      280
        the least discovery. For the earth, you see,
        draws moist thoughts down by force into itself—
        the same process takes place with water cress.
STREPSIADES: What are you talking about? Does the mind
        draw moisture into water cress? Come down,
        my dear little Socrates, down here to me,
        so you can teach me what I’ve come to learn.
[Socrates’ basket slowly descends]
SOCRATES: Why have you come?
STREPSIADES:                         I want to learn to argue.
        I’m being pillaged—ruined by interest                                                             [240]
        and by creditors I can’t pay off—                                                               290
        they’re slapping liens on all my property.
SOCRATES: How come you got in such a pile of debt
        without your knowledge?
STREPSIADES:                                 I’ve been ravaged
        by disease—I’m horse sick. It’s draining me
        in the most dreadful way. But please teach me
        one of your two styles of arguing, the one
        which never has to discharge any debt.
        Whatever payment you want me to make,
        I promise you I’ll pay—by all the gods.
SOCRATES: What gods do you intend to swear by?                                      300
        To start with, the gods hold no currency with us.
STREPSIADES: Then, what currency do you use to swear?
        Is it iron coin, like in Byzantium?
SOCRATES: Do you want to know the truth of things divine,                              [250]
        the way they really are?
STREPSIADES:                              Yes, by god, I do,
        if that’s possible.
SOCRATES:                          And to commune and talk
        with our own deities the Clouds?
STREPSIADES:                                    Yes, I do.
SOCRATES: Then sit down on the sacred couch.
STREPSIADES:                                                     All right.
        I’m sitting down.
SOCRATES:                 Take this wreath.
STREPSIADES:                                     Why a wreath?
        Oh dear, Socrates, don’t offer me up                                                         310
        in sacrifice, like Athamas.*
SOCRATES:                                                 No, no.
        We go through all this for everyone—
        it’s their initiation.
STREPSIADES:                 What do I get?
SOCRATES: You’ll learn to be a clever talker,                                                         [260]
        to rattle off a speech, to strain your words
        like flour. Just keep still.
[Socrates sprinkles flour all over Strepsiades]
STREPSIADES:                                 By god, that’s no lie!
        I’ll turn into flour if you keep sprinkling me.
SOCRATES: Old man, be quiet. Listen to the prayer.
[Socrates shuts his eyes to recite his prayer]
        O Sovereign Lord, O Boundless Air,
        who keeps the earth suspended here in space,                                       320
        O Bright Sky, O Sacred Goddesses—
        the Thunder-bearing Clouds—arise,
        you holy ladies, issue forth on high,
        before the man who holds you in his mind.
STREPSIADES: [lifting his cloak to cover his head]
        Not yet, not yet. Not ‘til I wrap this cloak
        like this so I don’t get soaked. What bad luck,
        to leave my home without a cap on.
SOCRATES: [ignoring Strepsiades]
        Come now, you highly honored Clouds, come—
        manifest yourselves to this man here—
        whether you now sit atop Olympus,                                                         330     [270]
        on those sacred snow-bound mountain peaks,
        or form the holy choruses with nymphs
        in gardens of their father Ocean,
        or gather up the waters of the Nile
        in golden flagons at the river’s mouths,
        or dwell beside the marsh of Maeotis
        or snowy rocks of Mimas—hear my call,
        accept my sacrifice, and then rejoice
        in this holy offering I make.
CHORUS [heard offstage]
            Everlasting Clouds—                                                                               340
            let us arise, let us reveal
            our moist and natural radiance—
            moving from the roaring deep
            of father Ocean to the tops
            of tree-lined mountain peaks,                                                                         [280]
            where we see from far away
            the lofty heights, the sacred earth,
            whose fruits we feed with water,
            the murmuring of sacred rivers,
            the roaring of the deep-resounding sea.                                               350
            For the unwearied eye of heaven
            blazes forth its glittering beams.
            Shake off this misty shapelessness
            from our immortal form and gaze upon
            the earth with our far-reaching eyes.                                                             [290]
SOCRATES: Oh you magnificent and holy Clouds,
        you’ve clearly heard my call.
[To Strepsiades]
                                                             Did you hear that voice
        intermingled with the awesome growl of thunder?
STREPSIADES: Oh you most honored sacred goddesses,
        in answer to your thunder my stomach seems to growl—                                      360
        it’s made me so afraid—if that’s all right . . .
[Strepsiades holds his stomach in pain]
        Oh, oh, whether right nor not, I need to eat something!
SOCRATES: Stop being so idiotic, acting like
        a stupid comedian. Keep quiet.
        A great host of deities is coming here—
        they’re going to sing.
CHORUS: [still offstage]
            Oh you maidens bringing rain—
            let’s move on to that brilliant place,                                                               [300]
            to gaze upon the land of Pallas,
            where such noble men inhabit                                                               370
            Cecrops’ lovely native home,*
            where they hold those sacred rites
            no one may speak about,
            where the temple of the mysteries
            is opened up in holy festivals,*
            with gifts for deities in heaven,
            what lofty temples, holy statues,
            most sacred supplication to the gods,
            with garlands for each holy sacrifice,
            and festivals of every kind                                                                      380     [310]
            in every season of the year,
            including, when the spring arrives,
            that joyful Dionysian time,
            with rousing choruses of song,
            resounding music of the pipes.
STREPSIADES: By god, Socrates, tell me, I beg you,
        who these women are who sing so solemnly.
        Are they some special kind of heroines?
SOCRATES: No—they’re heavenly Clouds, great goddesses
        for lazy men—from them we get our thoughts,                                       390
        our powers of speech, our comprehension,
        our gift for fantasy and endless talk,
        our power to strike responsive chords in speech
        and then rebut opponents’ arguments.
STREPSIADES: Ah, that must be why, as I heard their voice,
        my soul took wing, and now I’m really keen
        to babble on of trivialities,
        to argue smoke and mirrors, to deflate                                                             [320]
        opinions with a small opinion of my own,
        to answer someone’s reasoned argument                                              
        with my own counter-argument. So now,
        I’d love to see them here in front of me,
        if that’s possible.
SOCRATES:                             Just look over there—
        towards Mount Parnes. I see them coming,
        slowly moving over here.*
STREPSIADES:                                     Where? Point them out.
SOCRATES: They’re coming down here through the valleys—
        a whole crowd of them—there in the thickets,
        right beside you.
STREPSIADES:               This is weird. I don’t see them.
SOCRATES: [pointing into the wings of the theatre]
        There—in the entrance way.
STREPSIADES:                                 Ah, now I see—
        but I can barely make them out.

[The Clouds enter from the wings]
SOCRATES:                                                             There—                                410
        surely you can see them now, unless your eyes
        are swollen up like pumpkins.
STREPSIADES:                                        I see them.
        My, what worthy noble presences!
        They’re taking over the entire space.
SOCRATES: You weren’t aware that they are goddesses?
        You had no faith in them?
STREPSIADES:                                         I’d no idea.
        I thought clouds were mist and dew and vapor.                                           [330]
SOCRATES: You didn’t realize these goddesses
        support a multitude of charlatans—
        prophetic seers from Thurium, quacks                                                     420
        who specialize in books on medicine,
        lazy long-haired types with onyx signet rings,
        poets who produce the twisted choral music
        for dithyrambic songs, those with airy minds—
        all such men so active doing nothing
        the Clouds support, since in their poetry
        these people celebrate the Clouds.
STREPSIADES: Ah ha, so that’s why they poeticize
        ”the whirling radiance of watery clouds
        as they advance so ominously,”                                                                 430
        ”waving hairs of hundred-headed Typho,”*
        with “roaring tempests,” and then “liquid breeze,”
        or ”crook-taloned, sky-floating birds of prey,”
        ”showers of rain from dewy clouds”—and then,
        as a reward for this, they stuff themselves
        on slices carved from some huge tasty fish
        or from a thrush.*
SOCRATES:                     Yes, thanks to these Clouds.                                             [340]
        Is that not truly just?
STREPSIADES:                         All right, tell me this—
        if they’re really clouds, what’s happened to them?
        They look just like mortal human women.                                              440
        The clouds up there are not the least like that.
SOCRATES: What are they like?
STREPSIADES:                                 I don’t know exactly.
        They look like wool once it’s been pulled apart—
        not like women, by god, not in the least.
        These ones here have noses.
SOCRATES:                             Let me ask you something.
        Will you answer me?
STREPSIADES:             Ask me what you want.
        Fire away.
SOCRATES:         Have you ever gazed up there
        and seen a cloud shaped like a centaur,
        or a leopard, wolf, or bull?
STREPSIADES:                                         Yes, I have.
        So what?
SOCRATES:             They become anything they want.                                
        So if they see some hairy savage type,
        one of those really wild and wooly men,
        like Xenophantes’ son, they mock his moods,
        transforming their appearance into centaurs.*                                                 [350]
STREPSIADES: What if they glimpse a thief of public funds,
        like Simon? What do they do then?*
SOCRATES:                                             They expose
        just what he’s truly like—they change at once,
        transform themselves to wolves.
STREPSIADES:                                                 Ah ha, I see.
        So that’s why yesterday they changed to deer.
        They must have caught sight of Cleonymos—                                        460
        the man who threw away his battle shield—
        they knew he was fearful coward.*
SOCRATES: And now it’s clear they’ve seen Cleisthenes—
        that’s why, as you can see, they’ve changed to women.*
STREPSIADES: [to the Chorus of Clouds]
        All hail to you, lady goddesses.
        And now, if you have ever spoken out
        to other men, let me hear your voice,
        you queenly powers.
CHORUS LEADER: Greetings to you, old man born long ago,
        hunter in love with arts of argument—                                                    470
        you, too, high priest of subtlest nonsense,
        tell us what you want. Of all the experts                                                           [360]
        in celestial matters at the present time,
        we take note of no one else but you—
        and Prodicus*—because he’s sharp and wise,
        while you go swaggering along the street,
        in bare feet, shifting both eyes back and forth.
        You keep moving on through many troubles,
        looking proud of your relationship with us.
STREPSIADES: By the Earth, what voices these Clouds have—                  480
        so holy, reverent, and marvelous!
SOCRATES: Well, they’re the only deities we have—
        the rest are just so much hocus pocus.
STREPSIADES: Hang on—by the Earth, isn’t Zeus a god,
        the one up there on Mount Olympus?
SOCRATES: What sort of god is Zeus? Why spout such rubbish?
        There’s no such being as Zeus.
STREPSIADES:                         What do you mean?
        Then who brings on the rain? First answer that.
SOCRATES: Why, these women do. I’ll prove that to you
        with persuasive evidence. Just tell me—                                                  490     [370]
        where have you ever seen the rain come down
        without the Clouds being there? If Zeus brings rain,
        then he should do so when the sky is clear,
        when there are no Clouds in view.
STREPSIADES: By Apollo, you’ve made a good point there—
        it helps your argument. I used to think
        rain was just  Zeus spitting from the sky
        Tell me who causes thunder? That scares me.

SOCRATES: These Clouds do, as they roll around.
STREPSIADES:                                                         But how?
        Explain that, you who dares to know it all.                                              500
SOCRATES: When they are filled with water to the brim
        and then, suspended there with all that rain,
        are forced to move, they bump into each other.
        They’re so big, they burst with a great boom.
STREPSIADES: But what’s forcing them to move at all?
        Doesn’t Zeus do that?
SOCRATES:                             No—that’s the aerial Vortex.*
STREPSIADES: Vortex? Well, that’s something I didn’t know.                             [380]
        So Zeus is now no more, and Vortex rules
        instead of him. But you still have not explained
        a thing about those claps of thunder.                                                              510
SOCRATES: Weren’t you listening to me? I tell you,
        when the Clouds are full of water and collide,
        they’re so thickly packed they make a noise.
STREPSIADES: Come on now—who’d ever believe that stuff?
SOCRATES: I’ll explain, using you as a test case.
        Have you ever gorged yourself on stew
        at the Panathenaea and later
        had an upset stomach—then suddenly
        some violent movement made it rumble?*
STREPSIADES: Yes, by Apollo! It does weird things—                                 520
        I feel unsettled. That small bit of stew
        rumbles around and makes strange noises,
        just like thunder. At first it’s quite quiet—                                                       [390]
        ”pappax pappax”—then it starts getting louder—
        ”papapappax”—and then
        it really thunders “papapappax”—
        just like these Clouds.
SOCRATES:                                             So think about it—
        if your small gut can make a sound like that,
        why can’t the air, which goes on forever,
        produce tremendous thunder. Then there’s this—                                 530
        consider how alike these phrases sound,
        ”thunder” and “hunger”
STREPSIADES: All right, but then explain this to me—
        Where does lightning come from, that fiery blaze,
        which, when it hits, sometimes burns us up,
        sometimes just singes us and lets us live?
        Clearly Zeus is hurling that at perjurers.
SOCRATES: You stupid driveling idiot, you stink
        of olden times, the age of Cronos!* If Zeus
        is really striking at the perjurers,                                                            
        how come he’s not burned Simon down to ash,
        or else Cleonymos or Theorus?
        They perjure themselves more than anyone.                                                   [400]
        No. Instead he strikes at his own temple
        at Sunium, our Athenian headland,
        and at his massive oak trees there. Why?
        What’s his plan? Oak trees can’t be perjured.
STREPSIADES: I don’t know. But that argument of yours
        seems good. All right, then, what’s a lightning bolt?
SOCRATES: When a dry wind blows up into the Clouds                             550
        and gets caught in there, it makes them inflate,
        like the inside of a bladder. And then
        it has to burst them all apart and vent,
        rushing out with violence brought on
        by dense compression—its force and friction
        cause it to consume itself in fire.
STREPSIADES: By god, I went through that very thing myself—
        at the feast for Zeus. I was cooking food,
        a pig’s belly, for my family. I forgot
        to slit it open. It began to swell—                                                                  [410]
        then suddenly blew up, splattering blood
        in both my eyes and burning my whole face.
CHORUS LEADER: Oh you who seeks from us great wisdom,
        how happy you will be among Athenians,
        among the Greeks, if you have memory,
        if you can think, if in that soul of yours
        you’ve got the power to persevere,
        and don't get tired standing still or walking,
        nor suffer too much from the freezing cold,
        with no desire for breakfast, if you abstain                                              570
        from wine, from exercise, and other foolishness,
        if you believe, as all clever people should,
        the highest good is victory in action,
        in deliberation and in verbal wars.
STREPSIADES: Well, as for a stubborn soul and a mind                                       [420]
        thinking in a restless bed, while my stomach,
        lean and mean, feeds on bitter herbs, don’t worry.
        I’m confident about all that—I’m ready
        to be hammered on your anvil into shape.
SOCRATES: So now you won’t acknowledge any gods                                580
        except the ones we do—Chaos, the Clouds,
        the Tongue—just these three?
STREPSIADES:                                         Absolutely—
        I’d refuse to talk to any other gods,
        if I ran into them—and I decline
        to sacrifice or pour libations to them.
        I’ll not provide them any incense.
CHORUS LEADER: Tell us then what we can do for you.
        Be brave—for if you treat us with respect,
        if you admire us, and if you’re keen
        to be a clever man, you won’t go wrong.                                                  590
STREPSIADES: Oh you sovereign queens,
        from you I ask one really tiny favour—
        to be the finest speaker in all Greece,                                                                [430]
        within a hundred miles.
CHORUS LEADER:                 You’ll get that from us.
        From now on, in time to come, no one will win
        more votes among the populace than you.

STREPSIADES: No speaking on important votes for me!
        That’s not what I’m after. No, no. I want
        to twist all legal verdicts in my favour,
        to evade my creditors.
CHORUS LEADER:                 You’ll get that,                                                   600
        just what you desire. For what you want
        is nothing special. So be confident—
        give yourself over to our agents here.
STREPSIADES: I’ll do that—I’ll place my trust in you.
        Necessity is weighing me down—the horses,
        those thoroughbreds, my marriage—all that
        has worn me out. So now, this body of mine                                                    [440]
        I’ll give to them, with no strings attached,
        to do with as they like—to suffer blows,
        go without food and drink, live like a pig,                                               610
        to freeze or have my skin flayed for a pouch—
        if I can just get out of all my debt
        and make men think of me as bold and glib,
        as fearless, impudent, detestable,
        one who cobbles lies together, makes up words,
        a practiced legal rogue, a statute book,
        a chattering fox, sly and needle sharp,
        a slippery fraud, a sticky rascal,
        foul whipping boy or twisted villain,                                                           [450]
        troublemaker, or idly prattling fool.                                                         620
        If they can make those who run into me
        call me these names, they can do what they want—
        no questions asked. If, by Demeter, they’re keen,
        they can convert me into sausages
        and serve me up to men who think deep thoughts.
CHORUS: Here’s a man whose mind’s now smart,
            no holding back—prepared to start
            When you have learned all this from me                                                      [460]
            you know your glory will arise
            among all men to heaven’s skies.                                                           630
STREPSIADES: What must I undergo?
CHORUS: For all time, you’ll live with me
            a life most people truly envy.
STREPSIADES: You mean I’ll really see that one day?
CHORUS: Hordes will sit outside your door
            wanting your advice and more—                                                                   [470]
            to talk, to place their trust in you
            for their affairs and lawsuits, too,
            things which merit your great mind.
            They’ll leave you lots of cash behind.                                                
CHORUS LEADER: [to Socrates]
        So get started with this old man’s lessons,
        what you intend to teach him first of all—
        rouse his mind, test his intellectual powers.
SOCRATES: Come on then, tell me the sort of man you are—
        once I know that, I can bring to bear on you
        my latest batteries with full effect.                                                                     [480]
STREPSIADES: What’s that? By god, are you assaulting me?
SOCRATES: No—I want to learn some things from you.
        What about your memory?
STREPSIADES:                                                    To tell the truth
        it works two ways. If someone owes me something,                              650
        I remember really well. But if it’s poor me
        that owes the money, I forget a lot.
SOCRATES: Do you have any natural gift for speech?
STREPSIADES: Not for speaking—only for evading debt.
SOCRATES: So how will you be capable of learning?
STREPSIADES: Easily—that shouldn’t be your worry.
SOCRATES: All right. When I throw out something wise
        about celestial matters, you make sure
        you snatch it right away.                                                                                     [490]
STREPSIADES:                                 What’s that about?
        Am I to eat up wisdom like a dog?                                                            660
SOCRATES: [aside] This man’s an ignorant barbarian!
        Old man, I fear you may need a beating.
        [to Strepsiades] Now, what do you do if someone hits you?
STREPSIADES: If I get hit, I wait around a while,
        then find witnesses, hang around some more,
        then go to court.
SOCRATES:                         All right, take off your cloak.
STREPSIADES: Have I done something wrong?

SOCRATES:                                                     No. It’s our custom
        to go inside without a cloak.
STREPSIADES:                                                 But I don’t want
        to search your house for stolen stuff.*
SOCRATES: What are you going on about? Take it off.                              
STREPSIADES: [removing his cloak and his shoes]
        So tell me this—if I pay attention                                                                       [500]
        and put some effort into learning,
        which of your students will I look like?
SOCRATES: In appearance there’ll be no difference
        between yourself and Chaerephon.
STREPSIADES:                                     Oh, that’s bad.
        You mean I’ll be only half alive?
SOCRATES: Don’t talk such rubbish! Get a move on
        and follow me inside. Hurry up!
STREPSIADES: First, put a honey cake here in my hands.                            680
        I’m scared of going down in there. It’s like
        going in Trophonios’ cave.*
SOCRATES:                                                 Go inside.
        Why keep hanging round this doorway?
[Socrates picks up Strepsiades’ cloak and shoes. Then Strepsiades and Socrates exit into the interior of the Thinkery]



                                                         Plato’s Symposium
Aristophanes professed to open another vein of discourse; he had a mind to praise Love in another way, unlike that of either Pausanias or Eryximachus. Mankind, he said, judging by their neglect of him, have never, as I think, at all understood the power of Love. For if they had understood him they would surely have built noble temples and altars, and offered solemn sacrifices in his honor; but this is not done, and most certainly ought to be done: since of all the gods he is the best friend of men, the helper and the healer of the ills which are the great impediment to the happiness of the race. I will try to describe his power to you, and you shall teach the rest of the world what I am teaching you.
In the first place, let me treat of the nature of man and what has happened to it. The original human nature was not like the present, but different. The genders were not two as they are now, but originally three in number; there was man, woman, and the union of the two, of which the name survives but nothing else. Once it was a distinct kind, with a bodily shape and a name of its own, constituted by the union of the male and the female: but now only the word 'androgynous' is preserved, and that as a term of reproach.
In the second place, the primeval man was round, his back and sides forming a circle; and he had four hands and the same number of feet, one head with two faces, looking opposite ways, set on a round neck and precisely alike; also four ears, two privy members, and the remainder to correspond. He could walk upright as men now do, backwards or forwards as he pleased, and he could also roll over and over at a great pace, turning on his four hands and four feet, eight in all, like tumblers going over and over with their legs in the air; this was when he wanted to run fast.
Now the genders were three, and such as I have described them; because the sun, moon, and earth are three; and the man was originally the child of the sun, the woman of the earth, and the man-woman of the moon, which is made up of sun and earth, and they were all round and moved round and round because they resembled their parents. Terrible was their might and strength, and the thoughts of their hearts were great, and they made an attack upon the gods; of them is told the tale of Otys and Ephialtes who, as Homer says, attempted to scale heaven, and would have laid hands upon the gods.
Doubt reigned in the celestial councils. Should they kill them and annihilate the race with thunderbolts, as they had done the giants, then there would be an end of the sacrifices and worship which men offered to them; but, on the other hand, the gods could not suffer their insolence to be unrestrained. At last, after a good deal of reflection, Zeus discovered a way.
He said: 'Methinks I have a plan which will enfeeble their strength and so extinguish their turbulence; men shall continue to exist, but I will cut them in two and then they will be diminished in strength and increased in numbers; this will have the advantage of making them more profitable to us. They shall walk upright on two legs, and if they continue insolent and will not be quiet, I will split them again and they shall hop about on a single leg.'
He spoke and cut men in two, like an apple which is halved for pickling, or as you might divide an egg with a hair; and as he cut them one after another, he bade Apollo give the face and the half of the neck a turn in order that man might contemplate the section of himself: he would thus learn a lesson of humility. Apollo was also bidden to heal their wounds and compose their forms. So he gave a turn to the face and pulled the skin from the sides all over that which in our language is called the belly, like the purses which draw tight, and he made one mouth at the center, which he fastened in a knot (the same which is called the navel); he also took out most of the wrinkles, much as a shoemaker might smooth leather upon a last; he left a few, however, in the region of the belly and navel, as a memorial of the primeval state.
After the division the two parts, each desired the other half, came together, and throwing their arms about one another, longing to be one again, they began to die from hunger and self-neglect, because they did not like to do anything apart. Each of us when separated, having one side only, like a flat fish, is but the half of a human, and is always looking for the other half.
And such a nature is prone to love and ready to return love, always embracing that which is akin to him. And when one of them meets with his other half, the actual half of himself from the former life, the pair are lost in an amazement of love and friendship, and one will not be out of the other's sight, as I may say, even for a moment: these are the people who pass their whole lives together, and yet they could not explain what they desire of one another, for the intense yearning which each of them has towards the other cannot be explained otherwise.
And the reason is that human nature was originally one and we were a whole, and the desire and pursuit of the whole is called love. There was a time, I say, when we were one, but now because of the wickedness of mankind God has dispersed us, as the Arcadians were dispersed into villages by the Lacedaemonians. And if we are not obedient to the gods, there is a danger that we shall be split up again and go about in basso-relievo, like the profile figures showing only one half the nose which are sculptured on monuments, and that we shall be like tallies. Wherefore let us exhort all men to piety in all things, that we may avoid evil and obtain the good, taking Love for our leader and commander.
Let no one oppose him--he is the enemy of the gods who opposes him. For if we are friends of God and at peace with him we shall find our own true loves, which rarely happens in this world at present. I am serious, and therefore I must beg Eryximachus not to make fun or to find any allusion in what I am saying to Pausanias and Agathon. But my words have a wider application--they include men and women everywhere; and I believe that if our loves were perfectly accomplished, and each one returning to his primeval nature had his original true love, then our race would be happy. And if this would be best of all, the best in the next degree must in present circumstances be the nearest approach to such a union; and that will be the attainment of a congenial love.
Wherefore, if we would praise him who has given to us the benefit, we must praise God, who is our greatest benefactor, both leading us in this life back to our own nature, and giving us high hopes for the future, for he promises that if we are pious, he will restore us to our original state, and heal us and make us happy and blessed.
This, said Aristophanes, is my discourse on love, which, although different from yours, I must beg you to not ridicule, in order that each may have his turn; each, or rather either, for Agathon and Socrates are the only ones who have not left during my speech.

Week 9

Sparta vs. Athens

Week 9