Clouds by Aristophanes - an excerpt

¹Thinkery: The Greek word phrontisterion (meaning school or academy) is translated here as Thinkery, a term borrowed from William Arrowsmith's translation.

³Wearing one’s hair long and keeping race horses were characteristics of the sons of very rich families.

educational establishment, the Thinkery. ¹On one side of the stage is

Damn! Lord Zeus, how this night drags on and on!

It’s endless. Won’t daylight ever come?

²During the war it was easy for slaves to run away into enemy territory, so their owners had to treat them with much more care.

I heard a cock crowing a while ago,

but my slaves kept snoring. In the old days,

they wouldn’t have dared. Damn and blast this war—

so many problems. Now I’m not allowed

to punish my own slaves.² And then there’s him—

this fine young man, who never once wakes up,

but farts the night away, all snug in bed,

wrapped up in five wool coverlets. Ah well,                                          10             [10]

I guess I should snuggle down and snore away.

I can’t sleep. I’m just too miserable,

what with being eaten up by all this debt—

thanks to this son of mine, his expenses,

his racing stables. He keeps his hair long

and rides his horses—he’s obsessed with it—

his chariot and pair. He dreams of horses.³

And I’m dead when I see the month go by—

with the moon’s cycle now at twenty days,

as interest payments keep on piling up.⁴                                               20

 

Let me take these and check my creditors.

How many are there? And then the interest                                                            [20]

I’ll have to work that out. Let me see now . . .

What do I owe? “Twelve minai to Pasias?”

Twelve minai to Pasias! What’s that for?

Oh yes, I know—that’s when I bought that horse,

the pedigree nag. What a fool I am!

I’d sooner have a stone knock out my eye.⁵

Damn it, anyway.

I wish that matchmaker had died in pain—                                                              50

the one who hooked me and your mother up.

I’d had a lovely time up to that point,

a crude, uncomplicated, country life,

lying around just as I pleased, with honey bees,

and sheep and olives, too. Then I married—

the niece of Megacles—who was the son

of Megacles. I was a country man,

and she came from the town—a real snob,

extravagant, just like Coesyra.⁶

When I married her and we both went to bed,                                                         60

I stunk of fresh wine, drying figs, sheep’s wool—                                             [50]

an abundance of good things. As for her,

she smelled of perfume, saffron, long kisses,

greed, extravagance, lots and lots of sex.⁷

Now, I’m not saying she was a lazy bones.

She used to weave, but used up too much wool.

To make a point I’d show this cloak to her

and say, “Woman, your weaving’s far too thick.” ⁸

⁴The interest on Strepsiades’ loans would increase once the lunar month came to an end.

⁵Twelve minai is 100 drachmas, a considerable sum. The Greek reads “the horse branded with a koppa mark.” That brand was a guarantee of its breeding.

as a common name in a very prominent aristocratic family inAthens. Coesyra was the mother of a Megacles from this family, a woman well known for her wasteful expenditures and pride.

The Greek has “of Colias and Genetyllis” names associated with festivals celebrating women’s sexual and procreative powers.

⁸Packing the wool tight in weaving uses up more wool and therefore costs more. Strepsiades holds up his cloak, which is by now full of holes.