The Bucket List Book Adventure: Book 16 - Clouds - Aristophanes

 


Dear Henry,

Book 16 of the Bucket List is DONE! Let me tell you all about Clouds by Aristophanes.

Aristophanes was born about 450 BC and was one of Ancient Greece's comedic playwrights. He is the only one whose work has survived. His career began about 427 BC with the play Diataleis. He may have written as many as 40 plays. However, most of his work remains fragmented. 

None of Aristophanes's plays are cohesive stories but relatively small, loosely connected scenes with a chorus occasionally breaking in. It reminded me a bit of a sketch comedy series you would find on  Saturday Night Live or Monty Python, and I wonder if this playwright is the progenitor of that type of comedy.

Clouds is Aristophanes' most notorious surviving play.


The play begins when Stepsiades, a distraught father who is completely bankrupt due to his son's gambling problems, enrolls in the philosophy school next door to learn how to stop his son from ruining the family.

It recounts the ridiculousness and faulty logic that Stepsiades and his son, Pheidippides, learn from the school and the primary philosopher, Socrates. Throughout the play, a Chorus regularly breaks in and tells the audience how great the play is. The Chorus also warns of comeupance.

After Stepsiades and Pheidippides receive their "education" (cue Pink Floyd's The Wall), Stepsiades uses his new "logic" to deny his debts and then flogs one of his creditors. 

The tables are turned on Stepsiades after he and Pheidippides argue about poetry, and Pheidippides beats his father. Pheidippides was quite spoiled if you ask me, and has twice victimized his father.

The play ends with a very upset Stepsiades burning down the school and throwing rocks at all of the students.


The play was written as a satirical attack on the Sophist school of thought and was interpreted as a personal attack on Socrates. However, Socrates was not a Sophist and also argued against the nonsense being taught in the various philosophical schools that had popped up all over Greece, like branches of the University of Phoenix. It may have been a joke, with Aristophanes using the well-known philosopher's name as a comedic character and believing everyone would see the humor.

No one thought it was a joke, and Clouds would sway public opinion on schools such as these and are believed to have contributed to the downfall and execution of Socrates.

It wasn't my brand of humor.  


It was of the bawdy, bathroom-type variety, and if you are a fan of Larry the Cable Guy, you will probably like this play.  


Next up is Meno by Plato, which is the start of some fundamental hard-core philosophy. I'll let you know what I think.

xoxo a.d. elliott

P.S. Check out the YouTube video here: https://youtu.be/4lFv63ydgKA


****************************************

a.d. elliott is a wanderer, photographer, and storyteller currently living in Salem, Virginia. 

In addition to the travel writings at www.takethebackroads.com, you can also read her book reviews at www.riteoffancy.com and US military biographies at www.everydaypatriot.com

Her online photography gallery can be found at shop.takethebackroads.com

#TaketheBackRoads

Like my page? Please consider supporting my work by visiting my sponsors, my webshop, or by buying me a cup of coffee!




Location: Salem, VA 24153, USA

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Bucket List Book Adventure: Book 15 - Histories

Image
Dear Henry, It's been a while, but I've finally gotten back to the bucket list book adventure  and have finished "Histories" by Herodotus. Hair- odd- uh-tus.....hair-odd-uh-tus.....It's taken me a month to learn how to pronounce his name, and I still say it wrong half of the time. Anyway, let me tell you all about the Histories. Herodotus, the "Father Of History," is somewhat of a mystery. He was believed to be born around 484 BC in the vicinity of the ancient Greek city of Halicarnassus, today known as Bodrum, Turkey. Maybe. There are a lot of question marks.  His life has a lot more question marks. Herodotus traveled extensively throughout the Mediterranean, the Middle East, and North Africa and was believed to be in Athens at the beginning of the Peloponnesian War. And, of course, his death is also big of a mystery. It is estimated to have occurred between 430 and 420 BC, and he probably rests in Thurii, Italy, having left Athens around 430 BC for the...
Read more

Basilicas, Books, & Bringing Home the Bacon

Image
Dear Henry, Wow, it's been a while. Let's catch up. I've been so busy! Several months ago, I took a part-time job at a local bookstore to get out of the house and out of my head (plus, you know, the discount). I had just begun adjusting to the physical demands of retail work when the Christmas shopping season (and working hours) began. I'm not quite sure if it's because of "the accident" or because I'm a pudgy middle-aged woman, but wow, I've been exhausted. So, I put everything on hold and dedicated myself to reading the entire 14-book Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan ( read his Everyday Patriot biography here ). I've been keeping my feet up when I wasn't at work, and I'm just now getting used to the job. This season of holiday hours has helped me feel better about my Camino plans. I've always worried that it would be too challenging, but I now know I can spend six to eight hours a day on my feet, multiple days in a row.  Now,...
Read more

The Resurrection of the Old Lick Cemetery In Roanoke Virginia

Image
Dear Henry, I have always felt a strong call to "pray for the dead," even as a child.  My grandmother was an avid genealogist (I inherited this love from her), and I used to accompany her to various old graveyards, where she transcribed and photographed old headstones. I would spend my time trying to scrape overgrown grass and weeds from the headstones, having developed the strange belief that they couldn't go to heaven if you couldn't read the name on a tombstone. It always made me so sad to see unkept headstones. While I've (somewhat) grown out of the belief that an unmarked grave condemns people to walk the earth as ghosts, the image of Patroclus, in Madeline Miller's book The Song of Achilles ( review here ), wandering the world as a shadow because no one would write his name down made me cry. I was also very sad to see this poor, unkept little cemetery right as I pulled off Interstate 581. One of my first thoughts entering the city of Roanoke for the firs...
Read more