Aristophanes: The Complete Plays
Page 8
DEMOSTHENES: The oracle expressly says
that first a rope peddler appears108
and he takes over the city’s affairs.
NICIAS: So that’s peddler number one. Who follows?
DEMOSTHENES: After him another peddler, this time a sheep seller.109
NICIAS: That makes two peddlers. What happened to the second?
DEMOSTHENES: He goes on flourishing until another bastard appears
even more disgusting than he is, so he goes under,
for this bastard is none other than our own Paphlagon:
leather seller, robber, and a howler
with a voice like the Cycloborus in full flood.
NICIAS: So that seller’s done in by the hide seller?
DEMOSTHENES: Precisely.
NICIAS: What the heck! All we need now is to add
one more seller from somewhere.
DEMOSTHENES: Quite likely! . . . As a matter of fact,
there is one in the offing with a most unusual trade.
NICIAS: Who’s he?
DEMOSTHENES: Sure you want to know?
NICIAS: I certainly do.
DEMOSTHENES: A sausage seller, and that’s who does him in.
NICIAS: What! . . . A sausage seller? . . . Holy Poseidon,
fancy a trade like that!
Come on, get going. We’ve got to find the man.
DEMOSTHENES: It’ll take some searching. . . .
Look, there he is on the way to the market.
What a coincidence!
[SAUSAGEMAN appears carrying brazier and utensils.]
Come, immortal Sausageman.
Come, dear comrade, this way, this way, savior of our land
and our salvation.
SAUSAGEMAN: What’s all this? Why the salutation?
DEMOSTHENES: Approach and learn that from now on
you are gloriously fortunate and heaped with every blessing.
NICIAS: Yes, yes, but relieve him of his trestle
and tell him about the god’s oracle
while I go and keep an eye on Paphlagon.
[He goes into the house.]
DEMOSTHENES: Well now, the first thing to be done
is to put down all your paraphernalia
and prostrate yourself before the gods.
SAUSAGEMAN: Say, what is all this palaver?
DEMOSTHENES: Fortunate one,
you are rich; it is in the cards:
a cipher today, tomorrow a giant, and master
of Athens, that brilliant town.
SAUSAGEMAN: I’d appreciate it, sir,
if you’d just let me
wash my tripe and sell my sausages
and stop making fun of me.
DEMOSTHENES: Tripe indeed! You mutton head!
Just take a look over there.
D’you see these serried ranks of stooges?
SAUSAGEMAN: Of course I do.
DEMOSTHENES: You’re going to boss the lot:
market, port, Pnyx, the Assembly—bah!—you’ll tread
it underfoot and cut
the generals down to size;
chain people up, put them behind bars,
go fucking in the Town Hall.
SAUSAGEMAN: What, me?
DEMOSTHENES: You indeed, and that’s not all.
Climb up on your table.
See those islands dotted around?
SAUSAGEMAN: I do.
DEMOSTHENES: Isn’t that enough to make you happy? Just take a glance with your right eye towards Cairo, and swivel the other left towards Carthage.
SAUSAGEMAN: Ooh! . . . What a pledge! . . . But I’ll be cockeyed,
damn it!
DEMOSTHENES: It’s all yours to buy and sell. You’ll be the biggest shot on this planet—according to the oracle.
SAUSAGEMAN: Fine, but please explain:
how can I ever be such—I, a sausageman?
DEMOSTHENES: Precisely because that’s what’s going to make you
great.
You’re common, pushy, and off the street.
SAUSAGEMAN: But I don’t think I’m worthy of being Mr. Big.
DEMOSTHENES: Bullshit! How can you say you’re not worthy?
Don’t tell me that you’re not a bad egg
and that your family has a reputation.
SAUSAGEMAN: Shucks, no! We’re lowest of the low.
DEMOSTHENES: Thank God for that!
In the rat race that’s a start.
SAUSAGEMAN: But, sir, I have no education.
DEMOSTHENES: Not to worry!
Your only handicap is having no money.
Politics, these days, is no occupation
for an educated man, a man of character.
Ignorance and total lousiness are better.
Don’t jettison such god-given advantages
and what the oracle promises.
SAUSAGEMAN: What does the oracle promise, then?
DEMOSTHENES: Wondrous things, in a lofty enigmatic tongue.
[reading from the scroll ] “Amen! Amen!110
When the hidebound eagle with his crooked claws
Shall the clumsy bloodsucking serpent seize,
Then shall the garlicky breath of Paphlagons expire
And the sellers of tripe be ripe
For divine munificence; unless of course
Selling sausages is more
What they require.”
SAUSAGEMAN: But how’s all that apply to me? Explain.
DEMOSTHENES: [pointing a finger at Cleon, who was in the audience]
This Paphlagon here is the hidebound one.
SAUSAGEMAN: Then who’s the one with crooked claws?
DEMOSTHENES: Him of course!
He grabs whatever he gets his talons on.
SAUSAGEMAN: And the snake, who’s he?
DEMOSTHENES: That’s obvious, too, because
a snake is long and a sausage is long
and both are greedy—greedy for blood,
and the oracle says the snake will beat the bird,
unless, of course, fiddled out of it by words.
SAUSAGEMAN: This prophecy makes me feel real good,
but what amazes me is the idea
that I could ever run the country.
DEMOSTHENES: Nothing to it, my dear sir. Just do what you are doing: make hash and salami of everything in your pantry, with sweet pickle for the People in the form of twaddle, while pursuing everything you already have or need: a rasping voice, paltry origins, and being morally a mess. You have the complete recipe for political success. On top of that, you have both Delphi and the oracle on your side.
[holding out the garland and the goblet]
So put the garland on,
pour a toast to the good god Goofy
and watch out for Paphlagon.
SAUSAGEMAN: But who will I have to help me? The rich are all a-quiver and the poor get diarrhea.
DEMOSTHENES: You’ll have the Knights, a thousand strong,
who have no love for him and will cheer you on,
and every decent upright citizen.
Then, of course, there’s me as well,
and every person of goodwill.
Don’t be dismayed by the fact that the face you see
is hardly anything like him.
The mask makers were too jittery to make a copy.
But you spectators are smart enough to spot him.111
NICIAS: [ from inside the house] Hey, look out! Paphlagon’s about to emerge.
[PAPHLAGON stomps out of the house.]
PAPHLAGON: You’ll never get away with this, I swear
by all the twelve Olympians:
not a chance you’ll be able to dodge
even with your unending machinations. . . .
Ho ho! What’s that Chaldean goblet doing there.
It can only mean one thing: inciting
the Chaldeans to rebel.
Well, you’re finished, done for, you disgusting couple.
DEMOSTHENE
S: [as SAUSAGEMAN gets ready to run]
Noble Sausageman, don’t run away.
You musn’t fail us in the struggle.
Help, men of the cavalry!
Help in the nick of the fray!
Simon and Panaetius,112 attack him on the right.
Sausageman, our forces are near, come back
and put up a fight.
They are almost here, scattering the dust
as they gallop to attack.
Turn and face him, for we must
repel and chase him.
[The CHORUS of KNIGHTS marches into view, chanting in trochaic octameter.]
CHORUS: Smite him, smite him, smite the villain
who upsets our knightly clan.
He’s the pitfall, he’s the tax man,
he’s the most voracious suck man.
Villain, villain, I’ll say villain,
which he is all through the day.
Smite him, chase him, rout him, shake him,
and as we do, greatly hate him.
With a battle cry attack him
but take care in case he may
Elude you, for this is not a
path he doesn’t know as well as
Eucrates113 when he skedaddled
to his mill and got away.
PAPHLAGON: Elders of the jury help me,
you whom I have made my brothers,
And to three obols upped your fee:
you whom my bullying furthers
Whether I be right or wrong.
Come to my defense, for I am
At this moment being unstrung
by these practitioners of crime.
CHORUS: We have every right to do so
because you help yourself to public
Funds for office—an abuse so
like a man who goes to pick
Figs and squeezes one and thereby
discovers whether it is ripe
Or still too green, or if nearby
some poor rich and guileless chap
Who’s afraid of litigation
is a juicy one to tap;
And even distant isolation
isn’t safety from attack.
With lies and slanders you’ll extract
a person from the far Crimea
And twist his arms behind his back
and trip him headlong on his ear.
PAPHLAGON: So you’re joining in the attack?
You ought to know that it’s for you
That I’m being battered. It’s a fact.
I was just about to do
You a favor and to move
a motion making it a must
That a statue be approved
in timely honor of your guts.
LEADER: What a faker! What a fraud!
Did you notice how he did his
Best to get us on his side
as if to trick old doddering biddies?
Well, that way out he’ll get the stick
And this way, if he dares, a kick.
PAPHLAGON: My city! My people! What kind of creatures
Are here and now disemboweling me?
SAUSAGEMAN: Bawl your head off: it’s your usual way
Of intimidating our poor city.
PAPHLAGON: Bawl I shall, and you’ll be first to get the jitters.
LEADER: If your bawling has him crawling
You’re the champion of the hour,
But if he trounces you in yawling
We’re the ones who win the wager.
PAPHLAGON: A stake for a steak and I’ll do what it takes
To denounce the smuggling of nautical stakes
For the triremes of Sparta.
SAUSAGEMAN: And I, by Zeus, will do the same
And denounce this man who dares to come
To our City Hall with an empty belly
And leave it again with a bursting one.
DEMOSTHENES: Precisely that! And he sneaks away
With bread and meat and fish fillet:
Titbits that even Pericles
Was never given, if you please.
PAPHLAGON: Submit to the fact that you are dead.
SAUSAGEMAN: I can outshout you three times over.
PAPHLAGON: And I’ll blast your shouts out of your head.
SAUSAGEMAN: I’ll holler and make your shouting wither.
PAPHLAGON: I’ll slander you—as I slander a commander.
SAUSAGEMAN: I’ll batter your bottom, you mongrel cur.
PAPHLAGON: I’ll swallow you up in a mighty yelp.
SAUSAGEMAN: I’ll cut you off from your lines of escape.
PAPHLAGON: You, who can’t look me in the face!
SAUSAGEMAN: Very like me—we’re a common disgrace.
PAPHLAGON: Any more lip and I’ll make you rip.
SAUSAGEMAN: I’ll chuck you away, you dirty turd.
PAPHLAGON: I’m ready to own I’m a thief—you aren’t.
SAUSAGEMAN: Hermes of the market knows I’m bent.
Caught red-handed, I’ll say it’s absurd.
PAPHLAGON: Then you’re a thief of others’ rackets,
And I’ll report you to the police
For the possession of tripish titbits
Belonging to the gods. And that’s not nice,
Especially when you evade the tax.
CHORUS: You lousy and you loathsome and you bold
Bellowing rat,
Your effrontery knows no hold,
Filling Parliament and land,
The fiscal and the legal system and every court.
You trash collector plunging our city into oceans of muck
Who has made all Athens deaf with your din
As you scan the sea from a high rock
Like a tuna fisher hoping to spot
Where the tribute shoals are thick and where they are thin.
PAPHLAGON: This conspiracy was stitched together long ago.
SAUSAGEMAN: If you can’t stitch
I can’t make sausages. . . . Oh,
You’re the expert at slicing the hide
Of a substandard ox with sleight of hand
And making it look oh so solid and thick,
Then selling it to farmers at a phony price;
Yet after a day’s wear
It somehow seems to spread.
DEMOSTHENES: Yes, by Zeus, I got caught in the same snare: My friends and neighbors thought it very funny When my shoes turned into paddles On the way to Pergase.114
CHORUS: [to PAPHLAGON]
From the beginning it seems you have practiced the fiddles
Indispensable to every politician:
Relying on them you pick the fruit
Off the juiciest visitors coming in
While Hippodamus’ son115
Looks on in tears.
However, I am glad to say
There is someone here
Even slimier than you are,
Who from the very start I think we’ll see
Outsleaze and outclass you
In vice, trickery, and brass.
LEADER: [to SAUSAGEMAN]
All right then,
Since you were reared
In the environment that makes men what they are,
Explain why a decent upbringing is bizarre.
SAUSAGEMAN: [pointing to PAPHLAGON] Fine!
I’ll show you what it’s done for this here citizen.
PAPHLAGON: But first listen to me.
SAUSAGEMAN: Why should I? In sliminess I’m equal to you.
DEMOSTHENES: If that doesn’t disarm him, then
tell him that your forebears were slimy, too.
PAPHLAGON: So you won’t hear me speak first?
SAUSAGEMAN: Absolutely not!
PAPHLAGON: Absolutely, yes!
SAUSAGEMAN: Holy Poseidon, I’ll fight you on the spot.
PAPHLAGON: If you don’t hear me first, I’m going to burst.
SAUSAGEMAN: Let me repeat: I won’t.
DEMOSTHENES:
For the gods’ sakes, let him, let him burst.
PAPHLAGON: What makes you think you’re fit to speak against me?
SAUSAGEMAN:116 Because I’m as good as you at making a
mess . . . see?
Talk of speaking, I can just see you flogging some
dead horse of a case with grim thoroughness, thinking it a
success.
Well, if you ask me, most people do the same.
You, for instance, probably waffled brilliantly
in a grungy little lawsuit against some poor immigrant
after spending half the night getting it by heart,
mumbling it in the streets, forswearing drink,
and going over it again and again among your pals
till you were driving them up the walls.
And all this began to make you think
you were a stupendous rhetorician.
You damn fool! It’s pure delusion.
So tell us the potent brew that’s enabled you
to strike the whole town dumb
with the brilliance of your tongue.
PAPHLAGON: What kind of man do you take me for?
I’m someone who can down
a plate of tuna steaming hot,
chase it with a flagon of unwatered wine—
yes, on the spot—then, what is more,
chew those ruddy generals up at Pylos.
SAUSAGEMAN: And for me it’s chitlins and tripe to dine on,
chased with greasy gravy, then
with unwashed hands to go and choke those clueless
politicians and chew up Nicias.
DEMOSTHENES: Most of what you’ve said is on the ball
but I’m not so sure about that guzzling the gravy all
by yourself.
PAPHLAGON: [to SAUSAGEMAN]
But I don’t see you being all gung-ho for devouring
the Milesian big fish and sending them scattering117.
SAUSAGEMAN: Me? I’ll just have spareribs and invest in ore.
PAPHLAGON: And I’ll do more.
I’ll pounce on the Assembly and give it a battering.
SAUSAGEMAN: And I’ll stuff your arsehole like a black pudding.
PAPHLAGON: And I’ll grab you by the rump upside down.
DEMOSTHENES: If you grab him you’ll have to grab me, too.
PAPHLAGON: I’ll fix you to a stake like glue.
SAUSAGEMAN: I’ll denounce you for a cowardly clown.
PAPHLAGON: I’ll use your carcass as hide for leather.
SAUSAGEMAN: I’ll pluck off your eyebrows with a tweezer.
PAPHLAGON: I’ll have your skin to make a suitcase.
SAUSAGEMAN: I’ll turn you into mince for pies.