Rhetoric, comedy, and the violence of language in Aristophanes' Clouds

Abstract

This is a thought-provoking reading of Aristophanes' Clouds. O'Regan's principle theme is the logos, or power of argument, and its effects; she also assesses the self awareness of the second Clouds as a comedy of logos directed towards a resistant audience. Within and without the play, the logos meets defeat when confronted with human nature. The argument conveys insight into Athenian thought and the play's workings, the more so because it balances rhetoric with comedy, reminds the reader that this is a comic logos, explored in the comic mode, and connected with the intentions and vicissitudes of the first and second Clouds.