A modern plot from an Archaic Greek playwright, Aristophanes

Aristophanes
Originally uploaded by Alun Salt

A brief summary of the cynical playwright Aristophanes' play, The Clouds:

Faced with legal action for non-payment of debts, Strepsiades, an elderly Athenian, enrolls his son in The Thinkery (the "Phrontisterion") so that he might learn the rhetorical skills necessary to defeat their creditors in court. The son thereby learns cynical disrespect for social mores and contempt for authority and he subsequently beats his father up during a domestic argument, in return for which Strepsiades sets The Thinkery on fire.

It was a satire at the expense of Socrates and was, said some, damaging to Socrates reputation.