Ancient Greek comedy () was one of the final three principal

drama Drama is the specific Mode (literature), mode of fiction Mimesis, represented in performance: a Play (theatre), play, opera, mime, ballet, etc., performed in a theatre, or on Radio drama, radio or television.Elam (1980, 98). Considered as a g ...

tic forms in the theatre of classical Greece; the others being

tragedy A tragedy is a genre of drama based on human suffering and, mainly, the terrible or sorrowful events that befall a tragic hero, main character or cast of characters. Traditionally, the intention of tragedy is to invoke an accompanying catharsi ...

and the

satyr play The satyr play is a form of Attic theatre performance related to both comedy and tragedy. It preserves theatrical elements of dialogue, actors speaking verse, a chorus that dances and sings, masks and costumes. Its relationship to tragedy is st ...

. Greek comedy was distinguished from tragedy by its

happy ending A happy ending is an ending of the plot of a work of fiction in which there is a positive outcome for the protagonist or protagonists, and in which this is to be considered a favourable outcome. In storylines where the protagonists are in phy ...

s and use of comically exaggerated

character archetype A stock character, also known as a character archetype, is a type of character in a narrative (e.g. a novel, play, television show, or film) whom audiences recognize across many narratives or as part of a storytelling tradition or convention. Th ...

s, the latter feature being the origin of the modern concept of the

comedy Comedy is a genre of dramatic works intended to be humorous or amusing by inducing laughter, especially in theatre, film, stand-up comedy, television, radio, books, or any other entertainment medium. Origins Comedy originated in ancient Greec ...

Athenian Athens ( ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Greece, largest city of Greece. A significant coastal urban area in the Mediterranean, Athens is also the capital of the Attica (region), Attica region and is the southe ...

comedy is conventionally divided into three periods;

Old Comedy Old Comedy is the first period of the ancient Greek comedy, according to the canonical division by the Alexandrian grammarians.Mastromarco (1994) p.12 The most important Old Comic playwright is Aristophanes – whose works, with their daring pol ...

survives today largely in the form of the eleven extant plays of

Aristophanes Aristophanes (; ; ) was an Ancient Greece, Ancient Greek Ancient Greek comedy, comic playwright from Classical Athens, Athens. He wrote in total forty plays, of which eleven survive virtually complete today. The majority of his surviving play ...

; Middle Comedy is largely lost and preserved only in relatively short fragments by authors such as

Athenaeus Athenaeus of Naucratis (, or Nαυκράτιος, ''Athēnaios Naukratitēs'' or ''Naukratios''; ) was an ancient Greek rhetorician and Grammarian (Greco-Roman), grammarian, flourishing about the end of the 2nd and beginning of the 3rd century ...

Naucratis Naucratis or Naukratis (Ancient Greek: , "Naval Command"; Egyptian: , , , Coptic: ) was a city and trading-post in ancient Egypt, located on the Canopic (western-most) branch of the Nile river, south-east of the Mediterranean sea and the city ...

; New Comedy is known primarily from the substantial papyrus fragments of

Menander Menander (; ; c. 342/341 – c. 290 BC) was a Greek scriptwriter and the best-known representative of Athenian Ancient Greek comedy, New Comedy. He wrote 108 comedies and took the prize at the Lenaia festival eight times. His record at the Cit ...

. A burlesque dramatic form that blended tragic and comic elements, known as

phlyax play A phlyax play (, pl: , ''phlyakes''), also known as a hilarotragedy (), was a burlesque dramatic form that developed in the Greek colonies of Magna Graecia in the 4th century BC. From the surviving fragments and titles of the plays, they appear to ...

or hilarotragedy, developed in the Greek colonies of

Magna Graecia Magna Graecia refers to the Greek-speaking areas of southern Italy, encompassing the modern Regions of Italy, Italian regions of Calabria, Apulia, Basilicata, Campania, and Sicily. These regions were Greek colonisation, extensively settled by G ...

by the late 4th century BC. The philosopher

Aristotle Aristotle (; 384–322 BC) was an Ancient Greek philosophy, Ancient Greek philosopher and polymath. His writings cover a broad range of subjects spanning the natural sciences, philosophy, linguistics, economics, politics, psychology, a ...

wrote in his ''

Poetics Poetics is the study or theory of poetry, specifically the study or theory of device, structure, form, type, and effect with regards to poetry, though usage of the term can also refer to literature broadly. Poetics is distinguished from hermeneu ...

'' (c. 335 BC) that comedy is a representation of laughable people and involves some kind of blunder or ugliness which does not cause pain or disaster. C. A. Trypanis wrote that comedy is the last of the great species of poetry Greece gave to the world.

Periods

The

Alexandrine grammarians The Alexandrine grammarians were philologists and textual scholars who flourished in History of Alexandria, Hellenistic Alexandria in the 3rd and 2nd centuries BCE, when that city was the center of Hellenistic culture. Despite the name, the work of ...

, and most likely

Aristophanes of Byzantium __NOTOC__ Aristophanes of Byzantium ( ; Byzantium – Alexandria BC) was a Hellenistic Greek scholar, critic and grammarian, particularly renowned for his work in Homeric scholarship, but also for work on other classical authors such as ...

in particular, seem to have been the first to divide Greek comedy into what became the canonical three periods:Mastromarco (1994) p. 12 Old Comedy ( ''archaía''), Middle Comedy ( ''mésē'') and New Comedy ( ''néa''). These divisions appear to be largely arbitrary, and ancient comedy almost certainly developed constantly over the years.

Old Comedy (''archaia'')

The most important Old Comic dramatist is

(born in 446 BC). His works, with their pungent

political satire Political satire is a type of satire that specializes in gaining entertainment from politics. Political satire can also act as a tool for advancing political arguments in conditions where political speech and dissent are banned. Political satir ...

and abundance of sexual and

scatological In medicine and biology, scatology or coprology is the study of faeces. Scatological studies allow one to determine a wide range of biological information about a creature, including its diet (nutrition), diet (and thus habitat (ecology), where ...

innuendo An innuendo is a wikt:hint, hint, wikt:insinuation, insinuation or wikt:intimation, intimation about a person or thing, especially of a denigrating or derogatory nature. It can also be a remark or question, typically disparaging (also called in ...

, effectively define the genre today. Aristophanes lampooned the most important personalities and institutions of his day, as can be seen, for example, in his buffoonish portrayal of

Socrates Socrates (; ; – 399 BC) was a Ancient Greek philosophy, Greek philosopher from Classical Athens, Athens who is credited as the founder of Western philosophy and as among the first moral philosophers of the Ethics, ethical tradition ...

in ''

The Clouds ''The Clouds'' (, ''Nephelai'') is a Greek comedy play written by the playwright Aristophanes. A lampooning of intellectual fashions in classical Athens, it was originally produced at the City Dionysia in 423BC and was not as well received as th ...

'', and in his racy anti-war farce ''

Lysistrata ''Lysistrata'' ( or ; Attic Greek: , ''Lysistrátē'', ) is an ancient Greek comedy by Aristophanes, originally performed in classical Athens in 411 BC. It is a comic account of a woman's mission to end the Peloponnesian War between Greek city ...

''. He was one of a large number of comic poets working in Athens in the late 5th century, his most important contemporary rivals being

Hermippus Hermippus (; fl. 5th century BC) was the one-eyed Athenian writer of the Old Comedy, who flourished during the Peloponnesian War. Life He was the son of Lysis, and the brother of the comic poet Myrtilus. He was younger than Telecleides and old ...

and

Eupolis Eupolis (; 446 411 BC) was an Athenian poet of the Old Comedy, who flourished during the time of the Peloponnesian War. Biography Very little is known about Eupolis' life. His father was named Sosipolis. There are few sources on when he first ...

. The Old Comedy subsequently influenced later European writers such as Rabelais,

Cervantes Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra ( ; ; 29 September 1547 (assumed) – 22 April 1616 NS) was a Spanish writer widely regarded as the greatest writer in the Spanish language and one of the world's pre-eminent novelists. He is best known for his no ...

Swift Swift or SWIFT most commonly refers to: * SWIFT, an international organization facilitating transactions between banks ** SWIFT code * Swift (programming language) * Swift (bird), a family of birds It may also refer to: Organizations * SWIF ...

, and

Voltaire François-Marie Arouet (; 21 November 169430 May 1778), known by his ''Pen name, nom de plume'' Voltaire (, ; ), was a French Age of Enlightenment, Enlightenment writer, philosopher (''philosophe''), satirist, and historian. Famous for his wit ...

. In particular, they copied the technique of disguising a political attack as buffoonery.

Middle Comedy (''mese'')

New comedy first slave theatre mask NAMA3373 Athens Greece

The line between Old and Middle Comedy is not clearly marked chronologically,

and others of the latest writers of the Old Comedy being sometimes regarded as the earliest Middle Comic poets. For ancient scholars, the term may have meant little more than "later than Aristophanes and his contemporaries, but earlier than

". Middle Comedy is generally seen as differing from Old Comedy in three essential particulars: the role of the chorus was diminished to the point where it had no influence on the plot; public characters were not impersonated or personified onstage; and the objects of ridicule were general rather than personal, literary rather than political. For at least a time, mythological burlesque was popular among the Middle Comic poets. Stock characters of all sorts also emerge: courtesans, parasites, revellers, philosophers, boastful soldiers, and especially the conceited cook with his parade of culinary science. Because no complete Middle Comic plays have been preserved, it is impossible to offer any real assessment of their literary value or "genius". But many Middle Comic plays appear to have been revived in

Sicily Sicily (Italian language, Italian and ), officially the Sicilian Region (), is an island in the central Mediterranean Sea, south of the Italian Peninsula in continental Europe and is one of the 20 regions of Italy, regions of Italy. With 4. ...

and

in this period, suggesting that they had considerable widespread literary and social influence.

New Comedy (''nea'')

New Comedy followed the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and lasted throughout the reign of the

Macedon Macedonia ( ; , ), also called Macedon ( ), was an ancient kingdom on the periphery of Archaic and Classical Greece, which later became the dominant state of Hellenistic Greece. The kingdom was founded and initially ruled by the royal ...

ian rulers, ending about 260 BC. It is comparable to

situation comedy A sitcom (short for situation comedy or situational comedy) is a genre of comedy produced for radio and television, that centers on a recurring cast of character (arts), characters as they navigate humorous situations within a consistent settin ...

and

comedy of manners In English literature, the term comedy of manners (also anti-sentimental comedy) describes a genre of realistic, satirical comedy that questions and comments upon the manners and social conventions of a greatly sophisticated, artificial society. ...

.Winkler, Martin M. (2001)
''Classical Myth & Culture in the Cinema''
p. 173 The three best-known playwrights belonging to this genre are

, Philemon, and

Diphilus Diphilus (Greek: Δίφιλος), of Sinope, was a poet of the new Attic comedy and a contemporary of Menander (342–291 BC). He is frequently listed together with Menander and Philemon, considered the three greatest poets of New Comedy. He was ...

. The playwrights of the New Comedy genre built on the legacy from their predecessors, but adapted it to the portrayal of everyday life, rather than of public affairs. The satirical and farcical element which featured so strongly in Aristophanes' comedies was increasingly abandoned, the de-emphasis of the grotesque—whether in the form of choruses, humour or spectacle—opening the way for greater representation of daily life and the foibles of recognisable character types.S Halliwell ed., ''The Birds'' (Oxford 1998) p. ix Apart from Diphilus, the New Comedians preferred the everyday world to mythological themes, coincidences to miracles or metamorphoses; and they peopled this world with a whole series of semi-realistic, if somewhat stereotypical figures, who would become the stock characters of Western comedy: braggarts, the permissive

father figure A father figure is usually an older man, normally one with power, authority, or strength, with whom one can identify on a deeply psychology, psychological level and who generates emotions generally felt towards one's father. Despite the literal t ...

and the stern father ('' senex iratus''), young lovers, parasites, kind-hearted prostitutes, and cunning servants. Their largely gentle comedy of manners drew on a vast array of dramatic devices, characters and situations their predecessors had developed: prologues to shape the audience's understanding of events, messengers' speeches to announce offstage action, descriptions of feasts, the complications of love, sudden recognitions, ex machina endings were all established techniques which playwrights exploited and evoked. The new comedy depicted Athenian society and the social morality of the period, presenting it in attractive colors but making no attempt to criticize or improve it. In his own time, Philemon was perhaps the most successful among the New Comedy, regularly beating the younger figure of Menander in contests; but the latter would be the most highly esteemed by subsequent generations.H Nettleship, ed, ''A Dictionary of Classical Antiquities'' (London 1894) p. 478 Menander's comedies not only provided their audience with a brief respite from reality, but also gave audiences an accurate, if not greatly detailed, picture of life,H J Rose, ''A Handbook of Latin Literature'' (London 1967) p. 78 leading an ancient critic to ask if life influenced Menander in the writing of his plays or if the case was vice versa. Unlike earlier predecessors, Menander's comedies tended to centre on the fears and foibles of the ordinary man, his personal relationships, family life and social mishaps rather than politics and public life. His plays were also much less satirical than preceding comedies, being marked by a gentle, urbane tone,J Boardman ed., ''The Oxford History of the Classical World'' (Oxford 1986) p. 182 a taste for good temper and good manners (if not necessarily for good morals). The human dimension of his characters was one of the strengths of Menander's plays, and perhaps his greatest legacy, through his use of these fairly stereotype characters to comment on human life and depict human folly and absurdity compassionately, with wit and subtlety. An example of the moral reformations he offered (not always convincingly) is Cnemon from Menander's play ''

Dyskolos ''Dyskolos'' (, , translated as ''The Grouch'', ''The Misanthrope'', ''The Curmudgeon'', ''The Bad-tempered Man'' or ''Old Cantankerous'') is an Ancient Greek comedy by Menander, the only one of his plays, and of the whole New Comedy, that has ...

'', whose objections to life suddenly fade after he was rescued from a well. The fact that this character was not necessarily closed to reason makes him a character whom people can relate to. Relief with Menander and New Comedy Masks - Princeton Art Museum

Relief with Menander and New Comedy Masks - Princeton Art Museum

Philemon's comedies tended to be smarter, and broader in tone, than Menander's; while Diphilus used mythology as well as everyday life in his works. The comedies of both survive only in fragments but their plays were translated and adapted by

Plautus Titus Maccius Plautus ( ; 254 – 184 BC) was a Roman playwright of the Old Latin period. His comedies are the earliest Latin literary works to have survived in their entirety. He wrote Palliata comoedia, the genre devised by Livius Andro ...

. Examples include Plautus' ''Asinaria'' and ''Rudens''. Based on the translation and adaptation of Diphilus' comedies by Plautus, one can conclude that he was skilled in the construction of his plots. Substantial fragments of New Comedy have survived, but no complete plays. The most substantially preserved text is the ''Dyskolos'' ("Difficult Man, Grouch") by Menander, discovered on a papyrus, and first published in 1958. The Cairo Codex (found in 1907) also preserves long sections of plays including '' Epitrepontes'' ("Men at Arbitration"), '' Samia'' ("The Girl from Samos"), and '' Perikeiromene'' ("The Girl who had her Hair Shorn"). Much of the rest of our knowledge of New Comedy is derived from the

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

adaptations by Plautus and

Terence Publius Terentius Afer (; – ), better known in English as Terence (), was a playwright during the Roman Republic. He was the author of six Roman comedy, comedies based on Greek comedy, Greek originals by Menander or Apollodorus of Carystus. A ...

Influence

Horace Quintus Horatius Flaccus (; 8 December 65 BC – 27 November 8 BC), Suetonius, Life of Horace commonly known in the English-speaking world as Horace (), was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus (also known as Octavian). Th ...

claimed Menander as a model for his own gentle brand of

Roman satire Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of exposing or ...

. The New Comedy influenced much of Western European literature, primarily through Plautus and Terence: in particular the comic drama of

Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 23 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's natio ...

and

Ben Jonson Benjamin Jonson ( 11 June 1572 – ) was an English playwright, poet and actor. Jonson's artistry exerted a lasting influence on English poetry and stage comedy. He popularised the comedy of humours; he is best known for the satire, satirical ...

, Congreve, and

Wycherley People with the family name Wycherley include: * Don Wycherley, Irish actor * Florence Wycherley, Irish politician * Ralph Wycherley, Canadian hockey player * Richard Ernest Wycherley, an English Classicist * Billy Fury (Ronald Wycherley), Britis ...

, and, in France,

Molière Jean-Baptiste Poquelin (; 15 January 1622 (baptised) – 17 February 1673), known by his stage name Molière (, ; ), was a French playwright, actor, and poet, widely regarded as one of the great writers in the French language and world liter ...

.J Boardman ed., ''The Oxford History of the Classical World'' (Oxford 1986) p. 450 The 5-act structure later to be found in modern plays can first be seen in Menander's comedies. Where in comedies of previous generations there were choral interludes, there was dialogue with song. The action of his plays had breaks, the situations in them were conventional and coincidences were convenient, thus showing the smooth and effective development of his plays. Much of contemporary romantic and situational comedy descends from the New Comedy sensibility, in particular generational comedies such as ''

All in the Family ''All in the Family'' is an American sitcoms in the United States, sitcom television series that aired on CBS for nine seasons from January 12, 1971, to April 8, 1979, with a total of 205 episodes. It was later produced as ''Archie Bunker's Pla ...

'' and ''

Meet the Parents ''Meet the Parents'' is a 2000 American comedy film written by Jim Herzfeld and John Hamburg and directed by Jay Roach. It stars Ben Stiller as Greg Focker, a nurse who suffers a series of unfortunate events while visiting his girlfriend's paren ...

''.

Dramatists

Old Comedy

Middle Comedy

New Comedy

Some dramatists overlap into more than one period.

Notes

Sources

* Brown, Andrew. 1998. "Ancient Greece." In ''The Cambridge Guide to Theatre.'' Ed. Martin Banham. Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press was the university press of the University of Cambridge. Granted a letters patent by King Henry VIII in 1534, it was the oldest university press in the world. Cambridge University Press merged with Cambridge Assessme ...

. 441–447. . * Brockett, Oscar G. and Franklin J. Hildy. 2003. ''History of the Theatre''. Ninth edition, International edition. Boston: Allyn and Bacon. . * Carlson, Marvin. 1993. ''Theories of the Theatre: A Historical and Critical Survey from the Greeks to the Present.'' Expanded ed. Ithaca and London:

Cornell University Press The Cornell University Press is the university press of Cornell University, an Ivy League university in Ithaca, New York. It is currently housed in Sage House, the former residence of Henry William Sage. It was first established in 1869, maki ...

. . * Csapo, Eric, and William J. Slater. 1994. ''The Context of Ancient Drama.'' Ann Arbor:

University of Michigan Press The University of Michigan Press is a university press that is a part of Michigan Publishing at the University of Michigan Library. It publishes 170 new titles each year in the humanities and social sciences. Titles from the press have earn ...

. . * Freund, Philip. 2003. ''The Birth of Theatre''. Illustrated ed. Vol 1. of ''Stage by Stage''. London: Peter Owen. . * Janko, Richard, trans. 1987. ''Poetics with Tractatus Coislinianus, Reconstruction of Poetics II and the Fragments of the On Poets.'' By

. Cambridge: Hackett. . * Ley, Graham. 2006. ''A Short Introduction to the Ancient Greek Theater.'' Rev. ed. Chicago and London:

University of Chicago Press The University of Chicago Press is the university press of the University of Chicago, a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois. It is the largest and one of the oldest university presses in the United States. It pu ...

. * Olson, S. Douglas, ed. 2007. ''Broken Laughter: Select Fragments of Greek Comedy.'' Oxford:

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the publishing house of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world. Its first book was printed in Oxford in 1478, with the Press officially granted the legal right to print books ...

. . * Taplin, Oliver. 1993. ''Comic Angels and Other Approaches to Greek Drama Through Vase-Painting.'' Oxford:

Clarendon Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the publishing house of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world. Its first book was printed in Oxford in 1478, with the Press officially granted the legal right to print books ...

. * Trypanis, Constantine Athanasius. 1981. ''Greek Poetry from Homer to Seferis.'' Chicago:

External links

"Aristotle on Comedy" by Malcolm Heath, University of Leeds

BBC Radio 4 ''In Our Time'' programme on ancient Greek Comedy, Thursday 13 July 2006
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