Myth, parody and comic plots: The birth of gods and Middle Comedy, in: G. Dobrov (ed.), Beyond Aristophanes: Transition and diversity in Greek Comedy, Atlanta/Georgia 1995, 1–27 (original) (raw)

Review of Rusten, J. (ed.) The Birth of Comedy. Texts, Documents, and Art from Athenian Comic Competitions, 486–280. Translated by Jeffrey Henderson, David Konstan, Ralph Rosen, Jeffrey Rusten, and Niall W. Slater. (The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2011), Classical Review 62 (2012): 376-78.

"Tendencies and Variety in Middle Comedy", in S. Chronopoulos & C. Orth (eds.), Fragmente einer Geschichte der griechischen Komödie — Fragmentary History of Greek Comedy, Mainz 2015, 159–198.

There was nothing monotonous about Middle Comedy and its theatrical productions. Their remains, even though fragmented and mutilated, reveal a panorama of great variety in form and composition, at all levels of dramatic writing. The dramatists cultivated many different types of play, developed a rich repertoire of plot patterns and motifs, employed an extensive range of comic strategies. In the beginning of this essay, the students of Middle Comedy are compared to the poor Lazarus of the Biblical parable, feeding on crumbs that fall down from the rich tables of the other scholarly magnates. However, as we recall, there are two characters named Lazarus in the Bible. One of them is this pauper; the other one is a man that was raised from the dead. Perhaps Middle Comedy may also resemble this second Lazarus and become alive again, resurrected from the realm of oblivion, if we read its texts with proper care. It can be Lazarus, come from the dead, come back to tell us all, if only we prick up our ears to listen. (From the epilogue of the essay.) This much expected volume, which contains the proceedings of a memorable conference at the University of Freiburg, is now in print. A detailed Greek summary of my essay is attached here in PDF. An English summary will follow soon.

"From mythological comedy to political satire. Some stages in the evolution of Old Comedy"

Summary: On Aristotle’s evolutionary scheme (Poet. 4), potential iambographers attracted to early comedy did not produce dramatic invectives against individuals, but "dramatised the laughable" in the manner indicated by Margites and other burlesque epics. Kratinos was later able to superimpose a harmless parody of myth on current events, and thus turn it into political satire by innuendo (Dionysalexandros). Aristophanes gave up mythological pretence, shows contemporary Athenians reacting to present-day issues, satirizes political "villains" directly, but constructs his plots on top of a narrative sequence of functions whose origins lie in traditional myth and folk tale. This endows his heroes with the ability, to succeed in humanly unattainable plans in order to counteract evil. Lysistrata represents another evolutionary stage in that it has a female heroine at a time when no male hero could stand for a significant part of the audience.

"The Structure of Mythological Old Comedy", Philologus

Philologus, 2020

Scholars often assume that Old Comedies based on mythological stories differed from other Old Comedies primarily by their mythological plot material, and that therefore they shared the structural features of the surviving plays of Aristophanes. I show that the evidence may instead indicate that these Old Comedies did not as a rule have a parabasis or an agon. The structure of mythological Old Comedy could then have resembled the satyr play more closely than Aristophanic Old Comedy, meaning genre did not necessarily determine form.