Old Comedy

“ The privileged merry-maker, who, under different names, has appeared on almost all stages, whose part is at one time a display of shrewd wit, and at another of coarse clownishness, has inherited something of the licentious enthusiasm, but without the rights and privileges of the free and unrestrained writers of the Old Comedy. Could there be a stronger proof that the Old Comedy, which we have described as the original species, was not a mere Grecian peculiarity, but had its root and principle in the very nature of things? ”

“ We now leave Tragic Poetry to occupy ourselves with an entirely opposite species, the Old Comedy. Striking as this diversity is, we shall, however, commence with pointing out a certain symmetry in the contrast and certain relations between them, which have a tendency to exhibit the essential character of both in a clearer light. In forming a judgment of the Old Comedy, we must banish every idea of what is called Comedy by the moderns, and what went by the same name among the Greeks themselves at a later period. ”

“ The old comedy rose to its perfection in Aristophanes, and in him also it died with the freedom of Greece. Then arose a species of drama, more fitly called dramatic entertainment than comedy, but of which, nevertheless, our modern comedy (Shakespeare's altogether excepted) is the genuine descendant. ”

“ The peculiar quality and charm of our comedy is that, deriving from sources not only distinct, but remote in literary habitat,—scriptural, allegorical, farcical, pastoral, romantic, classical, historical, or purely native and social,—it has not dissipated itself in a thousand streamlets, but has carried down deposits from each tributary at its best. In Love's Labor's Lost, Two Angry Women, As You Like It, Old Wives' Tale, Every Man in His Humour, we find, as in a miner's pan, 'colours' from vastly different soils. ”

“ For such historical characters in the Old Comedy have always an allegorical signification, and represent a class; and as their features were caricatures in the masks, so, in like manner, were their characters in the representation. But still this constant allusion to a proximate reality, which not only allowed the poet, in the character of the chorus, to converse with the public in a general way, but also to point the finger at certain individual spectators, was essential to this species of poetry. As Tragedy delights in harmonious unity, Comedy flourishes in a chaotic exuberance ”

“ PREFACE
v "'Dost thou think, because thou art virtuous, there shall be no more cakes and ale ... nor ginger hot i' the mouth?' Or knowest not that while man, casting the dice with Fate and Mistress Grundy, imagineth a new luck, there shall be new comedy? Why, then, reprint these old?"
In part, because the comedies of a nation are for literature as well as for the footlights, and literature, in most cases, begins after the footlights are out. In part, because old comedies make good reading, not only for lovers of fiction and the stage, but for the student of society and the historian. ”

“ Our modern Comedy, as I observ'd before, has a much greater Resemblance with what the Ancients call'd the Middle Comedy, than either the Old, or New. It is much graver, and less satirical than the first, and has more delicate Touches of Wit and Raillery than the last. Terence seems neither by Genius, nor Inclination, to have had the least Turn for the sharp and satirical Way of Writing: His Excellency lies rather in copying the common Characters of Human Nature, and drawing them in the exactest Manner, and truest Light; than in painting any of its Extravagancies, whether in Vice, or Folly. ”

“ But this idea does not exhaust the essential character of Comedy; for parody always supposes a reference to the subject which is parodied, and a necessary dependence on it. The Old Comedy, however, as a species of poetry, is as independent and original as Tragedy itself; it stands on the same elevation with it, that is, it extends just as far beyond the limits of reality into the domains of free creative fancy.
Tragedy is the highest earnestness of poetry; Comedy altogether sportive. ”

“ There can be no doubt that the element of invective and personal satire which distinguishes the Old Comedy is directly descended from the magical abuse of the phallic procession, just as its obscenity is due to the sexual magic ”

“ Dropping for the most part personal allusions, caricature, ridicule, and parody, which, in a more general form than in the old comedy, had maintained their ground in the middle comedy, the poets of the new comedy made it their business to reproduce in a generalized form a picture of the every-day life of those by whom they were surrounded. ”

“ This was the view of English Comedy of a sagacious essayist, who said that the end of a Comedy would often be the commencement of a Tragedy, were the curtain to rise again on the performers. In those old days female modesty was protected by a fan, behind which, and it was of a convenient semicircular breadth, the ladies present in the theatre retired at a signal of decorum, to peep, covertly askant, or with the option of so peeping, through a prettily fringed eyelet-hole in the eclipsing arch. ”

“ Why not write a comedy? So the thought came. I had never written anything save a few ill-spelt letters; but no matter. To find a plot was the first thing. Take Marshall for hero and Alice for heroine, surround them with the old gentlemen who dined at the table d'hôte, flavour with the Italian countess who smoked cigars when there were not too many strangers present. ”

“ He heard the dumb, strangled complainings of our hearts,—he saw higher beings looking down from above on the lamentable three hours' comedy of our life, wherein the ruddy child of the first act fades in the fifth to the old man in jubilee, and then, grown up and bowed down, vanishes behind the falling curtain. ”

“ I say to her, "An old comedy is to the comedy of to-day, precisely what an old beau, padded, painted, simpering with false teeth, and leering with rhumy eyes, is to a handsome, gallant young fellow, such as Mr. ”

“ But as the contrast between the matter and form is here in its proper place, and nothing can be more thoroughly opposite to the ludicrous form of exhibition than the most important and serious concerns of men, public life and the state naturally became the peculiar subject-matter of the Old Comedy. ”

“ Hence, in the weakness of old age, amorousness is the more laughable, as it is plain that it is not mere animal instinct, but that reason has only served to extend the dominion of the senses beyond their proper limits. In drunkenness, too, the real man places himself, in some degree, in the condition of the comic ideal.
The fact that the Old Comedy introduced living characters on the stage, by name and with all circumstantiality, must not mislead us to infer that they actually did represent certain definite individuals. ”

“ The spirit of the old romantic comedy had Comedy.long since fled; the graceful artificialities of the pastoral drama, even the light texture of the mask, ill suited the demands of an age which made no secret to itself of the grossness of its sensuality. With a few unimportant exceptions, such poetic elements as admitted of being combined with the poetic drama were absorbed by the opera and the ballet. No new species of the comic drama formed itself, though towards the close of the period may be noticed the beginnings of modern English farce. ”

“ This faculty will at times assert its rights as well as others; and hence several nations have set apart certain festivals, such as Saturnalia, Carnivals, &c., in which the people may give themselves altogether up to frolicsome follies, that when once the fit is over, they may for the rest of the year remain quiet, and apply themselves to serious business. The Old Comedy is a general masquerade of the world, during which much passes that is not authorised by the ordinary rules of propriety ”

“ Throughout the fifth century we find political and social comedy flourishing side by side, the great mass of the comedians being equally at home in either branch of the art, while, towards the close of that century and at the beginning of the next, the boundary line between the writers of “Old” and “Middle” Comedy is notoriously a very faint one. ”

“ An old satire written at the time of the Reformation brings together actors, dustmen, jugglers, conjurers, and sellers of indulgences.
But we want something more than wits and drolleries, and even public performances, to complete our idea of Comedy. We must have literary composition and artistic construction. ”

“ The characters in comedy are chiefly old men, slaves, courtesans, all in humble station or from small villages. The action begins rather turbulently, but ends happily, and the -106-style is neither high nor low. The typical themes of comedy are "sports, banquets, nuptials, drunken carousals, the crafty wiles of slaves, and the deception of old men." ”

“ Generally speaking, the old allegorical comedy is in its progress exposed to the danger of sinking. When we begin with turning the world upside down, the most wonderful incidents follow one another as a matter of course, but they are apt to appear petty and insignificant when compared with the decisive strokes of fun in the commencement. ”

“ LECTURE XIII. Whether the Middle Comedy was a distinct species—Origin of the New Comedy—A mixed species—Its prosaic character—Whether versification is essential to Comedy—Subordinate kinds—Pieces of Character, and of Intrigue—The Comic of observation, of self-consciousness, and arbitrary Comic—Morality of Comedy—Plautus and Terence as imitators of the Greeks here cited and characterised for want of the Originals—Moral and social aim of the Attic Comedy—Statues of two Comic Authors.
Ancient critics assume the existence of a Middle Comedy, between the Old and the New. ”

“ Then unto us more nearly one approached, And it alone began: "We all are ready Unto thy pleasure, that thou joy in us.
We turn around with the celestial Princes, One gyre and one gyration and one thirst, To whom thou in the world of old didst say,
'Ye who, intelligent, the third heaven are moving;' And are so full of love, to pleasure thee A little quiet will not be less sweet." ”

“ That is a home, where five may dwell with ease,
Tho' two would be a crowd, if enemies.
That is a home, where all your thoughts play free
As boys and girls about their father's knee,
Where speech no sooner touches heart, than tongue
Darts back an answering harmony of song;
Where you may grow from flax-haired snowy-polled,
And not a soul take note that you grow old ”

“ The soul is born old but grows young. That is the comedy of life.
Mrs. Allonby. And the body is born young and grows old. That is life’s tragedy. ”

“ An old man, hoary with the hair of eld,
Crying: “Woe unto you, ye souls depraved!
Hope nevermore to look upon the heavens;
I come to lead you to the other shore,
To the eternal shades in heat and frost.
And thou, that yonder standest, living soul,
Withdraw thee from these people, who are dead!” ”

“ I love everything that’s old: old friends, old times, old manners, old books, old wine; ”

“ For his malice is not a more terrible consequence of his aversion than his jealousy is of his love.
SIR SAMP. None of old Foresight’s sibyls ever uttered such a truth. Odsbud, you have won my heart; I hate a wit: I had a son that was spoiled among ’em, a good hopeful lad, till he learned to be a wit; and might have risen in the state. But, a pox on’t, his wit run him out of his money, and now his poverty has run him out of his wits.
ANG. Sir Sampson, as your friend, I must tell you you are very much abused in that matter: he’s no more mad than you are. ”

“ MISS JAY [fanning herself with her handkerchief] .
This is a very mystical oration!
FALK.
There you yourself provide the demonstration,—
A good old Norse one, sound, true-born, home-bred.
You draw distinction between wedded pledges
And those of Love: your Logic's without flaw.
They are distinguished just as roast from raw,
As hothouse bloom from wilding of the hedges!
Love is with us a science and an art ”

“ SIR SAMP. Zooks, but it is, madam, a very great while: to a man that admires a fine woman as much as I do.
ANG. You’re an absolute courtier, Sir Sampson.
SIR SAMP. Not at all, madam,—odsbud, you wrong me,—I am not so old neither, to be a bare courtier, only a man of words. Odd, I have warm blood about me yet, and can serve a lady any way. Come, come, let me tell you, you women think a man old too soon, faith and troth you do. Come, don’t despise fifty; odd, fifty, in a hale constitution, is no such contemptible age. ”

“ History is thorough, and passes through many phases when it bears an old figure to the grave. The last phase of a world historical figure is its comedy. ”

“ No, turn pimp, flatterer, quack, lawyer, parson, be chaplain to an atheist, or stallion to an old woman, anything but poet. A modern poet is worse, more servile, timorous, and fawning, than any I have named: without you could retrieve the ancient honours of the name, recall the stage of Athens, and be allowed the force of open honest satire.
VAL. You are as inveterate against our poets as if your character had been lately exposed upon the stage. Nay, I am not violently bent upon the trade. [One knocks.] Jeremy, see who’s there. ”

“ Alas, Love's home is also in Romance,
Only the Sun's descendants understand
The herb's right cultivation and advance.
With Love it is not otherwise than so.
Blood of the Sun along the veins must flow
If Love indeed therein is to strike root,
And burgeon into blossom, into fruit.
MISS JAY.
But China is an ancient land; you hold
In consequence that tea is very old—
STRAWMAN.
Past question antecedent to Jerusalem.
FALK.
Yes, 'twas already famous when Methusalem
His picture-books and rattles tore and flung—
MISS JAY [triumphantly] .
And love is in its very nature young! ”