Plautus was the single greatest influence on Western comedy. Shakespeare's Comedy of Errors and Molière's The Miser are two subsequent classics directly based on Plautine originals. The comedies printed here show him at his best, and Professor Segal's translations keep their fast, rollicking pace intact, making these the most readable and actable versions available. His introduction considers Plautus' place in ancient comedy. examines his continuing influence, and celebrates his power to entertain. Includes: The Braggart Soldier; The Brothers Menaechmus; The Haunted House; The Pot of Gold

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The special genius of the Roman comic poet Plautus is the wedding of native Italian farce with the mature and polished constructions of Greek comedy. The three plays translated in this book all contain that almost inevitable kernel of Greek comic plot: the love affair. But they have little else in common. In the first, a self-inflating soldier tries to live up to his image of himself as a lover. In the second, a beautiful maiden is rescued from an evil pimp. And in the third, an ill-starred husband fancies himself in love with his wife's young housemaid. Clever, or at least ambitious, slaves tend to move the action, in which the rudeness of farce merges with exuberant wit, satire, and parody.

"The works of Plautus," writes Palmer Bovie, "mark the real beginning of Roman literature." Now Bovie and David Slavitt have brought together a distinguished group of translators for the final two volumes of a four-volume set containing all twenty-one surviving comedies of one of Western literature's greatest dramatists. Born in Sarsina, Umbria, in 254 B.C., Plautus is said to have worked in Rome as a stage carpenter and later as a miller's helper. Whether authentic or not, these few details about the playwright's life are consistent with the image of him one might infer from his plays. Plautus was not "literary" but rather an energetic and resourceful man of the world who spoke the language of the people. His dramatic works were his way of describing and portraying that world in a language the people understood. Since Plautus's career unfolded against the background of the Second Punic War, it is not surprising that his prologues often end with a wish for the audience's "good luck against your enemies" or that the plays have their share of arrogant generals, boastful military captains, and mercenary adventurers. But other unforgettable characters are here as well—among them Euclio, in the Aulularia, the model for Molière's miser. In these lively new translations, which effectively communicate the vitality and verve of the originals, the plays of Plautus are accessible to a new generation. Plays and translators: Volume 4: Persa, Palmer Bovie . Menaechmi, Palmer Bovie . Cistellaria, R. H. W. Dillard . Pseudolus, Richard Beacham . Stichus, Carol Poster . Vidularia, John Wright.

The special genius of the Roman comic poet Plautus is the wedding of native Italian farce with the mature and polished constructions of Greek comedy. The three plays translated in this book all contain that almost inevitable kernel of Greek comic plot: the love affair. But they have little else in common. In the first, a self-inflating soldier tries to live up to his image of himself as a lover. In the second, a beautiful maiden is rescued from an evil pimp. And in the third, an ill-starred husband fancies himself in love with his wife's young housemaid. Clever, or at least ambitious, slaves tend to move the action, in which the rudeness of farce merges with exuberant wit, satire, and parody.