Satyric Play The Evolution of Greek Comedy and Satyr Drama [Hardcover]

Satyric Playis the first book to offer an integrated analysis of Greek comedy and satyr drama. Using a literary-historical approach, Carl A. Shaw argues that comedy and satyr plays influenced each other in nearly all stages of their development. Although satyr drama was written by tragedians and employed a number of formal tragic elements, the humorous chorus of half-man, half-horse satyrs encouraged sustained interaction between poets of comedy and satyr play. From sixth-century proto-drama, through classical productions staged at the Athenian City Dionysia, to bookish Alexandrian plays of the third-century, the remains of comic and satyric performances reveal a range of literary, aesthetic, historical, religious, and geographical connections. Shaw analyzes the details of this interplay diachronically, looking at a wide range of literary and material evidence. He shows that ancient critics and poets allude to comic-satyric associations in surprising ways, vases depict fascinating performative connections, and the plays themselves share titles, plots, modes of humor, and occasionally even a chorus of satyrs.Satyric Playuncovers and examines the complex, shifting relationship between comedy and satyr drama, offering insight into the development of these genres and the Greek theatrical experience as a whole.

List of Figures
Abbreviations
Introduction
Chapter One: Comedy and Satyr Drama in Plato and Aristotle
Chapter Two: Early K?mos Songs: Satyric, Precomic, and Dithyrambic Performance
Chapter Three: Sicilian Comedy and the Attic Satyr Play
Chapter Four: Old Comedy, Classical Satyr Drama, and Euripides' Alcesits
Chapter Five: Middle Comedy and the Satyric Style
Chapter Six: Post-Classical Satyr Play and Old Comedy
Conclusion
References
Index of Passages
General Index

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