Five Comedies: Miles Gloriosus, Menaechmi, Bacchides, Hecyra and Adelphoe

by Plautus, Terence, Douglass Parker

This is a book worthy of high praise. . . . All versions are exceedingly witty and versatile, in verse that ripples from one’s lips, pulling all the punches of Plautus, the knockabout king of farce, and proving that the more polished Terence can be just as funny. Accuracy to the original has been thoroughly respected, but look at the humour in rendering Diphilius’ play called Synapothnescontes as Three’s a Shroud. . . . Students in schools and colleges will benefit from short introductions to each play, to Roman stage conventions, to different types of Greek and Roman comedy, and there is a note on staging, with a diagram illustrating a typical Roman stage and further diagrams of the basic set for each play. The translators have paid more attention to stage directions than is usually given in translations, because they aim to show how these plays worked. This is a book to be used and enjoyed. --Raymond J. Clark, The Classical Outlook

Genres: Plays, Classics, College, Classical Studies, Drama, Read For School

424 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1938

About the author

Titus Maccius Plautus (c. 254 – 184 BC), commonly known as Plautus, was a Roman playwright of the Old Latin period. His comedies are the earliest works in Latin literature to have survived in their entirety. He wrote Palliata comoedia, the genre devised by the innovator of Latin literature, Livius Andronicus. The word Plautine refers to both Plautus's own works and works similar to or influenced by his.

Reviews

[Emma Whaley · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the funniest books I've ever read for class. The comedies are translated perfectly to remain humorous to even modern audiences. It just goes to show that some things have been funny for all of humanity. The translators know this and abuse the hell out of it.

[Corvo · Rating 3 out of 5]

Miles= Good, would recommend.
Menaechmi= very good, probably very funny on stage. Would recommend.
Bacchides= good. Funny, especially when performed.
Adelphoe= decent. Kind of boring. Doesn’t hold up well for modern audiences.
Hecyra= very problematic, definitely doesn’t hold up well. Would not recommend.

[Charlotte Lepage · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 The Greeks just do it so much better.

[Mirabella Ziegler · Rating 3 out of 5]

all we do is reuse media!! Plautus stole this from the Greeks and Shakespeare stole this from Plautus!!

[Ben · Rating 2 out of 5]

They say that comedy is one of the most difficult things to do well: itʻs so much a question of timing, phrasing, even the choice of an individual word can make or break a joke (and perhaps a whole scene, as well). So much harder, then, is the job of a translator of comedy; and this combination of Plautus & Terence, Parker & Berg achieves very mixed results, but Iʻm glad that they made the attempt.

Plautus, as the author of emotionally simple plots, boisterous energy, and almost non-stop wordplay, strikes me as the harder of the two authors to adapt. He is very much a product of his time and place and was well adapted to it, as his place as the more popular of the playwrights among the ancient Romans attests. But the result is that he doesn't necessarily travel well, across either time or space. We've no doubt lost much of the nuance of many of the words he uses and can therefore only guess at the effect that they would have had on the audience. Worst still, trying to approximate not just the jokes, but also the very sounds of the words themselves used to make them is would be a nearly impossible task under the best of circumstances. With this in mind, it's hardly a condemnation to say that Parker shoots a bit wide of the mark. His use of alliteration comes off feeling forced and the insults he uses end up just sounding foolish (but not in a good way). The energy is there; the art (and thereby, much of the humor, as well) is lacking.

Berg's Terence is strikingly different. Terence is, of course, the more restrained, thoughtful writer, whose plots may not achieve the guffaws of a Plautine farce, but are nevertheless, in their way, more well rounded as pieces of literature. They give the reader (or, more ideally, viewer) not just something to laugh at, but something to think about: an engaged member of the audience cannot simply let a Terentian play wash over him like a Plautine, then leave the theater unchanged by the experience. Terence taps into some very basic conflicts, and they in turn almost force the theater-goer/reader to form an opinion, take a side, root for one character or another. And so, where Terence puts less emphasis on wordplay (which is not, by any means, to say "elegance of phrasing") and more on ideas, his plays, it seems to me, are pre-primed for a potentially more positive reception from audiences of a far wider array of times and places.

In the end, I enjoyed Berg's Terence more than Parker's Plautus, perhaps for the reasons mentioned above. But then again, it is all just a matter of taste, and as the Romans themselves might say, de gustibus non disputandum est!

[bridget Michelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

we are reading this right now in my comedy and satire in greece and rome. it is great our school theater is putting on miles gloriosus (the braggart solider. it is pretty funny stuff
the only draw back is the change in names...plautus' plays are all very similar so if you read one it is like reading them all. perhaps a different translation will be better.

[Lady Betsy · Rating 4 out of 5]

The translation was pretty colloquial, in my opinion. It was easier to understand. The only downfall to this is the names of the characters as they don't use their real Greek names. So it took a while for me to figure out what Dexter's Greek name was, and etc. It had a rocky start at first as it didn't capture my attention but after a few pages it finally made sense and found the humor in it.

[Debi · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was my first time using this book in an Ancient Comedy class. It worked well. Though I didn't like the modernized names the editors gave to characters, my students found them very helpful. The translations are clear and well done. I'll be using this book again.

[Paulina Ree · Rating 5 out of 5]

one of my favorite greek dramas! very witty love/betrayal stories

[Jeremy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read Adelphos and Bacchides.

Though they aren't the funniest of ancient comedies, they are brilliant for their dramatic irony and their multiple plots.

[Samantha McLaughlin]

This book was read for my Latin Literature and Society class at university.