Review Article: Comedy

Abstract

This paper reviews and discusses two major publications on Greek comedy (J. Rusten, The Birth of Comedy and I. Storey, Fragments of Old Comedy) in the light of recent advances and trends in scholarship. It focuses in particular on periodization of the genre, including an evaluation of the contribution of ancient scholarship; the evidence for variety in Old Comedy; the different perspectives on competition within the genre; and the presentation and implications of the comic body. An assessment is offered of the impact on scholarship of large-scale research projects such as Kassel and Austin's Poetae Comici Graeci and Koster et al.'s Scholia in Aristophanem, as well as the growing material evidence for Greek comedy, its context and reception. Some significant ongoing problems are identified which require further study.