Plautus: Casina PDF
Preview Plautus: Casina
CAMBRIDGE GREEK AND LATIN CLASSICS GENERAL EDITORS E.J. KENNEY Fellow of PeterhouseC, ambridge AND MRS P. E. EASTERLING Fellow of Newnham College,C ambridge PLAUTUS CA§INA EDITED BY W. T. MAcCAR Y AssistantP roftssoro f Classiu in tlu Univnsity of Texas AND M. M. WILLCOCK Profu sor of Classiu in tlu Uniwrsityo f Lancasur CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS CAMBRIDGE LONDON• NEW YORK• MELBOURNE Published by the Syndics of the Cambridge University Press The Pitt Building, Trumpington Street, Cambridge CB 2 1 RP Bentley House, Euston Road, London 1 2 200 NW DB 32 East 57th Street, New York, NY 10022, USA 296 Beaconsfield Parade, Middle Park, Melbourne 32o6, Australia © Cambridge University Press 1976 ISBN: o 521 21041 o hard covers ISBN: o 521 29022 8 paperback First published 1976 Printed in Great Britain at the University Printing House, Cambridge (Euan Phillips, University Printer) CONTENTS Preface page vii Introduction I I GreekN ew Comedy ( (a) Its relationt o previousd rama 3 (h ) Its relationt o reality 5 (c ) Its relationt o universalp atterns of comedy 7 2 Roman comedy 9 3 Plautus 13 (a) Comparedt o Menander 13 (h ) Comparedt o Diphilus 16 (c) Comparedt o reality 17 4 Casina 21 (a) Production 21 (b ) Language 23 (c) Imagery 27 (d) Structurea nd themes 34 T. MA CCI PLA VTI CASINA 41 Commentary 95 Appendices 1 The scansiono f Plautint verse 211 2 The text 233 Bibliography 236 Indexes Latin words 1 General 2 [ V] PREFACE Our association started in the relationship of tutor (M.M.W.) and pupil (W.T.M.) at Sidney Su~sex College, Cambridge, in the years 1963-5, and continued when we were colleagues at the University of Minnesota in 1971. It was there that the work for this book began, in a jointly given graduate seminar. Responsibility for the finished product is divided, in that the Introduction is the work of W.T.M., the text and metre (including the Appendices) that of M.M.W., who also composed the first draft of the Commentary. All parts, however, have been continuously discussed between us, and there is little or nothing here now with which either would disagree. We wish to thank particularly Professor Kenney and Mrs Easterling, the Cambridge editors, for most conscientious and careful reading of the typescript and countless helpful suggestions; also Mr J.C. B. Foster of the University of Liverpool, who read and commented on most of the Commentary at an early stage, and Mr R.H. Martin of Leeds, who did the same for the Introduction and Appendix 2. Professor Chauncey E. Finch of the University of St Louis kindly helped with information about manuscript readings; Professor F. H. Sandbach of Cambridge communicated a characteristically clear-sighted argument about the speaker of line 392, and Miss Susan Hines, then of the University of Minnesota, convinced us about the speaker of the second half of 814. We are indebted also, for speedy provision of microfilms or photocopies of manuscripts, to the Vatican and Ambrosian Libraries, the University Library at Leiden, and the British Museum. April 1975 W.T.M. M.M.W. For the full titles of works cited by author's name only, see NOTE. the Bibliography, pp. 236--8. l vii l INTRODUCTION 1. GREEK NEW COMEDY The plays of Plautus arc not completely original crcatiorns, but adaptations into Latin, for the Roman stage, of Greek comedies first produced in Athens. Attic comedy is conventionally divided into three periods: Old Comedy, Middle Comedy and New Comedy. Old Comedy was the work of various poets active during the fifth century B.c.; only nine plays of Aristophanes have survived from this period, though the work of Eupolis, Cratinus and others is known to us through fragments. The beginning of Middle Comedy is set either at the end of the fifth century or in 388 at the death of Aristophanes, whose last two extant plays, &cleJia,z.uJaea nd PluluJ, differ in im portant respects from his earlier plays and are considered to mark the transition to this second period. In addition, we have fragments of plays by Alexis, Anaxandrides, Antiphanes and others. The first production of Menander, in 321, is taken as the beginning of New Comedy, which extends to the middle of the third century, when our evidence for activity on the comic stage in Athens comes to an end. From this period we have one complete play, and five others more or less complete, of Menander, and fragments of plays by Diphilus, Philemon and others. All of Plautus' plays are thought to have been adapted from New Comedy originals. 1 Greek New Comedy is a dramatic form which is in some respects quite foreign 'to modern audiences and in others essentially the same as much of the comedy which is even now being produced. We can reconstruct the plots of about fifty of these plays. Generally there are two young lovers who are separated by some kind of barrier: the girl is thought to be a slave or a foreigner and therefore unmarriageable; the boy is not acceptable to her father; there are rival lovers or previously arranged marriages. The action of the play is concen- 1 },'or earlier dating of thr originals of thr Amphit,uo and the Menarchmi, sec Webster 67 -97. [ I ] 2 INTRODUCTION trated on removing these barriers so that the lovers can be married. This is accomplished by recognition and reconciliation between estranged members of the family or changes in attitude which un expected new circumstances bring about. These 'barrier comedies' tend to end in some form of marriage: usually the young lovers gain their parents' approval for an actual marriage; if the plot turns on a misunderstanding between husband and wife, there is reconciliation; if the girl is in fact unmarriageable under Attic law, her arrangement with the boy is nevertheless stabilized by· a guarantee of financial support from his father. We see in this achievement of the young lovers a promise of new life and fertility, and a restatement of the values of social life: people can and should get along with each other, and, when they understand each other's good intentions, they do. wsx a:ptev av Menander put this succinctly: tcrr• av6pc.>nas, av6p(l,)1TQS ij (fr. 484), 'man is a thing of grace and goodness, so long as he follows his nature'. The barriers are perversions of human nature; youth triumphs over age, love over money, charity and goodness over selfishness and aggressiveness. There are complications to this main action, and characters subordinate to the young lovers and their parents. We find various professional types - soldiers, courtesans, cooks, parasites, pimps, doctors, money-lenders - in addition to household slaves and family friends. The social conventions which make the plots work seem strange to us: babies are abandoned and raised by strangers or stolen by pirates and sold into slavery; free women of the upper classes are secluded from male company and a variety of professional women fill their place; members of wealthy families have no occupations, but live off their lands, which are worked by slaves. We seldom find serious social criticism in the plays, nor indeed does our appreciation of them depend essentially on knowledge of the times in which they were written. Nevertheless we should know that there is some relation between their conventions and reality. So, too, we should see New Comedy as a development - the final development - in the long history of Greek drama; it did not spring suddenly from the context of fourth-century society, but grew out of the combined traditions of earlier comedy, tragedy and satyr play.
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