return to Cl 0.1

Professor D. Wilson

• political satire
• primary interest is public realm & conflict
• to inform and give useful advice (public)
• outrageous solutions to problems
• dramatis personae: 'dêmos-guy' and larger-than- life fantastic figures
• obscenity, ridicule, abuse
• chorus regularly central, addresses audience
• complicated meters
• padded costumes and masks

• social commentary
• primary interest is domestic realm & conflict
• comment on ethics of private life (??)
• problems resolved through personal relationships/ interaction
• dramatis personae: stock characters readily identified with different social classes
• "comedy of manners"
• chorus detached from plot
• meter similar to spoken language
• street clothes and masks

• intended effect on the audience: to make them laugh
• festive drama
• violation of dramatic illusion
• generation gap exploited
• exploit tragic plots and conventions (especially Euripides)
• subversive attacks (overt or understated) on social conformity

ACT I

• Prologue spoken by Moschion sets up the domestic conflict that will lead to a comic series of misunderstandings on the part of the three men about the baby.
• Dialogue between Moschion, Parmenon, and Chrysis: characterization of Moschion as hesitant, Parmenon as bolder, and Chrysis as kind and convinced of Demeas' love for her.
• Dialogue between Demeas and Nikateros: reveals that the wedding arrangements are already agreed upon.
• By the end of the scene, we the audience have all the details to enjoy observing the humorous--and nearly-but-not-quite-tragic--series of misunderstandings involving the three men upon whom the marriage, and the meaning of the baby, depend.

ACT II

• Demeas' "partial" discovery leads to a potentially tragic situation that is defused by Moschion, who "sticks to his story" rather than claiming his son.
• By the end of the act, the dilemma set up in the prologue appears to have been resolved, without revealing the intrigue.

ACT III

• "In the midst of a fair voyage, a storm can suddenly appear from nowhere. . ." (207f)
• Demeas' further 'discoveries' (overhears the nurse and sees Chrysis nursing the baby) lead him to infer, wrongly, that the baby is Moschion's and Chrysis'.
• Demeas attempts to exact the truth from Parmenon, who at first sticks to the story agreed upon; when Demeas says he knows the "whole truth," Parmenon admits that the baby is Moschion's. He fails, however, to admit to the intrigue, thus reinforcing Demeas' false inference.
• Here Menander's comedy flirts overtly with tragedy, all the while keeping it firmly ensconced in its comic setting:

  "O citadel of Kekrops' land, O vault of heaven on high. . ."(326f). Demeas reasons that Moschion has cleared himself of the guilt of sleeping with his father's concubine (which amounts to incest) by his eagerness for the upcoming marriage; therefore Chrysis, that HELEN, that trollop, must have seduced Moschion. She will have to go. An Athenian audience could hardly have missed the allusions to Euripides' Hippolytos, nor would the ironic inversions have escaped them (he sides with his son instead of his concubine, his son is in fact the seducer; cp. the inversion of Helen as the rapist!). The tragic scene in which Demeas throws Chrysis and "her" baby (whom we know to be his grandson) is penetrated with comic interruptions by the cook

ACT IV

• Revelation of the facts behind the events--an essential condition for a solution to the complexities of the plot in the spirit of comedy--finally takes place as Moschion admits his deed and the intrigue to his father.
• An even more extreme and comic variant of the tragic theme developed in Act III is reenacted by Nikateros when he finds HIS daughter nursing the baby.
• Demeas calm Nikateros' frenzied anger with comic deployment of a mythic theme: Zeus' penetration of Danae's prison (and of Danae) in the form of golden rain. Think! Does any part of your roof leak?" (390f).
• All is ready for the wedding; the conflict known to the audience has been resolved and the audience expects the ceremonies to begin. But Menander has a surprise in Act V.

ACT V

• Menander transfers the conflict within the household from the erotic relationship to the one between father and son, bringing the filial relationship to light as the chief interest of the drama.
• Moschion delays the wedding, for which he has been so eager, in order to punish his father for thinking Moschion would have sex with Demeas' concubine. He pretends to be preparing to run off and "join the army."
• The relationship between father and son is restored through personal interaction; Demeas gently corrects Moschion for disgracing him publicly, when he himself had tried to protect Moschion from disgrace.
• An appeal is made to the audience for favor, and the play dissolves in a festive procession, mirroring the festive context of the performance.

Some closing comments and questions for further consideration

• This is not a love story; the love story provides the humorous incident for a story about the relationship between an adoptive father and his son. [On the adoptive relationship, my thoughts are that it serves primarily to highlight Demeas' character as kindly and to enable the narrative details of the play, but is not social commentary on the institution of adoption per se.]
• Think about the effect on an Athenian audience, perhaps primarily male, watching Demeas misjudge a situation and condemn an innocent female of unrestrained sexual behavior, when in fact "we" know her to be innocent and his son to be guilty of rape. How might such a scene interact with other poetic traditions and with gender roles and expectations in 4th century Athens? IF New Comedy does indeed engage in social commentary, do you think Menander is affirming or contesting traditional views on relationships between the sexes?
• The tension created by Demeas' relationship with a non-Athenian emerges as an index of the generation gap between father and son. Moschion thinks the whole question of "legitimacy" is foolishness, what is important is that "we" are all human; Demeas, on the other hand, seems committed to the polis values inherent in citizenship by birth. How might the "new" notions of cosmopolitanism have contributed to the generation gap between Demeas and Moschion?