Comedy from Athens to Hollywood

This course will look at ancient comedy from its birth in Athens and Rome through Renaissance incarnations to the 19th and 20th century, including novels and films as well as plays. We will survey the main topics of comedy, from Aristophanes' focus on the absurdities of daily and political life in Athens to the Roman codification of a genre of everyman in love and in trouble. We will also examine how later writers and filmmakers use both traditions to give comedy its subversive power of social commentary.