Contents

• The Clever Slave and the Intrigue 

• The Soldier

• Supporting Characters

• Comic Devices and Convention 

• Bibliography

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Suggested Viewing

Rent A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum from your local video store.  This is a film version of Stephen Sondheim's 1962 Broadway musical, which combines the plot of three comedies by Plautus (The Haunted House, Pseudolus, and Casina). Although this film does not use The Swaggering Soldier as a source, it still has much in common with that play: in the film there is a soldier (called Miles Gloriosus), Pseudolus is a clever slave like Palaestrio, and the plot revolves around the clever slave getting a prostitute away from the soldier for his young master.  The film, even if not a historically informed production of Roman comedy, nonetheless successfully captures the spirit of that genre. 

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N.B.  With a very few exceptions, the translations of The Swaggering Soldier's text in this lecture are from E.F. Watling's Penguin translation of the play.  The remaining few are by the lecture's author.

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