The comic aner : the family man in Athenian Old Comedy

This paper builds on the argument of G.M. Sifakis that, "Types, then, are what the analysis of the dramatic structure of Old Comedy as a genre should aim at specifying" (Sifakis, 135). In this paper, I identify the father and husband, as he appears in certain plays of Old Comedy, as a kind of type character that I label the comic aner. I have chosen to use the Greek "aner" to capture the multifaceted nature of his position in the Greek oikos. The purpose of this paper is to identify the type's primary characteristics and then to consider what an analysis of Old Comedy from this perspective can tell us about the plays and the purposes of their authors. The paper is intended to proceed from the broadest view of the aner as a type in chapter one to a specific example of the function of one variant of the type, Dikaiopolis, in chapter four. The first chapter introduces the type character and identifies him within the plays of Aristophanes and suggests his presence in fragmentary plays of other authors. The second chapter considers how the aner produces humor specifically in his role as a father and husband. Chapter three considers how andres in the Clouds and Wasps indicate Aristophanes' involvement in a broader philosophical conversation on the nature of parent-child relationships. Chapter four examines how broader cultural trends that place greater emphasis on family in the face of hardship during the Peloponnesian War find expression in Aristophanes' Acharnians through the figure of the aner Dikaiopolis. The paper thus illustrates not only the existence of the type, but also its significance.