Abstract

This chapter examines the representation of joy in Roman comedy, in particular the language used to express joy and the way in which the comic writers take up tragic and philosophical ideas. Plautus follows the tragic treatment, which emphasizes the fragility of joy and how it is usually followed by greater pain, while Terence’s treatment stresses how in joy we are without pain and so most like the gods, a central feature of divinity in the Epicurean tradition. Terence also depicts a tension between an intense and private experience of joy and the desire to share one’s good fortune with others. Characters’ experiences of joy are not selfish or egoistic: they expect that others will delight in it, too. These texts thus poignantly depict the social dimensions of emotion, which are deeply intertwined in our relations with others.