Popular Comedy Conference
About the conference
The comic theatre of Greece and Rome, like that of many other crucial periods of comic history (e.g. Elizabethan and Jacobean drama; music hall; vaudeville) is often described as popular comedy. This conference aims to investigate the extent, limits and utility of considering comic drama to be "popular". We are particularly interested in the modes of performance and reception of comedy. How far does performance in front of a mass audience shape the form and language of comedy? How genuinely "popular" are different comic traditions? To what extent and in what ways do "elite" and "popular" interact in the original and subsequent contexts of reception? Is "popular comedy" a useful term or is it subsuming other more challenging concepts (such as, for example, class)? And to what extent can parallel themes in the production and reception of popular comedy be seen across cultures? The conference begins with the comic traditions of Greece and Rome, but is intended to broaden out the question to consider popular comedy in other periods and modes.
Our invited speakers are:
- Dr James Robson (Open)
- Prof. Ralph Rosen (Penn)
- Prof. Alan Sommerstein (Nottingham)
- Prof. Peter Wiseman (Exeter)
The conference is supported by grants from the Institute of Classical Studies and the Classical Association.
Programme
Programme
Wednesday 28 August 2013
| 9-10 | Registration | ||
| 10.00-10.10 | Welcome | ||
| 10.10-10.50 |
Session 1 - Introducing Popular Comedy: |
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| 10.50-11.20 | COFFEE | ||
| Session 2 - Aristophanes: | |||
| 11.20-12.00 | James Robson (Open University), Humouring the masses: the highs and lows of Aristophanic comedy | ||
| 12.00-12.40 | Sarah Miles (Durham University), Paratragedy and popular comic drama | ||
| 12.40-14.00 | LUNCH | ||
| Parallel sessions: | |||
| Session 3 - Menander: | Session 4 - Comic Drama and Beyond: | ||
| 14.00-14.40 | Giorgios Kazantzidis (Oxford), Doctors in a comic costume: medical language and mass audience in the comedy of Menander | Andrea Capra (Milan), A star performer and his people: the staging of Assemblywomen | |
| 14.40-15.20 | Valeria Cinaglia (KCL), ‘Menander and popular ethics’ | Viviane Klein (Boston), Animaniacs and Ancient Greek Satyr Drama | |
| 15.20-16.00 | Stavroula Kiritsi (RHUL), “Menander’s new adventure”: an adaptation of Dyskolos for the modern Greek audience | Steve Kidd (Brown), Is “elite comedy” a paradox? The case for sympotic comedy | |
| 16.00-16.30 | TEA | ||
| 16.30-17.30 | Key note address: Alan Sommerstein (Nottingham), How “popular” was Athenian comedy? | ||
| 18.30-20.00 | Reception: 65 Oakfield Avenue | ||
Thursday 29 August 2013
| Parallel sessions: | |||
| Sesssion 5 - Later Greek Humour: | Session 6 - Film & TV: | ||
| 9.30-10.10 | Inger Kuin (NYU), Audience and performance in Lucian’s comic dialogues | Lee Broughton (Leeds), Popular comedy in a popular film form: surveying and reassessing critical responses to comedic European Westerns | |
| 10.10-10.50 | Anna Foka (Umea), Popular impact equals popular comedy? The case of Byzantine mimes | Kai Schwind (Lillehammer/Oslo), “A chilled out entertainer” – Ricky Gervais in The Office, comedic performance versus the real | |
| 10.50-11.20 | COFFEE | ||
| Session 7 - Roman Mime and Beyond: | |||
| 11.20-12.00 | Andrea Argius (Rome), Late-Republican mime: a source for “public opinion” | ||
| 12.00-12.40 | Ian Goh (Manchester), Eclogues and Satires as a joint response to popular comedy during the Triumvirate | ||
| 12.40-14.00 | LUNCH | ||
| Session 8 - Roman Comedy: | |||
| 14.00-14.40 | Peter Kruschwitz (Reading), Populi sensus maxime theatro et spectaculis perspectus est | ||
| 14.40-15.20 | Amy Richlin (UCLA), Human trafficking and the memory of freedom in Plautine comedy | ||
| 15.20-16.00 | Peter Brown (Trinity, Oxford), The audiences of Plautus and Terence | ||
| 16.00-16.30 |
TEA |
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| 16.30-17.30 | Key note address: Peter Wiseman (Exeter), Liberior iocus: erotic performance in the Roman world | ||
| 19.30 | Conference dinner at a local restaurant | ||
Friday 30 August 2013
| Session 9 - Early Modern: | |||
| 09.30–10.10 | Kate de Rycker (Kent), The reception of Aretino’s comedies in Early Modern England | ||
| 10.10-10.50 | Martina Pranic (FU Berlin/Charles University, Prague), Highs and lows of Dundo Maroje: reconsidering the popularity of the most popular Ragusan comedy | ||
| 10.50-11.20 | COFFEE | ||
| Session 10 - Greek Comedy and Popular Modern Reception: | |||
| 11.20-12.00 | Olga Śmiechowicz (Jagiellonian University, Krakow), Aristophanes for Polish culture between 1890 and 1918 | ||
| 12.00-12.40 | Angeliki Varakis-Martin (Kent), Positive emotion, popular celebration and cognition in the modern staging of Aristophanic comedy | ||
| 12.40-14.00 | LUNCH | ||
| Session 11 - Cross-media perspectives: | |||
| 14.00-14.40 | Ian Wilkie (Institute of Education, London), Vaudeville comedy and twentieth-century art | ||
| 14.40-15.20 | Marcel Lysgaard Lech (University of Southern Denmark), To be and not to be: reflections on the comic character | ||
| 15.20-15.50 | TEA | ||
| 15.50-16.20 |
Concluding remarks and discussion: Costas Panayotakis and Ian Ruffell |
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Practical information
Practical information
Conference venue
The conference will take place in the Western Infirmary Lecture Theatre complex (WILT) - building B9 on map.
Accommodation
Several nearby hotels in Glasgow offer good value for money - please check those recommended by the University of Glasgow' s Conference and Visitor Services Office.
Maps and travel
Maps and travel information are available on the University's web pages
Travel Directions:
- From Edinburgh Airport to Glasgow city centre
Take the airport bus to Edinburgh Waverley (main train station). Take a train from here to either Glasgow Queen Street Station or Glasgow Central Station. Both are in Glasgow city centre. (For the remainder of the journey see 4 for the conference venue). - From Glasgow Airport to Glasgow city centre
An airport bus runs to Buchanan Bus Station in Glasgow city centre (right next to Queen Street Station) every 10 minutes. However, if you are going to the conference venue, it makes more sense to take the 747 bus that runs every 20 minutes, see 3. - From Glasgow Airport to the conference venue
Bus 747 runs every 20 minutes and takes the long way round to the city centre, passing close by the conference venue. Get off at the Western Infirmary, right after Kelvingrove Park. - By taxi from Glasgow Airport
There is a taxi rank outside Arrivals. This is a quicker but more expensive option (around £20). - From Glasgow city centre to the conference venue
Take the subway from Buchanan subway station. From Queen Street Station, follow the subway signs through the underground passage. From Central Station, see map here. Get off at Hillhead.
For more information about how to get to Glasgow or how to get around town, please visit the University of Glasgow website.
Postgraduate bursaries
Postgraduate bursaries
Through the generosity of the Classical Association, we have been able to offer postgraduate bursaries to cover accommodation and registration fees. The closing date for application has however passed and there are none left to be awarded.
Contact us
Contact us
If you have any queries regarding the conference, please contact the organisers:
|
Dr Ian Ruffell Email: Ian.Ruffell@glasgow.ac.uk |
Dr Costas Panayotakis |