A Study On The Attic Old Comedy

The comedy originates in ancient Greece, and the Attica is the most prosperous region of comedy culture in ancient Greece. According to the process of development, Attic comedy was divided into the old comedy, the middle comedy and the new comedy by the author of the Tractatus Coislinianus. The old comedy is most special among them. The birth and mood of the old comedy have the close relationship with the cult of Dionysos which was spreaded widely in the Greece world and was influenced by Athenian political transformation. Therefore this thesis attempts to take the classical resouces as foundation and uses theories and methods of the history, the psychology, the sociology, the religion, the literature and Communication to study the correlation between Attic old comedy and the cult of Dionysos, Athenian politics.This theis is divided into four parts totally, respectively introduce the psychogenic idiosyncrasy, survey of old comedy, the intrinsic relations between Attica old comedy and the cult of Dionysos, and the interactive relations between the old comedy and Athens politics.The first part:Introduction.This part explains the definition of the Attic old comedy and introduces the value of this study, and the innovative points of this thesis.The second part: psychogenic idiosyncrasy in the Attic old comedy. Firstly,Taking three essential factors: imitation, laugh, the introspection as the clue, the writer introduces the process of the ancient greece comedy coming into being,the development stage of the Attic comedy,Aristophanes,the most famous poet in Attica, and his works. Secondly, the writer analyzes the 'converse Oedipus complex' in the old comedy. Thirdly ,the writer points out the antinomy relation between the rational spirit and the irreasonableness in old comedy, furthermore,the dual property and dual function of laugh in the old comedy.The third part: the cult of Dionysos: the origin of Attic old comedy. Dionysos,who is the reversed Zeus, is psychological rootstock of the 'converse Oedipus complex'. Madness in the cult of Dionsos and laugh in old comedy is homogeneity. Non-rational cult of dionysos has established the non-rational base for the old comedy.The forth part:Attic old comedy and Athenian politics. The old comedy's performance style formed when Athens political situation had been changing during B.C. 7- the 6th century,which was protected by the old comedy's religious and got tolerance of the city-state. The old comedy and the city-state political life has the interactive relations.