Different Types of COMEDY

      

                Generally, Comedy means the form of literature, which ends happily. History of comedy begins with the ancient Greek Comos. Out of these grew the comedy of Aristophanes, generally in satirical tone. Menander, the so called New comedy, which was imitated by the Latin dramatists Plautus and Terence, which was resembled to so called "Comedy of Manners" some 18 century later. The true origin of English comedy however is to be found in the mystery and miracle plays of the modern age.

               When we are talking about the comedy, we shall be acquainted with the various types of comedy. Here, we shall discuss about the five major types of comedy.  

               1. Romantic comedy

               2. Comedy of humours

               3. Comedy of Manners

               4. Sentimental comedy

               5. Black or Dark comedy

              Here, we will discuss four types of comedy which are the most important type of comedy:

1. Romantic comedy:-

                 It is the most popular of all forms of entertainment. This kind of comedy has a pleasant mixture of love and laughter.

               The earliest English romantic Comedy is probably Ralph Roister Doister by Nicholas Udall. Some twelve years later another famous comedy was produced in doubtful authorship which is Gammer Gurton's Needle. Both has farcical and love interest. Shakespeare carried romantic Comedy in such a perfection with A Midsummer night's dream, As you like it and Twelfth night which are best examples of this kind of comedy at its best. 

               Other writers of romentic comedy in Shakespeare's time was Beaumont and Fletcher. Thomas Dekker wrote The Shoemaker's Holiday which is one of the liveliest of English comedies.

2. Comedy of Humours:-

   

            Ben Johnson was the most influential dramatist of this kind of comedy. He is extremely productive writer, not only of plays but also of masques, poetry and critisism. Johnson's idea was that "Comedy should not be 'true to life' but 'larger than life'. Each person should not be real, who has some human passion or weakness. His best comedies were...

• Every man in his Humour
• Every man out of his Humour
• The silent Woman
• Volpone
• The Alchemist
• Bartholomew 

               In "Every man in his Humour", the rich merchant Kitely has a young and pretty wife of whom he is madly jealousy: here jealousy is his Humour, OLd Knowell, is always worried about his son's behaviour and safety: Anxiety is his humour.         

              Johnson's importance does not depend on his theory of comedy, but upon his success as comic dramatist. In some ways they are more acceptable to modern audiences than romantic comedies. This seems clear when we compare a film comedy of that 1930-50 period with one produced during the last decade, not because that love and laughter are out of favour but that so many of us prefer comedy with a satirical tone.

3. Comedy of Manners/ Restoration Comedy:-

                 The phrase Comedy of manners often used in literary history and criticism, though its meaning is not always clear. It applied in England to the Restoration dramatists, especially Congreve and Wycherley. It make fun not so much of individual human beings and their humours as of social groups and their fashionable manners. It generally more or less satirical though in a good natured way. The comedy of manners is most likely to be found in an aristocratic group. It is highly artificial form of drama, full of verbal wit, and sometimes inclined to be cynical and hard. Oscar Wilde and Sheridan is also the biggest writers of this kind of comedy.

Ex.,

•  Wycherley's "The Country Wife"; it was showing the moral weakness of a particular social group, asking us to laugh at it but not necessary to approve of it.
• Sheridan's "The School for Scandal"; it depicts immoral behaviour of Lady Sneewell and Sir Benjamin- presumably because it is not sexually immoral 

                                          

4. Sentimental Comedy:-     

            The chief writer of sentimental comedy was Sir RIchardson Steele. A sentimental comedy was one written with the intention of expressing moral sentiments. In other words it contained an element of preaching, even though the preaching was disguised as entertainment. Steele agreed with Collier that the English stage needed cleaning up. He thought that the cleaning up could best be done by writting new plays rather than by attacking the old ones. He wrote a comedy called The Funeral, which was not very successful at all. In 1722 he produced The Conscious Lovers which had some success on the stage. After this work sentimental comedy ceased for some two centuries to be taken seriously. It was indeed amusingly satirised by several comic writers of the time.

                     In the present century there been a rebirth of the sentimental comedy, but under the name of 'the drama of social consciousness' and  'the drama of commitment' uses by writers who felt that comedy should be morally instructive as well as entertaining. thus writers as different as Wilde, Sir James Barrie, Sir Noel Coward and Sir Terence Rattigan have sometimes been criticised for being frivolous and for having no serious social purpose, whereas Shaw has been praised for using comedy as propaganda for his own. 

Let's wind up...

            So, the four types of comedy which are mentioned above are very useful. All this kind of comedy is very essential part of english literature. It can be called soul of literature.

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