Grotesque Realism in Plautus' "Amphitruo"

Author(s): David Christenson

Reviewed work(s):
Source: The Classical Journal, Vol. 96, No. 3 (Feb. - Mar., 2001), pp. 243-260
Published by: The Classical Association of the Middle West and South
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 GROTESQUEREALISMIN PLAUTUS'AMPHITRUO

Smphitruohas always stood apart amongPlautus'plays.

Critics have tended to take Mercury'splayful description
of Am. as a tragicomoedia (59, 63) all too seriously and
have perceived in it an unhappy blend of tragic and comic elements.
Much discomforthas centeredaroundthe figure of Alcmena, who is
often characterized as a misplaced tragic heroine. The com-
mentator Sedgwick typifies this view: "Whenever Alcmena
appears, P. forgets his clowning and the tone changes to something
not unworthy of tragedy, a high seriousnesssuch as would befit a
Romanmatron. P. makes free with the gods and the general, but is
overawed by the ideal wife and mother."' This characterization
was canonized in the CambridgeHistory of Classical Literature,
where Gratwickasserts that Alcmena is "presentedpowerfully as a
tragic heroine" and describes her canticum at 633-53 as "a tragic
aria, in which it is wrong to see any parody."2 Hunter, in his influ-
ential study of New Comedy, echoes this sentiment when he pro-
claims Alcmena to be "the epitome of the respected Roman
matrona."3 The notion of a tragic Alcmena has indeed met with
little dissent. In 1983 Perelli4 argued that Plautus' presentation of
her is rife with parody, but the primarily literary models he ad-
duces do not always seem apropos,and at any rate would be largely
lost on Plautus' audience. Two years later Phillips5 more convinc-

'Sedgwick 103.
2 CHCLII 109-10 and 130,
respectively. Cf. also Romano 875: "Alcumena is
clearlynot meant to be a comic figure and her style has its closest counterpart in
Greektragedy."
3 Hunter 126. More recently, the Italian commentatorOniga 213-14 writes
similarlyof Alcmena'scanticum: "Il discorsosi articolain varie sezioni, in cui metro e
sintassi,strettamenteuniti, seguono pensieri pieni di dignita matronale e di serieta
perfettamentetragica."
4 Perelli383-94.
5 Phillips121-6. In respondingto Phillips'article,Slater(1990)113 n. 24 notes his
reluctance to eschew the tragic view of Alcmena. Moore 108-25argues that comic
elementsgenerallyprevailover tragicones in the play but gives the (comic) figure of
Alcmenaonly passing notice (120).

THE CLASSICALJOURNAL96.3 (2001) 243-260

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244 DAVID CHRISTENSON

ingly assailed the predominant view by stressing the visual impact

of a pregnant character on stage, and by briefly analyzing
Alcmena's famous monody (633-53) in light of this. This paper will
follow Phillips' approach in carefully considering Plautus'
Alcmena in the context of performance, and seek to bolster her ar-
guments by examining this character from the perspective of Mik-
hail Bakhtin's concept of "grotesque realism." But whereas
Phillips was unwilling to "deny any point of contact between the
critics' tragic heroine and Plautus' Alcmena,"6 I shall argue that
the presentation of her character is thoroughly farcical, and en-
tirely consistent with Plautus' mythological burlesque and sex
farce.

Matrona grauida

The essentialprincipleof grotesquerealismis degradation,that is, the lower-

ing of all that is high, spiritual,ideal, abstract;it is a transfer to the material
level, to the sphereof earthand body in theirindissolubleunity.
To degradealso means to concernoneselfwith the lower stratumof the body,
the life of the belly and the reproductiveorgans;it thereforerelates to acts of
defecationand copulation,pregnancy,and birth. Degradationdigs a bodily
grave for a new birth:it has not only a destructive,negative aspect,but also a
regeneratingone.7

Though no rival to such monstrous grotesques as Rabelais' Pan-

tagruel ever appeared on Plautus' stage (or, probably, any stage),
essential features of grotesque realism are immediately recogniz-
able in Alcmena. As a jest of Sosia's makes abundantly clear (667),8
Alcmena appeared in grotesquely padded costume to mark the im-
minent birth of twins, one of whom is the superhuman Hercules.9
No other character in extant Greek and Roman drama appears
pregnant on stage, and in New Comedy pregnant women convention-
ally are only heard giving birth offstage.10 Moreover, matronae

6 Phillips122.
Bakhtin19-20and 21, respectively.
8Alcumenam ante aedisstaresaturamintellego.Cf. also Amphitryon'sgreeting in
the same scene, 681 et quom[te]grauidamet quomtepulchreplenamaspicio,gaudeo.
9 Cf. Phillips123.
10 Cf. Duckworth 125-6. Pregnancyas a palpablecondition may have figured
more extensivelyin Italianpopulartheater,as is suggestedby the meagerfragmentsof
Atellan farce:cf. Pompon. com.19-20 R si praegnansI non es, paribisnumquam, 55-6 R
decimusmensisest, cumfactumest. ita fit, ita sempersolet: I decumomensedemumturgens
uerminatur, parturit,and the title Satura("Medley"or a sketch featuringa pregnant
woman?).

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 GROTESQUEREALISM 245

(in contrast to meretrices) seldom appear ca the Plautine stage at

all, save to frustrate their husband's adulterous desires."1 In Am.,
Alcmena, who unwittingly engages in adultery,'2 holds the stage in
her bloated and caricatured form in no less than five scenes.'3 She
thus literally embodies what elsewhere in Plautus is a vehicle for
grotesque humor, as when the potbellied leno Cappadox proclaims
that he is carrying twins, Cur. 221 geminos in uentre habere uideor
filios.14 The appearance of any pregnant character, let alone an
exaggeratedly stuffed matrona, must have had an arresting visual
effect cn Plautus' audience: the body of the Roman matron, as also
the sexual affair within Amphitryon's household, has been comi-
cally-and very publically-turned inside out.
Alcmena does not come cn stage until the play's third scene
(499-550), but her appearance and her condition are forecasted
loudly and clearly. In the prologue Mercury piques the audience's
curiosity by stressing that she is pregnant (grauida) by both her
husband and Jupiter (103, 109, 111), and, when he effectively re-
sumes his prologue after the lengthy first scene (153-462), the god
divulges that she is about to give birth to twins (480). Thus, by the
time Mercury announces the entrance of Jupiter's uxor usuraria (498)
the audience awaits her appearance with much anticipation.
Plautus does not disappoint and has Jupiter immediately showcase
her condition at the scene's opening (499-500):

bene uale,Alcumena,curaremcommunem,quodfacis,
atqueinpercequaeso:mensesiam tibi esse actosuides.
"Good-bye,Alcmena. Take care for our commoninterest, as you are, and
please take it easy:you see thatyour time is now at hand."

Here we greatly rue the lack of visual evidence for early Roman
theater, and so a precise picture of Alcmena's costume, but it is at
least easy to imagine the audience's collective laughter when Jupi-
ter focuses all attention on her distended stomach. The actor play-
ing Alcmena (or Jupiter himself") might proudly stroke his

11As in, e.g., Cas.:cf. CHCLII

1109-10.
12So the of and Alcmena is
relationship Jupiter blatantlydescribedby Mercury,
134-5illaillumcensetuirum suomesse,quaecummoechoest.
13499-550,633-860,882-955,956-72,frs. 7-10.
14 Cf. St. 155-70,where the voracious
parasite Gelasimusin his bombasticen-
tranceclaimsthatFameshas been gestatinginside him for severalyears.
"5Forsuggestionsof Jupiter'sroaminghands in the text see 507,526, 903. Forthe
commoncarnivalesquegestureof belly-pattingin generalsee Bakhtin16.

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246 DAVID CHRISTENSON

bloated belly here, and the fact that this unusual spectacle was
created by a male actor would elicit additional laughs. Overt
metatheatricalplay with the convention of men performingfemale
roles is curiously lacking in Plautus,'6 a highly self-reflexive
playwright," but we should not conclude that Roman audiences
were blind to the actors' identity as males of (mostly) low status in
everyday life.'" Mercuryin the prologueof Am. reminds the audi-
ence of precisely this fact when he turns a jest (26-8) on his, and the
actorplaying Jupiter's,true social status.19 Similarly, his lengthy
parodicdecreeon claquesin the theater (64-85) foregroundsthe ac-
tors' participationin some sort of theatricalcompetition.20 The use
of stereotypical masks and costumes to some extent may have
bridged the gap between the actor's genderand the female charac-
ter he portrayed,21but if Roman comic actors employed falsetto,
the audience would be constantlycognizant that the female charac-
ters were being played by men. A passage in Quintilian criticizing
actors for inappropriately using an effeminata uox suggests that
this was the case in his day.22 And an exchange between two cour-
tesans at Rud. 233-4 (certouox muliebris auris tetigit meas :: mulier
est, muliebris uox mi ad auris uenit) is more comic if the actors
speak in artificially high tones.23 Thus it seems very likely that
Plautus' audience would take especial delight in the rare spectacle

16 One notable exception is Cas.,where in the play-within-the-playthe sexual

humoris built on Chalinus'impersonationof the femaleslave Casina:see furtherGold
17-29. Cf. also Taaffe140.
17 Cf. Slater (1985) passim.
18 Foractors'statussee Edwards123-31and Rawson.

'9 See Christenson26-7,28nn.

20
Cf. also Jupiter'sjest on his true social statusat 861-6(with Dupont 135-6).
21Thoughin Am.whateverdistortingalterationswere made to the conventional
costume of the matronamight by themselvesneutralizethis tendency.
22 Inst. 11. 3. 91 cum mihi comoedi
quoque pessimefacere uideantur, quod, etiamsi
iuuenemagant, cum tamenin expositioneaut senis sermo, ut in Hydriae prologo, aut mulieris,
ut in Georgo,incidit, tremulauel effeminatauocepronuntiant.
23 It is also
very easy to imagineChalinus using falsetto in the transvestite play-
within-the-play of Cas.,e.g. 978 non amas me? Cf. also Pompon. com. 57-8 R (in-
structions for a play-within-the-play?) uocem deducas oportet, ut uideantur mulieris I
uerba.Alternatively,this disjunction of gender and role is no less prominent, and
therefore no less humorous,if the adult actor used his naturalvoice, depending of
course on its depth (=perceived "maleness"in this culture; for the Romanmoralists'
assimilatetheir voices to those of
view that only the desidiosaiuuentus(i.e. effeminati)
women see Sen. Con. 1 praef.8 cantandi saltandiqueobscena studia effeminatostenent; [et]
capillumfrangere et ad muliebresblanditias extenuare vocem, mollitia corporis certare cum
feminis et immundissimisse excoleremunditiisnostrorumadulescentiumspecimenest).

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 GROTESQUEREALISM 247

of a male actor usurpingfemale fecundity itself; in performance,

this actor most probably seized every opportunity to highlight this
(biological) disjunctionthrough his gestures and intonations.24
Matrona(non?) satura

Proponentsof the tragic Alcmena not only point to her high-

minded sentiments25in complete isolation from the immediate,
visual aspects of her character discussed above, but also have
tended to overlook a distinctive feature of Plautus' representation
of her: she is made to be sexually insatiable.26 The sexually cari-
caturedAlcmena stands in stark contrast to the reserved and digni-
fied public persona of the idealized Roman matron.27 In the
prologue Mercuryannouncedthat the night had been lengthened
"while [Jupiter]takes his pleasure [uoluptatem]with Alcmena, the
objectof his desire" (113-14), and elsewhere used explicit language
to suggest the couple's sexual activity inside (104-12, 131-5). Simi-
larly, in the play's lengthy opening scene Sosia jests that the pro-
longed night is perfect for hiring an expensive prostitute (288), and
Mercuryin an aside (289-90)immediately approves of Jupiter's dal-
liance with Alcmena as demonstratingsimilar sexual opportunism.
And Mercuryin his prologizing address before Alcmena's first en-
trance again stressed the carnality of the affair (465) and stated
that he was present to cause confusionthroughout the household
"until [Jupiter]takes his fill [satietatem]of his lover" (472-3). But
despite all the sexual gymnastics Plautus wants his audience to
imagine to have taken place inside, Alcmena in her first appear-
ance immediately shows herself to be extremely solicitous about
the prospect of Jupiter'ssudden departure:502 quid istuc est, mi uir,
negoti,quodtu tam subitodomoabeas,"Whatreason do you have to
leave home so suddenly, my dear?" Jupiter,exasperated and eager
to depart, ironically asks her, "Isn't it enough [satin habes] if
there'sno woman I love as much as I do you?" (509). Obviously, this
is not "enough" for Alcmena, who, following Mercury's equally
ironic aside (510-11),replies (512-13):

24 Exaggerationof behaviorconventionallyassociated with the opposite sex is

common in (usuallyritualistic)transvestitedramain many societies:Apte 156-7.
25Esp. 641a-53,839-42.
26 Brieflydiscussed
by Segal 180-82,who nonetheless approves Hanson's view
that she is "the greatestincarnationof pietason the Romanstage"(180).
27Forwhich see
Treggiari229-61.

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248 DAVID CHRISTENSON

expeririistucmauellemme quammi memorarier.

pnus abis quam lectus ubi cubuisticoncaluitlocus.
"I'dpreferfirst-handexperienceof that to just being told so. You're leaving
me beforethe partof the couchwhere you lay had a chanceto warm up."

With Alcmena's ridiculous lament about the temperature of the

couple's bed of love, the motif of satietas, to this point relevant
only to Jupiter, now clearly shifts to the bloated matrona. The
scene continues with Alcmena's teary and melodramatic protests
(529-30), but she is ultimately assuaged by the glib Jupiter's gift
(the patera)28 and his ironic insistence that he will return sooner
than she expects (545).
Following the contentious approach of Amphitryon and Sosia
(551-632), Alcmena reappears to perform the song that critics have
almost universally judged to be solemn and serious. The very first
word of her solo, however, signals a resumption of the theme of sex-
ual satiety (633-4):

satin paruares est uoluptatumin uita atquein aetateagunda

praequamquodmolestumest?
"So,really, in life and in leading our lives isn't pleasure rare in comparison
with what is unpleasurable?"

Deprived as we are of the spectacle of performance, we must guard

against being unduly impressed by the broad generalizations29 an
uoluptas and its opposite here and not lose sight of speaker and con-
text. As the song soon makes clear, the musings of this extremely
pregnant and seemingly insatiable voluptuary arise from the fact
that she experienced "pleasure"30 for only a short time (638 p a -

28 Here she behaves not unlike the conventionally mercantile Plautine prosti-
tute:cf. Perelli387.
29
Commentators,as Onigaad loc., compareP1.Phd.60b.and Lucr. 4. 1133-4,but
fail to note that the popular perspective of Plautine comedy typicallydemands that
philosophizingcharactersbe reined in or openly mocked:cf. the exchanges at Mer.
145-8and Rud.1235-53.Alcmena'sreflections(633-6) on the inevitable succession of
pleasureand pain in human affairsare in fact more metatheatricalthan philosophical
in that the doubles-comedyis organizedso that harmoniousand tumultuous scenes
alternate as Alcmena appears with her counterfeit (499-550, 882-955) and real
husband (633-860,frs. 7-10), as is further confirmedby Jupiter'splayful echo of her
words here at 938-43. See furtherChristenson14.
30 Voluptas, a commonsexual euphemism(Adams 196-8) that is later attested as
a technicalterm for intercourse(OLDs.v. 5), occurs four times (633, 635, 637, 641) in
her song's opening. Up to this point in the play it had been used only of Jupiter's

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 GROTESQUEREALISM 249

rumper),since she has been able to see her "husband"for one night
only (638 noctemunammodo),i.e. the extraordinarily long night of
dalliance with Jupiterabout which the audience has been kept con-
tinuously informed. Thus, the prevailing view that Alcmena here
sings the aria of a tragic heroine is immediately called into
question.
The central motif of satietas spills over into the secondhalf of
her song, when she asserts that she would be satisfied by the public
accolades Amphitryon will win as a victorious general: 647a satis
mi esse ducam. Of this Phillips writes: "Modemreaders may lift
an amused brow at the equation of sexual pleasure and military
prowess."31But given the extensive build-up of the motif of sa tie-
tas to this point, it is more apropos to imagine an ancient Roman
audience, in whose culturalideology a sharp dichotomy was drawn
between public service and the pursuit of personal pleasure,32here
erupting with belly laughs. With typically Plautine verbal fan-
fare, the song ends in extravagant praise of uirtus, linguistically
promptedby her use of uirin 647. The words as they appear on the
page at 648-53 have impressed generations of readers, who have
found in them a solemn celebrationof Romanpatriotic values,33 but
speech and speaker should not be so neatly severed. By the end of
her song Plautus' pregnantvoluptuary has farcically replaced her
private pursuit of uoluptas with her husband's display of uirtus in
the public sphere. The keynote uirtus is loudly soundedfour times
(648, 649, 652, 653) and thus perfectly balances uoluptas at the
song'sopening.34A Romanaudiencecould not help but find this sub-
stitution delightfully incongruous:35the style of lines 648-53,
which begin and end with uirtus, no less than the bloated carica-
ture who delivers them, is extravagantly "over the top." In light

sexual gratification:with 114 uoluptatemcapitcf. 641 plusaegriex abitu uiri, quamex

aduentuuoluptatiscepi.
3' Phillips125.
32 Cf. Jupiter'splayful exploitationof the antithesisbetween amorand bellumat
504-5,527-8.
33E.g.CHCLII 130-1.
34See n. 30 above.
35 Forthe starkcontrastbetween uirtusand uoluptasin the Roman moralizing
traditioncf. Sen. De vita beata7. 3 altumquiddamest uirtus,excelsumet regale,inuictum,
uoluptashumile,servile,imbecillum,
infatigabile: caducum, cuiusstatioacdomiciliumfornices
et
popinaesunt. uirtutemin temploconvenies, inforoin curia,promurisstantem,puluerulentam,
coloratam,callosashabentemmanus:uoluptatemlatitantemsaepiusac tenebrascaptantem
circabalineaac sudatoriaac locaaedilemmetuentia,mollemenervem,meroatque unguento
madentem, pallidamautfucatamet medicamentis pollinctam.

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250 DAVID CHRISTENSON

of Alcmena's earthy sexuality, Phillips 125-6 plausibly suggests

that Plautus is "turninga word [i.e. uirtus]with usually no percep-
tible meaning to a highly sexualized sense."36 And Plautus, far
from spontaneouslyglorifying Romanaristocratic ideals here, has
an obvious dramatic purpose:the vainglorious Amphitryon, who
remains mnstage duringthe song,37and expects to be acclaimed for
the uirtus he has displayed in the successfulcampaign against the
Teleboans(cf. 654-8),is about to be terribly frustrated by his wife's
lukewarm reception. The song'sconclusion,then, is primarily de-
signed to highlight the comicconfusionsurroundingAlcmena's ap-
parent indifferenceto Amphitryon'sclaim to uirtus that drives the
immediately following scene (654-860).38 Thus, the view that
Plautus has somehow combinedthe figures of the ideal matrona
and tragic heroine in the character of Alcmena who as such cham-
pions the Roman(male), aristocratic ideal of uirtus seems wholly
untenable:both the character, i.e. the unabashed sensualist, and
the actor playing her, who in everyday life was countedamongthe
most despised infames of Romansociety,39 are singularly unsuited
to deliver, in any straightforwardly patriotic fashion, this enco-
mium of Romanuirtus.
The motif of satiety, however, is not capped by Alcmena's sub-
stitution of uirtus for uoluptas. Sosia, the comic center40for the
lengthy and tumultuousconfrontationbetween the spouses that

36 Cf. the common use of the uir- root with reference to the male genitaliaand
sexual potency (with Adams 69-70)and a possiblepun on 653 penest(=penesest) and
penis.
37 The precedingscene (551-632)takes place in an unspecified locationbetween
the harborand Amphitryon'sresidence. As no indicationof an exit is given at that
scene's close and Alcmena never announces the entrance of slave and master but
simply notices them (660), they apparentlyremain on stage (perhaps pantomiming
theirjourney)during the song, which they are presumednot to hear.
38 As Alcmena belts out her "ode"to uirtus,perhaps Amphitryonstruts pomp-
ously on stage in eager anticipationof a hero'swelcome. Plautus is quite capable of
such a breach of versimilitude (see n. 37 immediately above); cf., e.g., Sosia's
designationof himselfas a uerna(180sumuerouernauerbero)immediatelyon the heels
of Mercury'saside to the audiencedescribingSosia in just such terms(179hic qui uerna
natustqueritur).Of this phenomenon Slater(1990) 109 writes, "the action does not
take place on a plane of illusion,but appealsdirectlyto the audiencefor approval."
39 "... the actorwas the inversionof the soldier-citizen,paradigmaticallylacking
in virtus"(Edwards 131;cf. also Edwards 128: "Actorsexhibitedtheir bodies for the
pleasureof the public. Theywere often assimilatedto prostitutes.").
40 In this role the slave frequentlyjests on Alcmena'spregnant condition:667-73,
718-19,723-4,785-6.

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 GROTESQUE REALISM 251

follows, revives the play on satietas as slave and master approach

Alcmena (664-7):

SO. Amphitruo,rediread nauemmeliustnos. AM. qua gratia?

SO. quiadomi daturusnemoest prandiumaduenientibus.
AM. qui tibinunc istucin mentemst?SO. quiaenim seroaduenimus.
AM. qui? SO. quiaAlcumenamanteaedis staresaturamintellego.

"Amphitryon,we'd better go back to the ship." "Why?""Because no one's

likely to serve us lunch when we get home.""Whatmakesyou think of that
right now?" "Because we've come too late." "How so?" "Because I see
Alcmenastandingstuffedin frontof the house."

In once again focusing the audience on Alcmena's condition (and cos-

tume), Sosia's jest has an obvious visual point. At the same time,
the humorous suggestion here that the matrona has emptied the
house's larder, taken together with the emphasis hitherto an
Alcmena's sexual insatiability, would, for an ancient and (proba-
bly) mostly male audience, evoke a stereotypical view of women at
least as old as Hesiod:

... in the case of femalecreatures,the appetite for food seemseasily to lead to

sexual appetite. This connectionis explained by the fact that with reference
to womenthetermgaster designatesthe stomach,as it does for nmi, but also
the womb, the "breast"where the child is conceivedand fed.4"

Closer to Plautus, comparison with the matrona quaedam Ephesi

(Petr. 111. 1) is instructive. In Eumolpus' "Melesian tale," the
widow of Ephesus is regarded, like Alcmena, as a public model of
pudicitia.42 The soldier, working in concert with the maid, none-
theless eventually overcomes the grieving widow's resolve to re-
main an univira by seducing her with food and drink (111.13-112.1):

itaque mulieraliquot dierumabstinentiasicca passa est frangi pertinaciam

suam,nec minus auide repleuit se cibo quam ancilla, quae prior uicta est.
ceterumscitis,quidplerumquesoleattemptarehumanamsatietatem.

41 Vernant 60. Cf. also, in connection with the vigorouswarriorAmphitryon's

somewhatsurprisingcasting-as would be immediatelyrecognizableby his mask and
costume--as a senex (see further p. 254 below) Vernant 67: "By her double
voraciousnessfor both food and sex, the shameless feminine gaster consumes the
male's energy and dispatches him from the greenness of youth to a desiccated old
age."
42 With Petr.111. 1 matrona ... tamnotaeeratpudicitiaeand Petr.111.5 una igiturin
tota ciuitatefabulaerat,solumilludaffulsisseuerumpudicitiaeamorisqueexemplumomnis
ordinishominesconfitebantur cf. Am. 677-8 quamomniumThebisuir unamesse optumam
diiudicat, quamque adeociuesThebani uerorumiferant
probam.

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252 DAVID CHRISTENSON

"Andso the lady, thirsty fromseveral days' abstinence,allowed her resolve

to be broken,and stuffed herself as voraciously as the maid (who was over-
come earlier). And I thinkyou all know what usually assails humansatiety."

At this point in the story, the widow of Ephesus readily enters into
an erotic relationship with the solider and eventually casts aside
all her scruples. The figures of Alcmena and the widow of Ephesus
thus both reflect a popular misogynist stereotype that "even the
chastest woman is promiscuous at heart."43 And, more generally,
this perceived connection between food and sexuality is also funda-
mental to Bakhtinian grotesque realism:

The grotesquebody celebratedby Bakhtin ... is a body in which becoming

rather than completionis evident,a body whose openness to the world and
the futureis emphaticallysymbolizedby the consumingmaws, pregnantstom-
achs,evidentphallusesand gargantuanevacuationsthatmakeit up.44

And thus, despite the negative (gender) stereotyping, the humor in

Am. here lends itself to broad, anthropological interpretation,45
and, presumably, there are aspects of Plautus' presentation of
Alcmena that would be no less appealing to the audiences who
flocked to the carnivals Bakhtin saw behind Rabelais' comic vi-
sion.
Alcmena's earthy sexuality continues to be highlighted in the
contentious scene that subsequently unfolds, where Plautus has her
relate the details of her romantic evening with Jupiter in-to Am-
phitryon-excruciating detail, e.g. 735 immo mecum cenauisti et
mecum cubuisti, "no, indeed, you dined with me and after you re-
clined with me"46 (cf. 799-808). Similarly, Sosia's many asides
there appeal to the audience's voyeuristic impulses, e.g. 801 iam
illud non placet principium de osculo, "Now I don't like that open-
ing part about a kiss," where, although osculo properly denotes a
formal kiss in greeting47 rather than an erotic one, Sosia teasingly
suggests otherwise. Plautus here invites his audience to revel in
the general's gradual realization that his wife has slept with an-

43 Richland78 n. 6. I owe this reference and the initial suggestionto consider

the widow of Ephesusin this discussionto my colleagueMarilynSkinner.
44 Dentith68. Cf. also, in colloquialLatin,the metaphoricaldescriptionof sexual
acts in termsof eating:Adams 138-41.
45 See further pp. 254-59 below.
46 Thetranslationis Segal's180.
47 Cf.Treggiari412.

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 GROTESQUEREALISM 253

other man. Thus, multiple comic ironies operate when Alcmena in

her defense champions the traditional values of the idealized Ro-
man matrona (839-42):

non ego illammi dotemducoesse, quaedos dicitur,

sed pudicitiamet pudoremet sedatumcupidinem,
deummetum,parentumamoremet cognatumconcordiam,
tibi morigeraatqueut munificasim bonis,prosimprobis.
"Idon'tconsidermy dowry to be of the usual sort, but to consist of my chas-
tity,decency,my restrainedpassion,my reverenceforthe gods, my love for ny
parents,the harmonyI keepwith my relatives, and the fact that I am obliging
and dutiful to you through my good deeds, and benefit you by virtuous
means."

Plautus' audience would be especially amused by Alcmena's decla-

ration that her atypical dowry consists of her pudicitia, pudor and
sedatus cupido: the deceived Alcmena technically has compro-
mised her chastity with Jupiter, whom Mercury had proudly
branded a moechus (135) in the prologue, and Plautus has consis-
tently represented her cupido as as anything but sedatus. Her men-
tion of reverence for the gods is absurdly ironic, especially after the
recent oath (831-4) in which she swore by her paramour's wife that
"no other mortal has joined his body with [her's]."48 And her as-
sertion of (traditional) indulgence toward Amphitryon here (842
morigera tibi) mirrors language elsewhere in the play explicitly
used of Jupiter's sexual gratification:49

paternuncintussuo animomoremgerit:
cubatcomplexuscuius cupiensmaximeest. (131-2)

"Myfather'sinside now, indulginghis desire:he's sleeping in the arms of his

heart'sdeepest desire."

perge,Nox, ut occepisti,gerepatrimoremmeo. (277)

"Keepat it, Nox, as you've started. Indulgemy father."

48 833-4mi extraunumte mortalisnemocorpuscorporeI contigit. Here (i.e. corpus

corpore)and elsewhere language referringto Alcmena and her pregnancy frequently
takeson aneffusivequalitythatis characteristic
of grotesquerealism,e.g. 487-8unout
fetu ... uno ut labore,681 grauidam ... plenam, 878-9 grauida est ... grauidast, 1089 geminos ::
geminos,1136-7grauidam... grauidam. Cf. Bakhtin 303: "Exaggeration,hyperbolism,
excessivenessare generallyconsideredfundamentalattributesof the grotesquestyle."
49Forhomoeroticplay on morigerus in Cas.see Cody 455-6.

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254 DAVID CHRISTENSON

uolo deludi illunc,dum cum hac usuraria

uxorenuncmihimorigero. (980-1)
"Iwant him [i.e.Amphitryon]to be driven to distraction,while I indulge my-
self now with this borrowedwife of mine."

Sosia's commentary immediately following Alcmena's declaration

of chastity, "Egad, if she's really telling the truth, that woman is
positively perfect" (843), further undermines any genuine grauitas
in 839-42, and also suggests that her lines may have been delivered
melodramatically. Thus, in light of all this irony, cross-chatter,
and (presumably) stage business, it is most difficult to see how
Plautus' Alcmena embodies the highest ideals of female pietas;
there is no place for a Lucretia in Plautus' sex farce, and Alcmena in
her exaggerated sexual appetite more closely resembles another
figure of Plautus' grotesque imagination: sancta Saturitas (Capt.
877).

Comoediapraegnans

In order to grasp fully the force of the grotesque comic spectacle

of which Alcmena is just a part, it is instructive to examine the
play's other chief characters. If, as is most manifest in the case of
Alcmena, "The basic principle of grotesque or Carnival realism is to
represent everything socially and spiritually exalted on the mate-
rial, bodily level,""5 we should expect these characters-
especially the gods-to suffer a similar process of comic
degradation. Jupiter, whom in everday cult the Romans wor-
shipped as luppiter optimus maximus,"5 in imitation of Amphi-
tryon appears as a senex in Am.52 Elsewhere in Plautine comedy
(e.g. Cas.), when the thoughts of the senex turn to love (properly
the province of the young in this genre), he suffers humiliating de-
feat. Costumed as the senex and caricatured as glib and lecherous
throughout,53 the supreme god cuts a ridiculous figure on stage in

50 Bristol 22.
51 Cf. Mercury'splayful allusionto the supreme god's title, 278 optumooptume
optumamoperamdas.
52 Cf. 1032,1072,and Leadbeater.

53 Cf. Mercury'scavalier descriptionof his father'serotic escapades in the pro-

logue (esp. 104-6,113-14)and in his subsequentaddress to the audience (esp. 472-3);
Jupiter'sblandiloquentmanipulationof his mistress at 499-545 and his apparent
tendencyto grope her (n. 15 above) on stage;and, finally,Jupiter'sreconciliationwith

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 GROTESQUE REALISM 255

indulging his all too human lusts.54 As we have seen, the affair of
Jupiter and Alcmena is portrayed as a highly carnal, adulterous
tryst, to which the birth of the heroic Hercules and the glory it
will bestow upon his mortal parents is almost wholly subordi-
nated.55 Mercury, in keeping with the festive spirit of the sex
farce, even goes so far as to recommend his father's behavior to the
males in Plautus' audience (995-6):

amat:sapit;rectefacit,animoquandoobsequitursuo;
quod omnishominesfacereoportet,dum id modo fiatbono.
"He'sin love, he's smartand does the rightthingby indulginghis passion-as
all men should do, providedit's done in properfashion."

And so the chief god, whose lust has driven him to enter the de-
graded world of comic theater and comic actors,56is made to appear
ridiculously human in his voracious sexual appetite.
Though he at least retains some vestiges of his divine function
as XaTp1S57of the gods, Mercury in aiding his father's amorous in-
trigue likewise undergoes a precipitous decline in status to assume
the role of the slave Sosia, as he himself laments directly to the
audience (176-9):

satiustme queriillo modo seruitutem:

hodiequi fuerimliber,eum nunc
potiuit pater seruitutis;
hic qui uernanatustqueritur.
"I'mthe one who should be complaininglike that about slavery: to think that
I who was freejust this day have been enslaved by my own father! And this
'born-slave'is complaining?"

Thus, from the play's start Mercury wears (cf. 116-9) the grotesque
accouterments of the clever Plautine slave-including, most proba-

Alcmena (882-955)so that he may enjoy yet another sexual encounter with her (cf.
esp. 891-2,980-1).
54In light of the fact that the play's plot is motivated by Jupiter'ssexual passion,
Mercury'saside with reference to Sosiais richly ironic,284 deosesse tui similisputas?
See furtherChristenson32-3.
5 Even in Jupiter'sfinal explanation(i.e. as deusex machina)of all that has hap-
pened (1131-43) Plautus has the god casually inform Amphitryon, "I borrowed
Alcmena'sbody and made her pregnant with my son by sleeping with her" (1135-6
Alcumenae usuramcorporisI cepiet concubitu grauidam fecifilio: cf. the similarlycrude
descriptionsof the affairat 108,498, 980-1).
56 Cf. pp. 245-47above.
57E. Ion.4.

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256 DAVID CHRISTENSON

bly, padded tights, elongated feet, a pot-belly, a red wig, and a

mask with distorted facial features5"-and so is the very embodi-
ment of the carnival clown. To deceive Sosia he must also assume
the conventional attributes of the Plautine seruus callidus (268-9):

itaqueme malumesseoportet,callidum,astutumadmodum,
atquehunc telo suo sibi, malitia,a foribuspellere.
"Andso I mustbe wickedlycleverand completelycunning,and I mustremove
this fellow fromthe doors here using his own weapon--craftiness."

The unusual plot of Am. calls for the gods' play-within-the-play to

succeed at the human characters' expense, though in a more typical
Plautine play the similarly attired Sosia would be expected to em-
brace the role of clever slave to achieve some (comically) heroic
triumph;59 since in Am. it is Mercury who functions as the Plautine
subaltern selflessly pursuing his master's interests (i.e. Alcmena),
as if merely out of love for the comic ludus, Sosia's triumphs are
peripheral, as when, for example, he manages to produce an account
of the battle which he fled (186-261) by drawing upon various,
mostly literary traditions60 that even Mercury must approve (248-
9). Sosia's grotesquely realistic perspective nonetheless often sur-
faces throughout the play, as when in the battle narrative he
states (254) with certainty that the fighting persisted into the
evening because this factor caused him to miss the midday meal.61
His archetypically comic imagination readily confuses the celes-
tial and the earthbound, as when he hypothesizes that the cosmos
itself has somehow been transformed in his own bibulous image cn
the long night of Jupiter and Alcmena's affair:

credoego hacnoctuNocturnumobdormiuisseebrium. (272)

"I'mconvincedthatNoctumus has passed out drunktonight."

58With Sosia's description of his double (441-9) cf. As. 399-400 and Ps. 1218-20.
Cf. also the representations of slaves in Bieber 147-66 passim.
'9 Forcomicheroismin Plautussee Slater168-78.
60 The bibliographyon Sosia'smessenger'sspeech is substantial;for the fullest
and best accountsee Oniga (1985).
6 He later admits that during the thick of the battle he hid in a tent and
consumed a hirnea (431) of undiluted wine. Cf. also 968-9, where Jupiter sends Sosia
to fetch Blepharo so that the latter "may have lunch with [him]"; Sosia returns with
Blepharo (frs. 11-14) and the pair are greatly confused by the strange turn of events at
Amphitryon's home, and, as no lunch is served, the slave presumably complained
bitterly in this lost section of the play.

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 GROTESQUE REALISM 257

credoedepolequidemdormireSolematqueadpotumprobe;
mirasunt nisi inuitauitsese in cenaplusculum. (282-3)62
"Oh,I'mcompletelysure thatSol is asleep and totally tanked. It's a wonder
if he didn'toverindulgea bit much at dinner."

And finally, we should trace the considerable degradation

Amphitryon undergoes. As the play opens, the thoroughly Roman-
ized, aristocratic general has brilliantly won the battle against
the Teleboans, having met the necessary preconditions to celebrate
a grand Roman triumph,63 and also, even more impressively, to
dedicate the spolia opima (cf. 252). Amphitryon sends Sosia
ahead of him to advertise his success to Alcmena, but the slave is
driven from the house by his double in the opening scene, and
Alcmena at any rate has already learned of the battle's outcome
from Jupiter during their prolonged night of love. Thus, Amphi-
tryon's attempt to play the miles gloriosus and proud husband be-
fore Alcmena, whom he initially hails as the paradigm of Theban
probitas (678), is sorely frustrated by his gradual revelation that
she has spent the previous night with a paramour (682-854; cf. frs.
7-10). Following his physical confrontation with his double (fr. 15-
1038), Amphitryon, still prevented from entering his home, is left
alone an stage (1039-52) to ponder his mistreatment. Convinced
that he is a disgraced cuckold and wholly unaware of the power he
is up against, he blusters that he will strike down everyone in the
house, even his father and grandfather (1050).64 With a final co-
mic boast of impiety,65 he impotently charges the house-the locus
of his power as paterfamilias-and is stopped dead in his tracks by
Jupiter's thunderbolt. In the following scene, Bromia effectively
must resurrect66 the collapsed senex, who has come to question his
own identity.67 As comic endings tend to include rather than

of the pateraaureaawarded to Amphitryonupon

62 Cf. also his characterization
his defeat of the Teleboansas the one "with which King Pterelaswas in the habit of
getting drunk"(261).
63 Halkin.

64 An absurdfloutingof pietasin a patriarchalsociety such as ancient Rome:cf.

Segal 15-41.
65 With 1051nequemeIuppiternequedi omnesid prohibebunt cf. the reportedboast
of Campaneusat Aesch. Sept.427-9.
66 Cf. 1074sepultust quasisit mortuos,1076perii::surge:: interii,and 1078 quasisi ab
Accherunte ueniam.
67Cf. 1082scinmetuomesseerumAmphitruonem?

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258 DAVID CHRISTENSON

exclude "blocking characters" such as Amphitryon,68 he is

eventually placated by Bromia's(1087-1129)and Jupiter's (1131-43)
revelations as to what has taken place, but only afterhe suffers the
(for him) extremeindignities of cuckoldry,and the loss of his social
status and sense of identity.
Thus, Am. indisputably is a play in which high and low, di-
vine and human, sublime and terrestrial are thoroughly confused
and commingled. The players operate in an entirely material and
non-spiritual realm, and the play ultimately celebrates, in addi-
tion to deception and theatricalityitself, human sexuality and pro-
creation. It concludes, appropriately, with the birth of the
extravagantly human and popular hero Hercules, and, taken as a
whole, is a clear exemplar of what Bakhtin termed grotesque
realism.
Bakhtin further insisted that grotesquerealism is necessarily
socially regenerative and "offersthe chance to have a new outlook
on the world, to realize the relative nature of all that exists, and to
enter a completely new order of things";69and the laughter of the
carnival in which grotesque realism typically flourishes, according
to Bakhtin (after Freud), "liberates not only from external censor-
ship but first of all from the great interior censor;it liberates from
the fear that developed in man during thousands of years in its
very depths; fear of the sacred, of prohibitions, of the past, of
power."70 These latter, quasi-religious suppositions constitute the
most problematicaspects of Bakhtin's theory of grotesquerealism,
and carnival in general, and participate in a larger, longstanding
debate in anthropological literature as to whether festive comedy
is socially disruptive or merely functionsas a kind of temporary
"safety valve" that in the end serves to reinforcehierarchical dis-
tinctions and everyday social norms.7' Segal's influential study
concludedthe latter with regard to Plautine comedy, i.e. that it
engages in only a temporary "flouting of the rules,"72but it is per-
haps more prudentto avoid such sweeping pronouncements.73In the

68 Cf. Arist. Poet. 1453a36ff. and Frye 165.

69 Bakhtin 34.
70 Bakhtin 94.
71 For circumspect critique of Bakhtin see Dentith 70-9, and for the issue as it

pertains to Athenian Old Comedy Goldhill 176-88 (with further references to relevant
anthropological literature).
72 Segal 14.
73Cf. the brief but incisive conclusions of Moore 197-201.

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 GROTESQUEREALISM 259

particular case of Am., we should hardly expect our scant social

historical recordto inform us as to whether or not the play in any
manner challenged traditional Romanconceptionsof marriage, pa-
triarchy, or divinity. Nevertheless, a play such as Am. that gro-
tesquely caricatures figures of authority who normally command
respect in both the human and divine spheres could have served,
more generally, to expose these social roles as cultural construc-
tions.74 The Romanelite's steadfast resistance to the construction
of permanent theatersand stock characterization of the theater as
a locus of immorality suggest that it perceived theater as a poten-
tially subversive threat to its traditional authority." It is beyond
the scope of this discussion to speculate as to what ultimate effects
Plautine theater may have exercised on Roman society, though it is
hoped that this is a critical direction that Plautinists will continue
to pursue,despite the dearth of pertinent historical evidence (i.e.
the muted voices of those most likely to have been socially rein-
vigorated by Plautine comedy). The main thrust of this paper has
been to counter the persistent notion that Amphitruo is unique
among Plautus' plays in exhibiting an unsettling, tragicomic (in the
post-classical sense of the word) "schizophrenia,"especially so far
as the character of Alcmena is concerned. It is also hoped that
Bakhtin's potentially useful model of grotesquerealism may prove
fruitful in future Plautine studies.

DAVIDCHRISTENSON
The University of Arizona

74Cf. Bristol113: "An actor earns a livelihoodby representingor mimickingthe

language and gestures of other men and women. The appropriationand mis-
appropriationof the speech of another is the very raisond'8tre of acting and of the
audience's interest in what an actor does. Thus an actor is permitted to disguise
himself,that is to arbitrarilycopy the guiseor appropriatesocial integumentof another
man or woman. And the actoris also the disseminatorof indirectdiscourse,the image
of language that belongs to someone else. These relationshipsare parodic, forms of
discursive and semiotic misrulethat saturate all performance... An actor is not just
someone whose speech is 'dissembling':the deeperproblemis thathe is valued for his
abilityto dissembleconvincingly. Becauseof this, the theater may indeed be the site
of a diabolicalpedagogy,a 'schoolof abuse'or at leasta settingin which authoritymay
be radicallyinterrogated."
75See furtherEdwards98-123.

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260 DAVID CHRISTENSON

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