Terence

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Terence (195-159 B.C.), or Publius Terentius Afer, was a Roman comic playwright. As a translator and adapter of the Greek New Comedy, produced about 336-250 B.C., he gave near-perfect form and expression in Latin to the comedy of manners.

Information about the life of Terence is based mainly on two sources: the prologues of Terence's plays, in which he defends himself against hostile criticism, and a life of Terence written by Suetonius (ca. A.D. 70-ca. 135) and preserved in Donatus's commentary on the plays of Terence.

The prologues provide few facts, and the brief biography is filled with contradictions. Suetonius, like other ancient biographers, gathered his information from earlier sources and undoubtedly filled out the account with inferences from Terence's plays, conventional themes, and anecdotes.

Basically accepted by most scholars is that Terence was born in Carthage and brought to Rome as a slave while quite young. Since Carthage and Rome were at peace during this period, Terence's master, Senator Terentius Lucanus, acquired him by purchase rather than as a captive in war. The youth was then educated and manumitted. Terence is described as medium in stature, graceful in person, and dark (fuscus) in complexion. Fuscus may mean that Terence was merely darker enough than the ordinary Roman to attract notice or that his complexion was that of a Moor. The second possibility would add an interesting racial dimension to the history of Latin literature.

Terence gained access to the Scipionic Circle, the foremost literary group of his day, composed of young aristocrats devoted to Greek letters and culture, but such lofty connections sparked malicious accusations that Terence either had not written his own plays or was greatly assisted in their composition.

Terence read his first play, the Andria, to the aged playwright Caecilius, who pronounced it a success and encouraged further works. After composing a total of six plays during the years 166-160 B.C., Terence journeyed to Greece to gather more plays to adapt into Latin and died on his way home. Terence had married but was survived by only a daughter who inherited his small estate on the Appian way and married a Roman knight.

Chronology and Sources

The chronology of Terence's plays remains a matter of dispute, but the following enjoys the widest acceptance: Andria (166 B.C.), Hecyra (first staging, 165), Heauton Timorumenos (163), Eunuchus (161), Phormio (161), Adelphoe (160), and Hecyra (second staging and third staging, 160).

All six plays of Terence are adaptations (to what extent is unknown) of Greek originals no longer extant. The Hecyra and the Phormio are each based on a play by Apollodorus of Carystus (3d century B.C.). The Heauton Timorumenosis drawn from one play of Menander, and the Andria and Eunuchus each draw upon two plays of Menander. The Adelphoe borrows from a play of Menander and a play of Diphilus (ca. 340-289 B.C.).

The Plays

The Andria, Terence's first play, is typical. Two young men, who are friends, are in love with two girls but are prevented from marriage until the end of the play by two fathers. The plot is double and relies on devices of mistaken identity, deception, and recognition. Yet several features are atypical: attempted trickery by a father against a son and a slave; self-deception by a father when he refuses to accept the truth; and the intrigues of a slave, which, far from assisting the young man in love, only create greater difficulty for him.

The Heauton Timorumenos employs Terence's conventional deception and double plot of two young lovers whose affairs are closely interwoven. The treatment of the recognition of the free birth of a young girl marks an advance in technique, for it occurs in the middle of the play and complicates rather than solves a problem. The Eunuchus is notable for the vigor and daring of its hero, Chaerea, perhaps the most attractive of Terence's young men. After rape and impersonation, Chaerea assumes responsibility for his actions and marries the girl he both loved and offended.

The Phormio furnishes an amusing and clever portrait of a unique character type, a blending of sycophant, parasite, and friend, whose legal and psychological expertise secures the love affairs of his young comrades by outwitting their fathers. The Hecyra, Terence's least humorous play and perhaps the apex of classical high comedy, studies the dilemma of a young husband who finds that his wife is pregnant by another man. Poorly received in antiquity, the Hecyra now enjoys high praise and is noteworthy for a serious portrayal of married life; two exceptional female characters, a generous courtesan and a misunderstood mother-in-law; the absence of the usual double plot of two young lovers; the employment of suspense until the very end; and the diminished role of the slave.

The Adelphoe presents in ancient garb the problem of how to raise a son. Two methods are studied, the strict and the compliant, and both are found wanting. Demea, the play's hero and perhaps the only Terentian character to experience true growth and development, at last achieves the harmonious balance of discipline and leniency which the poet recommends.

His Prologues

The function of a Terentian prologue was neither to supply the necessary antecedents for the audience's understanding of the action of the drama nor to explain in advance the outcome of the plot, as Plautus sometimes does. An older and established playwright of whom we know little, Luscius Lanuvinus, maliciously attempted to check Terence's incipient career with three major criticisms. Terence employed the polemic prologue to defend himself. To the charge that his plays are slight compositions, Terence replies with cutting remarks about Lanuvinus's recent play. To the charge that his plays were in reality written by or greatly altered by noble friends, Terence is evasive, probably because an outright denial might have offended the distinguished men who aided his career. To the charge that he contaminated or drew from two Greek originals to create one Latin play, Terence replies that the older comic poets Naevius and Plautus set precedents for this procedure.

Plot Construction and Characterization

All Terentian plays concern youthful love, and all but one (Hecyra) employ the double plot. Two love affairs involve two young men, two girls, and two fathers, who are often contrasted. With the elimination of the expository prologue, Terence relies less on irony than on suspense and surprise. Impersonation, trickery, mistaken identity, and recognition (anagnorasis) are usual devices.

Terence himself makes us aware that his characters are human types by using telltale names rather than sharply delineated individuals. The usual cast of stock characters includes male members of the household: a young man (adulescens) hopelessly in love; an aged parent (senex), sometimes lenient and sometimes severe; and a cunning slave (servus). In female roles there are a young girl (virgo), a courtesan (meretrix), a wife or mother (matrona), and a maidservant (ancilla). A parasite (parasitus), slave dealer (leno), and soldier (miles) make up comic roles. Still, Terence varies each character within his type and occasionally invests a character with individuality that transcends typology.

His Style and Influence

The language of Terence achieves a perfection of correct expression, lightness, clarity, and elegance; and although the speech of everyday life can be detected, it is not the colloquial language of the common people but of refined society. Cicero praised the polish and refinement of Terence's style; Caesar lauded the purity. Avoiding variety or novelty which jars, Terence gave final form to many maxims: "Fortis fortuna adjuvat (Fortune favors the brave)" and "Dictum sapienti sat est (A word to the wise is sufficient)."

Terence's plays enjoyed success during his lifetime and were both read and staged with admiration by the Romans after his death. The Middle Ages valued Terence more highly than Plautus for his Latinity and moral excellence. Renaissance Italy composed comedies in Latin modeled upon Terence, staged his plays, and wrote Italian comedies in the Terentian manner.

Molière's comedy of manners owes a special debt to Terence for tone, plot, and characterization. Finally, English comedy began under the influence of Plautus and Terence from the classical revival and the composition of Neo-Latin dramas. Nicholas Udall's Ralph Roister Doister, the first real English comedy, draws upon the Eunuchus, and Terentian influence is discernible in both William Shakespeare and Ben Jonson.

Further Reading

Terence's work in translation is available in a number of editions. One with commentary is that of Sidney G. Ashmore, The Comedies of Terence (1908). John Sargeaunt's edition, Terence (2 vols., 1912), also includes the Latin text. Two more recent collections are George E. Duckworth, The Complete Roman Drama (2 vols., 1942), and Frank O. Copley, The Comedies of Terence (1967). Gilbert Norwood, The Art of Terence (1923), offers sensitive but occasionally overly enthusiastic criticism. For traditional and original interpretation see William Beare, The Roman Stage (1951), and for excellent consideration of almost every aspect of Terence see George E. Duckworth, The Nature of Roman Comedy (1952).

Terence (Publius Terentius Āfer) (d. 159 BC?), Roman writer of comedy. The main source for his life is a biography written by Suetonius c. AD 100 and preserved in Donatus' commentary to Terence, but that itself is uncertain about many events. The manuscripts are divided between those who say he died at the age of 24 and those who say 34. He was said to have been born at Carthage and to have been a slave at Rome. In composing his plays he was alleged to have been aided by Scipio Aemilianus, C. Laelius, and others of that circle, allegations to which he himself refers with some pride (at being thought to have such distinguished friends). He is said to have died at sea while returning from a visit to Greece.

Terence wrote six plays (for details see individual titles): Andria (‘girl from Andros’), Hecyra (‘mother-in-law’), Heauton timorumenos (‘self-tormentor’), Eunuchus (‘eunuch’), Phormio, and Adelphoe (‘brothers’).

His plays are fabulae palliatae, and with two exceptions are adapted from Menander; he follows his Greek originals more closely than Plautus did, although sometimes combining portions of two plays. He thus represents scenes of the same Greek life as Plautus depicted, but by keeping the settings and conventions of his Greek sources, and excluding specifically Roman elements, he avoided obvious incongruity. Although the characters and subjects (young men's complicated love affairs) are much the same in both playwrights, the spirit is different. In Terence portraiture takes the place of caricature; conversation is much more natural than in Plautus, lacking the boisterous, farcical element of the latter. In all respects Terence is more refined and sophisticated than Plautus, but less robust. He abandoned the expository kind of prologue, and instead inserted necessary background information into the action; he also avoided the somewhat unnatural monologues of his models, rescripting them as dialogues. He introduces a more prosaic note by almost entirely avoiding lyric passages (cantica) and opera-like scenes; but only half of his lines are in the spoken metre of iambic senarii (see METRE, LATIN 2); the rest are iambic and trochaic septenarii, which were certainly ‘sung’ in the form of recitative. In general Terence aims at greater realism.

The plays of Terence did not have popular appeal but were greatly admired by discriminating critics like Cicero and Horace. They were widely known and studied in the Middle Ages, and were adapted into Christian form by Hroswitha (tenth century), the abbess of the Benedictine convent of Gandersheim in Saxony, for her nuns to read. Terence was much read in England in the sixteenth century and even acted (Phormio was performed by the boys of St Paul's School before Cardinal Wolsey). His influence can be traced in early English comedy and again in the comedy of manners of the Restoration. Several of his lines have become proverbial: quot homines, tot sententiae (‘as many opinions as there are men’), and fortis fortuna adiuvat (‘fortune favours the brave’), both from Phormio; see also HEAUTON TIMORUMENOS.

Quotes:

"You can take a chance with any man who pays his bills on time."

"I hold this as a rule of life: Too much of anything is bad."

"What harsh judges fathers are to all young men!"

"You're a wise person if you can easily direct your attention to what ever needs it."

"We are all of us the worse for too much liberty."

"Many a time from a bad beginning great friendships have sprung up."

See more famous quotes by Terence

This article is about Terence, the ancient Roman playwright. For other persons named Terence, see Terence (disambiguation). For other members of the Roman gens, see Terentius (gens).

Ancient theater masks

Publius Terentius Afer (195/185–159 BC), better known in English as Terence, was a playwright of the Roman Republic. His comedies were performed for the first time around 170–160 BC, and he died young probably in Greece or on his way back to Rome. Terentius Lucanus, a Roman senator, brought Terence to Rome as a slave, educated him and later on, impressed by his abilities, freed him. All of the six plays Terence wrote have survived.

One famous quotation by Terence reads: "Homo sum, humani nil a me alienum puto", or "I am a man, I consider nothing that is human alien to me." This appeared in his play Heauton Timorumenos.

Contents 1 Biography 2 Terence's plays 3 References 4 See also 5 External references

Biography

Terence's date of birth is disputed; Aelius Donatus, in his incomplete Commentum Terenti, considers the year 185 BC to be the year Terentius was born;^[1] Fenestella, on the other hand, states that he was born ten years earlier, in 195 BC.^[2]

He may have been born in or near Carthage or in Greek Italy to a woman taken to Carthage as a slave. Terence's ethnonym Afer suggests he lived in the territory of the Libyan tribe called by the Romans Afri near Carthage prior to being brought to Rome as a slave.^[3] This inference is based on the fact that the term was used in two different ways during the republican era: during Terence's lifetime, it was used to refer to anyone from the land of the Afri (Africa, meaning Northern Tunisia including Carthage); later, after the destruction of Carthage in 146, it was used to refer to non-Carthaginian Berbero-Libyans, with the term Punicus reserved for the Carthaginians.^[4] It is therefore possible that Terence was of Libyan^[5] descent, considered ancestors to the modern-day Berber peoples.^[6]

In any case, he was sold to Terentius Lucanus, a Roman senator, who educated him and later on, impressed by Terence's abilities, freed him. Terence then took the nomen "Terentius," which is the origin of the present form.

When he was 25, Terence left Rome and he never returned, after having exhibited the six comedies which are still in existence. According to some ancient writers, he died at sea.

Terence's plays

Like Plautus, Terence adapted Greek plays from the late phases of Attic comedy. He was more than a translator, as modern discoveries of ancient Greek plays have confirmed. However, Terence's plays use a convincingly 'Greek' setting rather than Romanizing the characters and situations.

Terence worked hard to write natural conversational Latin, and most students who persevere long enough to be able to read him in the vernacular find his style particularly pleasant and direct. Aelius Donatus, Jerome's teacher, is the earliest surviving commentator on Terence's work. Terence's popularity throughout the Middle Ages and the Renaissance is attested to by the numerous manuscripts containing part or all of his plays; the scholar Claudia Villa has estimated that 650 manuscripts containing Terence's work date from after 800 AD. The mediaeval playwright Hroswitha of Gandersheim claims to have written her plays so that learned men had a Christian alternative to reading the pagan plays of Terence, while the reformer Martin Luther not only quoted Terence frequently to tap into his insights into all things human but also recommended his comedies for the instruction of children in school.^[7]

Terence's six plays are:

• Adelphoe (The Brothers)
• Andria (The Girl from Andros)
• Eunuchus; Restoration poet and playwright Sir Charles Sedley modelled his comedy Bellamira: or, The Mistress (1687) partly on this play.
• Heauton Timorumenos (The Self-Tormentor)
• Hecyra (The Mother-in-Law)
• Phormio

The first printed edition of Terence appeared in Strasbourg in 1470, while the first certain post-antiquity performance of one of Terence's plays, Andria, took place in Florence in 1476. There is evidence, however, that Terence was performed much earlier. The short dialogue Terentius et delusor was probably written to be performed as an introduction to a Terentian performance in the ninth century (possibly earlier).

A phrase by his musical collaborator Flaccus for Terence's comedy Hecyra is all that remains of the entire body of ancient Roman music. This has recently been shown to be unauthentic^{[citation needed]}.

References

1. ^ Aeli Donati Commentum Terenti, accedunt Eugraphi Commentum et Scholia Bembina, ed. Paul Wessner, 3 Volumes, Leipzig, 1902, 1905, 1908.
2. ^ G. D' Anna, Sulla vita suetoniana di Terenzio, RIL, 1956, pp. 31-46, 89-90.
3. ^ Tenney Frank, "On Suetonius' Life of Terence." The American Journal of Philology, Vol. 54, No. 3 (1933), pp. 269-273.
4. ^ H. J. Rose, A Handbook of Latin Literature, 1954.
5. ^ Michael von Albrecht, Geschichte der römischen Literatur, Volume 1, Bern, 1992.
6. ^ "...the playwright Terence, who reached rome as the slave of a senator in the second century BC, was a Berber", Suzan Raven, Rome in Africa, Routledge, 1993, p.122; ISBN 0415081505.
7. ^ See, e.g., in Luther's Works: American Edition, vol. 40:317; 47:228.

See also

Literature portal

• Theatre Portal

External references

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Terence

• The six plays of Terence at The Latin Library (Latin)
• Andria at The Perseus Digital Library (English)
• Hecyra at The Perseus Digital Library (English)
• Heautontimorumenos at The Perseus Digital Library(English)
• The Eunuch at The Perseus Digital Library(English)
• Phormio at The Perseus Digital Library (English)
• The Brothers at The Perseus Digital Library (English)
• Terence's works: text, concordances and frequency list
• The Life of Terence, part of Suetonius's De Viris Illustribus, Translated by J. C. Rolfe.
• Commentum Terenti by Aelius Donatus, at the Internet Archive; 1902 Teubner edition. (Latin)
• SORGLL: Terence, Eunuch 232-264, read by Matthew Dillon

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