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There are some pretty fundamental differences between comedy and tragedy: one's generally funny; the other tends to leave me teary-eyed. But the differences between the two types of drama, particularly in its earliest forms, go much deeper than that. They deal with the world in very distinct ways: comedy depends on malleability, whereas tragedy is all about how there is only one path, one fate, one choice and no escaping the consequences. Comedy is set in whatever time it was written; tragedy tends to work with mythical times and characters. These differences in form also have a role in the ultimate ways gender roles and gendered relationships are understood: as stereotypes in comedy and ideals in tragedy. That is to say, in comedy, gender roles tend to reflect the then-current understanding of how actual relationships and gender work, and in tragedy, the characters perform the then-current models for what gender in individuals and relationships should be. In tragedy, the transgression of socially sanctioned gender roles represents a flaw in the character. Clytemnestra, for example, is one of the most gender bending female characters of Greek tragedy - and one of the most demonized. The playwrights tend to explain her actions against Agamemnon in terms of her flaws as a woman, as a wife and even, in plays showing her interactions with her children, as a mother. For a grown woman, anything outside those two categories of wife and mother should not be acceptable. Even more broadly, women should be passive where men are active, and Clytemnestra simply disregards this. Although, in my twenty-first century mind, Clytemnestra was completely justified because of Agamemnon's actions, the plays show Clytemnestra to be a woman who's gone too far, and thus deserving of what is coming to her. The only play we have that really takes up her "side" of the issue at all is the last of the Oresteia, but even there, the end of the play just reinforces that women are inferior to men and should remember their place. Clytemnestra was vilified by her transgression, but not everyone who breaks gender norms is demonized. Antigone, for example, is very much the hero of Sophocles' first Theban play, despite her willful nature and refusal to remain passive. Creon, her uncle and the king, started the whole problem by denying Antigone the one relationship with men that she, as a virgin, had left. Then he exacerbated the problem by deciding that she wouldn't be marrying Haemon - placing Antigone in a role as an independent person, and thus forcing her into the active role. By causing this, Creon becomes the bad guy, and Antigone is merely doing what any good person in her position would do. However, Antigone does not get out of the play scot-free: she still ends up dying in the end because she decides to hang herself instead of just waiting for death. She is still punished for her transgressions of gender norms: she assumes that Haemon will not take on the masculine active role of hero, and acts instead of waiting, thus bringing her own demise. Not only does she act wrongly with respect to her own gender, she also destroys herself and Haemon and Eurydice and Creon by acting wrongly with respect to her relationship. Though she is the hero of the play, she still pays greatly for violating gender ideals. By thus punishing Antigone and Clytemnestra, the message is clear: women who are masculine will suffer the consequences. But tragic gender deviants are not all women; in fact, they're not even all mortal. The most famous transgender character in tragedy was Dionysus. When he got involved, gender roles, and everything else, went crazy, and nowhere is this more apparent than the Bacchae. Both Dionysus and Pentheus end up breaking gender norms, but in very different ways and situations. Visual feminization is the "preliminary sign of Pentheus' total defeat, at the hands first of Dionysos and then of the women." (Zeitlin, 343) But, unlike his mortal counterpart, Dionysus never succumbs to femininity: as the god of madness and irrationality, feminine attributes, femininity is his tool. And as a deity, he never has to pay for anything he does, but the people around him do. Dionysus, by nature, is a "disrupter of normal social categories," and in this role, he destroys the entire House of Cadmus. Tragedy tends to have sad endings, mostly because the characters' unchangeable natures did something to bring about their destruction. But in the Alcestis, the title role is, in fact, a perfect example of what a woman should be. Her husband, on the other hand, made a serious gender faux pas in asking his wife to die in his place. Pheres reprimands his son, telling him he's "weaker than the woman who died for you." (lines 697-8) Because of this violation, Admetus suffers great pain and shame in the loss of Alcestis; but, once he's repented his mistake, Heracles steps in and saves the day. The good woman, following only the desires of her husband, is rewarded with her life, and everything works out in the end. The play presents an ideal wife and, after Ademtus's repentance, an ideal relationship. Again, tragedy supports the ideal gender relationship. The Alcestis ends well, and there has been plenty of debate as to whether or not it's really a tragedy - but one thing it's certainly not is Aristophanic Old Comedy. Comedy had a completely different form than tragedy, and was written to invoke sobs of laughter, not tears. Most of the jokes were culturally located, and they made fun of the people in the audience. As a result, the plays were set in the time in which they were performed, and often in the place; they dealt with real people and real relationships. Further, the point was not to show the inherent wrongness or rightness of any character. In comedy, all characters should be laughable in some manner, and thus being less than ideal is a requirement: even gods are mocked in comedy (Dionysus in the Frogs). Also, because there isn't a plotline the way there is in tragedy and New Comedy, the characters really can't be punished or rewarded for any behavior, and thus gender cannot be used in the same way as before. But that doesn't mean that comedy has nothing to say about gender. The women of the Lysistrata aren't shy in essentializing what femininity is. Kleonike, better than any other, seems to explain to the audience just what women, as women, can and can't do. When Lysistrata suggests saving Athens she responds, "Us? Be practical? Wisdom for women? There's nothing cosmic about cosmetics - and Glamor is our only talent." (Parker, 353) Then, when the idea is broached, the women will die for the cause, but they have a hard time giving up sex. "Women! Utter sluts, the entire sex!" (Parker, 361) fumes Lysistrata. Likewise, they love to drink, and Kleonike proudly states, "I never shut up!" (Parker 394) These statements are mostly parodies of women, the opposite of ideals, and probably about as representative of the actual group. But the women do have other ways of performing their gender. They respond in noteworthy ways to the owls and snakes, whether they are actually afraid or not, their fear is apparently a normal reaction for women. They acknowledge the ideals of women, and accept them as good: "My ideal is a well-bred repose that doesn't even stir up dust �" but none of them take on that role. Later, when the commissioner confronts Lysistrata, he objects to being hushed by a woman wears a veil "as a constant reminder of congenital inferiority, an injunction to public silence," and so she responds by taking it off and giving it to him. No big deal to her. The parody of the feminine gender is pretty obvious, but men are in there too. They are more obviously fulfilling their gender roles because they are at war, doing the whole outside wanna-be-like-Achilles thing, but they are hardly Homeric heroes. Like the women, the men are just dying to get laid, and are led along more than once by "the handle," as Lysistrata so eloquently put it. Despite their supposed superiority, the women seem to be just as smart as the men, though perhaps this is just Lysistrata's somewhat more masculine role. They also match each other in the choruses and in the comic interactions (the old man and the old woman). In the end, Peace has won, as have the women. The women return to their previous places in society, but not without giving the men a new understanding that women remain in their social places out of compliance, not because they can't be in any other. Here, unlike in tragedy, taking on new gender roles has no negative consequences. This is a normal trait of comedy; switching roles is common, and negative consequences are never permanent. But at the same time, this seems closer to reality as gender roles are, in fact, fluid things. Another reason gender roles seem more realistic in comedy is there is a range of what is feminine and what is masculine. Women can love to drink still be very feminine - just not a feminine ideal. Men can beg their wives for sex, and still be men - just not ideal heroic men. Couples can disagree and try to manipulate each other, and still be perfectly normal couples. In tragedy, however, if a woman is acting outside of her ideal feminine role she is masculine, and couples breaking norms are doomed for failure. Comedy and tragedy define gender in very different ways. For the former, it is a source of humor, for the latter, it is a descriptive cue to a deeper understanding of the tragic heroic dilemma. Though plays of both forms deal conceptually with the present in which they were written, comedy is set in the present, whereas tragedy works through myths. Comedy depends on change and malleability in everything, but tragedy is unalterable. Thus a play like Lysistrata can happily end with a victory for women and peace and a return to gender norms, but "in the end, tragedy arrives at closures that generally reassert male, often patriarchal (or civic), structures of authority." (Zeitlin, 364) These differences between the two types of Greek drama ultimately lead to the respective perceptions of gender as stereotype and ideal in comedy and tragedy.
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Contact me at ailiathena@yahoo.com Written May 9, 2003 at Oberlin College Last Updated April 19, 2005
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