TRAGICOMEDY

Tragicomedy – is a special kind of drama that combines the features of tragedy and comedy. It means that such play may be sad but will have a happy ending, or it may be serious with some elements of humor emerging throughout the whole play. Unlike comedy and tragedy, tragicomedy emerged a bit later, in the times of Roman Empire. Roman dramatist Plautus was the first to write a tragicomedy and to use the term. In his play Amphitheater, he used the lightheartedness of comedy but chose gods and kings as the main characters. This was quite revolutionary of him. Before Plautus, there were strict rules about writing drama, it was either comedy or tragedy. These genres were never mixed together. Plautus was the first to note that in our daily lives we have features of both tragedy and comedy. Therefore, drama also can combine them both.