COMEDY --- DEFINITIONTragedy is universal and metaphysical. The uncompromising hero confronts fate, the riddle of the universe, and the riddle of his/her own being.
Comedy is social and specific to a family within a community. Comedy is concerned with the renewal of the self in a social context. Marriage is the social institution that best symbolizes renewal. The bride and groom redefine themselves as individuals through their marriage vows and the continuation of the family and the community is ensured if the marriage is blessed with children. A good marriage and family is a good society on a smaller scale. Harmony, joyfulness and love --- that is why a marriage is the most fitting end for a comedy.
The movement is circular like the wedding band itself or a dance around a maypole. Usually before the play begins, or in the first act, something or someone has caused the natural harmony of a family (society) to be disrupted. The play then is a gradual return to a state of order with lots of humor along the way. The uncharitable and intolerant are taught the error of their ways. The hypocrites are thoroughly routed. For a time it looks like chaos might triumph, but in the end common sense prevails.
The classic comic pattern has two lovers who are prevented by a parent or society from getting married. They are kept apart to the delight of everyone. At last of course they are united and harmony is restored with the added advantage that now society is improved -- more tolerant and more charitable than before. In the comic mode the audience as well as the players become part of the flow of the humanity community.
Comedy most likely evolved from fertility rites -- dramas and dances to ensure that the harvest was plentiful, that marriages produced many healthy children and that in general the community survived generation after generation.
Comedy dramatizes the regeneration of the social order and the triumph of love over cynicism and greed, freedom and truth over tyranny. Comedy inhabits a world Fallen from Grace where human beings are imperfect and therefore in constant need of reform. Comic theater is the vehicle for that reform -- that visible place where our foibles and shortcomings are exposed. Through laughter we can see what we are and what we should be.
Comic types: The miser, braggart, imposter, coward, parasite, old fool with young wife, foolish fop, jealous husband, saucy maid, etc.
Comic language: Malapropisms, puns, double meanings, stigmatized dialects, etc.
Comic devices: Disguises, mistaken identities, sexual intrigues, cross dressing, misread letters, practical jokes (some misfire), ill-fitting clothes, etc.