32 OLD COMEDY I

manner l The appeal of the comic poet to the people con-
tinually found new and surprising expression, but his jests
and his harshest satire sprang from a profound affection and
concern for their welfare,

An outward sign of Old Comedy, although one not alto-
gether indispensable, is the -parabasis^ which had developed
from the original komos and had become the centre of the play
The chorus 'came forward' or 'turned aside7 — hence the name
parabasts* — and addressed the audience, usually in the name
of the poet It is not our intention to discuss in detail the
various parts of comedy To us each single comedy, like Old
Comedy as a whole, is a literary unit, even though composed
of the most different elements The parabas^s,) however, de-
serves special mention, because it furnishes the clearest evi-
dence for the relations between the poet and his public.

The parabasts is a rather complicated compound of various
sections, partly recitative and partly song. Within the lifetime
of Aristophanes it went through a process of gradual decay,
until it disappeared entirely The problems of this develop-
ment do not concern us , 3 but it is of fundamental importance
to realize that the 'anapaests7 as well as the epirrhema, *the core
of the -parabasi$\ contain a direct address to the audience, in
which either the chorus or, through their voices, the poet
speaks to the people. The address is frequently introduced by
an exhortation to pay attention,4 An early and also a rather late
play of Aristophanes lay the same stress on the idea which
underlies theparabasts In the Acharmans the poet for the first
time speaks openly for himself. 5 He prides himself on having

1 adesp 864 — Cf Haigh,
2 A 629, K 508, P 735, Th 785
3 F. M Cornford, The Origin of Attic Comedy (1914), I22ff, maintains that
tlieparatiasis of the Lysistrate, which contains no anapaests and is divided between
two choruses, represents the original type If so, it remains to explain why
Aristophanes neglected the original form m all his earlier plays Actually the male
and the female choruses are the natural and necessary outcome of the plot, and
this is probably also the reason why there are no anapaests It was not possible to
have a single chorus-leader speaking for the poet, at least not till after the recon-
ciliation, by which time it would have been too late for the farabasts We must,
however, recognize that, for whatever reason, the poet chose to keep entirely in
the background m this play Also there are no allusions to the audience, with one
exception (12 17^), which is put in only to reduce the allusion ad absurdum
4 See above, p 30, note 7
5 A.628ff