Lucian of Samosata and the classical theory of laughter

Author(s)

Mônica Mishima

• Document type: Master's Dissertation
• Press: Campinas, SP.
• Institution: Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Instituto de Estudos da Linguagem
• Defense date: 2011-02-22

Examining board members

Trajano Vieira; Flávio Ribeiro de Oliveira; Daniel Rossi Nunes Lopes

• Advisor: Trajano Vieira

Abstract

Going through the satirical works of Lucian of Samosate, we may notice the incongruence between the speech and the actions of one or many characters as the reason for laughter. According to Quentin Skinner and Verona Alberti, some thinkers from the Classical Antiquity stablished the contrast of what one is and what one appears to be as the sole motive for laughing. Through this research, we intend to sketch how the classical theory of laughter is presented in Symposium or the Lapiths, a satire on philosophers by the aforementioned author (AU)