By composing six popular comedies, Terence became pivotal in the development of Latin literature and, because his plays have never ceased to be read, eventually of European drama. Writing toward the beginning of Rome's engagement with Greek culture, Terence pioneers both accurate literary translation and creative competition with his original while setting linguistic standards for the classical Latin style to come. His comedy--written at the end of a living tradition of Greco-Roman comedy--though still in touch with its origins in the grotesque and fantastic, represents the mediocre lives of realistic characters and transmits to a Europe that had no Menander possibilities for comedy at work not only in comic drama but, in time, also in the novel and the situation comedy. As a working professional of the theater Terence gave early witness to the tension between artistic ambition and the commercial demands of a popular art form.

Publius...