SOURCE: "The Comic Spirit in Plautus and Terence" in The Roman Way, W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1932, pp. 47-63.

A German-born classical scholar, essayist, and translator, Hamilton is best known as an explicator of ancient cultures for the modern reader. Her studies include The Roman Way (1932) and Spokesmen for God: The Great Teachers of the Old Testament (1949). Below, she compares the style of Terence with that of his predecessor, Plautus.

[Plautus and Terence] are the founders of our theatre. Their influence has been incalculable. The two main divisions of comedy under which all comic plays except Aristophanes' can be grouped, go back to the two Roman playwrights. Plautus is the source for one, Terence for the other. The fact is another and a vivid illustration of how little the material of literature matters, and how much the way the material is treated. Both dramatists deal with exactly the...