The Pot of Gold and Other Plays

Plautus (c.254-184 BC), perhaps the supreme comic writer of the Roman world, has also proved the most influential. The Pseudolus, with its love-lorn young man and quick-talking slave who try desperately to wrest the captive heroine away from the scheming pimp, is a typical and masterly example of Plautus' genius. Other plays in this volume, adapted from Greek models to the manners and customs of his day, are invaluable historical documents about Roman life

As fresh, witty and perceptive today as the day they were written, they also introduce many classic comic characters and situations: the confusions surrounding the Menaechmus twins inspired Shakespeare's Comedy of Errors; the old miser in The Pot of Gold became Molière's L'Avare; while the sponger in The Prisoners and the swaggering soldier are undying - and hilarious - comic types. In E. F. Watling's fine translation, as suitable for the stage as for reading, Plautus' broad and lively humour is brilliantly re-created