Most of us, I think of classics as exclusively Greek tragedies, but Plautus offers here a Latin comedy. You know that trope in movies and TV where the kids are having a house party and then the parents come home unexpectedly and everyone has to hide and pretend there was no party? Well, that’s The Haunted House. Philolaches is a young man whose father, Theopropides, has been abroad for three years. While he’s been away, Philolaches has been engaging in debauchery with his friends, hosting alcohol-fueled ragers. He has also paid to have a sex worker become his exclusive mistress. When they discover that his father has returned, the house goes into a panic and Tranio, one of their slaves, has to take action.
Tranio develops a plot that requires more and more effort to sustain. He tells everyone to lock themselves inside the house and then when Theopropides returns, Tranio emerges to warn him that the house is haunted and that by even knocking on the door, he may be cursed. It’s like an episode of Fraser from there, where one lie requires another, requires another, requires another, requires another. Tranio is nearly a comic version of Iago, praising the value of lying as he digs himself in deeper. Philolaches owes a lender money for all the booze and Tranio develops a plot to have Theopropides pay off the debt because—oh, it’s not for booze or buying the freedom of a sex worker—it’s because the house was haunted, so they bought the neighbour’s house at a huge discount. When Theopropides wants to go into the house, Tranio has to approach the neighbour and say that Theopropides is looking to do some renovations and wants to inspect the house. Luckily, he’s able to get in and inspect without too many questions, but the tension of the play is that the lie is ready to unfold at any moment. It’s a fun, short little piece that tells an essentially sitcom-esque story. I think it’s hard to genuinely connect with a piece so old. Our expectations of stories have changed over time, and so there’s always a bit of a distance (cf. Irving Howe’s History and the Novel). I think comedies in particular are difficult to sustain over a long period, but the comedy comes primarily through the situation rather than the language, so The Haunted House maybe has an advantage in that respect.
Structurally, the play is pretty interesting. The opening scene of the play is an interaction between the city slave and the country slave to set the stage. Throughout the play, we get songs (?) where characters offer their life philosophies. There are also tangents that take up a significant amount of time, the most notable of which is a lengthy exchange between Philematium (Philolaches’ mistress) and her elderly maid Scapha with Philolaches eavesdropping. It’s a comic moment where Philolaches offers comment on Scapha’s advice and he’s getting increasingly annoyed with her.
Other than Tranio, Philolaches is probably the character about whom we learn the most. In his life philosophy song, he explains how life is like a house that needs constant repair. He displaces responsibility from himself and blames his father for not maintaining him well and allowing cracks to form in him. In those cracks, love seeps in and now he sees himself as no good, giving up his life for his lover. It’s an insight into Athenian life, which is also noted in the introduction by the translator, about how much influence parents ought to have on their children.
I wouldn’t put Plautus on the same level as current playwrights, but I was surprised by how ‘modern’ the work seems relative to other narratives. Perhaps it’s because the play had to appeal to lowest common denominator, but it actually has stayed an entertaining premise, even if it’s not going to change my world.
Short play, short review. Happy reading!
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