On the pure freedom of laughter

Abstract

The aim of this article is to defend the hypothesis that Lucian de Samosata’s poetics, which has as its criterion the notion of pure compositional and thematic freedom, also has as its consequence a pure freedom in relation to laughter. Lucian would conceptualize his poetics as a harmonious mixture of comedy and philosophical dialogue. However, Plato also appropriated various elements of comedy in the composition of his dialogues, as well as defending a thesis on ridicule that seems to be confused with Socratic practice itself, thus playing an important dramatic role. In order to clarify the difference concerning the question of laughter between these two authors, the article will be divided into two parts: in the first part, I will present the thesis that Plato develops in the Philebus on ridicule, seeking to demonstrate the critical uses of laughter in his thought in general; in the second part, the status of Lucianic poetics will be discussed, in order to make visible the way in which Lucian turns upside down the relationship between philosophy and comedy that would have been established by Plato, freeing laughter from the cloister of philosophical gravity.