SOURCE: "The Humour of Petronius," in The Satyricon of Petronius: A Literary Study, Faber and Faber Limited, 1968, pp. 214-31.

In the following essay, Sullivan discusses Petronius's wide range of humor, including the humor of incongruity, literary humor, farce, mime situations, verbal wit, and satiric dialogue.

I. Gi; I. some General Considerations =~ Ssome General Considerations

Nothing is more boring than writing about what is comic, and so one approaches the subject of Petronius' humour with a heavy heart, though it is almost the first characteristic of the Satyricon that the reader notices. L. Dugas' sound remarks come to mind:

Il n'est pas de fait plus etudie que le rire; il n'en est pas qui ait eu le don d'exciter davantage la curiosite du vulgaire et celle des philosophes; il n'en est pas sur lequel on ait recueilli plus d'observations et bati plus de theories, et avec cela il n'en...