My project investigates Seneca’s complex reception of Roman comedy by focusing on the figure of the so-called seruus callidus (“clever slave”), one of Roman comedy’s most popular and enduring stock characters. The central premise of my dissertation is that Seneca’s tragedies reveal a widespread and increasing interest in adopting and adapting the language, characterization, and plot(-making skill)s associated with the seruus callidus from his earlier plays (the Phaedra) to his late masterpiece (the Thyestes). By employing genre theory and reader-response theory, I investigate how Seneca’s tragic plots, characters, and language self-consciously appropriate central aspects of Roman comedy—thus opening new horizons and imbuing new dramatic energy through the incorporation of comic elements.