Life of the Party : University of Georgia Press : 9780820336909 : 0820336904 : 01 Aug 2010 : Critics have long recognized the links between community festivals and literary art. The comedies and tragedies of the ancient Greeks grew out of their festivals; Anglo-Saxon poetry was often read at festival occasions; and the structural patterns of renaissance drama are inseparable from their festive origins. In The Life of the Party, Christopher Ames argues that the private party has become the festival of modern culture and has served as a shaping force in the fiction of many important twentieth century writers. Drawing upon and extending theories of Mikhail Bakhtin and others, Ames contends that parties have inherited much of the spirit and social function of festivals and carnivals. In these ?controlled transgressions,? ordinary rules of behavior are set aside for a short time, permitting excess and including (usually in veiled form) a ritual encounter with death, as well as a cathartic