noun pl. comedies -·dies

1. Obsolete a drama or narrative with a happy ending or nontragic theme Dante's Divine Comedy
2. 1. any of various types of play or film with a more or less humorous treatment of characters and situation and a happy ending
   2. such plays collectively
   3. the branch of drama having to do with such plays
   4. the writing, acting, or theoretical principles of this kind of drama
3. a novel or any narrative having a comic theme, tone, etc.
4. the comic element in a literary work, or in life
5. an amusing or comic event or sequence of events

Etymology: ME & OFr comedie < L comoedia < Gr kōmōidia < kōmos, revel, carousal + aeidein, to sing: see ode