Drama Flashcards
William Shakespeare
1564-1616
- most important/popular author
Types/Genres of Drama
most popular:
- comedy
- tragedy
- history
Comedy
Drama
happy end
mostly ends in marriage
Tragedy
Drama
sad/bad end
mostly ends in death
History
Drama
not really popular
Drama to Theatre
Author <-> Dramatic text <-> Reader
Theatre/Apparatus <-> Performance Text <-> Audience
Communication Model Narrative Texts
Levels of Communication
extra-textual Level of Communication: empirical author -> empirical reader
intra-textual level of communication I + II: Internal Communication System: character communication
How does drama compensate for the lack of mediator?
through Dramtic Text (primary and secondary) and Theatrical Text
Plurimediality
primary: what actors say on stage
secondary: everything that’s not spoken, helps organise the play
Plurimediality
usage of a lot of different medias/codes
What is a chorus?
a character who is not part of the play is introduced to the audience
epic tendencies
Drama
character talks directly to the audience
“breaks” the fourth wall between external and internal communication
Codes and Channels of Theatre Communication
Channel: visual or acoustical
Code: verbal or non-verbal
Sender: Character or stage
acoustical & verbal -> linguistic or paralinguistic -> Character or stage
from text to play
Drama
Theatre/Acting Company: commissions the writer
Writer: writes the Foul Papers, then reviews these and makes a fair copy
Foul Paper/Fair Copy: given to Master of Revels
Master of Revels: censors the Performance (decides if it’ll be played/printed)
Theatre/Acting Company: performs the Play OR
Printer: prints the play/text as Quarto or Folio
Different Types of Speech
in drama
- Dialogical Speech
- Monological Speech
-> Monologue
-> Soliloguy - Asides
-> Monological Aside
-> Aside ad spectatores
-> Dialogical Aside
Dialogical Speech
two ore more characters talking to each other
Monological Speech
character talks for an extended amount of time, alone
- Monologue: character is NOT alone on the stage, other characters are there
- Soliloguy: character is alone on stage
Asides
character breaks out (i.e. to the audience)
- Monological aside
- Aside ad spectatores
- Dialogical aside (talks to one character and suddenly breaks out to talk to another [without the first character hearing him])
-> the character he originally talks to, doesnt hear him
Discrepant Awareness
Drama
- superior audience awareness (dramatic irony -> the reader/audience knows way more than most of the characters)
- inferior audience awareness
Figure conceptions
Drama
- static vs. dynamic
- one-dimensional vs. multidimensional
static vs. dynamic
Figure Conceptions (Drama)
- static: character stays the same the whole time
- dynamic: characters views, etc. change/develop over time
one-dimensional vs. multidimensional
Figure Conceptions (Drama)
one-dimensional: there’s not much to the character
multidimensional: the character is more complex
Characterisation
(Drama)
- Figural (explicit) Character communication
- Figural (implicit) character’s presence
- Authorial
Figural (explicit) Character communication
Characterisation (Drama)
Self Commentary
- Monologue or
- Dialogue
Commentary by Others
- Monologue
-> before 1st appearance
-> after 1st appearance
- Dialogue
-> in praesentia
-> in absentia
Figural (implicit) Character’s Presence
Characterisation (Drama)
- non-verbal Characterisation
-> stature, facial expressions, mask, costume, setting - Verbal Characterisation
-> voice, rhetoric, register (dialect, jargon,…)
Authorial
Characterisation (Drama)
- Explicit
-> Paratexts, Speaking names (Names with a meanign, ex.: Severus Snape -> Snape - Snake Symbol of Slytherin) - Implicit
-> Contrasts and Parallels in the Configuration (i.e. form of texts)
–> high class characters speak in verses (Gedichtsform), low class characters speak in prose (Blockabsatz)
Exposition
(Drama)
- transmission of information to do with the events and situations from the past that determine the dramatic present
-> referential function (mostly related to the context of a message)
Dramatic Introduction
(Drama)
- used to simulate the audience’s attention and to attune it to the fictional world of the drama
-> phatic function
-> example: a chorus (not part of the play) introduces the fictional world
Isolated vs. Integrated Exposition/Dramatic Introduction
isolated: not part of the play/Characters
integrated: a character of the play
Monological vs. dialogical exposition/dramatic introduction?
monological: character(person talks alone
dialogical: character/person talks with someone else
Classical 5-Act Structure Drama
G. Freytag
- Act: Exposition
- Act: Rising Action (complication)
- Act: Climax and peripeteia (reversal)
- Act: Falling Action (unravelling/untying)
- Act: catastrophe or denoument
Dramatic Conventions and concepts
Aristotle’s Unities
Unity of Action
Unity of Time
Unity of Place
=> not all plays stick to these unities
Unity of Action
Aristotle
every part is important to the outcome and effect of the play
Unity of Time
Aristotle
a play can’t cover more than a day
Aristotle’s Conception of Tragedy
ideally only one place
-> you can’t switch between several places during a play
Aristotle’s Conception of Tragedy
usually has a tragic hero
-> a man whose character is generally good, whose misfortune is brought about not by vice or depravity but by some error
Classical Conception according to Aristotle
- hubris
- hamartia
- peripeteia
- anagnorisis
- catharis
hubris
Classical Conception Aristotle
refers to the tragic hero at the beginning of the play
-> over-confident
hamartia
Classical Conception Aristotle
translates to: tragic flaws
-> hero has some ‘mistakes’
peripeteia
Classical Conception Aristotle
at some point of the play there’s a reversal of fortune
anagnorisis
Classical Conception Aristotle
change from ignorance to knowledge of own downfall
catharis
Classical Conception Aristoteles
when reading a Tragedy we experience pity and fear
-> through thi: purification of these emotions
