Drama Terms Flashcards
Iambic Pentameter
Example:
Two households, both alike in dignity
(In fair Verona, where we lay our scene),
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.
From forth the fatal loins of these two foes
A pair of star-crossed lovers take their life,
Whose misadventured piteous overthrows
Doth with their death bury their parents’ strife.
The fearful passage of their death-marked love
And the continuance of their parents’ rage,
Which, but their children’s end, naught could remove,
Is now the two hours’ traffic of our stage—
The which, if you with patient ears attend,
What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.
A line of verse with five metrical feet, each consisting of one short (or unstressed) syllable followed by one long (or stressed) syllable. Think of hip-hop, think heartbeats, bah bum, bah bum, bah bum, bah bum, bah bum - ten beats or syllables per line. Sometimes Shakespeare contracts words to make the beats fit.
Soliloquy
Example:
But soft! What light through yonder window breaks?
It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.
Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,
Who is already sick and pale with grief,
That thou, her maid, art far more fair than she.
An act of speaking one’s thoughts aloud when by oneself or regardless of any hearers. In a play even if other actors are on stage, they don’t “hear” the actor speaking. It’s a way to convey inner thoughts on stage solely for the audience.
Monologue
Example:
And for that offence
Immediately we do exile him hence:
I have an interest in your hate’s proceeding,
My blood for your rude brawls doth lie a-bleeding;
But I’ll amerce you with so strong a fine
That you shall all repent the loss of mine:
I will be deaf to pleading and excuses;
Nor tears nor prayers shall purchase out abuses:
Therefore use none: let Romeo hence in haste,
Else, when he’s found, that hour is his last.
Bear hence this body and attend our will:
Mercy but murders, pardoning those that kill.
A long speech by one actor in a play which is directed toward other actors on stage.
Aside
Example:
Is she a capulet?
O dear account. My life is my foe’s debt.
A remark or passage by a character in a play that is intended to be heard by the audience but unheard by e other characters in the play.
Pun
Example:
Mercutio - That dreamers often lie?
Romeo - In bed asleep, while they do dream things true.
Romeo - Not I, believe me. You have dancing shoes with nimble soles; I have a soul of lead.
A joke exploiting the different possible meanings of a word or the fact that there are words that sound alike but have different meanings. These tend to be funnier when heard aloud because not every audience member may get these on the first listen.
Catharsis
Example: When Romeo and Juliet both kill themselves in quick secession.
In tragedies these are the feelings of pity and fear felt by the audience, for the inevitable downfall of the protagonist. The Greeks believed that if the audience experienced this pity and fear in a play and had emotional responses as an audience member that they would be better equipped to handle their emotions in regular society. The audience purges negative emotions through watching characters suffer and/or die. (These are the parts of the play where you feel the need to have a nice ugly cry).
Oxymoron
Example:
O serpent heart, hid with a flow’ring face!
Did ever dragon keep so fair a cave?
Beautiful tyrant, fiend angelical!
Dove-feathered raven, wolvish-ravening lamb!
Despised substance of divinest show!
Just opposite to what thou justly seem’st,
A damnèd saint, an honorable villain!
O nature, what hadst thou to do in hell
When thou didst bower the spirit of a fiend
In moral paradise of such sweet flesh?
Was ever book containing such vile matter
So fairly bound? O, that deceit should dwell
In such a gorgeous palace! (3.2.79-91)
A figure of speech in which the apparently contradictory terms appear together.
Hamartia
Example: Romeo is extremely rash and doesn’t think things through. This can be seen with him falling in love with Juliet minutes after meeting her.
A fatal flaw leading to the downfall of a tragic hero or heroine; this can also be looked at as the moment when the tragic hero makes the decision that leads to his/her downfall.
Malapropism
Example:
Mercutio - Yea, is the worst well? Very well took, i’faith, wisely, wisely.
Nurse - If you be he sir, I desire some confidence with you. (meant to say “conference instead of confidence?
Mercutio - She will indite him to supper (makes fun of nurse by saying indite when he means invite)
When a character mistakes a similar sounding word for another, typically used to get a laugh (either intentionally or at a character’s expense). The nurse in Romeo and Juliet uses a lot of these. She tries to sound more education by using larger words but ends up seeming less educated because she misuses words. Shakespeare uses this device to often highlight the differences between classes.
Character Foil
Example: Benvolio & Mercutio
A foil is a character that serves as a contrast to another character, normally the protagonist. The juxtaposition of these two characters serves to highlight the differences between them.
Apostrophe
Example: Juliet addresses Romeo in the balcony scene. This is considered an apostrophe because she is talking to him when she is thinking he actually isn’t there.
Occurs when an actor directly addresses someone ( or something) that is not present or something that can’t respond, like the moon, love, fate, or gods. An apostrophe can also address an absent person who is either off-stage, dead, or imaginary.
Motif
Examples:
- Night vs. Day
- Roles of Women
- Role of Marriage
- Age vs. Youth
- Past vs. Future
- Private vs. Public
- Private Strife vs. Social Well-Being
- Love vs. Hate
- Light vs. Dark
A recurring or featured idea, object, color, etc. that is present throughout a piece of literature.
Theme
Examples:
- Legacy
- Fate
- Love
- Duality
- Gender Roles
- Themes from Motifs
An overarching message, life observation, and/or life lesson that we can take away as readers/viewers based on what happens in a story.
Sonnet
Example:
Romeo - If I profane with my unworthiest hand (A)
This holy shrine, the gentle fine is this: (B)
My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand (A)
To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss. (B)
Juliet - Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much, (C)
Which mannerly devotion shows in this; (D)
For saints have hands that pilgrims’ hands do touch, (C)
And palm to palm is holy palmers’ kiss. (D)
Romeo - Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too? (E)
Juliet - Ay, pilgrim, lips that they must use in prayer.(F)
Romeo - O, then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do; (E)
They pray, grant thou, lest faith turn to despair. (F)
Juliet - Saints do not move, though grant for prayers’ sake. (G)
Romeo - Then move not, while my prayer’s effect I take. (G)
A poem of fourteen lines using any of a number of formal rhyme schemes, in English typically having ten syllables per line.
