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Literary and Cultural Studies (Subject) / Drama (Lesson)
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- Traditional European Dramatic Conventions the immediacy of dramatic performance has engendered the traditional 'three unities' of action, place and time the norm of unity of action derives from Aristotl's Poetics, who proclaimed that there should be "connection and continuity" in the plot Neoclassicist critics added the unity of place and unity of time numerous types of dramas (absurd, melodrama, pastoral, satire...) most basic distinction: from adversity to prosperty: comedy from prosperity to adversity: tragedy
- Freytag's Pyramid of Classical Drama Act: exposition/introduction Act: rising action/complication Act: climax/peripety/turning point Act: falling action/suspense Act: catastrophe/denoument
- Tragedy "A tragedy is the imitation of an action that is serious and also, as having magnitude, complete in itself; in language with pleasurable accessories, each kind brought in seperately in the parts of the work; in a dramatic, not in a narrative form, with incidents arousing pity and fear, wherewith to accomplish its catharsis of such emotions" ⇒ Aristotle In form: representations of action In function: delivers the audience of certain emotions and thereby teaches abput human nature apart from the pleasure it gives us, the function of tragedy is to purge the audience of pity and fear and thereby teach us about ourselves
- Requirements for catharsis "The tragic hero will most effectively evoke both our pity and terror if he is neither thoroughly good nor bad but a mixture of both: this tragic effect will be stronger if the hero is 'better than we are' in the sense that he is of higher moral worth" "charge in fortune" because of "mistake of judgement" ⇒ Aristotle Anagnorisis: Recognition; from ignorance to knowledge
- Elizabethan Drama (1558-1603) The Globe Theatre, built in 1599 by Shakespeare's playing company 'The Lord Chamberlain's Men Other Elizabethan theatres on the South Bank: The Curain, The Rose, The Swan No women were allowed on stage ⇒ boy players
- William Shakespeare (1564-1616) First Folio (1623): all plays, categorised as comedies, histories and tragedies earlier printings: quartos of individual plays, usually distinguished as good and bad quartos
- Categorisation of Shakespeare's plays according to Bradley The Great Tragedies: Hamlet (1600-1601) Othello (1603-1604) King Lear (1605-1606) Macbeth (1606) The Problem Plays: The Merchant of Venice (1597) Troilus and Cressida (1602) Measure for Measure (1603) All's Well that ends Well (1604) The Winter's Tale (1609) etc The Roman Plays: Titus Andronicus (1592) Julius Caesar (1599) Antony and Cleopatre (1606) Coriolanus (1608)
- Shakespeare's Hamlet Act: Initial situation (familial, political, metaphysical) Act: Hamlet's struggle with increasing doubt Act: Evidence and climatic events (mousetrap, dispute, murder) Act: Hamlet's abscence and return; madness and conspiracy Act: Catastrophe (duel, death, restoration of order)
- Dialogue Length of replies proportional share of speeches for each character frequency of change of speakers linear succession of speeches - one after another, or interruptions (troubled communication) Use of dialogue: not restricted to the usual function of dialogue in real life initiates the drama's action and furthers it -a kind of verbal action/performance serves characterisation, makes clear points of view and settles conflicts
- Monologue/Soliloquy/Aside Monologue: great degree of subjecticity, characters express their feelings and thoughts in an unmediated way (not necessarily reliable) Soliloquy: characters talking to themselves; honestly = reliabe information Aside: monological (aside to self); dialogical (aside to X) directly to the audience (aside to audience)
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- Dramatis personae major and minor characters contrasts and correspondences relationship and their changes conflicts (protagonist/antagonist) configuration on stage in seperate scenes character perspective (How informed are the characters? How are they disposed psychologically? What are their values and norms?) changing and static characters (Flat or round, individual or type)
- Representations of Time and Space Semantic Relationships: in a single locale stage vs. off-stage between different locales between fictional locale and real spatial context between locale and events Semantic interpretation of time: immediacy vs. distance (fictional vs. real spatial context)