Drama Terms 2
Terms
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- playwright
- a writer who makes plays
- Play
- written to be performed by actors on a stage before an audience
- drama
- performance in a theater, actors take on roles, perform actions, speak dialogue written in a script
- script
- text of many plays
- closet dramas
- written to be read rather than performed
- one-act play
- enitre play takes place in a single location and unfolds in one action
- acts
- the main division of a full length play
- scenes
- when location changes or a new character enters
- conventions
- understood and accepted by audiences, familiar techniques
- setting
- single location
- suspense
- anxious uncertainty about what will happen nextt
- exposition
- provides the necessary background information about the characters and their circumstances
- dialogue
- verbal exchanges between characters
- conflict
- The struggle within the plot between opposing forces. The protagonist engages in the conflict with the antagonist, which may take the form of a character, society, nature, or an aspect of the protagonist’s personality. See also character, plot.
- plot
- author's arrangement of incidents in the play that gives the story a particular focus
- subplot
- secondary action that reinforces, or contrasts the main plot
- protagonist
- central character
- antagonist
- oppostion to the central character
- stage direction
- A playwright’s written instructions about how the actors are to move and behave in a play. They explain in which direction characters should move, what facial expressions they should assume, and so on. See also drama, script.
- pyramidal pattern
- divide the plot into three essential parts. The first part is the rising action, in which complication creates some sort of conflict for the protagonist. The second part is the climax, the moment of greatest emotional tension in a narrative, usually marking a turning point in the plot at which the rising action reverses to become the falling action. The third part, the falling action (or resolution) is characterized by diminishing tensions and the resolution of the plot’s conflicts and complications.
- rising action
- in which complication creates some sort of conflict for the protagonist
- climax
- the moment of greatest emotional tension in a narrative, usually marking a turning point in the plot at which the rising action reverses to become the falling action
- crisis
- turning point in the action of a story that has a powerful effect on the protagonist. Opposing forces come together decisively to lead to the climax of the plot
- falling action
- is characterized by diminishing tensions and the resolution of the plot’s conflicts and complications.
- resolution
- The conclusion of a plot’s conflicts and complications. The resolution, also known as the falling action, follows the climax in the plot. See also dénouement, plot.
- conclusion or denouement
- "unknotting",resolution
- foil
- character whose behaviors and values contrast with the protagonist
- theme
- central idea or meaning of the play
- orchestra
- "dancing place"
- chorus
- chanted lines and danced
- skene
- a stage buliding that serves as a dressing rooms
- deus ex machina
- "god from the machine", author provides a to easy resolution for story
- prologue
- opening speech or dialogue, usually give exposition nessasry for the following action
- parodos
- chorus, commentary on what the audience has learned
- episodia
- episodes, characters exchanges dialogues with heated debate
- stasimon
- chours responds and interprets proceeding dialogue
- exodus
- last scene, follows final episode
- tragedy
- presents courageous individuals who confront powerful forces within or outside themselves
- hamartia
- weakness
- tragic flaw
- excess pride, ambition, passion
- hybris or hubris
- overweening pride
- catharsis
- purging of emotions
- reversal
- hero's fortune truns and unexpected direction, change occurs
- recognition
- previously unknown information is revealed to the protagonist resulting in the dicovery of the truth
- dramatic irony or tragic irony
- creates a discrepancy between what a character believes or says and what the reader or audience member knows to be true.
- mystery plays
- dramatize stories from the bible, "Creation"
- Miracle plays
- based on the lives of saints
- Morality plays
- allegorical plays are thier to teach humanity how to achieve salvation
- aside
- spech directed only to the audience
- soliloquy
- speech delieverd while an actor is alone on the stage
- history play
- British play
- comedy
- A work intended to interest, involve, and amuse the reader or audience, in which no terrible disaster occurs and that ends happily for the main characters. High comedy refers to verbal wit, such as puns, whereas low comedy is generally associated with physical action and is less intellectual. Romantic comedy involves a love affair that meets with various obstacles (like disapproving parents, mistaken identities, deceptions, or other sorts of misunderstandings) but overcomes them to end in a blissful union. Shakespeare’s comedies, such as A Midsummer Night’s Dream, are considered romantic comedies.
- comic relief
- humorous scene that alleviates tension
- romantic comedies
- lovers whose hearts are set on each other, but whose lives are complicated
- satire
- critical eye on vices, follies and holds for ridicule
- high comedy
- verbal wit
- farce
- A form of humor based on exaggerated, improbable incongruities.