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I. Definition of the genre II. An overview of the history of drama and

Exercises of the theatre
II. An overview of the history of drama
and of the theatre
II.1. Greek drama and theatre
II.1. Greek drama and theatre
1. Origins and development
Exercises
1. Origins and development
II.2. Elizabethan drama and theatre
1. Origins The roots of European drama and theatre are to be
2. Genres found in ancient Greece.
3. Main characteristics of
Elizabethan theatre In the religious celebrations of the god of wine and
Exercises madness, Dionysus, costumed and masked choruses
II.3. Modern tendencies in drama and (a group of singers) presented lyrics honouring him
the theatre to the accompanying music of an aulos (an
1. The formation of the modern instrument similar to modern day flute) or the lyre.
theatre from the Restoration to the These hymns or choral lyrics we call dithyrambs.
end of the 19th century
Though we have no written record, tradition has it
2. The realistic revolution of the
end of the 19th century that in 6th century B.C. Thespis was the first writer
3. Experimental trends in the 20th who placed one separate actor in front of the chorus,
century and thus created a dialogue on stage. Slowly the
Exercises topics of the dithyrambs widened and included
III. Main Dramatic Genres: Tragedy and episodes from myths of other gods, not only
Comedy Dionysus, and of mythic heroes as well.
III.1. Tragedy
1. Definition The heyday of Greek drama coincides with the
2. Tragic structure glorious era of Greek democracy, that is 5th century
3. Types of tragedy BC, when during a five-day spring festival the
III.2. Comedy dramas were shown and awarded. Though these
1. Definition plays were already much different from early
2. Types of comedy dithyrambs, they still remained the representative of
III.3. Other genres a communal spirit, and to attend the festival was part
Exercises of an Athenian’s civic and religious duty.
IV. Exercises
V. Links The festivals opened with dithyrambs, followed by
five comedies, and ended with the performances of
tragedy-trilogies and a satyr-play (a mythical story
of burlesque nature often in obscene language,
performed by a chorus of satyrs). Tragedies had
much developed since then and became the most
prestigious form of play-acting. Aeschylus (524-456
BC) selected a second actor to converse with the
chorus and the first actor, which resulted in more
exciting plot developments and more dialogue on
stage, while Sophocles (496-406 BC) added the third
actor, and Euripides (480-406 BC) the prologue to
precede the events. Actors wore masks and specific
costumes as well as cothurni (high soled shoes) to
be easily seen by the audience. The chorus did not
 only recite their lines in unison but also followed a
strict choreography of movements and dance.

Theatres were outdoors, holding an unusually large

crowd, with theatrons (seating areas)
accommodating over 2,000 people. The stage, raised
at the narrower end of the semicircle theatron was
backed by a painted façade, the skene. Actors
appeared on the stage, while the chorus was placed
in the orchestra, the circular area in front of the
stage. Stage machinery was also used, e.g. in letting
down the gods from above the stage.

For Greeks going to the theatre and watching a play

signified belonging to a community and a religion,
and was not a simple recreational event. This
characteristic of dramatic arts, that is welding a
society together, has remained long present in later
ages as well.

See also: III. Main Dramatic Genres – tragedy, satyr

play, old comedy, new comedy

Origins: medieval drama

The Middle Ages, with their contempt for pagan Antiquity, brought an end, at least
temporarily, to the popularity of drama as well. However, even medieval man turned out to
be ‘playing man’, homo ludens, as Johan Huizinga described the inherent drive of humanity
to have and create entertainment in all kinds of situations. It was during the Renaissance, the
rebirth of the values and forms of Antiquity that both Greco-Roman tragedy (primarily
Seneca), and comedy (Terence and Plautus) found their way back to the stages. However, the
dramatic heritage of the Middle Ages is also vital to understand the achievements of
Renaissance drama.

Most of the factors that are associated with modern drama developed in some form during the
Middle Ages, a period of transition in many ways. By the end of this period, the drama lost
its ritual nature and became a form of entertainment above all.

Medieval drama knew nothing of Greek drama (the latter was considered pagan, just like the
whole of the Antique world); therefore the starting point was the Bible, and the Latin text of
the mass. As a result, medieval drama is predominantly religious; at the beginning it is
mainly liturgical drama, a form of drama drawing on the inherent dramatic elements of the
mass: the spoken and sung dialogue between priest and congregation (‘audience’); and the
so-called tropes (verses), e.g. “Quem queritis?” ‘Whom do you seek?’ in the Easter Day
ritual. This trope was probably the first to be turned into a play in its own right; later many
other such plays were performed at the great festivals of the Church, at Christmas, Easter,
Pentecost, Corpus Christi, etc.
The purpose of medieval drama was instruction (the Church was the sole possessor of
education and consequently knowledge, as the masses were illiterate). Drama was therefore
called the “quick book” (i.e. ‘living’ book) whose purpose was to teach the lower classes the
mysteries of the faith, presenting the story of mankind from Creation to the Last Judgment,
hence this type of drama is also known as the mystery play.

Liturgical plays were devised (probably also written) by the clergy, first performed within the
mass (e.g. the Passion, or the Quem queritis dialogue, see above), later, as they were
becoming more and more secular, they were put on outside the church, performed by trade
guilds, on pageants (wagons, moving around the city, stopping at several points, performing
the same play for a new audience). After a while, the plays included not only Biblical and
apocryphal or legendary elements, but more and more characters included in their own
right, e.g. Mack, the most lively and all-round comic character in the Wakefield Second
Shepherd’s Play. 2. Genres

 mystery: in the narrow sense: story from the Bible, usu. presented as part of a longer
sequence telling the story of man from the Creation to the Last Judgment.
 miracle: a later development from the mystery play, dramatising the lives and divine
miracles of saints, or the Virgin Mary. No significant texts survived in English
literature, but there is a famous French cycle, with forty-two plays about the divine
interventions of the Holy Virgin.
 morality: an allegory in dramatic form, dramatising the fight of good and bad within
(and for) the human soul; it presents man’s need for salvation and the various
temptations on his way through life towards death. These plays serve a didactic
purpose, similarly to religious sermons: they illustrate the war between God and the
Devil. Typical heroes are Mankind, or Everyman, with other characters such as Good
Deeds, Knowledge, Goods, Death, God, and the Devil. The influence of these plays
on Elizabethan drama is obvious: Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus shows how Good and
Bad Angels, God and the Devil fight for the soul of Faustus; and even Shakespeare’s
Richard III has a similar structure: two sides fighting for the salvation or the
damnation of the country.

In conclusion we can say therefore that during the Middle Ages the religious element in
drama became gradually less significant, being replaced by an emphasis on entertainment.
Also, an increasing concern for the commercial element is significant; not only as a necessary
financial background (the more elaborate and spectacular a play, the more expensive its
staging), but also as the recognition that the efforts of theatrical performers can be rewarded
with financial means. All of these developments were essential in paving the way for
Renaissance, especially Elizabethan drama.

3. Main characteristics of Elizabethan theatre - the influence of the theatre on the

texts

The reign of Elizabeth I (1558-1603) brought prosperity to England, it was an age of

expansion and new discoveries, and the theatre as a form of entertainment enjoyed an
unprecedented popularity. (It seems that the drama becomes the dominant popular genre
when a society feels secure in its position in the world, as it happened in the heyday of
Athenian democracy in the 5th century BC.)
At the beginning of the Renaissance, many medieval characteristics of the theatre remained;
first of all, actors were travelling around the country in companies, under the patronage of a
wealthy aristocrat, in whose house they could survive the winter months, when no open-air
performances were possible. The most famous companies of the age were the Lord Admiral’s
Men, with Christopher Marlowe as the leading dramatist, and the Lord Chamberlain’s Men,
with William Shakespeare.

As travelling companies gave performances wherever they found a proper place and the
prospect of a good audience, they usually performed in the courtyards of public houses and
inns, making good use of the entrances behind them, and also the windows on the first floor
that overlooked the scene. This type of theatrical space was used even later when the first
purpose-built theatres were constructed. The space above the stage represented heaven, or
was used when a balcony scene was required, as in Romeo and Juliet; the stage represented
earth and was used for the majority of the action, with a little space opening from it, serving
the purposes of an inner room; and if the representation of hell was necessary, the empty
space below the stage was used, as in Hamlet, where the Ghost’s voice could come from
under the boards.

As the authorities did not like the idea of large crowds gathering together, most public
theatres were built outside the city walls of London, on Bankside. These theatres were
constructed in a circular shape (“this wooden O”, as it is referred to in Shakespeare’s Henry
V, Prologue 13); they were still partly open-air spaces, although there was a roof above the
stage, and people sitting in the galleries were also sheltered from the extremities of the
weather, but the groundlings, who were standing around the stage, were practically
unprotected from rain or sunshine. The most famous London theatres were the Rose, the
Theatre, and Shakespeare’s Globe.

The most important feature of Elizabethan theatre was the appearance of new stage forms,
with the result of an acting style completely different from anything before or after it. The so-
called apron stage, surrounded by the audience on three sides, could not make use of the
scenery of medieval pageants, but neither did it need and desire the spectacle of later
Jacobean masques, not to mention Victorian theatre and its claim for ‘reality’. Therefore, the
Elizabethan bare stage forced the playwright to provide everything verbally – the text of
every play contains all sorts of information that modern authors would include in their stage
directions only. (Cf. references telling us about the location: Rosalind: “Well, this is the
Forest of Arden” As You Like It, 2.4.12; about the time: King Richard: “What is’t o’clock?
Catesby: It’s supper time, my lord: it’s nine o’clock” Richard III, 5.3.48-49; about the
weather: Hamlet: “The air bites shrewdly, it is very cold” Hamlet, 1.4.1; about the view:
Duncan: “This castle hath a pleasant seat” Macbeth, 1.6.1 etc.)

As there were no curtains either, entrances were also marked by words: (Horatio: “But soft,
behold. Lo, where it comes again”, Hamlet, 1.1.129; “Here Clarence comes”, Richard III,
1.1.41). Even more problematic were exits, especially when dead bodies had to be disposed
of; therefore most of the time they are carried off the stage, e.g.: Fortinbras: “Let four
captains / Bear Hamlet like a soldier to the stage”, Hamlet, 5.2.400-1.

Another significant factor about the dramatic text of Elizabethan theatre, at least in the case
of Shakespeare, is that actually there is no authorised edition of the plays. The more reliable
editions of Shakespeare’s plays were published after his death, collected by his colleagues,
actors and literary men (e.g. John Heminges and Henry Condell, actors in the Lord
Chamberlain’s Company, edited the First Folio in 1623 and wrote a Preface to it). As there
was no copyright, the right of performance belonged to whoever had the text, therefore rival
companies were trying to steal texts in any way imaginable (sending their spies to the
performance who jotted down the text in short-hand, or paying actors who recited the play for
them – as much as they could remember), which resulted in so-called pirated editions.

Besides the text, the actor had only himself (not herself, as only men were allowed to act on
stage), with his facial features, his body and senses, and more importantly, his garments, to
create a dramatic personality. There was no scenery and hardly any props used on stage, but
costumes were lavish and often carried metaphorical meanings as well. Renaissance theatre
also relied on the typical costumes of medieval stock characters (as the crown of kings, the
white robe of angels and the furry black costume of the devil, etc).

Sometimes, especially when the time/place gap between two scenes was greater than usual,
or some preliminary background information is indispensable, a prologue was used, e.g. in
Romeo and Juliet, Henry V, The Winter’s Tale, etc.

Besides the public theatre, there were also private theatres restricted for the use of the
aristocracy and the royal court; Shakespeare’s Blackfriars Theatre being the most famous
example. These buildings were similar in structure to the ‘wooden O’-s of the public theatres
but had already full roof covers and accommodated a smaller audience.

After the brilliance of Elizabethan drama, the reign of James I brought significant changes to
the theatre as well. As James was insecure about his own claim for the throne, he tried to
reinforce his position as a king with spectacular representations of absolute royal power. He
also encouraged his wife, Queen Anne, in her passion for elaborate court entertainments,
called masques, which were in fact allegorical propaganda exercises carried out in
spectacular form, glorifying the King and the monarchy. The significance of the masque in
the history of the theatre was the development of the proscenium stage, which has been the
dominant stage form ever since. The most important feature of these masques was the visual
impact they made, therefore the role of the designer was essential. The key figure of Jacobean
art was the designer Inigo Jones, who had complete control over theatres for about two
decades.

At the same time, Ben Jonson and other dramatists of the age who wanted to preserve the
dominance of content over spectacle, put on their satirical plays in the theatres of London.
Their favourite genre was tragedy of the most violent kind, provoking horror with blood and
thunder (not content with the Aristotelian emotions of pity and fear).

However, the increasingly Puritan middle classes, who had been waging a war against theatre
since the opening of the first public playhouse in 1576, were more and more opposed to this
kind of entertainment, and soon after the outbreak of the Civil War in 1642 Parliament
banned all plays, recommending instead “the profitable and seasonable considerations of
Repentance, Reconciliation and peace with God” (Ronald Harwood, All the World’s a Stage,
Methuen, London, 1984, p. 150.). They distrusted anything that was pleasant, as leisure and
entertainment were opposed to the Puritan ethics. Many other features of Renaissance theatre
were also clearly against God and godliness; it is enough to think of the fact that men dressed
up as women on stage, which is referred to as an abominable sin in the Bible (Deuteronomy
22:5).
Besides, theatres were also considered dangerous for political reasons, just like all places
where large crowds could gather uncontrolled. It is enough to add to the above the bawdy
jokes and illicit behaviour typical of these places, it is not surprising that Puritans could not
allow anything of this sort. Although plays were still put on in secret, both in private homes
and public houses, it was not until the Restoration of Charles II in 1660 that English theatre
entered its second great age.

II.3. Modern tendencies in drama and the theatre

1. The formation of the modern theatre from the Restoration to the end of the 19 th
century

Restoration Drama

The Restoration period refers to the decades between the restoration of the English
monarchy in 1660 and the end of the century, during which the theatre regained its popularity
and productivity, although the scope of drama was far from the abundance of genres in the
Elizabethan theatre. However, the period is extremely significant in the history of English
theatre, since most of the foundations of what we know today as modern theatre were laid
during these decades.

When King Charles II came back from his exile on the Continent, he brought an enthusiasm
for entertainment to England, but no one in the royal court wished to allow the subversive
element of the theatre to go uncontrolled. Besides, the King got used to regarding the theatre
as a social event as well, where there was an opportunity to meet and observe other members
of the aristocracy. As the previous public playhouses were clearly not suitable for
accommodating the monarch, now new theatre buildings had to be designed and constructed.
The King issued royal patents to two theatres, Thomas Killigrew’s, which became the
foundation of the later Drury Lane theatre, and Sir William Davenant’s theatre, which was
the forerunner of the Covent Garden theatre. These new theatre buildings contained boxes for
the King and the Royal Family, while the galleries, and the pit were used by the lower
classes.

The stage itself also underwent significant changes; first the bare stage gave way to the scenic
stage, then later the proscenium arch over the stage, which had appeared in Jacobean
masques, also became a significant part of theatre design, framing the production and at the
same time, separating the stage from the auditorium.

The dominant dramatic genre in the Restoration period was the comedy of manners,
depicting elegant society together with its vices and follies, with an emphasis on verbal wit
and stylishness, rather than moral instruction; outstanding authors were William Wycherley
(The Country Wife) and William Congreve (Love for Love; The Way of the World). This
genre was later refined and perfected in the second half of the 18th century by Richard
Brinsley Sheridan (The School for Scandal), who set the vein for the tradition of satirical
comedies, which has been a widely practiced tradition in English drama ever since. This
genre fulfils the desire to criticise society but at the same time retains the audience’s wish to
recognise itself in a favourable light, as witty and intelligent, fashionable and brilliant. The
art of criticism was also born in this period, when it was considered fashionable to be seen at
the theatre as early as possible (this is the period when the tradition of first night rituals was
born), and then to discuss and criticise the performances in the appropriate social circles.

In tragedy the new genre of heroic tragedy gained prominence, the most important authors
being Sir William Davenant, former collaborator of Inigo Jones (the designer of Jacobean
court masques) and the holder of a royal patent for the Covent Garden theatre; and also John
Dryden, the most important literary figure of the period.

This was the period in English theatre history when women also made their appearance on
the stage, although first they were only seen in foreign, mainly French troupes. Then the
Royal Warrant of King Charles II permitted only women to perform female roles, and this
novelty of theatrical practice brought about not only a more realistic portrayal of the female
character, but also the beginnings of the modern star-image of actresses, whose private lives
were just as much followed by their fans as their stage careers.

A reaction against the immoral society of the comedy of manners came in the form of the
sentimental comedy in the late 17th, early 18th century. This period did not produce any
outstanding pieces, but it was popular both in England and France at the time. Afterwards no
significant new comic form appeared in drama until the Theatre of the Absurd in the 20th
century, but playwrights were elaborating on and widening the scope of the already
established genres.

By the end of the 19th century, national characteristics of theatres have largely disappeared;
from this time on, national theatres were aware of and influenced by other nations’ theatrical
achievements, and new trends or approaches travelled across national boundaries.

Nevertheless, another dramatic form produced outstanding achievements in the age, the so-
called closet drama (often called a dramatic poem), which was designed to be read rather
than performed. As literacy was increasing among the middle classes and the reading public
was widening, this form also gained prominence, and many famous poets contributed to the
genre. One of the earliest examples is Milton’s Samson Agonistes, and later ones are Byron’s
Manfred, Shelley’s Cenci and Prometheus Unbound, or Keats’s Otho the Great.

2. The realistic revolution of the end of the 19 th century

By the end of the 19th century theatres often turned performances into spectacles. With
elaborate stage machinery and realistic scenery taken to the extreme, dramas themselves
often came to play a secondary role on stage. Popular melodramas, gothic and sentimental
plays, as well as musical extravaganzas drew the largest crowds into playhouses all across
Europe and even in North-America.

As a reaction to the unrealistic and incongruent plays they often saw on stage some of the
dramatists began to follow the instructions of Eugène Scribe (1791-1861) and turned to
writing well-made plays which, as opposed to sensationalist popular dramas, were neatly and
logically structured, however, often lacked a notable plot and thorough characterisation.

The creative impulse that rejuvenated drama at the end of the century came from the fields of
science and novel writing. Influenced by the writings of Darwin on hereditary and social
determinism, Jules and Edmond Goncourt, and more importantly Emile Zola began to write
novels depicting characters with sociological objectivity, showing theretofore neglected
aspects of contemporary society. They, in turn, had a great impact on the Norwegian
playwright, Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906).

His dramas, A Doll’s House (1879) and Ghosts (1881) shocked and whipped up audiences all
over the world with their brave display of failed marriages and hereditary determination,
forcing European middle classes to confront themselves and the faulty aspects of their value
system with reality. Although first severely criticised by officials – so much so that in
England the Lord Chamberlain refused to give a performance permit to these plays – these
dramas proved to be immensely popular among audiences, as they showed those corners of
their lives, usually hidden behind society morals, which they themselves described as reality.

Ibsen introduced everyday events, a realistic setting and a naturalistic acting style onto the
stage, with a heavy stress on psychological realism. His dramaturgy has much in common
with Sophocles’ tragic structure, evident e.g. in Oedipus Rex, in that the action on stage aims
at uncovering, and analysing the past. His characters (usually members of a family) lead
seemingly harmonious lives but as the doors of the past open up (for example by the
appearance of a visitor) it reveals the rotten core of their co-existence. Thus the dramatic
exposition of these dramas already includes part of the conflict, and the action of the plays is
mostly centred around the analysis of the past. As opposed to Oedipus, however, the
uncoverings the characters make do not lead to some comforting universal truth, as each
character carries their inner truths, the incompatibility of which with the truth of the others
leads partly to the final catastrophe.

Ibsen is now the second most frequently played playwright in Europe after Shakespeare, and
his art influenced such writers as August Strindberg (1849-1912), Gerhart Hauptmann (1862-
1946), Maxim Gorky (1868-1936) and Arthur Miller (1915-2005).

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The realistic-naturalistic movement reached its second highest artistic peak probably in
Russia, in the plays of Anton Chekhov (1860-1904) and in the productions of the Moscow
Art Theatre led by Konstantin Stanislavsky (1863-1938).

Chekhov drew a delicate picture about the everyday life of the Russian landed gentry, leaving
behind the binding dramatic rules of previous decades, the governing conflicts, dialogues and
structure of older plays. While Ibsen’s characters focus on the past instead of the present,
Chekhov’s figures (e.g.: in The Three Sisters, The Cherry Orchard, or the Sea-Gull) forsake
the present, and live in memories and utopias instead. They relinquish proper human
relations, and with that the means of real communication as well.

As opposed to the earlier rules of drama which governed stage speech, Chekhov’s figures
often interrupt each other, talk at the same time, or simply stay silent when on stage,
paralleling the pace of everyday conversations. Thus in Chekhov’s hands the traditional
dramatic forms (as the conflict of drama, or the function of dialogue in forwarding the events)
very often become meaningless, or at least irregular. However, although he displays
disappointment over the waste of youthful energy and talent in Old Russia, his plays contain
an element of hope for the future, rather accurately showing the forces that later worked
behind the Russian Revolution (especially Trofimov’s speech at the end of Act II of The
Cherry Orchard, “All Russia is our orchard”). His plays, therefore, can mostly be categorised
as tragicomedies, thus resembling life in this respect as well, where personal tragedies often
mix with comic moments.

Chekhov’s influence is felt throughout the ages, especially in the plays of Tennessee
Williams (1911-1983), Arthur Miller, Clifford Odets (1906-1963) or Michael Frayn (1933-).

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The realistic change in dramatic writings brought about a wave of more naturalistic stage
designs in the theatres of Europe, with middle-class interiors and realistic sets superseding the
gothic settings of the 1850s. An imaginary fourth wall was pulled up between the audience
and the actors, which resulted in the complete separation of the actions on stage and
auditorial reactions to it.

A new, naturalistic acting style was soon to follow, developed by one of the most important
theorists of acting, Konstantin Stanislavsky, the actor-manager of the Moscow Art Theatre.
The Stanislavsky acting-method emphasised realistic presentation and a careful attention to
every detail of the production, which usually needed meticulous research and preparation on
behalf of the costume-and stage designers, and used historically accurate sets and costumes. 
It stressed the actor’s emotional identification with the character and his natural use of body
and voice, as well as the theatre’s social and educational significance.

This socially conscious method, which later also had a huge impact on Anglo-American
acting styles, and was developed into Method acting, however, caused the stagnation of
experimental theatre culture in most of the Eastern block countries in the 1950s, and is thus
today regarded as rather controversial.

3. Experimental trends in the 20th century - symbolism, expressionism, the epic

theatre, the theatre of the absurd

By the time realism of acting, scenery and drama got accepted in the theatres of Western
culture, a new demand also materialized for a psychological realism of another kind. Claims
that naturalists only showed the surface of truth became widespread and the symbolists in
France and Belgium, the Expressionists in Germany and the representatives of the other
‘isms’ usually collected under the umbrella term of the ‘dramatic avant-grade’ launched an
unrealistic attack on contemporary dramatic traditions.

Influenced by the writings of Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) they claimed that the human
subconscious should also be presented on stage, and advocated the usage of symbols and
abstractions in reforming drama.

Symbolic dramas wished to strip away traditional theatricality and replace it with a
suggestive dreamlike universe created by symbols, words and acting. According to Maurice
Maeterlinck (1862-1949), one of the leading figures of the movement, the essence of a play
lies in its second, deeper meaning, which is hidden beneath the dialogues. In his art
symbolism is combined with a kind of new romantic idealism, for example in his most
famous play, The Blue Bird, first put on stage by Stanislavsky in Moscow, in which two
children go on a seek in their dreams after the blue bird of happiness just to find it when
awoken in their own room.
Although symbolist plays are not very popular today these writers enabled a huge change in
stage design still visible in contemporary theatres. They initiated the kind of symbolic
scenery of abstract settings which is still common on our stages, and what finally superseded
the hyper-naturalistic design of the fin-de-siècle. (see e.g.: the change between Herbert
Beerbohm Tree’s Twelfth Night (1901) where real grass and living rabbits lured the audiences
into the theatre and Henry Gordon Craig’s Hamlet (1911) with its huge barren walls and
empty spaces.)

Expressionism, born and booming in Germany, was a more political movement which
revolted against materialism, bourgeois values, massive urbanisation and the capitalist
exploitation of the working classes. As clear from this list above, expressionists were mostly
supporters of socialist ideas, and used their characters as mouthpieces for advocating
political or revolutionary doctrines.

Generally, we can say that expressionist art, instead of giving an overall realistic impression
on events, presented a violently personal, dreamlike vision. August Strindberg (1849-1912)
and Frank Wedekind (1864-1918) are notable forerunners of the movement which got fully
fletched in the works of Georg Kaiser (1878-1945) and Ernst Toller (1893-1939).
Expressionism had a very strong visual impact on both theatrical and film arts, with its
distorted, nightmarish images which aimed at unmasking the dark, hidden world of the
subconscious. The best examples of this kind of scenography are to be found in films such as:
Robert Wiene’s The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1919), F.W. Murnau’s Nosferatu (1922), or
Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (1927).

Though not its only forerunner, expressionism is important to understand Bertold Brecht’s
(1898-1956) epic theatre as well. The most influential political genre since 1945, epic
theatre aimed at continuously engaging its audience, and doing this through experiments.
These experiments involved shifting the dramatic focus from character to plot, and
emphasising the epic quality of the dramas at hand. This Brecht wished to achieve by
‘alienating’ his audience from the events on stage, with the insertion of commentators,
choruses and ‘songs’, thus preventing the viewers from identifying with any of the characters,
let alone experiencing a catharsis of any kind. (This is the so-called V-Effekt or
Verfremdungseffekt.) This way the audience could stay reflective and critical, and could be
woken up to their everydays, so that they realise (with their brains and not by their emotions)
how they should change their own lives.

Brecht’s plays, such as The Threepenny Opera (1928) which highlights the hypocrisy of
bourgeoisie society, The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui (1941/1961) which ridicules the Nazi
regime, or Mother Courage and Her Children (1939/1941) with talks about the horrors and
the absurdity of warfare, all stay set pieces in the theatres of the Western world.

Brecht’s influence on European theatre culture is mainly twofold. He encouraged several

directors to be critical of prevailing opinions, to study life as well as art, to be creative of a
spirit of inquiry and to stage plays with an aim to dig out the strong social messages at their
cores. What had a longer lasting effect on stage techniques, however, were his stage
constructions, developed by and with Gaspar Neher, and influenced by German expressionist
theatre. His rejection of the decorative, directed against the spectacle of the Göringtheater of
Nazi Germany, found ardent followers. Directors often favoured his chalk-white light with
which he aimed at showing not hiding the actions on stage and enabling the spectator to
follow the story “without impediments,” as well as his “selective realism” “in which
fragmentary or metonymic objects represent objects or circumstances in the real world and
yet, because of their deliberate incompleteness, invoke the artifice of the stage and yet invite
the intellectual attendance of the spectator.

Brecht wanted theatre to teach and raise awareness of social questions, to incite revolutions
and induce social changes. The last important theatrical trend of the 20th century, however, is
built around exactly the realisation that all these: change, improvement and the advancement
of societies are mere illusions.

The theatre of the absurd is a term coined by Martin Esslin in 1961 which refers to
playwrights whose plays disregard all traditional elements of dramatic arts, such as round
characters with well-grounded motivations, logical dialogues and a causative plotline
developing from A to B.

In Samuel Beckett’s (1906-1989) Waiting for Godot (1952), for example, famously, ‘nothing
happens’. Two men wait for Godot who never turns up, and probably does not even exist;
they seemingly lead no sensible conversations, they do nothing in particular, and the play
does not progress at all. The ideas of the well-written plays of the late 19th century thus got
rejected, playwrights like Beckett (Eugène Ionesco 1909-1994, Edward Albee (1928-), Jean
Genet (1910-1986), Harold Pinter (1930-) or Václav Havel (1936-)) do not believe in the
“possibility of neat resolutions, clearly defined motivations, acceptable solutions or the
settlement of conflicts.” (Martin Esslin, The Theatre of the Absurd, 1962.) They instead
emphasise the sense of human purposelessness, and the absurdity of human existence, the
impossibility of actions fulfilling a purpose, the meaningless struggle of human beings in a
hostile and irrational universe.

Most importantly the main constituent of dramas, the dialogue often got misused or even
meaningless in these absurd plays, signifying the impossibility of modern communication.
This is why Martin Esslin can validly state that these plays are rather like poems, developing
a poetic image, rather than a series of events.

III. Main Dramatic Genres: Tragedy and Comedy

III.1. Tragedy

1. Definition

Tragedies are serious plays, usually depicting the downfall of the protagonist. The
earliest definition of tragedy was handed down to us by Aristotle, in his Poetics:

“Tragedy, then, is an imitation of an action that is serious, complete, and

of a certain magnitude; in language embellished with each kind of artistic
ornament, the several kinds being found in separate parts of the play; in
the form of action, not of narrative; through pity and fear effecting the
proper purgation of these emotions.”

Aristotle gave this as a descriptive definition, based on the dramas of his age, mostly on
Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex, a tragedy he admired, but later ages often regarded this definition as
a prescriptive doctrine, so it is important to understand its parts for a fuller comprehension of
the development of dramatic arts as well.
 1. Aristotle, first of all, describes drama as a mimetic art, which takes its subject from
life. However, he – in other parts of the Poetics – contrasts it with history claiming
that history describes the facts, relating how events happened, while drama describes
the possibility, how things could happen.
2. Furthermore, Aristotle emphasises that the subject matter of a tragedy is serious, that
is fitting the genre. To use a later writer’s, Horace’s term, tragedies should have
decorum – appropriate style, character, form and action.
3. Aristotle also talks about certain fixed parts of the play, which we distinguish under
the following terms:
o Hubris: The hero’s / heroine’s arrogance, or pride with which they violate the
gods, or moral rules. This antagonism leads to the major conflict the
protagonist has to face in the course of the tragedy.
o Hamartia: The Greek word means ‘error’, but was often mistranslated as
‘tragic flaw’. Aristotle, however, meant by it not a character weakness, but a
mistaken, misplaced deed, a misjudgement, the hero commits and later falls
victim to.
o Anagnorisis: That crucial point, or turning point of the drama where the hero
recognises his/her previous misjudgement. This is often the climax of the play,
followed by the reversal of the hero’s fortune (peripeteia).
o Peripeteia: The sudden reversal of the hero’s fortune, in the case of a tragedy
his downfall.
o Catharsis: The most debated of Aristotle’s terms. It describes the
‘purification’ or ‘purgation’ of our souls at the end of a tragic performance
through the pity we feel for the lost hero and the terror the horrifying events
raised in us.

Later centuries also insisted on the fact that a tragedy should contain the Aristotelian unities,
those of time (the play should not cover events longer than one day), of space (the play
should occur in one place), and of action (the play should have one coherent, major plotline),
but Aristotle himself only mentioned the unity of action in his writing.

2. Tragic structure

Gustav Freytag, a 19th-century German critic analysed the structure of drama in the following
way: 1) introduction, 2) inciting moment, 3) rising action, 4) climax, 5) falling action, 6)
catastrophe. The climax is the apex of the pyramidal structure, as you can also see on this
page. The pyramidal structure shows clearly how complication and emotional tension rise
like one side of a pyramid toward its apex. Once the climax is over, the descending side of
the pyramid depicts the decrease in tension and complication as the drama reaches its
conclusion and denouement (‘unknotting’, ‘unwinding’, the unravelling of the main dramatic
complications at the end of a play, the outcome or result of a complex situation or sequence
of events).

The structure of the Freytag-pyramid is based on a typical five-act tragedy, but is in fact
applicable to a large number of plays, and also to many forms of fiction.

Types of tragedy
  Revenge tragedy (tragedy of blood): the plot is centred on the tragic hero’s
attempts at taking revenge on the murderer of a close relative; in these plays the
hero tries to ‘right a wrong’. The genre can be traced back to Antiquity, e.g. to the
Oresteia of Aeschylus, and the tragedies of Seneca. During the Renaissance, there
were two distinct types of revenge tragedy in Europe; the Spanish-French tradition
(Lope de Vega, Calderón, Corneille) focusing on honour and the conflict between
love and duty; and the English revenge tragedy following the Senecan traditions of
sensational, melodramatic action and savage, often exaggerated bloodshed in the
centre. Elizabethan revenge tragedies usually feature a ghost, some delay, feigned or
real madness of the hero, and often a play-within-the-play; cf.: Kyd: The Spanish
Tragedy; Shakespeare: Hamlet; Webster: The Duchess of Malfi.
 Domestic tragedy: a play typically about middle-class or lower middle-class life,
concerned with the domestic sphere, the private, personal, intimate matters within
the family, between husband and wife (as opposed to the national – matters of a
nation/country, or universal – the whole of mankind). There are plenty of examples in
Tudor and Jacobean drama, e.g. Shakespeare: Othello; Heywood: A Woman Killed
with Kindness, but also some in the 18th century, like Lillo: The London Merchant,
and the term may even be applied to the work of later dramatists as well.

Heroic tragedy: Mostly popular during the English Restoration, heroic tagedy or
tragicomedy usually used bombastic language and exotic settings to depict a noble
heroic protagonist and their torment in choosing between love and patriotic duties. A
typical example would be John Dryden’s The Conquest of Granada.

III.2. Comedy

1. Definition

Comedy is the other major dramatic genre besides tragedy. It is a drama chiefly written to
amuse its audience, with characters mostly taken from everyday life, (as opposed to tragedy,
where they are superior to us in character or social standing) and a plot usually ending
happily. In the Middle Ages this term simply meant a story ending in happiness (e.g.:
Dante’s La Divina Commedia), and was seen as the complementary of tragedies, (in a
narrative tragedy the hero: “from wealth [is] fallen to wretchedness,” while in a narrative
comedy climbs from wretchedness to wealth/happiness), the two together making up the
wheel of fortune, a major symbol of human fate.

Tragedies and comedies can be compared on several grounds, by setting up opposites as

those of death and love, solitude and company, punishment and reward, etc., but these
comparisons cannot really be generalised, they rather apply one-by-one to the different
modes of the tragic and the comic sub-genres that developed during the centuries.

The cradle of European comedy also rocked in the Mediterranean, in the Athens of 5th century
BC. There the second day of the Dionysian celebrations was traditionally devoted to five
comedies. The only playwright competing, whose name was handed down to us, is
Aristophanes (450-385 BC), with whom we connect the genre of Old Comedy.  Old
Comedies have fantastical plots with often surreal turns combined with political and social
satire of contemporary figures. The New Comedy of Menandre (340-290 BC), however,
evolves around love plots. The young lovers have to face trials and tribulations, often the
opposition of their parents and other senile or conservative members of society, but with the
help of their witty servants they overcome the difficulties, and get united in the end. The
genre can probably be best defined by two Shakespearean quotations, as New Comedies had
a great impact on the Elizabethan playwright’s romantic comedies, too. Although “the course
of true love never did run smooth”, as Lysander says in A Midsummer Night’s Dream
(1.1.134), after misunderstandings, plottings and counterplottings, finally, “Jack shall have
Jill; Nought shall go ill,” (3.2.461-62) the comedy ends in weddings and general
reconciliation.  Menandre’s comedies were reinvented by two Roman authors around the 2nd
century BC, by Plautus (254-184 BC) and Terence (195-159 BC) who, in turn, influenced
both the commedia dell’arte of the Middle-Ages (an Italian form of comedy whose plot
mainly centred around love and intrigue, with often farcical dialogues, and which was a
popular type of marketplace entertainment until the 15th century) and the Renaissance plays
of Shakespeare and Lope de Vega, not only in their plots, but mostly in the usage of stock
characters. Stock characters are stereotyped figures characterised mostly by their roles
and not by their inner qualities. Such stock characters include the senex – the old miser, the
miles gloriosus – the braggart soldier, the witty servant, etc, whom we can also find in
Shakespearean tragedies (Polonius in Hamlet), or histories (Falstaff in Henry IV, 1-2), or
comedies (Touchstone in As You Like It)

2. Types of comedy

 Romantic comedy: Based on Greek New Comedy and Roman commedia erudita, a
composite genre which centres mostly on the vicissitudes of young lovers, who
get happily united in the end. The best examples for this genre are to be found in
Shakespeare’s oeuvre, e.g.: A Midsummer Night’s Dream, As You Like It.
 Comedy of humours: a form of drama typical at the end of the 16th and the
beginning of the 17th century; based on the medieval and Renaissance belief that
people’s actions are governed by their dominant bodily humour (blood, phlegm,
bile or black bile), its characters are ruled by a particular passion or trait. The
first and most significant playwright of the genre was Ben Jonson, esp. in his Every
Man in His Humour and Every Man Out of His Humour.
 Satirical comedy: a form of comedy whose main purpose is to expose the vices
and shortcomings of society and of people representing that society; it is often
very close to farce or the comedy of manners. The earliest examples are the works of
Aristophanes, esp. his Clouds, Birds, Frogs; in English literature, Ben Jonson’s
Volpone or Sheridan’s School for Scandal must be mentioned. In European literature,
the greatest master of the genre is undoubtedly Molière.
 Comedy of manners: also ‘Restoration comedy’ or ‘artificial comedy’; the prevailing
kind of drama in the second half of the 17th century, before the advent of the so-called
sentimental comedy in the early 18th century. The comedy of manners depicts a
stylish society, mainly the middle and upper classes, its focus is on elegance, with
characters of fashion and rank, but also would-be nobles, ambitious social climbers,
fops, country bumpkins, and so on. Its topics are social intrigue, mainly marital and
sexual, and also adultery and cuckoldry. The most important playwrights in the
Restoration period are William Congreve and William Wycherley; but some of
Shakespeare’s plays (e.g. Love’s Labour’s Lost, or Much Ado About Nothing) can also
 be considered examples of this genre, as are the plays of Molière, Sheridan, and Oscar
Wilde.
 Sentimental comedy: also ‘drama of sensibility’; the dominant comic genre after
Restoration comedy, popular entertainment for the middle classes in the 18th century.
It appeared as a reaction against the immoral and licentious comedy of manners,
which emphasised vices and faults of people; sentimental comedy focused on the
virtues of private life, with simple and honourable characters. Some typical
examples can be found in the work of Oliver Goldsmith and Robert Steele; however,
on the whole, the genre did not prove to be as enduring as its predecessors, and it is
not often performed any more.
 Farce: a form of low comedy, whose intention is to provoke simple mirth in the
form of roars of laughter (and not smiles); it uses exaggerated physical action,
character and absurd situation, with improbable events, a complex plot, with
events rapidly succeeding one another, pushing character and dialogue into the
background. The origins of the genre are not clear, but farcical elements can be
found already in the plays of Aristophanes and Plautus; in English literature, even
parts of Shakespeare’s Comedy of Errors, or The Taming of the Shrew, together with
the Falstaff plays (1-2 Henry IV, The Merry Wives of Windsor) can be classified as
farce.

Black comedy: (translated from the French comédie noire) a form of drama which
displays cynicism and disillusionment, human beings without hope or convictions, their
lives controlled by fate or unknown and incomprehensible powers; a genre popular in the
second half of the 20th century, when the absurd predicament of mankind is increasingly in
the focus of literature.

III.3. Other genres

 Tragicomedy: a term not easy to define and distinguish from the problem play or
black comedy, among others. The term was first used by Plautus, but the concept is
even older, and has always been used to refer to tragedies with a happy ending
(also called ‘mixed tragedies’). Later it was also used for tragedies with comic
subplots, and by the end of the 16th century, the two kinds became intermingled.
Dramatists increasingly tended to use comic relief in their tragedies and tragic
aggravation in comedies, to enhance the desired effect.
 Problem play:
1. a group of Shakespearean plays (Measure for Measure, Troilus and
Cressida, All’s Well that Ends Well), all of which have a formal comic
ending, and could therefore be classified as comedies, had not their
serious tone and content defy such an approach. They present complex
moral, ethical, or social problems, which are not completely resolved by the
end of the play, as various interpretations and approaches remain possible and
troubling for the audience.
2. also ‘thesis play’, or ‘propaganda play’, a dramatic form which
originated in France in the 19th century. The plays belonging to this genre
deal with a specific problem and usually offer a solution, as in Ibsen’s A
Doll’s House, or G.B. Shaw’s Mrs Warren’s Profession, or Major Barbara.
From the 1960s onwards, some playwrights used this form to approach broad
 political and social issues, often writing about ‘the state of Britain’ as such.
Outstanding authors are John McGrath, David Hare, Edward Bond, etc.
 Masque: an elaborate form of courtly entertainment, combining poetic drama,
song, dance and music. It was popular in England during the reign of Elizabeth I,
James I and Charles I, but also in 16th century Italy and France. The plot of masques
was usually simple, predominantly allegorical, with mythological elements, often
used for glorifying the monarch. The performers were often not only professional
actors, but also members of the aristocracy and the noble court. (Shakespeare: Henry
VIII, Ben Jonson, etc)

History play: also ‘chronicle play’, a play based on recorded history rather than myth
or legend; in the centre there is often not an individual hero but rather the fate and the
future of the nation. Early examples include The Persians by Aeschylus; the first English
drama considered a history play is John Bale’s King John (c. 1534). In the Renaissance, the
genre became increasingly popular, with the contributions of Marlowe (Edward II) and
Shakespeare (covering English history with a succession of plays from Richard II to Henry
VIII, and also a play on King John). There have been notable history plays even in the 20th
century, e.g. Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, and Robert Bolt’s A Man for All Seasons.

VI. Links

Development of theatrical space forms:

http://www.ithaca.edu/faculty/bracewel/stgcraft/Archive/thtrform.htm

Greek theatre and drama:

http://www.theatron.co.uk/gallery.htm
http://www.georama.gr/eng/history/02.html
http://www.ithaca.edu/faculty/bracewel/stgcraft/Archive/thtrform.htm
http://ancienthistory.about.com/library/bl/bl_dithyramb.htm
http://www.theatrehistory.com/ancient/greek.html
http://novaonline.nvcc.edu/eli/eng251/agamemguide.html

Elizabethan theatre and drama:

http://shakespeare.palomar.edu/theatre.htm
http://www.uni-koeln.de/phil-fak/englisch/shakespeare/
http://www.bartleby.com/60/203.html
http://dmoz.org/Arts/Literature/Drama/Elizabethan/

Modern tendencies in drama and the theatre:

http://pages.zdnet.com/kinema/talks/id11.html
http://www.northern.edu/wild/th100/CHAPT14.htm

Freytag’s pyramid:

http://web.cn.edu/kwheeler/freytag.html
Further references:

http://drama.lap.hu/index.html#links
http://www.theatron.co.uk/gallery.htm
http://www.theatredatabase.com/ancient/
http://www.georama.gr/eng/history/02.html
http://www.theatron.co.uk/romeperm.htm
http://www.stoa.org/diotima/
http://www.qrg.northwestern.edu/aigames.org/2000/MMateas00.pdf
http://www.english.uni-mainz.de/projects/cde/links.htm
http://www.schoolshows.demon.co.uk/resources/technical/gloss1.htm
http://www.theatrecrafts.com/glossary/glossary.shtml
http://www.geocities.com/akatsavou/links_en.html
http://www.schoolshows.demon.co.uk/resources/technical/gloss1.htm
http://www.theatrecrafts.com/glossary/glossary.shtml
http://www.tonisant.com/aitg/
http://www.artslynx.org/theatre/
http://www.zeroland.co.nz/theater.html

Texts

Shakespeare:

Henry V
King Lear

Renaissance texts:

http://dmoz.org/Arts/Literature/Drama/Elizabethan/

G. B. Shaw:

Pygmalion

Henrik Ibsen:

A Doll’s House
Ghosts

Anton Chekhov:

The Three Sisters

The Cherry Orchard
Sea-Gull
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