Lecturer: Koné Klohinwélé. (nielfang@yahoo.

fr) Department of English University

University Peleforo Gon Korhogo-
Drama Course objectives:
- Distinguish drama from other literary genres
- Define specifics terms relating to the study of drama (play, drama, theatre)
- Discuss the origins of theatre, drama
- Define different types of drama
- Distinguish the dramatic devices used in the play
- Discuss some themes addressed by the play
- Discuss the different parts of the play

Bio/Bibliography:
Olawale Gladstone Emmanuel Rotimi known in the intellectual and artistic circles as
Ola Rotimi was born on 13 April1938 in Ilesa Nigeria from a yoruba descent and died
on 18 August 2000. He has been one of Nigeria’s leading playwright and theatre
directors. A critic praised him, during his obituary, as a “complete man of theatre: an
actor, director, choreographer and designer. He created performance spaces,
influenced by traditional architectural forms. Ola Rotimi was the Head of department
of creative arts at the University of Port Harcourt.
His fiction works include:
- The Gods Are Not To Blame
- Our Husband Has Gone Mad Again,
- Hopes of the Living Dead,
- Kurunmi,
- Ovonromwen Nogbaisi
As a lecturer, he has also contributed to theory development in drama through the
following
- Issues in African Theatre
- African Dramatic Literature: to be or to Become? An Inaugural Lecture Holding Talks:
An Absurdist Drama
- Akassa You Mi

I- Defining terms
The terms play, drama and theatre are often used sometimes alternatively without any
distinction between them. None specialists would use them as synonyms
indiscriminately. Although close either in meaning or as art forms, they are clearly
different, some being aspects of the others.
The play is a literary composition. It is not intended to be read by the audience. The
playwright (the person who writes the play) knows that his work will be read but the real
goal is to have it received by the audience in a theatre after its interpretation by
directors, actors, designers. These are the professional readers, the theatre artists who

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will transform the play (text) into the theatrical event that will be seen and heard in a
theatre by an audience.
The drama is the printed text of the play, the written or text version. Drama is
sometimes the generic term, the genre in a piece of writing (TV, Show, movie, … that
is usually about a serious subject which is not intended to make the audience laugh).
Theatre refers to the actual production of the play on stage, the performed or
animated rendition of the text/play. It is also the place where the performances are
held.

Humo(u)r: the quality of being amusing or comic. It may mean ability to appreciate
things, situations or people that are comic. A clown jester is an entertainer who
either paints his or her face or dresses in a funny way and performs foolish tricks to
make people or audience laugh.
Tragic play: it is a written piece that consist of courageous, noble characters who
must confront powerful obstacles. These formidable obstacles are external (external
enmity, other opposing forces or characters) or internal (his own destiny,
temperament, etc) to the characters. Tragic characters are the epitome of bravery.
They embody the depth of the human spirit in the face of adversity, danger, defeat
and even death.

I- Generalities about the genre

Some probable origin of the term “comedy”. In Ancient Greek pantheon, there existed a
demigod named Comus. The genre seems to have borrowed its name from that god as
by many of its characteristics, the genre shares the features of that god. Comus was a
god of fertility in a large and unpretentious sense. It was content to leave matters of
great intellectual import to Apollo and gigantic passions to Dionysos while he was mainly
concerned about the maintenance of the commonplace conditions that are friendly to
life. Maintaining equilibrium among living things, and restoring it once it has been lost,
were Comus’s special talents. These talents are shared by the many comic heroes who
follow that god’s example. Literary comedy depicts the loss of equilibrium and its
recovery. Whether the normal processes of life are obstructed unnecessarily, the comic
mode seeks to return to normal.
Comedy as opposed to tragedy avoids strong emotions: passionate love, hate,
patriotism that leads to death. When these appear in drama, they appear ridiculous in a
comic context. It creates a psychological mood incompatible with deep emotions. Great
ideas and ideals are not favorite topics for comedy which treats them as if they were
insignificant.
Human beings behave irrationally, committing follies which reveal their essential
ignorance and ridiculousness in relation to civilized systems of ethical and social
behavior. Aristotle argued that comedy imitates the action of men who are subnormal or
inferior to the social norms. Tragedy as for it imitates the action of superior men. This
implies that comedy is basically pessimistic while tragedy is basically optimistic: it
believes in man’s potential strength and greatness).

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Comedy demonstrates that man is durable even though he may be weak, stupid and
undignified. The tragic hero suffers or dies for his ideals; the comic hero survives without
them. That is why at the end of the comic play, the hero manages to marry his girl,
evades enemies, slips by the oppressive forces or authorities, avoid drastic punishment
and to stay alive. Victories are small but he lives in a world where only small victories are
possible. Weakness is the common condition of mankind that must be lived with, not
worth dying for. Comedy is careless of morality, goodness, truth, beauty, heroism, and all
such abstract values men say they live by. Man’s capacity for survival and to celebrate
the continuity of life itself, despite moralities.
Honor belongs to the vocabulary of tragedy and warfare. At best it is irrelevant to
peace, at worst destructive of it. When honor is used as a principle of public policy, it can
be dangerous and disruptive (ex: the Vietnam War, Hamlet: revenge with a respite to the
ghost for slain father).
Dialectical social role of comedy. Aristotle says art imitates life but as Oscar Wilde,
British 19th century playwright contented, life imitates art as well as art imitates life.
Artists and thinkers create images of what life might be like and so provides models for
human behavior which men imitate.
For tragedy, the world is a battlefield where good and evil, man and nature, truth and
falsehood make war, each with the goal of destroying its polar opposite. Warfare is the
basic metaphor of tragedy, and its strategy is a battle plan designed to eliminate the
enemy. That is why tragedy ends with a funeral or its equivalents: weeping, suffering,
emotional pain, etc. Comic strategy sees life as a game. Its basic metaphors are sporting
events and the courtship of lovers, and its conclusion is generally a wedding rather than
a funeral. When faced with polar opposites, the problem of comedy is always how to
resolve conflict without destroying the participants. Comedy is the art of accommodation
and reconciliation.

II- Summary:
In this specific play, Ola Rotimi transplants to an African context the theme of
Sophocles’s Oedipus Rex. King Adewale was born in a royal family. The soothsayer
tells the royal family that this son will bring catastrophe to his kingdom and family.
This story is about the progress of that tragic character from his abandonment and
triumphant return to his tribe. Without knowing it, he kills an old man who happens
to be the king of a kingdom whose queen he soon marries after saving the tribe from
a monster. It soon dawns on him that the old man he killed was his father and the
woman he wedded and gave children to is his mother. He resorts to leaving the tribe
with the children after crushing his eyes.
II- Characteristics
 Protagonists’ lives are turned upside down and they suffer agony. This
fall from a high status to the lowest is the essence of tragedy since the
fall makes the suffering all the more distressing.
 The tragic flaw of the main character(s). Tragic flaw or weakness is
responsible for the downfall. Ex: Adewale is the son of royal family,

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 then a king, a venerated character, a hero in Kutuje for his military
exploits and other extraordinary exploits. But his tragic flaw is the
excessive pride he shows and his high tempered personality which he
cannot control. These lead to unknowingly murder of his own father. It
is pride, arrogance and his ability to focus others’ anger and enmity
against him (the priest, his unknown half brother etc) A problem that
could have been solved privately behind doors is disclosed publicly
because of his uncompromising attitude. His mother and wife commits
suicide when it dawns on her that she has committed incest and
married the person who killed her husband. As for Adewale, he ends
up gouging out his own eyes, banishing himself from his tribe.
 The heartbreaking, distressing and painful ending: death, chaos, exile
or banishment (temporary or definitive). The protagonist is a man of
honor, a man of principles who accepts responsibility for his mistakes.
He is not concerned with personal goal but pursue common cause and
goal. It is this greatness, this sense of sacrifice and concern for human
values which causes the catharsis in the audience or readers of the
play. Catharsis is the main reason why people read or watch a
performance. It is what they get from it. To see a character’s downfall
from greatness to hopelessness may leave most people hopeless. But
seeing a character take responsibility and fight for great causes and
principles and fights for a larger cause lead to retain his goodness
through everything he suffers. This commitment causes relief in
audiences which is what catharsis is: purging of emotions, specifically
fear and pity. The audience feels compassion for the tragic hero and is
left with the affirmation of human values which prevents from the
feeling of despair. The reader/watcher is sad at the end but feels
reconciled with human positive values and hope for mankind.
Aristole’s characteristics of a tragic hero:
 Hamarthia or tragic flaw which causes the downfall of the hero
 hubris: excessive pride and disrespect for the natural order of things (by killing
father, marrying mother Adewale has manifested a reject of laws of natural order
which must be reasserted.
 peripeteia: the reversal of fate that the hero experiences from happiness, glory to
suffering and death.
 anagnorisis or epiphany: anagnoris literally means recognition, a startling discovery
that produces a change from ignorance to knowledge in a literary work. The modern
term used is epiphany. Aristotle termed it to refer to the recognition or discovery of
some important truth. This discovery leads to the protagonist’ self-awareness (a very
important part of character development) The protagonist comes to know what has
previously been hidden and this changes his actions and the course of the story.
Anagnoris usually involves revelation of the true identity of persons, previously
unknown ex: Oedipus kills his father, marries mother and learnt it in the last

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 moment. Adewale is confronted with his crime, incest. The development of the play
is based on this discovery which carries lots of tension. Climax is reached when this
revelation is made.
 Nemesis: a punishment that the protagonist cannot avoid, usually occurring as a
result of hubris: suffering of the tribe (epidemics), hero’s gouging out his eyes and
exile.
 Catharsis: feeling of pity and fear experienced by audience for the inevitable
downfall of the protagonist.

Other constituting elements of the tragic play

Intervention of supernatural elements which contribute to hero’s downfall. These
elements and the deeds of the hero lead to downfall. These actions are the outcome
of heroes ‘overambitious personality and flaws. ex: to accept to be king in a tribe to
which one is a stranger
External vs internal conflicts: external conflict is between the tragic hero and other
opponents. The opposing forces will necessarily win against the tragic hero. The
inward struggle is at the level of thoughts in hero’s mind. Death, insanity and
intervention of spiritual forces which work against the hero.
The downfall affects not only the hero’s personal life but that of the entire nation or
community. The failure reflects the powerlessness of human beings and the
impotence of fate.
Tragedy reflects the paradox of life as a calamity and suffering experienced by the
tragic hero. These are contrasted with the previous happiness and glory.
Structure of a tragedy
The plot: the plan or the narrative structure. The story = narrative events
arranged in their time-sequence. A plot organizes the events according to a
sense of causality. A dramatic plot is a carefully arranged series of causally
interrelated and connected incidents made up of actions and inactions. The
plot is the unified structure of a play’s incidents, the play’s story line that
helps us discover what things happen, to whom, how where and the actions
and reactions and their results. (145): exposition, conflict, complication,
climax and resolution. Aspects of the plot: protasis, a Greek term meaning
something put forward: introductory part of the play that precedes the
epitasis (= exposition).
Epitasis: rising action of a drama; the Greek term means increase in intensity. The
part of the play that develops the main action and leads to the catastrophe or
denouement (rising action).
Catastasis: state or condition: it refers to the dramatic complication that immediately
precedes the climax.
Catastrophe: Greek terms meaning end of a tragedy, end, close. It refers to the final
action that completes the unravelling of a plot = final stage in falling action.
Denouement: Greek term meaning referring to an action untying the knots of an
episode it refers to events following the climax, the last exciting final part of a story,

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the final outcome, result or unravelling of the main dramatic action and
complication, the solution of the mystery, the explanation or outcome of the conflict.

Ex: Freitag’s pyramid: (to be inserted)

Exposition: setting the scene, characters, setting, and description of background.

Inciting incident: something happens to begin action. A single event usually signals
the beginning of the main conflict. The inciting incident is sometimes called the
complication.
Rising action: the story builds and get more exciting. Generally in the second act and
extend to 3 or 4th act. The plot gathers momentum and action increases. Plot reaches
crisis: hero makes a decision that changes the course of the play.
Climax: the moment of greatest, most exciting tension in a story. It is the event that
the rising action builds up to and that the falling action follows.
Resolution: the character solves the main problem or conflict or someone solves it
for him.
Falling action: From beginning to 4 act, opposite forces become active and start an
open confrontation and start plotting the removal of the hero as a result of which the
power starts declining. Event happen as a result of the climax and we know that the
story will soon end.
Denouement or resolution: It is in the last and final act. The opposing forces reach
the full power and defeat the isolated tragic hero. He then recognizes his faults, yet
cannot do anything about it. It signals the end of the story. Any remaining secrets,
questions or mysteries unsolved after resolution are solved now by characters or
explained by the playwright. Denouement can be seen as the opposite of exposition.

Language and stylistic devices in a tragedy.

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 ADDITIONAL NOTES ON DRAMA

III- Historical and cultural backgrounds to drama and theatre.

The early forms of drama can be dated to ancient Greece and Rome as far 7 th century BC.
Ex: Horace, Juvenal. The Greeks and Romans wrote satiric plays as a weapon of attack on
their respective societies. Tragedies address human problems ex: Archilocus (the first
Greek to write drama). As for Romans (ex: Horace, Juvenal), their satirc plays continue to
shape and influence contemporary artists up to now.
In Africa, the tradition of satiric drama dominates with playwrights like WOLE Soyinka,
Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Ama Ata Aidoo, Ola Rotimi, Athol Fugard, Osofisan, etc in whose
productions actions and shortcomings in the society are being critized in a context of
endemic corruption, moral decay and political morass as a way of restoring order in their
societies.
These modern forms of drama borrow from the traditional artistic forms as expressed in
folk tales, songs, proverbs and verbal arts with their symbols and ritualistic
performances.
Literature is divided into three main genres: poetry, drama and Novel. Drama which is the
concern here is often analyzed through these specifics: characterization, performance, plot,
style, setting and theme. It is also about reading, stage directions, motivation, dramatic and
situational irony.
Drama, contrary to other forms of literature is a story told in action by actors who act on
stage to represent the characters in the story. It can be in verse or in prose. Generally, it tells
a story which involves conflicts and motions through action and dialogue. Such a story is
designed for theatrical performance on a stage. Drama, unlike the other literary genres is a
staged art.” (Di Yanni, 2002: 1161)
Drama is a mimetic art as it imitates and represents real life, aspects of human characters,
qualities, life and experiences. It is also said to have a representational quality. It is an active
and an immediate art because the characters say and do things actively by employing both
the verbal and non-verbal forms, communication through speech, gestures and bodily
actions.
It is also an interactive art: actors perform and act in a face-to-face interaction among
themselves, and with the audience. Di Yanni: “character interaction is the heart of drama: it
is the spring plot, the source of meaning, and the soul of dramatic experience.” In drama,
humans fulfill their desire to be entertained (audience) and to entertain (actors), to watch
and to be watched, to see and to be seen, to hear and to be heard.
Drama is a total art, a holistic art and an inte rmedial art as it makes use of other art forms or
genres. Painting, designing, movement, lighting, music, dance are used for effect.

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In reading a play, we must exercise a high sense of imagination that makes us feel we are
watching the performance or the play are real life situation. The imagination is heightened
by the stage directions and other instructions provided by the playwright (prologue, stage
indications which are all types of information addressed to readers to have a vivid picture of
the real or likely situation.) A play should be read theatrically. Like in any literary piece,
actions, postures, indications are all signs to be decoded. The more and better we are able to
imagine the behavior, posture, speech alteration of voices, facial expressions, costumes and
movements of the characters, the play’s scenery and sound effects, the better we will absorb
the atmosphere and feeling and enjoy or appreciate the play.”(139)
Readers of a play go through 3 main processes: their own experience of life, interpretation,
evaluation of the play.
The experience. It involves emotional and intellectual feelings the play evokes on us through
characters, their situations and actions and the plot as we read and how we are affected by
these feelings.
The interpretation: our understanding of the ideas and meanings of the play. This
understanding relies on our intellectual abilities and experiences, comprehension and
rational understanding. Interpretation goes through 4 main processes: observing –
connecting – inferring – concluding. (140) We observe the details including characters,
language, plot and theme. We then make some connections among the many details
observed and then draw some inferences or hypothetical interpretations. Based on these,
we can come to a conclusion about the meaning of the play.
The evaluation: Our judgment or opinion about the play. It refers to what we think or
perceive about the beliefs, attitudes and values the play puts across. Do we like it or not? Do
we agree with some of the values or of ideas put forward? Accept or reject values, ideas and
even the way they were dealt with? This evaluation is based on our unique cultural, moral
and aesthetic values but it depends on our personal experience, feelings and how well we
understood the meaning of the play.
IV- STRUCTURE OF THE PLAY
The play is divided into two acts each with 5 scenes. Analyzing the structure of the play will
lead us to focus on the following elements: setting, style, aside, flashback, motivation,
anagnorisis and epiphany.
Setting: It refers to Time (intellectual or period (epochs, season) and place of the actions of
the play. It includes scenery, physical arrangements and even organization of doors, curtains,
the lighting system: general environment of the character, religion, morals, colonial or
postcolonial context, urban or rural contexts. The setting is generally the first information
provided. Here Nigeria, Lagos in an atmosphere of general elections. The home of Major
Lejoka Brown, Lagos International Airport. We have general setting in each Act or scene. The
setting can be specific. Anything that happen before the Act (pages vi,vii,viii up to x) is part of
the setting. It is a precondition to understand and enjoy the events that will unfold in the
play.

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Style: the way the playwright expresses himself: imagery – symbolism – diction – and
sentence structure. For instance if the playwright wants to reveal information about a
character to audience but wants to conceal that information to other characters, he can rely
on soliloquy. The character voices his inner thoughts aloud to the audience, either alone on
stage or with other actors keeping silent. This device is used as a true indicator of the mind
of characters.
Some elements of style:

- Repetition ex: Not only is the master in love … madly in love with Politics, he breathes
Politics, he washes his mouth every morning with Politics, he sleeps with Politics and
dreams of … (23)/ Ehen? Therefore! If you marry in Magistrate Court nko?/ I don’t
care/If you marry in American Toronto!/I don’t care/ Whether you wear all rings in
this world o, I don’t care/ Whether you know book tele you tire o, I don’t care (25)
This you don’t know, that you don’t know (31)
- Images: to be in love, madly in love with politics; an over-beaten war prisoner talks
blobloblo
- The same character who speaks in an academic English and the next moment shifts
to pidgin pages 36-37 (linguistic hybridity); presence of many sociolects: military
idioms or vocabulary, religious or islamic sociolect or muslim preacher’s rhetorics,
political jargon, housewife language, market women pidgin, etc. popular language or
pidgin, Yoruba, arab versus academic English, medical sociolect with Lizz (34),ex:
wallahi – Unsurni ya Allah – La rahbaniya fil Islam” (coranic benediction, Arabic
prayers.
Yoruba: Iyawo or yawo = housewife, ase = Amen; k’abo = welcome; ogongo
Pidgin: tele = adverb “till” or “until”, tory like plasa = the story has the piquant
appeal of vegetable stew (plasas); nyash = anus or buttocks; butu = squat; over sabi =
overt display of knowledge, etc
cf to glossary at the end of the play. Linguistic melting pot or hybridity which reveals
the polyglot, open, versatile population of postcolonial Africa. Yoruba songs (In a
performance the song would be kept in Yoruba without any translation to keep its
repetitions, images, rhythm, etc)
it is a play in an indigenized English. It also reveals some information about the
targeted audience of the playwright. For a non-Nigerian, non-Yoruba, non- African
can have access to the text, it will be ideally performed before a Nigerian for a full
enjoyment of the play.
- Lots of ideophones or onomatopoeia = cultural language (p 28):
- Irony: the courageous soldier is going to shit for a mere woman in a phallocratic
context. (30), a muslim crossing himself (33), Okonkwo bows (does the right thing)
but Major rebukes him (34)

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Aside : a passage or remark where the characters speak to the audience or to themselves,
giving the illusion that while the audience hears them, other characters on the stage do not.
Like the soliloquy, playwrights may use this technique to reveal much about characters’
attitudes and motivations. In Our Husband …, because of the light tone, satiric and comic
nature of the play, we do not have lots of inner thoughts where the characters will need to
hide feelings or be preoccupied with psychological concerns. Sometimes, though, Sikira
speaks her mind as if to herself but loud enough for the interlocutor to hear her say
something he can’t make out. Like when Mustafa asks when the young lady is arriving.
“Young lady – ha! The witch is old enough to be my grandmother.”(18) It is different from a
situation where a character’s personality is hidden up to the crucial moment of betrayal or
disloyalty. Mustafa knows Sikiri’s personality. He knows she is a rude girl: “Hmm. Children of
these days – only Allah can save us.” This play is such that no character appears to stay alone
for a minute.
Flashbacks: interruption in drama to show an event that happened earlier. It can present
scenes or incidents that occurred prior to the plot or outside the diegesis before the
opening of the play or in another scene and was not indicated. It helps viewers, audience
and readers to understand the present state of affairs: to understand why some characters
behave the way they do. Flashbacks can be done through recollections of characters, dream
sequences, narration by characters. Here we have a linear plot. We have some recollections
all right like Major’s war experience in Congo, his meeting with Elizabeth and their marriage.
But it is not used as a technique by the playwright but revealed in a discussion among
characters.
Off stage: a dramatic technique for something that occurs outside the visible stage, area but
can be heard, felt on stage. Ex: a noise that originates from the outside (35) = backstage
Motivation: this is the driving force or incentive for an action or actions. It is triggered by a
combination of the characters’ temperament and the moral nature and circumstances in
which the character finds itself. The motivation may be determined by a character flaw or
defect also called hamartia. In classical Greek tragedy, hamartia often leads to the downfall
of the protagonist: an error, transgression or weaknesses or tragedy (fate) ex: of hamartia:
The Gods Are Not To Blame – in the bible – Hamlet – In Africa, we may usually have
transgressions transferred from earlier generations. It can be a vicarious imprecation, a curse
carried over from generation to generation. The tragic hero in drama is fallible. His downfall
is the result of his hamartia, his error or transgression or his lifestyle or weakness of
character.
According to this interpretation, every tragic hero has some fatal weakness, some moral
Achilles heel: a weak or vulnerable point, fault especially in somebody’s character which can
lead to his downfall: excessive pride, hot tempered character, thirst for power, sex, that
bring him to an unsuccessful end. In Ola Rotimi’s Our Husband … economic, political,
religious and social conditions combine with personal attributes to motivate a person to act
or react certain was that will bring his downfall.

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 V- ELEMENTS IN DRAMA

1- Characters: the protagonist is the main or central character. His opponent or

opposing force is the antagonist. Cf character study in fiction is also valid here: round
and flat characters, dynamic and static characters. Drama is after all a narrative
structured in a dialogue form. Here the protagonist is introduced very early to the
audience. The latter’s behavior is expected to enlist the interest and empathy of the
audience. The character that changes or grows during the course of the play is said to
be dynamic or round. The stereotyped (simplified) characters that fails to change or
grow is static. Round characters are well developed personas with a complex,
versatile personality that can surprise the reader. He exhibits different personality
traits. The flat character is a static one who does not grow or change. Flat characters
generally represent a category of people and their behavior that is commonly known
by readers: taxi drivers, politicians, religious preachers, housewives. Their reactions
can be easily predicted.
There is no fully round character in the play. But Di Major, Sirika, Mama Rashida can
be considered as round characters to the extent that they end up different from their
earlier personalities or positions. Di Major is true to himself at the end, has been
restored to his real wife and has a different view of politics. He almost regrets to have
lent his ears to the sirens of politics. Now he is more a professional man more
concerned about his own business, making it more prosperous and in complicity with
his wife. As for the two ladies (Rashida and Sikira), they have been equipped mentally
and intellectually, professionally to be responsible for themselves. They become
independent beings and no more the slaves they used to be in their master’s house.
All through the play, we see Sikiri’s growth and we clearly see that she has some
rebel nature in her. She gives signs of her rebellion against the society and its
hypocritical rules and values.
You would expect Polycarp to behave his houseboy way and speak in pidgin. We will
expect Alaji Mustafa to behave the hypocritical way of the religious man as far as
gender issues are concerned and interject into his expression some Arabic words.
Party thugs are using coarse words and singing ferocious songs ready for violence.
Sikiri does look like a kitchen maid and Elisabeth is almost justified for taking her for
one. We will also expect the American doctor to speak in medical terms from time to
time. As an educated westernized woman, she would be expected to opt for gender
equality and revolt against polygamy. We would also expect Mama Rashida (before
the influence of Lizz) to submit to traditions as far as levirate is concerned, for
example, and be submitted to her husband.
2- Dialogue: Apart from stage directions which are indicated by italicized descriptions,
the rest of this action is written into dialogue between the different characters. The
dialogue is the essence of drama though we may have forms that can be referred to
as “monodrama” with a single actor performing. Characters interact and their
interactions are known as dialogue. If only one character speaks, it is a monologue. A
soliloquy is a dramatic convention to express a character’s state of mind. It

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represents the characters thoughts to make the audience aware of what he/she is
thinking.
VI- THE DIFFERENT TYPES OF DRAMA

1- Tragedy and melodrama. Here we have a set of characters struggling vainly to

avert a predetermined doom; in melodrama characters are drifted to disaster in
spite of themselves while in tragedy they go down to destruction because of
themselves. In tragedy characters determine and control the plot; in melodrama,
the plot determines and controls characters. The writer of tragedy initially
imagines certain characters inherently predestined to destruction because of
what they are, and afterwards invents such incidents as will reasonably result
from what is wrong within them. The writer of melodrama initially imagines a
stirring train of incidents interesting and exciting in themselves and afterwards
invents such characters as will readily accept the destiny that he has foreordained
for them.
2- Comedy and farce:
Comedy= It is a literary genre with a humorous play in which actors dominate the
action; It is usually satirical in tone and is a light or amusing play usually with a
happy and cheerful ending. It involves a serious theme with a well-developed
plot. It makes the audience or reader laugh. It also has more natural characters.
A farce is a comic drama in which both the characters and events shown are
improbable and deserving to be laughed at. Farce produces excessive laughter
through exaggerated effect. It is also a funny play based on ridiculous and unlikely
situations and events. There is rarely pure comedy.
We have romantic comedy with theme of love leading to a happy conclusion.
Comedy of manners: deals with intrigues and relations of ladies and gentlemen,
living in a sophisticated society. It relies on high comedy, derived from sparkle
and wit of dialogues, violations of social traditions and good manners by
nonsense characters like jealous husbands. Sentimental comedy.

Bibliography:
Agyekum (Kofi), Introduction to Literature, Adwinsa Ltd., 2013. Chapter 10.
Di Yanni (Robert), Literature Reading Fiction: Poetry and Drama, New York,
McGraw-Hill, 2002.
Cameron (Kenneth), Gillepspie (Patti), Jim Hunter, Jim Patterson, The Enjoyment
of Theatre, Boston, New York, Pearson, 2008.
Rotimi (Ola),
Our Husband Has Gone Mad Again, University Press Ibadan, 1999 (first edition in
1977)
The Gods Are Not To Blame, Ibadan University Press, 2002 (First edition in Oxford
University Press 1975.)

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 Follow-up assignments

Write short and precise answers to the following questions.

1- What is the geographical, temporal, ideological setting of Our Husband Has Gone
Mad Again (OHHGMA)?
2- What are the differences between drama, a play and theatre?
3- In which dramatic genre can you insert Our Husband …? (Tragedy, melodrama,
comedy, farce) Justify briefly your answer.
4- Why can we qualify Our Husband as a mimetic and representative art?
5- Why can we qualify Our Husband as a holistic and intermedial art?
6- To what extent is Our Husband a satirical play? Give examples of satirical attacks.
7- What general stages readers of a drama usually go through?
8- What elements can we take into account when analyzing the structure of a play?
9- What name is assigned to the technique which consists in giving information about
something that occurs outside the stage? Illustrate in Our Husband…
10- Define hamartia and illustrate it from the play studied.
11- What is anagnorisis? What is its dramatic importance? Illustrate in Our Husband …
12- List the characters you consider round or dynamic and those you consider flat.
Explain briefly your categories.

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13- What is the main difference between Ola Rotimi’s The Gods Are Not To Blame and his
Our Husband …?
14- What technical name is used for the dramatic technique which consists for an actor
to speak loud to audience or to himself while other actors on stage do not hear him?
Illustrate in the play studied.
15- Through which techniques is the comic conveyed in the play? Illustrate with two
examples for each technique.
16- What elements of style show that Out Husband is an indigenized play?
17- What main incident in the play is responsible for plot development? What is its
technical term?
18- What criticism(s) can level against Ola Rotimi’s play? (its aesthetic, its ideas, …)

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