Structural Elements of Drama

-Drama-From Greek, “action.” The enactment of a fiction by actors before an audience.

-Characters-In general usage, character is the sum of a person’s moral qualities, beliefs, and temperament.

-Dialogue-The exchange of speech in literature. Dialogue has three basic forms. In films and plays, it is the conversation between characters that actors deliver after having memorized it from a script. In fiction and nonfiction it is the conversation between characters that is indicated by punctuation to be separate from the narrative, frequently with attributions (who spoke each remark) included outside the punctuation.

-Monologue (Dialogue)-A speech by one person in a drama or variety show, or a poem representing a single person’s speech.

-Soliloquy (Dialogue)-A monologue spoken when a character is alone on stage. The soliloquy lets the audience hear the character’s thoughts and feelings.

-Conflict is the catalyst for action in narrative and dramatic plots, whether melodramatic, comic, or tragic. It is basically the opposition, or struggle, between two major agents.

-Stage Directions- Short phrases presented in brackets to direct the actors in their movements.

-Types of Drama:

-Comedy- From Greek, komos, “revel.” One of the two original forms of Greek drama, along with tragedy, comedy has expanded in meaning more than any literary term derived from an ancient literature. Originally, a comedy was a type of carousing festival celebration for the god Dionysus, probably associated with fertility. Although wit, humor, irony, and the ridiculous are perennially associated with comedy, they are not its principal distinction as a mode of literature.

-Tragedy- This term is now used for any long fictional or dramatic work that shows the decline and inevitable or unjust death of its protagonists, who face their doom with courage.

-Tragicomedy- The tragicomedy appears to show them on their way to their doom, but no one dies after all. In fact, the ending is often happy, the threatening doom reversed at the last minute by a deus ex machina device.

Reference

“Subjects: Literary Reference Center – Powered By Ebscohost .” Web.b.ebscohost.com. N. p., 2017. Web. 30 Oct. 2017.

Figurative and Connotative Devices
-Connotation- The significance, ideas, or emotions summoned up by a word in addition to its dictionary definition. Usually subjective and difficult to pin down exactly, connotations are absorbed as a part of learning one’s culture.

-Denotation- The strictly literal, objective definition of a word without regard to emotional, cultural, or historical associations. The denotation of a word is found in its dictionary definition.

-Allegory-From Greek allegoria, “speaking in another way,” allegory is a literary device for suggesting meanings other than the literal.

-Alliteration- stylistic device in which a number of words, having the same first consonant sound, occur close together in a series

-Allusion- brief and indirect reference to a person, place, thing or idea of historical, cultural, literary or political significance. It does not describe in detail the person or thing to which it refers. It is just a passing comment and the writer expects the reader to possess enough knowledge to spot the allusion and grasp its importance in a text -Anaphora- the deliberate repetition of the first part of the sentence in order to achieve an artistic effect

-Assonance- two or more words, close to one another repeat the same vowel sound, but start with different consonant sounds -Consonance- repetitive sounds produced by consonants within a sentence or phrase. This repetition often takes place in quick succession, such as in “pitter, patter”

-Foreshadowing- a clue of a future event that will take place in the story -Hyperbole- a figure of speech that involves an exaggeration of ideas for the sake of emphasis

-Idiom- a set expression or a phrase comprising two or more words -Imagery- to use figurative language to represent objects, actions, and ideas in such a way that it appeals to our physical senses

-Irony-Irony is perceptible contrast between what is said in a statement and what it really must mean, or between appearance and reality. There are three types of irony: verbal, dramatic, and situational. -Litotes- derived from a Greek word meaning “simple,” is a figure of speech that employs an understatement by using double negatives or, in other words, a positive statement expressed by negating its opposite expressions

-Metonymy-This is figure of speech in which something is not named directly but indicated by associations or attributes

-Metaphor-From Greek, “carry across.” This widely used figure of speech transfers meaning by implied comparison

-Onomatopoeia- a word which imitates the natural sounds of a thing. It creates a sound effect that mimics the thing described, making the description more expressive and interesting

-Oxymoron – two opposite ideas are joined to create an effect.

-Personification-This trope treats concepts, emotions, inanimate objects, and animals as if they were intelligent beings in their own right

-Sarcasm- derived from the French word “sarcasmor”, and also from the Greek word “sarkazein”, which means “tear flesh,” or “grind the teeth”

-Simile-Like a metaphor, a simile is a trope comparing two unlike things. However, the simile does so with the connective terms “as,” “like,” “than,” or “as if”

-Stream of Consciousness- Includes a number of disparate activities, including thought, memory, reaction to sensation, emotion, and associations. Moreover, there is no rational order to these activities. They flow, like a stream, as time passes and become part of consciousness because of both internal and external stimuli

-Synechdoche- A form of metaphor, which in mentioning an important (and attached) part signifies the whole (e.g. “hands” for labour)

-Symbol-This term refers to a means of bringing together the abstract and concrete or the general and the specific in a memorable combination. In general, it is an object or sensory impression that has an associated meaning or phenomenon

-Tautology- the repetitive use of phrases or words that have similar meanings. In simple words, it is expressing the same thing, an idea, or saying, two or more times

References “Figurative Language – Examples And Definition.” Literary Devices, 2015, https://literarydevices.net/figurative-language/.

“Subjects: Literary Reference Center – Powered By Ebscohost .” Web.b.ebscohost.com. N. p., 2017. Web. 30 Oct. 2017.

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