Drama: Dramaturgical Analysis- Every drama involves the audience psychologically in the following pattern: TBA in class
A. Explication: the audience is informed, by various devices, of (a) character- identities (b) time and place of action, and (c) problem(s) to be met in the play.
B. Complication: the audience is made aware of a heightening of the problem(s) of the play: “The plot thickens”.
C. Climax: the audience is conducted to the highest point of intensity: the problem must be resolved with no delay; the major crisis is induced, requiring a point-of-no-return decision/action.
D. Falling Action: the audience follows the resolution of complication and climax: in tragedy, the falling action is labeled catastrophe (Greek: the downward turn); in comedy, denouement (French: the unknotting or unraveling).
Dramaturgy, as an analytical tool, enables one to understand the nature and social processes of both ancient and modern societies in which elitist hierarchies control both behavior and consciousness of those at the lower levels of hierarchy. http://uwacadweb.uwyo.edu/RED_FEATHER/dramasociallife/005CRIT-DRAMA-SOCIETY.htm
Literary Analysis
Every drama presupposes a unity of ingredients for esthetic quality.
- Theme: the central meaning, comment, purpose of the4 playwright. (Not to be confused with either a single topic—i.e., love, justice ,treachery – or a synopsis of the plot, the theme may best be expressed be a declarative statement which contains a value judgment reflecting the playwright’s meaning, comment, or purpose).
- Central Conflict: the essence of drama is conflict; the tensions involved in audience participation are the dramatized forces in conflict; the protagonist, traditionally, is the character who centrally represents the value (or position, or ideal) with which the playwright is sympathetic; the antagonist represents similarly the value (or position, or ideal to which the playwright is opposed.
- Character: (a) external aspects of character (age, sex, appearance, class, etc.) are important to understanding but less important than ((b) internal aspects of character (hierarchy of values - - what matters most to an individual character at a given time- - - the ethos) to the lasting involvement of the audience. Each reader/viewer will bring his own vicarious relationship into focus at this point.
- Tone: the playwright by his selection and arrangement of such details as language, gesture, inter-action of characters, disposition of possible events, and techniques of staging evinces ones over-all attitude toward the world one is re-presenting in the play.
