Drama
1. Origin of Drama
The word drama comes from the Greek verb “dran” which means ‘to
act’ or to perform. Many scholars trace the origin of drama to wordless
actions like ritual dances and mimes performed by dancers, masked
players or priests during traditional festivals or ceremonies. One
account traces the origin to ritual. In the traditional society or in the
primordial times, sometimes, the seasons did not come as expected.
When this happened, men felt that they had offended the gods, so they
devised means of appeasing these gods. That act of appeasing the gods
is what we refer to as ritual. This ritual, as expected, involved a
ceremony in which the priest played an important role at a designated
location, mostly shrines. The priest would normally wear a special dress
for the occasion. That role, the dress (costume), and the utterance or
incantations are regarded as dramatic elements. Drama could therefore
emerge from this. So, if it is presented for entertainment and there is an
element of impersonation, imitation of an action, and re-enactment of an
action, it is drama. Another account traces the origin to man’s desire
for entertainment. Here, during festivals or other ceremonies, they
recreate the feats of some legendary or mythical heroes to entertain the
people.
Scholars are divided on the origin of drama. Some trace the origin to
Greece but others insist that drama in its definitive form or pattern
evolved from Egypt which is regarded as one of the cradles of
civilization in the world. The latter group argues that it was borrowed by
western merchants who developed and documented it, and who now
trace the origin to Greece. However, the account of tracing the origin of
drama to Greece is more plausible. The evolution is clearer and
well-documented.
Apparently, Greek drama evolved from religious festivals (ritual) that
were celebrated to ensure the fertility of the land and the well being of
its people. These festivals were connected with the worship of the god
Dionysius, a native god who like the vegetation dies and was reborn
each year. The festival involved singing and dancing by a chorus of
fifty men. The choral song, known as Dithyramb, was sang in honour of
the god. The men danced around the altar of Dionysius in a circular
dancing place called orchestra. Sometimes a story about the god was
improvised by the leader of the chorus, though remaining part of the
chorus. Sometimes he dresses like a character from mythology. At this
stage, individual actors were not involved in the performances.
The dramatist, Thepsis, is believed to have been the first person to
introduce the individual actor and the element of impersonation in the 6th
century B.C. During a particular performance, he stood out from the
chorus and instead of singing in the honour of the god, he sang as the
god. He performed between the dances of the chorus and he conversed
at times with the leader of the chorus. Thus drama was literally born.
Thepsis, therefore appeared as the first actor, and when he broke away
from the chorus, he added the dramatic potential of impersonation.
It is impersonation, because, instead of describing the god, Dionysius, or
his actions, he pretended to be the god. Thus the performance changed
from poetry performance to drama. Aeschylus added the second actor
and this gave drama a new thrust forward because the additional actor
enabled the dramatist to show in action a dramatic conflict rather than
talk about it. Sophocles’ addition of the third actor further enlarged the
scope of the dramatist and provided him with the means of complicating
his plot and devising more complex structural arrangement of his action.
It is important to note here that speech is not of essence in drama
because it could be presented without words or without the
accompaniment of music/dance.
The important feature of drama is communication. It induces a personal
communication and an immediate experience between the actor and the
audience. This makes drama a concrete art and the message is
immediate and direct. It is concrete because you can see the actors
performing and presenting a life-like story which affects you positively
or negatively and you re-act immediately. Accordingly, drama exists in
both oral and literary traditions.
In this course, we will concentrate more on the literary tradition, i.e. the
written drama. The text is called a play and the writer is called a
playwright. However, we will make reference to drama as performance
on stage from time to time because it is difficult to separate the two in
the study of dramatic literature.
2. Definition of Drama
There are many definitions of drama.Martin Esslin in Anatomy of Drama has the following definitions of
drama:
1. Drama can be seen as a manifestation of the play instinct as in
children who are playing mother and father.
2. Drama is something one goes to see, which is organized as
something to be seen.
3. It is an enacted fiction an art form based on mimetic action.
4. In arts, drama is the most elegant expression of thought nearest to
the truth (reality).
5. It is the most concrete form in which art can recreate human
situation, human relationship (57).
Aristotle’s definitions sum up these and other numerous definitions of
drama by different scholars. He defines drama simply as an imitation
of an action. He links it to the mimetic impulse in human beings like
children playing father and mother in a childhood play. This means that
imitation is part of life. Human beings have the desire to imitate others,
situations or events.
However, Betolt Brecht insists that drama is not just an imitation of
action, but a tool for the demonstration of social conditions. It is not just
an entertainment but an instrument of political and social change. From
these definitions, we can conclude that drama is a way of creating or
recreating a situation, an articulation of reality through impersonation or
re-enactment. An action becomes drama if it is an imitation of an earlier
action real or imagined. For instance, the story of a hunter who goes to
the forest, kills an antelope and takes it home even if he is dancing as he
goes home, is not drama. It becomes drama if the same story is reenacted
maybe as part of a festival. In the later case, some people
(actors) will represent the hunter and the antelope to the audience for
entertainment or education. A young man who aspires to be a hunter
could learn, from the presentation, how to stalk an animal or how to aim
the gun or bow while being entertained. This story could be represented
through mime, dance or in dialogue.
Drama as a literary genre is realized in performance, which is why
Robert Di Yanni (quoted in Dukore) describes it as “staged art” (867).
As a literary form, it is designed for the theatre because characters are
assigned roles and they act out their roles as the action is enacted on
stage. These characters can be human beings, dead or spiritual beings,
animals, or abstract qualities. Drama is an adaptation, recreation and
reflection of reality on stage. Generally, the word, dramatist is used for
any artist who is involved in any dramatic composition either in writing
or in performance.
Drama is different from other genres of literature. It has unique
characteristics that have come about in response to its peculiar nature.
Really, it is difficult to separate drama from performance because during
the stage performance of a play, drama brings life experiences
realistically to the audience. It is the most concrete of all genres of
literature. When you are reading a novel, you read a story as told by the
novelist. The poem’s message in most cases is not direct because it is
presented in a compact form or in a condensed language. The playwright
does not tell the story instead you get the story as the characters interact
and live out their experiences on stage. In drama, the characters/actors
talk to themselves and react to issues according to the impulse of the
moment. Drama is therefore presented in dialogue.
You can see that as a genre of literature, drama occupies a unique
position. It is also the most active of other genres of literature because
of the immediate impact it has on the audience. It is used to inform, to
educate to entertain and in some cases to mobilize the audience.
Most people associate funny action or other forms of entertainment as
drama. An action could be dramatic yet it will not be classified as
drama.
The dramatic is used for any situation or action which creates a sense of
an abnormality or the unexpected. Sometimes we use it to describe an
action that is demonstrated or exaggerated. For instance, if you are at a
bus stop, a well-dressed young girl passes and cat-walks across the road,
her high-healed shoes breaks and she slips, the immediate reaction will
be laughter from almost everybody there. For some people, this is
drama. Although she was walking in an abnormal way and unexpectedly
her shoe breaks, her action could be called dramatic but it is not
dramatic action. Again, the action of a teacher who demonstrates, by
injecting life into his teaching as he acts out certain situations, is
dramatic but it is not drama.
What then is drama? Drama is an imitation of life. Drama is different
from other forms of literature because of its unique characteristics. It is
read, but basically, it is composed to be performed, so the ultimate aim
of dramatic composition is for it to be presented on stage before an
audience. This implies that it a medium of communication. It has a
message to communicate to the audience. It uses actors to convey this
message. This brings us to the issue of mimesis or imitation. We say
that drama is mimetic which means that it imitates life. You may have
heard people say that drama mirrors life. Yes, it is the only branch of
literature which tries to imitate life and presents it realistically to the
people. It is this mimetic impulse of drama that makes it appeal to
people. Drama thrives on action.
The term drama is used at the following three (3) different levels:
1. Performance
2. Composition
3. Branch of Literature.
(1) Performance
Drama is used for plays that are acted on stage or screen. These plays
are different from musical performances because they must tell stories
which are acted out by actors and actresses. You remember what we
said earlier about imitation or re-enactment and impersonation. These
actors and actresses must be playing roles by imitating other characters.
It means, therefore, that they must assume other people’s personalities
by bearing different names, ages, occupation, nationalities, etc. Finally,
they must be conscious of themselves as actors by trying hard to pretend
that they are the characters they are representing.
(2) Composition
Drama is used to describe a dramatic composition which employs
language and pantomime to present a story or series of events intended
to be performed. Sometimes, especially with written compositions, they
may not be presented on stage but this does not stop it from being
drama. In as much as a play is enjoyed more when it is performed, you
can still read a play and be entertained by it.
(3) Branch of Literature
Drama is a term used for that branch of literature that covers dramatic
composition. You know already that drama is a literary art. The basic
difference between drama and other forms of literature (prose and
poetry) is that drama is presented in dialogue from the beginning to the
end. Any information by the playwright is given in stage- direction.
We have dialogue in prose and poetry but they are interjected in the
course of the story.
3. The Nature of Drama
You learnt in unit one that drama has a unique nature. It has developedand been improved upon by various dramatists over the ages. It has also
been influenced by the developments and changes in the world. The
unique nature of drama makes it possible for it to be read and as also to
be performed. Unlike the prose and poetry which depend on narration,
drama is presented only through dialogue. The novel is divided in
chapters and the poem is written mostly in stanzas, drama is presented in
acts and scenes, movements or parts. William Shakespeare made the
five-act structure the standard for his plays. Each dramatist is free to
adopt his/her own style.
In addition to the fact that plays can be read and enjoyed by people in
the privacy of their homes, people also watch and enjoy the plays as an
audience in a theatre when the plays are presented on stage. The
audience gives an immediate reaction to the performance on stage.
Drama is temporary in nature. Every performance has a definite
duration (i.e. it lasts for a certain length of time). Each performance of a
play is therefore a distinct work of art. Even if the actors, the
composition and the decors remain unchanged throughout the
production, each performance varies in nature and quality as one may be
better than other. A good example is in a case where an actor may have
performed badly in one production and better in another one. It means
therefore that “every performance of a play, even by the same actors,
represents a different realization of its possibilities and no single
performance can fully realize all its possibilities”(Scholes 17). Once a
performance is conducted, it ceases to exist except in one’s memory.
Ritualistic presentations could also be viewed from the same
perspective.
This content is published with due acknowledgement to the following developers and contributors. This content is published for students and not for any commercial gain.
Course Developer/Writer Onyeka Iwuchukwu
National Open University of Nigeria
Lagos.
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