NRS 440VN-Aristotle and the Elements of Drama Discussion

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Drama is a collaborative art that represents events and situations, either realistic and/or symbolic, that we witness happening through the actions of actors in a play on a stage in front of a live audience. According to the greatest dramatic critic, Aristotle (384–322 BCE), the elements of drama are as follows:

1. Plot: a series of events leading to disaster for the main characters who undergo reversals in fortune and understanding but usually ending with a form of enlightenment—sometimes of the characters, sometimes of the audience, and sometimes of both

2. Character: the presentation of a person or persons whose actions and the reason for them are more or less revealed to the audience

3. Diction: the language of the drama, which should be appropriate to the action

4. Thought: the ideas that underlie the plot of the drama, expressed in terms of dialogue and soliloquy

5. Spectacle: the places of the action, the costumes, set designs, and visual elements in the play

6. Music: in Greek drama, the dialogue was sometimes sung or chanted by a chorus, and often this music was of considerable emotional importance; in modern drama, music is rarely used in serious plays, but it is of first importance in the musical theater

Aristotle conceived his theories in the great age of Greek tragedy , and therefore much of what he has to say applies to tragedies by such dramatists as Aeschylus (ca. 525–456 BCE), especially his trilogy, Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, and The Eumenides. Sophocles (ca. 496–406 BCE) wrote Oedipus Rex, Antigone, and Oedipus at Colonus; and Euripides (ca. 485–406 BCE), the last of the greatest Greek tragedians, wrote Andromache, Medea, and The Trojan Women. All of these plays are still performed around the world, along with comedies by Aristophanes (ca. 448–385 BCE), the greatest Greek writer of comedies. His plays include Lysistrata, The Birds, The Wasps, and The Frogs. These plays often have a satirical and political purpose and set a standard for much drama to come.

Plot involves rising action, climax, falling action, denouement . For Aristotle, the tragic hero quests for truth. The moment of truth—the climax—is called recognition . When the fortune of the protagonist turns from good to bad, the reversal follows. The strongest effect of tragedy occurs when recognition and reversal happen at the same time, as in Sophocles’s Oedipus Rex (Figure 8-1).

The protagonist, or leading character, in the most powerful tragedies fails not only because of fate, which is a powerful force in Greek thought, but also because of a flaw in character (hamartia) , a disregard of human limitations. The protagonist in the best tragedies ironically brings his misfortune upon himself. In Oedipus Rex, for example, the impetuous behavior of Oedipus works well for him until he decides to leave “home.” Then his rash actions bring on disaster. Sophocles shows us that something of what happens to Oedipus could happen to us. We pity Oedipus and fear for him. Tragedy, Aristotle tells us, arouses pity and fear and by doing so produces in us a catharsis , a purging of those feelings, wiping out some of the horror. Aristotle and the Elements of Drama Discussion

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FIGURE 8-1 Oedipus Rex. In the Tyrone Guthrie Theatre production, 1973, the shepherd tells Oedipus the truth about his birth and how he was prophesied to kill his father and marry his mother.

Courtesy Guthrie Theater. Photo: Michael Paul

The drama helps us understand the complexities of human nature and the power of our inescapable destinies.