History of English
Drama
History of English
Drama - Know more about it
Drama:
1) Drama is a composition in
verse or prose to be acted on the stage, in which a story is related by means
of dialogue and action and is represented with, accompanying gesture, costume
and scenery as in real life.
2) Drama is a composition
designed for performance in the theatre in which actors take the roles of the
characters, perform the indicated action and utter the written dialogue
The elements
of drama are-
1. plot
2. characterization
3. dialogue
4. settings
5. stage directions
6. conflict
7. theme
Important notes on History of English Drama
1) Drama has its origins in
folk theatre.
2) Drama is a multiple art
using words, scenic effects, music, gestures of the actors and the organising
talents of a producer.
3) The dramatist must have
players, a stage and an audience.
4) Amphitheaters: a
circular building without a roof and with rows of seats that rise in steps
around an open space. Amphitheaters were used in ancient Greece and Rome.
5) Minstrels: a
medieval singer or musician, especially one who sang or recited lyric or heroic
poetry to a musical accompaniment for the nobility.) People enjoyed their
performances.
6) Between the 13th and 14th
century drama started having themes which were separated from religion.
7) Miracle plays: Miracle
plays are among the earliest formally developed plays in medieval Europe. These
plays focused on the representation of Bible stories in churches.
8) Mortality Plays: a
kind of allegorical drama having personified abstract qualities as the main
characters and presenting a lesson about good conduct and character, popular in
the 15th and early 16th centuries.
9) In the Morality plays, the
characters were abstract vices and virtues.
10) Allegory: a story, play,
picture, etc. in which each character or event is a symbol representing an idea
or a quality, such as truth, evil, death, etc.; the use of such symbols.
11) The Secular Morality plays
have direct links with Elizabethan plays.
12) Features of the
Renaissance Period:
i) They imposed a learned
tradition.
ii) They were classical in
depth with themes of education.
iii) They presented general
moral problems.
iv) They showed secular
politics.
v) These plays had nothing to
do with religion.
vi) There were examples of
both, comedy and tragedy.
13) Prime dramatists
of the Elizabethan period :
Thomas Kyd, Christopher
Marlowe and William Shakespeare.
14) Tragedy developed in the
hands of Kyd and Marlowe.
15) The public theatre
of the 16th century:
i) It differed in many
important ways from the modern theatre.
ii) It was open to sky.
iii) They were without
artificial lighting.
iv) The stage was a raised
platform with the recess at the back supported by pillars.
v)There was no curtain and the
main platform could be surrounded on three sides by the audience.
vi) There were galleries
around the theatre.
16) In the 17th century the
enclosed theatre gained importance. There was increasing attention to scenic
device as the theatre became private.
17) William Shakespeare is
often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon".
18) Ben Johnson was
contemporary to William Shakespeare. He was a classicist, a moralist and a
reformer of drama.
19) Due to the Civil wars, no
theatres existed between 1642 to 1660.
20) The Restoration produced a
very different kind of dramatic literature. Dramatists like Chapman, Thomas
Middleton, Webster and Dekker were at the forefront.
21) When Charles II came back
with the Restoration of 1660, the theatres were reopened.
22) Comedy of Manners: George
Etherege (18th centure)
23) Features of Modern
Theatre:
i) Use of picture frame stage.
ii) Actresses taking female
parts.
iii) Moveable scenery designed
to create a visual image for each scene.
iv) Use of artificial lights.
v) Irregular spectacle,
melodrama and farce.
vi) Monopoly held by the two
houses, Covent Garden and Drury Lane, for the performance of serious drama.
vii) The audiences which
gathered to the 19th century theatre had not the intelligence or the
imagination of the Elizabethan audience.
viii) The danger in the 19th
century theatre was that, above all, it was unrelated to the life of the time.
24) Ibsen was the great
Norwegian dramatist of the 19th century. He dominates modern drama.
25) Ibsen’s prominent dramas:
The Doll’s house, Ghosts, and An Enemy of the People.
26) George Bernard Shaw was
deeply influenced and affected by Ibsen’s innovative contributions and
experimentation. He was the most brilliant playwrights of his times.
27) H. Granville Barker, John
Galsworthy, St. John Ervine were some of the playwrights who explored
contemporary problems of 20th century.
28) Lady Gregory with W. B.
Yeats and J. M. Synge were the most important dramatists of this Irish revival.
29) John Osborne, wrote on
people who grew up after the Second World War. Osborne’s ‘Look Back in Anger’
brought a new vitality to the theatre scene.
30) Other important
playwrights of the modern era include Anton Chekhov, Bertolt Brecht, Eugene
O’Neill, Arthur Miller, Tennessee William, Eugène Ionesco, Samuel Beckett and
Harold Pinter.
31) Features of Indian
Theatre:
i) Earliest seeds of modern
Indian Drama can be found in the Sanskrit Drama.
ii) From the first century
A.D. ‘Mahabhasya’ by Patanjali provides a feasible date for the beginning of
theatre in India.
iii) ‘A Treatise on Theatre’
(Natya Shastra) by Bharat Muni is the most complete work of dramatology in the
ancient world. It gives mythological account of the origin of theatre.
iv) Modern Indian drama
however, has influences from all over the world, as well as Sanskrit and Urdu
traditions.
32) Features of
Comedy:
i) A comedy deals with
humorous story with a happy ending.
ii) A comedy creates laughter
and fun.
iii) A comedy depends mostly
on unusual circumstances and witty dialogues.
iv) A Comedy uses humorous
dialogues and situations to give relief
33) Features of
Tragedy:
i) The tragedy deals with a
serious or darker themes with sad ending.
ii) A tragedy creates emotions
of pity and fear.
iii) In tragedy the main
character mostly has a moral flaw that causes the tragic end.
iv) A tragedy evokes pity for
the characters and teach moral lesson.
34) Drama: Drama
is a composition in verse or prose to be acted on the stage. It tells a story
through action, costume, setting and dialogue.
35) The four periods
of History of British Drama are:
i) Medieval period
ii) Renaissance period
iii) Restoration period
iv) Victorian period
36) The four elements
of drama are:
i) plot
ii) characters
iii) theme
iv) stage directions
37) Examples of dramas
each from four periods of history:
i) Medieval period
:- Robin Hood, Everyman
ii) Renaissance
period
:- Romeo and Juliet, Duchess
of Malfi
iii) Restoration
period
:- All for Love, The Way of
the World
iv) Victorian
period
:- The Importance of Being
Earnest, A Doll’s House
Activities based
on History of English Drama
Q.5.
|
A) Objective
test |
4 Marks |
|
A1. (MCQ, Fill in the
blanks, True or False) |
(2) |
|
A2. (Match the columns,
Elements of Drama, Chronological order) |
(2) |
Model Activities:
|
Activity Sheet No. 1 |
A) Fill in the blanks.(2)
i)
---------------- is a composition in verse or prose to be acted on the stage.
a) Drama b)
Novel c) Short story d)
Poetry
Answer-
a) Drama
ii) The play
‘Romeo and Juliet’ belongs to -----------
a) Medieval period
b) Renaissance period
c) Restoration period
d) Victorian Period
Answer-
a) Medieval period
B) Choose the correct alternative.(2)
i) The public
theatre of the 16th century has not the following one feature.
a) Open to sky
b) No artificial lighting
c) Curtain
d) Raised platform as a stage
Answer-
c) Curtain
ii) Shakespearean
era came into existence in the 16th century to the public theatre.
a) 14th
b) 15th
c) 16th
d) 17th
Answer-
c) 16th
|
Activity Sheet No. 2 |
A) Fill in the blanks.(2)
i) Drama has its
origins in ---------- theatre.
a) historical
b)
folk
c) modern
d) ancient
Answer-
b) folk
ii) Thomas Kyd,
Christopher Marlowe, William Shakespeare, G. B. Shaw. Here the dramatist who is
odd is------------
a) Thomas Kyd
b) Christopher Marlowe
c) William Shakespeare
d) G. B. Shaw
Answer-
d) G. B. Shaw
B) Choose the
correct chronological order.(2)
a) Modern Period
b) Restoration Period
c) Medieval Period
d) Victorian Period
Answer-
c) Medieval Period
b) Restoration Period
d) Victorian Period
a) Modern Period
|
Activity Sheet No. 3 |
A) Fill in the blanks.(2)
i) ---------------
is the contemporary to William Shakespeare.
a) Ben Johnson
b) Oliver Goldsmith
c) Richard Sheridan
d) Oscar Wilde
Answer-
a) Ben Johnson
ii) Ibsen is the
great Norwegian dramatist of the ----------- century.
a) 16th
c) 17th
d) 18th
e) 19th
Answer-
e) 19th
B) Find the odd
element. (2)
i) See the terms
and write odd one.
a) settings
b) stage directions
c) conflict
d) acting
Answer-
d) acting
ii) See the
writers and write odd one.
a) Thomas Kyd
b) Christopher Marlowe
c) William Shakespeare
d) T.S Eliot
Answer-
d) T.S Eliot
|
Activity Sheet No. 4 |
A) Fill in the blanks.(2)
i) The writer of
The Doll’s house, Ghosts and An Enemy of the People is-----------
a) Oscar Wild
b) G. B. Shaw
c) Ibsen
d) William Shakespeare
Answer-
c) Ibsen
ii) Earliest seeds
of modern Indian Drama can be found in the ----------- Drama.
a) English
b) Sanskrit
c) Farsi
d) French
Answer-
b) Sanskrit
B) Answer the
following.(2)
i) Name any four
periods of History of British Drama.
Answer:-
The four periods of History of
British Drama are:
i) Medieval period
ii) Renaissance period
iii) Restoration period
iv) Victorian period
ii) List the four
elements of drama.
Answer:-
The four elements of drama are
plot, characters, theme and stage directions.
|
Activity Sheet No. 5 |
A) Fill in the blanks.(2)
i) A Treatise on
Theatre (Natya Shastra) is written by-----------
a) Patanjali
b) Samuel Beckett
c) Bharat Muni
d) Harold Pinter
Answer-
c) Bharat Muni
ii) The series of
events occurring in a play is ------------
a) characterization
b) theme
c) stage directions
d) plot
Answer-
d) plot
B) Give any two features of ‘Comedy’.(2)
Answer-
i) A comedy deals with
humorous story with a happy ending.
ii) A comedy creates laughter
and fun.
iii) A comedy depends mostly
on unusual circumstances and witty dialogues.
iv) A Comedy uses humorous
dialogues and situations to give relief.
See More-
Being Neighborly
Nose versus Eyes
|
Activity Sheet No. 6 |
A) Answer the following.(2)
i) Give any two
examples of dramas each from any four periods of history.
Answer:-
i) Medieval
period
:- Robin Hood, Everyman
ii) Renaissance
period
:- Romeo and Juliet, Duchess
of Malfi
iii) Restoration
period
:- All for Love, The Way of
the World
iv) Victorian
period
:- The Importance of Being
Earnest, A Doll’s House
B) Give any two features of ‘Tragedy’.
Answer-
i) The tragedy deals with a
serious or darker themes with sad ending.
ii) A tragedy creates emotions
of pity and fear.
iii) In tragedy the main
character mostly has a moral flaw that causes the tragic end.
iv) A tragedy evokes pity for
the characters and teach moral lesson.
Do Get more activities in the following book.
Activity workbook for Std. XI English
By: Prof. Tushar Chavan
Rashtriya Junior
College,
Chalisgaon
Dist. Jalgaon
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