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Study guide originally prepared by Anna Brígido and Jesús Tronch 2009
STUDY GUIDE for DRAMATIC TEXTS:
TITLE OF PLAY:
AUTHOR:
DATE-HISTORICAL PERIOD:
TEXT USED:
CRITICAL ANALYSIS:
BRIEF SYNOPSIS (plot):
STRUCTURE: (chronological sequence vs. text presentation of events; sub-plots; tensions; climax)
GENRE: (elements from other genres, subversions, modifications)
MAIN THEMES (relevance; connections to genre, character, historical and socio-political context, other plays):
CHARACTERS: (hierarchies, class tensions, gender, role of women)
SPACE / TIME: (classical unities, contrasts, narrative vs. real space/time)
IDEOLOGIES: (representation of diverse realities, moral issues, power conflicts, support or critique of the socio-
political system at the time, representation of women, common people, gay rights, other nationalities)
LANGUAGE / STYLE: (verse vs. prose, dialogue / set-speeches, tone, rhetorical devices, images, figures of
speech)
CONDITIONS OF PERFORMANCE: (stage directions, props, movements, visualization of action, space,
character, lighting, music)
READER/AUDIENCE RESPONSE: (audiences at the time, contemporary reception, what is your own
reading of the play? Main contributions of the play to genre, theatre, universal themes, ideological tensions, support of the status quo, subversion of power hierarchies. Main faults, weaknesses).
Study guide originally prepared by Anna Brígido and Jesús Tronch 2009
The study of a dramatic text. Orienting questions:
PLOT, ACTION, STORIES:
What conflicts or tensions do you find in the play? How are they resolved? Is the action or story presenting a conflict or struggle against nature, another person, society, destiny, against other elements within the individual, or a combination of these? Who tells the story? Whose perspective do we get and does it affect the way other characters from different social backgrounds, gender, race, nationality are perceived? Are the motivations persuasively or convincingly presented? How motivated / likely / justified do you find the events succeeding one another in the play? Is the action or story of the play (the chronological succession of events) different from the actual plot (arrangement and presentation of events in the text)? Is the main drive of the plot based on action, character, thought or thesis? Is it a single-plot or a multiple-plot play? What is the relationship among the various plots in terms of dramatic importance? What is the dramatic function of the sub-plot(s), what do they contribute to the structure and meaning of the play? Is the play using classic type-scenes or situations (judgement, triumph, siege, council, deathbed, farewell, wooing, conversion or „talking-over‟-scenes)?
STRUCTURE (presentation of events):
At what points in the play do you identify the exposition, complication and resolution stages of the action? What is (are) the climatic moment(s) of the play?
CHARACTER:
Who is the protagonist of the play? (What character speaks most lines?) What kind of person is he or she? Is the antagonist a character, a social force, an environment? Are the main characters round or flat? Static or dynamic? Are there any stock characters? (the braggart soldier [ miles gloriosus ], the witty servant, the miser, the lecherous old man, the wrathful old man [ senex iratus ], the wise old man, the fool or buffoon, the clown, the vice or devil, the parasite, the femme fatale , the shrew, the nurse, the fop, the trickster, the rake) To what do secondary characters contribute? Do they give background information, serve as a 'foil' to the main character, do they oppose, criticize, underscore the main characters? Do they help develop the main characters? What is the role of women? Are they submissive, rebellious, do they readily accept their “function” in society? What choices/outlets are they given? How are characters from other social and ethnic backgrounds represented? How is homosexuality portrayed? Does the play follow the classical unities (time/space/action)?
CONTENT, THEMES:
How would you express in one sentence what the play is ultimately about (its theme or themes)?
Study guide originally prepared by Anna Brígido and Jesús Tronch 2009
exhortation, accusation, appeasement, wooing, petition, invocation, counsel, panegyric, greeting, challenge, triumph)? How do characters address each other? Do forms of address reveal something about social class or power relationships between the speakers? Are the interlocutors being relevant, ambiguous, too or less informative than expected? What do these politeness strategies reveal about power relationships?
VERSE,PROSE:
If the play uses verse, what versification patterns is it using? What do these versification forms mean, are they appropriate for the character/theme/situation? What values do they convey? What are the prose segments of the play used for (characters of lower social rank; intimate, informal, humorous or less tense episode)? What are the verse segments of the play used for (moments of great tension or emotional impact; solemn or ceremonial situations? What do the shifts from verse to prose or vice versa indicate?
RHETORICAL DEVICES, IMAGES, FIGURES OF SPEECH:
What rhetorical devices does the text use? For what purpose? Is there any rhetorical device that is recurrent? Why? What are the main images used in the play? Are there any patterns of images? Are the images original or cliché? What do they say about the character using them, about the situation? What is the function of the images: decorative purpose, intensify the expression or the inward experience, present general thoughts in a more condensed form, characterize, create atmosphere, mood? Are specific images associated with one element (character, place) in contrast to other elements? Do they have a place in the dramatic structure? Do they represent the play's leading motifs? Do they set up expectations in the audience and create dramatic tension? Do they help connect the scenes? Do they symbolically express correspondences and interrelations underlying the action of the meaning of the play?
STAGE CONVENTIONS, STAGE DIRECTIONS:
Bearing in mind the physical space in which the play was first performed, what specific stage conventions does the play use (in relation to scenery, movements on the stage, acting style, sound effects, lighting)? Is the mode of presentation realistic or illusionistic? What information do the stage directions bear? Are they used to describe setting, characterization? Does the text use the “aside” convention? “eavesdropping”? What costumes, make-up, hairstyle do the play call for? What‟s their meaning or function? What props are necessary for the play? What is their function? Do they have any symbolic meaning? What stage scenery or decor(s), lighting does the play call for? Why? What sound effects or music does the play call for? At what specific moments? Why? Does the playtext indicate movement of characters on the stage (upstage, downstage, left, right)? Does the playtext indicate grouping of characters on the stage? spatial distinction between characters?
2. Literary and Theatrical Context:
Study guide originally prepared by Anna Brígido and Jesús Tronch 2009
TEXT USED, PUBLISHER:
Is the text you are using a reliable one? Is it a scholarly edition (critical edition, facsimile, diplomatic transcript) carefully prepared by an editor? If the text is a critical edition (that which establishes a new text by altering what is judged erroneous in previous texts), does it have textual notes or a textual apparatus that allow you to "reconstruct" the source text(s) on which the edition is based? Is language (spelling, punctuation…) modernized? Do footnotes and/or additional critical texts in the appendix seem to you ideologically balanced or is any particular interpretation of the text highlighted?
BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION:
Is there anything in the author‟s life (experience, emotional or spiritual state, ideas, beliefs, values, tastes) that is relevant to the play? How was the author socially related to her or his audience? Was s/he in some way dependent or independent? Did s/he make a living from this, or was it a private activity? Did s/he require or hire others to produce and distribute it?"
SOURCES AND INFLUENCES:
What changes from its sources do you find in the play? Why were they made? How do these changes contribute to the shape and meaning of the play? Are there any direct literary/artistic/historical influences? Is the play based on current events, is it responding to a particular historical juncture, to other contemporary plays or art forms?
CONDITIONS OF PERFORMANCE:
What institution(s) (private, public) owned or controlled the production of the play? Did their interests and ideology affect the play in any way? Was the choice of genre motivated by ideological, institutional, commercial, literary, personal purposes? Was the play also distributed in other 'literary' or 'artistic' modes (manuscript, print, film; through libraries, bookshops)? What institutions owned or controlled them?
3. Historical context - Socio-political issues
Does the play reflect or reveal its contemporary social organization? Is the play representing a society before or after that of author's? Is he criticizing or supporting the socio-political realities of his time? What contemporary social, political, ideological issues are present in the play? Does it naturalize and justify social hierarchies based on class, race, sexuality, gender, region, etc. or does it level/subvert them in some explicit/allegorical manner? Are there any “uneven developments” in this respect (being socially progressive in one aspect like gender, but appearing conservative in relation to class issues, for example)? Consider the general modes of economic production and social organization contemporary to the play (mainly 'slave', 'feudal', 'bourgeois', 'capitalist'). Are aspects of the social organization presented as dominant? Are others not represented at all, misrepresented, or under-represented? How are they related to the theme(s) of the play? Consider social, political, ideological issues that were 'hot' at that time: are they represented in the play? how? Was the play disrupting or confirming social norms at that time? Are there competing value systems or ideologies (some appearing as dominant, others as residual or emergent? Can we perceive any explicit or implicit commitment of the author to any ideology?
