Drama , Legends - Art of Reading [ 4 ]

4- ] Art of Reading 

Drama .

Drama is all around you . Television shows – from soap operas to cartoons to crime stories are drama . Movies at the theater art at home are drama . Skits and plays performed at school are drama . Even advertisements on television or radio can be drama .

A drama also called a play , is a story meant to be performed or acted for an audience . Drama may be brief or long .

Kinds of Drama :

1-] Television comedy -] Soap opera 3-] Television serious show  4-] made-for-TV movie 5-] recording of a movie played on a TV 6-] radio broadcast of a play of show 7-] movie at the theater 8-] skit performed in school 9-] play on stage .

The Elements of Drama :

Like novels and short stories , dramas have a plot , a setting and characters .

The printed version of a drama is called a script . The script usually begins with the cast of characters .

The audience follows the story line and learns about the characters through dialogue or lines spoken by the characters .

The cast of characters is a list of all characters in the play . It sometimes tells who they are .

The protagonist is the main character of the play . The actions of the protagonist set the play in motion .

The antagonist is any character or force that stands in the way of the protagonist . The antagonist can be someone or something . The conflict between these two opposite forces is what makes a drama or any good story exciting and suspenseful .

Blank Verse :  Shakespeare wrote much of his plays in blank verse which is a form of unrhymed poetry that has [ five ] beats per line . In each line of blank verse , you will hear five pairs or syllables . The stress or emphasis falls on the second syllable of every pair .

Irony :  It is a contrast between appearance and reality . In verbal irony a person says one thing and means another .

Allusions :  An allusion is a reference to a person , a place or a thing from history or from a work of literature , music or art . In “I’ve seen the Promised Land” Martin Luther King makes many historical and biblical allusions . Even the title of his speech contains an allusion to the Bible .

Soliloquy :  It is a long speech given by a character – typically when he/she is alone on stage . It is as if the character were talking to himself or herself.

A soliloquy can teach you a lot about a character because he/ she usually reveals private thoughts and emotions .

An Aside :  It is a comment that a character makes either to another character on stage or to the audience .

Suspense :  It is what makes you feel uneasy or uncertain about what is going to happen next . Writers can build suspense through character’s actions or words .

Legends .

A legend is a traditional story passed down by word of mouth that is believed to be based on historical events and an actual hero . Over the years , most legends become exaggerated .

Some elements of legends :

The setting is a particular place .

Heroism is what makes a legend survive from generation to generation . Sometimes the hero has superhuman strength , character or courage .

The plot is often a loosely connected series of events or heroic deeds .

Characters do the action in the story . Often in legends , the characters are flat , or not well developed .

In tall tales characters have super-human abilities and can do impossible deeds . They are wildly imaginative stories . Often they were passed down  by word of mouth for many years before being written down .

The heroes of tall tales have extra or ordinary traits , for example , they might have superhuman strength or the ability to fly . They might have giant hand or ears or feet allowing them to do amazing deeds .