What is Drama?

If we are to study dramatic structure, a workable definition of drama is imperative. Throughout history many different definitions have been proposed. For most theorists the nature of drama is identical with its function. The broadest distinction among theorists continues to extend the gamut between pleasure and social importance. pleasure serves)

Perhaps it is best to look at the some of the definitions provided by leading theorists in the course of history. In Aristotle's Poetics we read for example:

The name ''drama'' is given to such poems as those by Sophocles and Aristophanes as representing action. If the more refined art is the higher, and the more refined in every case is that which appeals to the better sort of audiences, the art which imitates anything and everything is manifestly most unrefined^4.1

Social value is the primary value of drama, if we are to believe Aristotle. There are others who think along similar lines.

In 1570 Castelvetro writes:

The function of a good poet is, through observation and insight, to imitate the truth of the accidents of humanity's lot, leaving the discovery of the natural and accidental things to the philosopher and the scientist^4.2

In 1657 d'Aubignac proposed that:

We are not... to imagine that... publick Spectacles(theatrical performances) afford nothing but vain Splendour without any real utility^4.3

And in the same period Corneille wrote:

It is impossible to please according to the rules without at the same time supplying utility.^4.4

Dryden perceived that drama, aside from its social function, has a duty to please:

Lisideius conceived what a play ought be: A just and lively image of human nature representing its passions and humours, and the changes of fortune to which it is subject; for the delight and instruction of mankind^4.5

Ten years later he further stated that:

To instruct delightfully is the general end of all poetry^4.6

In 1712 Addison complained:

Were our plays subject to proper inspections and imitations we might not only pass several of our vacant hours in the highest entertainment, but should always rise from them wiser and better than we sat down to them^4.7

Schlegel, on the other hand, had a different opinion:

Poetry taken in its widest acceptation, as the power of of creating what is beautiful, and representing it to the eye or ear, is a universal gift of Heaven, being shared to a certain extent even by those whom we call barbarians and savages. Internal excellence alone is decisive, and where this exists, we must not allow ourselves to be repelled by the external appearance. Everything must be traced up to the root of human nature: if it has sprung from thence, it has an undoubted value of its own; but if, without possessing a living germ, it is more externally attached thereto, it will never thrive nor acquire a proper growth^4.8.

Coleridge is one of the first theorists to introduce the concept of pleasure:

The common sense of all art consists in the excitement of emotions for the immediate purpose of pleasure through the medium of beauty; therein contradistinguishing poetry from science, the immediate purpose of which is truth and possible utility^4.9.

While G.B. Shaw sees pleasure as the main goal of all arts:

The worthy artist or craftsman is he who serves the physical or moral senses and ennobled faculties into pleasurable activity^4.10

From these citations we may conclude that the function of drama is relatively well defined. We have yet to find an answer to the question of what drama actually is. Maybe we can define drama by its forms. Goethe for instance gives the following more concrete definition:

drama, conversation bound up with action, even if enacted only before the imagination^4.11

I think that that is quite a workable definition of drama. In this definition even reading a play can be called drama. In my view this is somewhat counterintuitive. What this definition doesn't include is dance and pantomime.

I think however that I best agree with Aristotle who expresses the following definition of drama:

The name of ''drama'' is given to such poems as those by Sophocles and Aristophanes, as representing action^4.12

The imitation of action is the most important aspect of drama. It is this definition which is the most comprehensive. If it were applied to our modern time it would include almost every form of theater. But not only theater, it would also include movies, televised plays and even radio-plays. I am fully aware of the fact that this definition is not conclusive.