Structure

• Acts are larger and consists of scenes

• Story (chronological sequence of events) vs. plot (causal connection)

• play can contain sveral plot-lines → Key questions:

  • What is relationship between plot-lines?

  • Are there turning points that shift matters within plot line?

Open and closes form of drama

- Aristotelian closed form:

• three unities (action (1 plot), place (singular place), time (linear time)) → to be believable for mimesis

• tightly-knit plot with resolution at end

• underlying assumption: there is order in the wordl that can be restored if lost

• More traditional forms of drama

- Open form:

• rejection of three unities

• loosely connected scenes, no resolution or closure

• underlying assumption: no meaning or order in in life

• more mordern forms of drama (20th century onwards)

→ Plays hardly ever display all features of one form

Freytag's pyramid: Five-act-structure in closed forms of drama