Understanding Poetry and Drama

What is Poetry?

1      

        Definition:

• an imaginative awareness of experience expressed through meaning, sound, and rhythmic language choices to evoke an emotional response.
• Wordsworth : as "the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings;"
• Emily Dickinson : "If I read a book and it makes my body so cold no fire ever can warm me, I know that is poetry;"
• Dylan Thomas : "Poetry is what makes me laugh or cry or yawn, what makes my toenails twinkle, what makes me want to do this or that or nothing."

For more definitions, check this link.http://poetinthecity.wordpress.com/2011/03/16/what-is-poetry-50-definitions-and-counting/. It was really interesting!

2    Elements of Poetry :

·         Setting

·         Imagery

·         Theme

·         Voice

·         Tone

·         Structure and Poetry

Stanzas

Form

·         Sound Patterns

Rhyme

Rhythm & Meter

Word Sounds

·         Meaning and Poetry

Concreteness & Particularity

Denotation & Connotation

Figurative/ Connotative Devices

For more information about the elements of poetry,  drop by to this link! http://learn.lexiconic.net/elementsofpoetry.htm

3    Type of Poetry

            Epic- a lengthy narrative poem in grand language celebrating the adventures and accomplishments                 of a legendary or conventional hero.

Couplet- two lines of verses which rhyme and form a unit alone or as part of a poem.

Sonnet - a short rhyming poem with 14 lines. The original sonnet form was invented in the 13/14th century by Dante and an Italian philosopher named Francisco Petrarch. The form remained largely unknown until it was found and developed by writers such as Shakespeare.

Actually, there are many types of poetry. Let’s check this website for more information. http://www.poetryfoundation.org/learning/glossary-terms?category=forms-and-types.

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What is Drama?

1      Definition:

-        a literary composition involving conflict, action crisis and atmosphere designed to be acted by players on a stage before an audience. This definition may be applied to motion picture drama as well as to the traditional stage.

2   Elements of  Drama :

 Aside - Lines whispered to the audience or to another character on stage.

Catastrophe - the final event in a drama (a death in a tragedy or a marriage in a comedy).

Comedy - A light play with a happy ending.

Comic Relief - A bit of humor injected into a serious play to relieve the heavy tension of tragic events.

Crisis - The turning point in the plot.

Dramatic Irony - occurs when the audience knows something that the character on stage is not aware.

      3. Types of Drama :

Tragedy -- In general, tragedy involves the ruin of the leading characters. To the Greeks, it meant the destruction of some noble person through fate, To the Elizabethans, it meant in the first place death and in the second place the destruction of some noble person through a flaw in his character. Today it may not involve death so much as a dismal life, Modern tragedy often shows the tragedy not of the strong and noble but of the weak and mean.

Comedy -- is lighter drama in which the leading characters overcome the difficulties which temporarily beset them.

Problem Play -- Drama of social criticism discusses social, economic, or political problems by means of a play.

Farce -- When comedy involves ridiculous or hilarious complications without regard for human values, it becomes farce.

Comedy of Manners -- Comedy which wittily portrays fashionable life.

Fantasy -- A play sometimes, but not always, in comic spirit in which the author gives free reign to his fantasy, allowing things to happen without regard to reality

Melodrama -- Like farce, melodrama pays almost no attention to human values, but its object is to give a thrill instead of a laugh. Often good entertainment, never any literary value.

To gain more information, click this link, http://homepage.smc.edu/jones_janie/TA%202/2FormsofDrama.htm