POETIC DRAMA
Definition, Features, Examples
Poetic drama
also known as ‘Verse Play’ is a genre of literature that refers to plays that
contain poetic elements. It is a newly formed genre which became popular in the
beginning of the 20th century English literature.
DEVELOPMENT
OF POETIC DRAMA:
Poetic plays
were popular during the 16th century. Shakespeare, Marlowe and
others wrote such poetic plays profusely. But during the 17th, 18th
and 19th centuries these poetic plays lost their charm. But poetic
drama in the 20th century arose as a reaction to the naturalistic prose drama
of Ibsen, Shaw and Galsworthy. By the second decade of the century, this prose
drama had reached a dead end. New dramatists-cum-poets like T. S. Eliot, W. B.
Yeats and others heralded a new era of poetic plays.
·
16th
century – Shakespeare’s ‘Midsummer Night’s Dream’
·
17th
century – John Milton’s ‘Samson Agonists’
·
19th
century - William Wordsworth’s ‘Boarderers’, Shelley’s ‘Prometheus Unbound’
Though poetic
drama has been written time to time through the various ages of English
Literature but it is only during the 20th century that poetic drama established
itself as an important dramatic form.
FEATURES
OF POETIC DRAMA:
1.
Poetic
drama includes elements of drama and poetry both.
2.
Characters
speak in verse on stage and often use lofty syntax.
3.
Its
verse form is blank verse or free verse.
4.
It
expresses the inner most reality of life.
5.
The
writers mostly followed ancient Greek and Elizabethan drama.
MAJOR
WRITERS OF POETIC PLAYS:
W.B. Yeats,
J.M. Synge, John Masefield, Cristopher Isherwood, W.H. Auden, Stephen Spender,
Cristopher Fry, T. S. Eliot
EXAMPLES
OF POETIC DRAMA:
·
W.B.
Yeats’ ‘The Countess Cathleen’, ‘The Land of Heart’s Desire’
·
Christopher
Fry’s ‘The Lady is Not for Burning’, ‘Venus Observed’
·
T. S.
Eliot’s ‘Murder in the Cathedral’, ‘The Family Reunion’
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