Medieval Drama
Dark ages begin about 400 ACE
Germanic tribes overrun Rome
Literacy plummets
Trade dwindles to almost nothing
Cities can no longer sustain development – they deteriorate
Roman Catholic church is only institution that survives
Liturgical Dramas begin around 1000 ACE
Extensions of church services
Latin
Entirely biblical
Performed within the church by members of the clergy
In 1210 the Pope forbids members of the clergy from performing in plays
Vernacular Drama
Performed in everyday speech – common language
Moved out of the church, into the town squares
Performed by non-clerics
Mystery Plays were performed as parts of cycles (Cycle plays) - Noah’s Ark
Performed by guilds
Performed on Pageant Wagons (Wagon Stages)
Often paraded through town
Sometimes performed on a platform stage with heaven on one side & a hellmouth on the
other
Still limited to scenes from the Bible
Morality Plays were non biblical stories that still carried a moral - Everyman
Allegorical
Performed alone, not as part of a cycle
Not Biblical Stories
Renaissance Drama
Renaissance means “rebirth,” and this is the period during which Europeans looked back to
antiquity and sought to regain some of the glory of Ancient Rome and Greece.
The Renaissance begins in Italy and sweeps north from there. Why? Italy was and is the
crossroads of the Mediterranean. They had it all – The Pope, the trade routes, the wealth, the
cities, the numeracy, the literacy. They also had Commedia dell’arte.
To understand the Renaissance, you must first understand Humanism.
Humanism – in distinction from deism, though not atheistic, humanism upheld the inherent
worth of individuals and their life in this world. Humanists believed in the near infinite capacity
of human beings to improve themselves through reason and personal fulfillment. The humanist
is a self-made man, responsible for and rightly proud of his accomplishments, refinement, and
knowledge. Humanists also stressed the importance of this world, not just the next world, and
they urged a love and tolerance of neighbors.
Renaissance thinkers also liked rules. In order to recapture the glory of the past, you needed to
follow the rules of Neoclassicism or the Neoclassical ideal.
Art should achieve, first and foremost, verisimilitude. That is, it should have “the appearance of
truth” – it should be true to life. This does NOT mean that art should merely reflect the
superficial reality around us, but rather that art should depict life as it really is. The aim is an
articulation of truth. To achieve this, three conditions that must be met:
Reality – no fantasy, soliloquy, or anything that can’t be realistically presented. (The bible and
certain myths are exceptions.)
Morality – art should teach a moral lesson. God created a just world, so art should present it
that way. In the end evil should be punished, good rewarded.
Universality – truth is universal, so particularity is not as important as universality.
Neoclassical plays conformed to three unities.
Time – stage time and story time should be equivalent. Later this is loosened to mean that no
more than 24 hours ought to be depicted.
Place – one location. Later loosened to mean that locations not more distant than could
reasonably be reached during the course of the play ought to be depicted.
Action – one plot.
Plays must have five acts (because Horace said so).
The purpose of drama is to teach and please, in that order. There are only two forms of drama,
Tragedy and Comedy.
Tragedy teaches by showing the horrifying consequences of mistakes and immorality.
 Serious stories
 History or mythology
 Poetic style
 Unhappy endings
 Kings and nobles (rulers)
Comedy teaches by ridiculing behavior that should be avoided.
 Humorous stories
 Domestic subjects
 Lower style
 Happy endings
 Middle and lower classes
Decorum – all people should act according to their station in life. They should be presented
appropriately for their age, sex, race, class, and profession.
Poetic justice – wickedness is punished, goodness rewarded
Perspective – in the first half of the 15th Century, Italian artists invented/discovered perspective
drawing. Sebastiano Serlio brought it to the Italian Stage in the fist half of the 16th century,
combining it with Vitruvius’ descriptions of Tragic, Comic, and Pastoral scenes. It spread north
from there.
Torelli’s Pole and Chariot system of scene shifting allowed for quicker changes of scene and
more interesting stagings.
For the Midterm, on your own you need to study
Elizabethan England – late 16th and early 17th centuries – Shakespeare and Marlow
Public Theatres
Private Theatres
Women
The Spanish Golden Age
Corrales
French Neoclassicism