Dramatic Plot & Its Division

Dramatic Plot & its Division
Dr Farida Panhwar
Institute of English Language & Literature
University of Sindh, Jamshoro, Pakistan
Dramatic plot
• Every dramatic story arises out of some conflict

some clash of opposed individuals, or passions, or
interests between good and evil.
• Or as embodied respectively in the hero and the
villain.
• Or against fate or circumstance, as in Oedipus the
King.
• Or against the code or conventions of society, as in
An Enemy of the People.
• Or the collision of the hero with inward struggle of
the man with himself, like Hamlet and Macbeth -
The movement of the plot
• With the opening of this conflict the real plot

begins; leading actions towards the end.
• Between the beginning and end the story will
be composed of fluctuations of the inner or
outer struggle.
• Thus the movement of the plot will
necessarily follow a fairly well-defined and
uniform course .
The dramatic line.
• The complications arise from the initial clash

of opposed forces will continue to increase
until a point is reached at which a decisive
turn is taken in favour of one side or the
other.
• After which, the progress towards the final
triumph of good over evil or of evil over good.
• This is sometimes called the dramatic line.
Division of Dramatic Plot
• It is probable that this natural five-fold

structure of a dramatic story may account for
the common, indeed at one time universal,
division of a play into five acts
• 1. Drama begins with some initial incident in
which the conflict originates.
• 2. Rising Action, Complication or Growth in
which conflict increase in intensity while the
outcome remains uncertain.
Division of Dramatic Plot
• 3. Climax, Crisis or Turning Point, at which

one of the contending forces obtains control
henceforth, its ultimate success is assured
• 4. The Falling Action, Resolution, or
Denouement, comprising the stages in the
movement of events towards this success
are marked out.
• 5. The Conclusion or Catastrophe, in which
the conflict is brought to a close.
Introduction: incident/s
• The word ' incident ' is the starting-point is the
motive-principle of the plot.
• It may cover mental (Hamlet) processes as well as
external events.
• In many cases we may distinguish two springs of action :
as in Romeo and Juliet, where the conflict arises both
from Romeo's determination to attend the Capulets ball
and from the resolve of Juliet's parents to marry her to
the County Paris.
• Of course in a play composed of two or more stories,
each story will have its initial incident ; and these initial
incidents may or may not occur close together.
1. Exposition
• The purpose of the introduction or exposition is to

put
• the spectator in possession of all such information
as is necessary for the proper understanding of the
play, character whose fortunes he hopes soon to
be interested, but of whom and of whose
circumstances he for the moment knows nothing ;
and as t it is essential that he should learn as
quickly as possible who and what they are.
• The opening scene or scenes largely occupied with
explanatory matter.
Complication or crisis
• Complication or crisis tests the dramatist's

workmanship by the elementary canons of
clearness and logical consistency.
• Given the characters and their circumstances, then
every event should appear to grow naturally out of
what preceded it.
• The movement of the action as a whole should
never be obscured by unimportant details.
• The play of motives should be distinctly shown, and
proper relations between character and action
should be carefully maintained.
• One special feature of the complication is that during the
rising action the elements in the conflict come into
prominence, for good or evil, as the chief agents in
bringing about the catastrophe.
• If the conflict is mainly between persons, then the first
part of the play should familiarise us with the characters
who are dominated the second part ; if it lies mainly in
the mind of the hero, then by the careful presentation of
those qualities which are presently to gain control, the
conduct should be foreshadowed which will lead him to
happiness or disaster.
• The great law of the crisis is that it shall be the

natural and logical outcome of 'all that has gone
before.
• which means
• that we shall be able to explain it completely by
reference to the characters and to the condition of
things existing at the time.
• An event which is to determine the whole course of
the action to its catastrophe should thus arise out of
the action itself ; it should not be a mere accident
thrown into the plot from the outside.
Denouement
• The crisis past, we enter to its conclusion

whether the play is to have a happy or an
unhappy ending.
• In comedy it will take the form of the gradual
withdrawal of the obstacles, the clearing
difficulties and misunderstandings, by which
the wishes of the hero and heroine have
been thwarted and their good fortune
jeopardised.
Denouement
• In tragedy, on the contrary, its essence will

consist in the removal of those resisting
elements which have held the power of evil in
check, and in the consequent setting free of
that power to work out its own will.
• In any case, what remains after the crisis is
the development of the new movement and to
the extent to which we now foresee the
outcome of events.
Denouement
• Our interest will be different in kind from that
which had been excited during the earlier stages
of the action. Hitherto, we have watched the plot
with growing uncertainty and suspense ; now,
uncertainty and suspense being largely set at
rest, our interest will be due in part to that
sympathy with the characters which makes us
desirous of following their story to its very close,
in part to the dramatist's skill in the treatment of
the incidents by which the anticipated results are
to be accomplished.
Conclusion
• Now is the ultimate stage of the plot, in which the dramatic

conflict is brought to rest with a sense of finality or
conclusion.
• It is usual to distinguish between the two chief kinds of drama
comedy and tragedy by reference to the nature of the
catastrophe: the one having a happy, the other an unhappy,
ending.
• There are many plays, in which, as in the tragi-comedy
where the interest of the plot is largely tragic, though at the
last the Fates smile on most of the good characters.
• Moreover, whether the catastrophe be in the main unhappy
• or happy, it may be qualified in various ways.
Conclusion
• In tragedy the darkness may be somewhat

broken by a suggestion that virtue has not
suffered nor good been overcome in vain ;
while in a comedy-close our sympathetic
interest has been specially aroused.

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Dramatic Plot & its Division

• Every dramatic story arises out of some conflict

• With the opening of this conflict the real plot

• The complications arise from the initial clash

• It is probable that this natural five-fold

• 3. Climax, Crisis or Turning Point, at which

• The purpose of the introduction or exposition is to

• Complication or crisis tests the dramatist's

• The great law of the crisis is that it shall be the

• The crisis past, we enter to its conclusion

• In tragedy, on the contrary, its essence will

• Now is the ultimate stage of the plot, in which the dramatic

• In tragedy the darkness may be somewhat

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