The Swamp Dwellers Elements of Drama.
The Swamp Dwellers Elements of Drama.
The Swamp Dwellers Elements of Drama.
Semester 4
Elements of Drama
Lahoucine Aammari
FLDM, Fez
OUTLINE: ELEMENTS OF DRAMA
CHARACTER
PLOT AND STRUCTURE
STAGES, SETS, AND SETTING
TONE, LANGUAGE, AND SYMBOL
THEME
DRAMA AND THEATER
CHARACTER
The basic point about all plays, both in formal and thematic terms,
is that the characters are always caught up in some sort of crisis,
dilemma, or confusion; they are always faced by some sort of problem.
Stage directions provide clues about characterization.
[Stage Direction: Notes incorporated in or added to the script of a
play to indicate the moment of a character’s appearance, character
or manner; the style of delivery; the actors’ movement; details of
location, scenery and effects].
Makuri [despairingly]: No one. No one that could swear ... Ah, what a woman you
are for deceiving yourself (The Swamp Dwellers)
a)The setting:
The scene is a hut on stilts, built on one of the scattered semi-firm islands in the
swamps. Two doors on the left lead into other rooms, and the one on the right leads
outside. The walls are marsh stakes plaited with hemp ropes.
b) How the character feels:
Alu [stubbornly.]: I know he’s dead.
c) How the character moves
MAKURI [sits down and takes up his work.]: Well, I will not
perform the death rites for a son I know to be living.
d) How the character speaks
[Alu begins to smile in spite of herself.]
MAKURI | futile effort to control himself.|: Ay—ya-ya! The river
bed .. . [Bursts out laughing again.]
- e) How the actors/actresses move on stage
Who is the protagonist? Why and how so? Which other characters, if any,
are main or major characters? Which are minor characters?
What are the protagonist’s most distinctive traits, and what is most
distinctive about his or her outlook and values? What motivates the
character? What is it about the character that creates internal and/or
external conflict? Which lines or stage directions reveal most about the
character?
What are the roles of other characters? Which, if any, functions as an
antagonist? Which, if any, serves as a foil? Does any character function as
a narrator or chorus, providing background information and commentary?
Why and how so?
Is characterization diverse? How might this affect an audience’s
experience of the play? In what ways might an actor choose to go against
the expected types, and how would this complicate the play’s overall effect
and meaning?
Which of the characters, or which aspects of the characters, does the play
encourage us to sympathize with or to admire? to view negatively? Why
and how so? Are there characters who might be more or less sympathetic,
depending on how the role is cast and interpreted?
PLOT AND STRUCTURE
Read the first scene or the first few pages and then stop. What potential for
conflict do you see here? What do you expect to happen in the rest of the
play?
How is the play divided into acts, scenes? What is the effect of this
structure? Does the division of the play correspond at all to the five stages
of plot development—exposition, rising action, climax, resolution,
conclusion?
What is the inciting incident or destabilizing event? How and why does
this event destabilize the initial situation? How would you describe the
conflict that develops? To what extent is it external, internal, or both?
What is the climax, or turning point? Why and how so? How is the conflict
resolved? How and why might this resolution fulfill or defy your
expectations?
STAGES, SETS, AND SETTING
Does all the action occur in one time and place, or in more than one? If the
latter, what are those times and places? How much time tends to pass
between scenes?
How important do the time, place, and social milieu seem to be, and in
what ways are they important? What about the plot and characters that
would remain the same if a director chose to set the play in a different time
and place? What wouldn’t?
What patterns do you notice regarding where and when things happen?
Which characters are associated with each setting? How do different
characters relate to the same setting? When, how, and why do scenes
change from one setting to another? Are there significant deviations?
Do the stage directions describe particular settings and props in detail? If
so, what seems significant about the details? How might they establish
mood, reveal character, and affect individual characters and their
interactions with one another?
Does the date of the play tell you anything about the way it was originally
intended to be staged? Does the representation of time and place in the
play implicitly call for a certain type of stage?
TONE, LANGUAGE, AND SYMBOL
Pay attention to the title. A title will seldom indicate a play’s theme
directly, but some titles do suggest a central topic or a key question. Probe
the rest of the play to see what insights, if any, about that topic or answers
to that question it ultimately seems to offer.
Identify any statements that the characters make about a general concept,
issue, or topic such as human nature, the natural world, and so on,
particularly in monologues or in debates between major characters. Look,
too, for statements that potentially have a general meaning beyond the
play, even if they refer to a specific situation.
If a character changes over the course of the play, try to articulate the truth
or insight that character seems to discover. Then consider whether and
how the play as a whole corroborates or complicates that insight.
Identify a conflict depicted in the play and state it in general terms or turn
it into a general question, leaving out any reference to specific characters,
setting, and so on. Then think about the insight or theme that might be
implied by the way the conflict is resolved.
The Swamp Dwellers, Wole Soyinka
Language- English
Protagonist- Igwezu
Antagonist- Kadiye
In The Swamp Dwellers, the main conflict is between the old
and the new way of life in the Nigerian society and Africa in
general. In Southern Nigeria, the individual was tightly bound
to his society, and with the introduction of more modern ideas,
this relationship was not quite as cohesive as it used to be. In
addition, the power of nature was also a difficult factor to deal
with when trying to survive and build a life and preserve the
culture. There are three main categories of characters: parents,
corrupt priests and their followers, and individuals who are
always moving and changing.
while the ethical dilemma at the
heart of The Swamp Dwellers
Alu, (1958) is grounded in the
history of the Nigerian nation
Makuri,
and in Yoruban notions of
Igwezu, twinship, the play reveals
A Beggar, something universal about how
migration and acculturation
The Kadiye,
erode traditional values and
Awuchike, reshape identity in ways that
Desela, privilege self-interest over
family and community, promote
The Servant of Kadiye, corruption, and accelerate the
The Drummer replacement of indigenous
ethical systems with the
depersonalized transactional
values of commerce and trade.
“Only the children and the old stay
here, bondsman. Only the innocent
and the dotards.” Igwezu
― Wole Soyinka, The Swamp
Dwellers: A Play in One Act